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We are fortunate to have recently obtained some hard-to-get, new bloodlines from Turkey. These crop-earred beautiful, young Turkish Import Anatolians are from authentic working dog parents in Turkey and are not related to, nor were they bred at the large new professional Turkish kennel operations that have come about in recent decades. Their ears were cropped in Turkey in anticipation of the fact that exportation might not have been possible, as in that case, their traditional Turkish owners would have cropped them later and as young adults, they would be outfitted for wolf territory--wearing spiked collars like their adult relatives.
These young imports are not related to any other bloodlines in the United
States.
At least one will be available to a
serious Code of Ethics
breeder with a good understanding of genetics and of the importance of traditional
landrace origins of these dogs. We will be working together to ensure that as these
individual pups become old enough, that their genetics will used responsibly to sustain
working ability and to support healthy genetic diversity in the Anatolian Shepherd Dog.
Anatolians are traditionally used to protect livestock in the Old World. They are the proven solution of millenia of selection, and now are seen as a sustainable method of assisting in wildlife conservation. They work by detering predation, so that wildlife that stays away can continue to live their lives and not be made into targets of human directed local eradication programs.
Over the years, it has become more difficult to get traditional coban kopegi (chobawn kopay - shepherds' dogs) from Turkey. Usually, when importations have been made, the dogs selected have typically been black masked fawns, not brindle. This is one of my favorite colors in the breed, but previously, all brindle dogs in the breed trace back to the same brindle imports of which there have been fewer than a handful in over fifty years of the breed's history in the USA.
If you are seriously interested in these Turkish import bloodlines, your
inquiry is invited. See my email form. Be sure that
your email address is correctly typed if you would like an answer. I am deaf and do not
play phone tag, so email is the best way to contact me.
.
Anatolian Shepherd Dog Blog
Anatolian
Shepherd Dogs
Semavi Anatolians - Breeders, Puppies available occasionally
We occasionally have a rescue available |
Masallah Sabah Sarki - Our beloved foundation bitch.
A Trio of Anatolians - A size comparison. (standing
next to people)
Livestock Guardian Dog Signs Available
Contents |
Contact me | |||||
Semavi Stuff
Litter information - No litters are currently planned
My Other Pages on this site cobankopegi.com
The Turkish Dog Mystique
Other links of interest - go here
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Why
choose an Anatolian?
My husband and I are quite fond of large dogs and wanted a breed that would be easy to care for and train. We also wanted to choose a breed that did not have a strong prey-drive. Prey-drives include the instinctive drives that enable most herding and gun dog breeds (most of the breeds in the United States) to excel in the tasks for which they were originally developed. Prey drives are actually stalking and predatory instincts that can usually be shaped for chasing, retrieving and doing other such things on command. Unfortunately, predatory behavior around livestock is generally undesireable. Even a herding dog must allow its predatory chase instincts to be controlled. It makes little sense to keep a predatory animal when there are choices among breeds that can be safely kept with livestock without chasing and killing these other animals.
After some exploration of the various breeds available, we discovered that what we wanted were dogs from a guardian breed that would be naturally gentle with livestock and thus require less corrective work to get them acclimated to our living situation. We had several horses initially, but due to time and health constraints now keep only one horse. We continue to keep some free-range poultry.
The somewhat obscure genre of the Livestock Guardian Dog (LGD) breeds provided the type of dog that we ultimately decided to choose our breed from. LGDs are among the most ancient of working dogs. When humans evolved from hunter/gatherers, and began to keep and domesticate livestock, there evolved specialized large and giant sized dogs. These dogs had low prey-drive, and would live among the livestock in a peaceful manner providing the first line of defense against predators such as bears, lions, wolves and others.
What is Anatolian character like?
I describe my dogs as calm, mellow and easy-going. They are not easily over-stimulated (read: HYPER!) and tend to think about things before reacting. Because of their size, and their aloof nature, they make excellent visual deterrents when doing their work as guardian dogs.
I think they are easy to train, but one must have patience and a clear focus on the intended goal, as well as a sense of humor. If you want a "Yes-Dog" or if a dog that plays mind games with you is not your cup of tea, this is definitely NOT the breed for you!
First of all this is not a barrel chested breed, and they are a bit longer on leg than
some breeds of comparible weight.
Males range from around 100 to 160 pounds; 29 to 35 inches at the top of their withers.
Average males are probably about 32 inches and 135 pounds. Females are generally a bit
smaller, 27.5 to 31 inches and 88 to 120 pounds.
They are good-sized dogs, so even a small Anatolian is a BIG dog.
Anatolians come in all sorts of colors and usually have short/medium length coats. Some have longer coats, but such should not hang from the dog, but lay relatively close to the body. They are a double coated breed and shed seasonally. Some conditions (such as living indoors) predispose these dogs to shedding a little bit all year long.
The Anatolians which I have had have been of the shorter or medium length coat, and of a variety of colors:
Fawn with black masks and black ears. Some fawn shades being closer to chamois in color, while others can be greyish or reddish. My adult male is Aslan with a reddish fawn coat, his mother was a classic sandy fawn, and his father a red fawn. I have a younger male and a female which are both a classic sandy-yellow fawn.
Sabah, my first Anatolian (and who was VERY beautiful!), was pure white. Both of her parents were fawn with black masks. Others, such as Disi can be white or creme in color and having the required black pigmented nose and eye leather, and both of her parents were "white".
My home-bred female who continued my foundation line was Bertha.
Mostly white but spotted with light tan on her back. She has a white muzzle with black
freckles, and grey face fask and black ears. She has had two litters, and all the puppies
were born fawn. Zor is a female that I kept from Bertha's last litter. Zor continues my
line of females.
Another pinto that I have owned is Vakur who is a black and white
pinto, but his black spots are marked with a pale lemon shade of brindling. A sort of
reverse-brindle effect (which means he is actually a genetic blackmasked fawn!). He has
lots of black speckles and ticking on the white parts of his body, which don't show at all
on the picture of him at 4 months! His mother was a brindle and his sire a classic fawn.
The genetics in this breed have been documented and the material can be quite interesting reading. I resist getting into the colors here, but I have a link above which describes a study that is based on classical genetics and evaluates extended pedigrees for registered Anatolians. (see Genetics above)
Anatolians are generally a very healthy breed that can live well into its teens. The
most significant health problem is usually Canine Hip Dysplasia(CHD).
The incidence of CHD in the Anatolian is somewhat lower in the breed than rate of the same
in some others. Be sure to learn more about CHD and OFA ratings before acquiring an
Anatolian.
A good breeder will be interested in DEPTH of pedigree for many important essentials. Ask your Anatolian Shepherd Dog's breeder what they can tell you about the depth of their pedigrees, and this may give you insight on their bloodline and goals.
Semavi Anatolians has been an Anatolian Shepherd Dogs International Inc., Code of Ethics Breeder since 1991. (go here to see a copy of Code)
We aim to breed sound, healthy dogs with correct breed character and working type which fit the breed standard. We encourage and practice hip certification and other health checks to be done on breeding stock. OFA now encourages breeders and owners to list preliminary results on their dogs, and this is wonderful because one can start to make some judgement about a bloodline when such information is public.
We breed for a medium to larger dog with good longevity for the breed. We place our puppies to select homes with guarantees. We register our litters with UKC and AKC.
To see more About Us, go here
"A gaze fixed on me, it was like a physical
blow. Where . . . ? A big dog, right in the middle of the flock was slowly uncurling.
Dusty dog and dusty sheep. I had not noticed while all were asleep. His patchy, tawny and white body had blended perfectly in the dappled shade, slightly darker muzzle made him look menacing now, as did his stance. He rose slowly and gingerly, and started stepping over the backs of his unconcerned charges, tail coming up, back ramrod straight. A wave of admiration hit me. There was a functional beauty chiseled to perfection by countless generations of work . . . I had been instantly cured of all desire to approach sheep in that land. I had met the GUARDIAN!"
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Aslan and Bertha in
a Polaroid pose.
Slower loading but more pictures! And information about the breed, registries and breed controversies
. . . and finally
Check out the Anatolian
Shepherd Dog WebRing Homepage for more information if you want to see more Anatolians
or find out how to add your Anatolian Page to the ring!
![]() ![]() Janice Frasche HOW to join the Anatolian Shepherd Dog WebRing |
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