As a child I already owned many different kinds of animals: cats, rabbits, hamsters, a lost budgie that happened to fly to us and that I had caught myself, fishes - only a dog and a horse were missing.
I still don't have a horse, but the wish for a dog was soon fullfilled. One day my aunt and my uncle paid us an unexpected visit and suggested that we adopt their 4 year old long haired German shepherd male called Baru. My uncle had to go to Algier for business reasons. Baru would either live with us - or die. The idea was horrible, but on the other hand this was my chance of finally getting a dog.
I begged and pleaded - and in the end I was allowed to keep my Baru. At that time I was eight years old. Baru stayed my best friend until his death! Friends of the German shepherd, please forgive me, but a dog of Baru's type simply didn't exist any longer. Baru was pretty large (about 67 cm), he had an absolutely straight back, a coat of medium length, his ears were not so large and he didn't have such a long and tapered muzzle.
So I started looking for a new dog: with a naturally built body, non-cropped, long-haired and with the same self-confident and straight character that Baru had! After long reflections (I already owned some very good dog encyclopedias at that time) I decided to go for a Kuvasz. Schneider-Leyer, "Welcher Hund ist das" (What kind of dog is this?), gave the final hint. By then, I already had the address of the "Klub für Ungarische Hirtenhunde" (Kennel Club for Hungarian Guard Dogs) in Berlin available. Three month of searching and letter writing followed, until on the 12th of August 1973 I finally got my first Kuvasz, Elek vom Ronghof. In 1978, Stephan and I bought Ambra vom Meerkotten, in 1980 the kennel "Vom Quecksilber" was founded - a childhood dream had become reality.
Until today, 124 puppies were born, 116 were raised. Many of them lived to an old age, like Bárány (12 years - in 4 litters Bárány had 42 puppies, all of them could be raised). Beli and Erec reached a proud age of 13 years, Csinos, Csarda, Csikos, Etuska and Gyöngy were already 12 years old when they died, Dugo and Fenseg-Juszuf 11 ˝ years. Hunor is now 11 ˝ years old, on the 8th of July 1999, Geza was 12 years old, etc. Unfortunately I don't know for all of them to which age they lived - sometimes I don't hear about the dogs any longer. Well, yes, and many puppies of our G, H and J litter are still alive.
Mariette Hellinger, 17th of April 2001
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