Whilst we continue to love Cardigan Corgis we have taken a step back from the CWCA.  Whilst we remain members, we are no longer active in the Club due to finding our Ethics dont aline with those of the club.  We continue to be very pro active with Health and Genetic Testing - far more than most Breeders in the UK.  

When selecting a breeder please look for one who cares for the breed and not what goes in their pockets.  Quality breeders will be involved in the breed, will have spent time evaluating which dog to use and not the one just down the road.  Blue puppies should only have blue and tri puppies in the litter, not red or brindle.  They should have one blue parent and one tri parent.  With regard to testing currently only PRA is the necessary test in the UK.  There can be extra Visual tests done on Eyes and will be recorded under the KC/BVA systems.

The Test for DM (Degenerative Myelopathy) is not complete or accurate, unlike PRA which will give results of Affected, Carrier or Clear, DM Gives results such as "at risk".  The whole genetic mapping of the condition is unknown at this time.  I have known an owner to live stressing about her dogs diagnosis of "at risk" for him to live a healthy happy life till 16 years of age!   Cardigans are not a breed that are reported with it, if any condition is reported it is usually Intervertebral Disc Disease (IVDD) and currently there is no test to predict whether a dog might develop the condition.

Just because it is advertised on a club or the kennel club website does not mean they are the best breeders.  Please Please do your homework.  Ask for references, a good breeder will have others with their dogs, mentors and maybe the person they bought their first dogs from who can provide a reference for them.    

Ask breeders about why they chose the dog they did, what they know about that dog, his owners, which lineage is behind them.  Good breeders know this information without going to printed pedigrees.    Not every good stud dog is a show dog, same with bitches but dogs who generation after generation are unknown to the breed people should worry you.  Just because its a European champion, doesnt mean its good stock - in some countries just showing up gets you awards towards the title of champion!

If you find a litter and want to verify it, contact us, contact others in the breed club and ask questions.  Price should not be the first thing discussed.

Our dogs are our pets.  They have been our hobby, many would say a passion.  We are not looking to breed more litters at this time. 

All of our Cardigan Corgis (Cardis) have excellent temperaments and are of  appropriate size, construction, soundness colour and are in good health.  Our dogs are intelligent, stable in mind and body and have loads of character. 

Our first Cardigan Corgi came into our life in March 2008, we’d been looking for a small robust dog who would fit into a family with kids, German Shepherds and a cat.  The impetus into getting a smaller dog was a plea from our youngest son who wanted a dog he could walk. 

Cardigans are categorised as a vulnerable breed, due to the limited numbers being born in the UK each year.  Cardigans have never been bred in high numbers and the numbers born each year has remained consistent for a long time.  We do our utmost to promote the breed, highlighting the benefits of owning them, as sadly so many others dont. 

Cardigans are often confused with the Pembroke Corgis, and people comment on the fact that they have a tail and that the colour is wrong.  Cardigans have always had a tail, and the tail often is seen with a white tip (from inch of white to only a few hairs and occasionally none).  Colour wise they come in many different colours including "recognised colours" of  Red and White, Brindle and White, Red Point Tri colour, Brindle Point Tri Colour, Blue Merle and Sable,  they can also be found in diluted colours, slate, liver and pink (otherwise known as ee or clear red).  We Colour test and coat test our dogs, this is not because its a health issue (unless breeding blue to blue), but to reduce the number of fault colours/coats we breed.

Cardigans are a very versatile breed and I think “Cardis Can” sum them up very well.

We are proud to have dogs who have qualified as Pets as Therapy (PAT) dogs and who also spend time working with children and adults to help them overcome their fear of dogs as well as introducing people to dog behaviour.  A number of the dogs we have bred are proud to have the accolade of "Good Citizen" which is gained by passing certain tests to prove behaviour and obedience.

 

We welcome visitors to come and meet us and the dogs as well as the other two and four legged residents that share our home.  We love to share our breed with people.

 

The dogs lead pretty spoilt lives and we are lucky enough to have a large garden that the dogs enjoy playing in, digging up or just mooching about in.  We are extremely lucky with where we live as we can quickly access many walks including canal towpaths, army land, and now have access to a private woodland where our dogs can safely run free.  All of this helps keep our dogs healthy in mind and body.

We did work with a senior school with the dogs running a "Reading with Dogs" program. The program had excellent results and we hope to start listening again soon.

About Us

 

Our dogs all live as part of the family and go on holiday with us.  Our dogs are expected to have manners and behave appropriately to the situation.  They love to socialise both in and out of the home.

 

Both of us have had dogs all our lives, Jo started with a collie cross and moved on to  GSD's and a Doberman.  She has also been fortunate to have been actively involved with many working breeds including Collies, Rottweilers and Dobermans.  Martyn had a slightly different introduction to dogs having grown up with Pugs!  We purchased our first GSD together in 1994 and along the way have had many trials and challenges.

 

Our sons Kieran (24 years) and Owen (22 years) both enjoy the dogs and help with their training and because of their wish for a dog more their size (when Owen was 4), we added the cardigans to our family (little did we know how addictive they can be). The boys are also great at helping socialise all our dogs and our puppies have been handled by the boys from the day they are born.

2024 will be a year of reflection, and decisions.  At this time shows will probably not feature much and definitely no breeding planned.   Rubus has been booked to be used at stud later this year and hopefully we will be able to direct puppy people that way in due course.  We have also been delighted to hear that a Liebehund has sired his first litter up in Scotland.  We have shown a little with Phasma getting a Reserve CC   from the breed Specialist Mr Peter Clifton, whilst she was very out of Coat;  She has now stepped back from the Ring and will only appear very rarely.  Trinny (L. St Trinian) has gone to Scotland and is now very spoilt with her new family and being taken lots of places by her new special human Georgie Maas.

2023 has been a quiet year as we take time to reflect and focus on other things, we did attend Crufts and Phasma did us proud with a 2nd in Open Bitch and she attended the Club show where despite lack of coat she was awarded another Res CC. We have our last litter for the foreseeable future and Phasma has been an amazing mum, with a Free Whelped Litter who have spent the summer delighting us and annoying their Dad Serious.   Rubus has sired a litter and we are looking forward to updates as they grow up.  A Java x Metric son has been delighting his new owners with his personality and awards in the ring.  Another Metric son has delighted us as we get updates from his escapades in the ring, and his amazing awards.  Our total of Stud book numbers has now tallied up at 9.  We ended the year with a trip to the CWCA and a very naked Phasma still managed to get the Reserve CC!  In November we decided to let Serious go to Jo's dad where he is a very spoilt dog with his own Chair, a Parrot who talks to him and a horse to visit!

2022 ended with the delight of Java x Metric Litter and this has taken us quietly into 2023.  We will not be out at the shows much, as we will be taking time for other projects and enjoying the dogs at home with our family.   Most of our dogs are now older and have no need to prove themselves in the ring.  We are also taking a year out from Stewarding.  We ended the year with Jo and Alison co breeding a litter of Skye Terriers and look forward to seeing where their progeny goes in 2023 with the shared affix of Coriend.

We have already decided that there will be only a few shows attended in 2022, we are going to be having a quieter year with non dog challenges to keep us focused.  We did attend Manchester  where Phasma got Best Bitch and was awarded Bitch Challenge Certificate, her side kick that day, on a rare day out was Mr Rubus who was awareded 1st Veteran Dog which delighted us.

April brought a single trip out to Working and Pastoral Breeds of Wales with Phasma and she was pleased to be awarded a Res CC.  August saw us out again, and this time it was Warwick's Turn for a Res CC.

Well the first show of 2021 went with a Bang and Wow!  After nearly not going, we decided last minute to face the possibility of rain at the first show of the season (for us) and not only did Warwick get 1st Limit Dog and Res Dog, but Phasma strutted her stuff from Open Bitch all the way to Best Pastoral!  Not only a first and a total dream accolade for us, but the first time a Cardi has taken that award since 2018!  Still on Cloud 9 here and Phasma has the shiny get out of jail card for any naughtyness!  Show two was another wow for us, Phasma got Bitch CC and Best of Breed, boy was that a HOT day, and melting was the order of the day.  We We did a couple more shows and Phasma added a couple of Res CC to her tally along with Res Best Bitch and Res Best in Show at the CWCA in September.  We havent felt like doing many shows, and I think that the quiet of 2020 has show us that we dont want to spend hours driving round the country to attend shows.

2020 I think will be a year many wont forget.  For us it started quietly.  We had made the decision back in the autumn of 2019 to do only Crufts this spring.  We managed to get there despite the worries, and were delighted to come home with Phasma Res CC and 1st Open Bitch.  Fennel managed a 3rd in Veteran Bitch and Warwick a 4th in Limit Dog.   Really Crufts was a blur as only the week before Clover's pups had arrived, and I attended crufts on a very sleep deprived day.  As for the rest of this year - well only time will tell.  March soon became April and then May saw our pups go off to their new homes.  Due to the restrictions we were sad not to be able to entertain our puppy owners in the normal way, but videos and many photos were shared and everyone got to see the puppies grow.   It was a challenging year for so many, but for us, it wasnt much different as Martyn continued to work at work, and after years of home educating Owen, he just was educated from home!

Wow well Crufts 2019 came with a Bang.  We took 6 dogs and 6 placed.  Comfrey won Veteran Dog, Warwick got 2nd Post Graduate Dog, Fennel 2nd veteran bitch, Java 4th Puppy Bitch (on her birthday), Phasma 2nd Open Bitch and Clover 1st Good Citizen Bitch and Bitch CC and awarded Best Opposite Sex.  We then rushed across Crufts and took place in the pre judging for the Crufts Breeders Competition (see photo at top of the page).  Later that day we were in the Big Ring at Crufts and got to show our much loved breed off to the masses.  We returned to Crufts on the Sunday when we took a turn on the Discover Dogs stand with Fennel, Haggis and Rubus.

We took a break for a while and no puppies this year has meant that we were able to return to the ring with the dogs and we are proud to have re qualified for the breeders group 2020.  Clover has continued her winning ways with a CC under Breed Specialist Sarah Taylor at Bournemouth.  Phasma has continued in her shiny stormtrooper manner and now has amassed a huge total of 12 CC's and 2 Reserves, along with a Fab 4th Place in the Pastoral Group at South Wales Kennel.  Mr Warwick is slowly maturing and we are delighted with his 1st CC in Scotland and a reserve CC at Windsor.

2018 has started quietly as planned, but bombed in March. Pepper was in whelp with a litter to Jake and pups were due after Crufts.   On the 7th March we took her to the vets as we had been unhappy with her size - she was much bigger than we expected and had taken her for a check up and only minutes after she undergone a scan to check on the pups who were not due for another week, she had a heart attack and died.  Our vet tried everything to revive her but it was not to be.  At my request he operated, Pepper had carried 11 puppies and 9 were brought home.  We have been lucky and have managed to rear six (2 girls and  4 boys, all tri colours).

March 8th brought Crufts and Poor Martyn was sent so that he could get some Emergency supplies for the orphans.  As he was going he took Warwick, Phasma and Clover, who came home with excellent results of 3rd, 1st and 1st respectively.  Poor Martyn was so shattered he has little recollection of the day.

Hand rearing Orphans was a long and emotional time but fortunately we were able to see it through with the 6 who survived the first week.  These pups went on to be our "Gold" litter.  March Also brought the first "Coriend" litter from Loony who Martyn and I co own.  This litter also brought devastation to us as one of the pups was to die from a Vaccine Reaction from Lepto 4.

As you can imagine with a start like that to 2018 we have had a pretty quiet year and we have shown a little, but not much.  Clover has come home with 2 challenge certificates (1 more and she will be a champion), and Little Miss Phasma has also had 2 more to add to her 3 from 2017.  We have also been taking part in the Kennel clubs Breeders competition and have been delighted with 2 wins, the best being under world renowned judge Liz Cartledge.  We are praying for a quiet 2019.

2017 saw the Star Wars pups leave for their new homes, and we are looking forward to their progress reports.  A trip to Crufts saw both Clover and Nella come home with 2nd places which we are delighted with.  March saw Clover come home from Guildford & District Canine society with a 1st Open, Best of Breed and gaining a Pastoral Group 3 award.

April started with a high as Clover was awarded a 1st Cardigan Corgi, Best of Breed and Pastoral Group 3 (of 16) under judge Frank Kane.  Sadly it crashed only 3 days later with the sudden and devastating death of Mint.  Cause unknown, other than she waited for Martyn to get up, and let her out at 6.30am, before dying in the garden.

June brought Clover her first ever Reserve Challenge Certificate and Phasma went Best Puppy and Puppy Group 4, all at 3 Counties Show.  Things continued well with Phasma getting Reserve Best of Breed and Best Puppy and Puppy Group 3 at Windsor dog show.  The good results continued in July while in Carmarthen when Clover went Best of Breed and Group 2 and Phasma amazed us with Best Puppy, Puppy Group 1 and Reserve Best Puppy in Show.  Then Clover received  her 2nd Res CC at Working and Pastoral breed and Phasma was awarded 4th in a very strong Puppy Stakes class.

July also brought a trip to Stoneleigh with Phasma, Clover and Rubus for a photo opportunity with students of the Nikon school.

August continued with the Wow factor with the Arrival of Comfrey Puppies up in Scotland and Clover's 3rd Res CC, beaten by Phasma who blew all our expectations getting our first ever Challenge Certificate at Bournemouth show and then topping that with a Best Puppy and Puppy Group 3.

September 2017 continued with delights in the show ring, First at Richmond with Martyn handling Clover to Best of Breed at Richmond Championship show and then West Country delights at Exeter with Phasma Best Puppy, Best of Breed and Puppy Group 1, with her brother Warwick getting Reserve Best of Breed.  The Next Day she had a repeat of the Best Puppy and Group 1 but this time following it up with a Best puppy in Show (we were so delighted!!).  The month was to end with another Massive high when Phasma went Best Puppy, Best Bitch (Bitch Challenge Certificate) and Reserve Best in Show at the Cardigan Welsh Corgi Club Show!!

October continued to bring the smiles and brags as Phasma went Best Puppy at South Wales Kennel Association and brought home another Pastoral Puppy Group 4 Award.  With her best puppy came the last point needed for her to claim her Junior Warrant. She could now claim to be L. Jakku (JW).  November brought yet more smiles as she claimed two Best of Breeds and 2 Group Awards at Adult level and her first placing in Junior at Championship level.

However the year was to end with a high we had not expected - Phasma's 3rd Challenege Certificate and her award of Champion!  2017 will certainly be one to remember and we are grateful to all those who supported and encouraged us throughout the mad 7 months that Phasma has been out in the ring. 

2016 started with sleepless nights as we had the arrrival of Mint's puppies on 6 January (known as our "Red" litter), and we have had a busy couple of months.  A visit by Johanna brought a suprise development of one of the puppies joining her in Finland due to Johanna falling in love within minutes of being in the door!  The remaining pups are scattered across England and one has flown all the way to Russia for her new life.

April brought the patter of tiny paws for Sorrel x Miles Grandpups living up in Shropshire with Mairi Dugdale and  June brought the patter of paws for Karen Hewitt at Cardhew with her Comfrey "Beatrix Potter" Puppies. July started badly with the loss of Tansy.  July also brought some life lessons, which we will never forget. 

September was brilliant as we attended the Cardigan Corgi Show where we were amazed and delighted with our results, Judge was Sarah Taylor (Bymil).  Rubus was awarded a fantastic 2nd in Graduate Dog, Clover a 2nd in Yearling Bitch and Nella with Alison another 2nd in Graduate Bitch and Donna showed Loony to a good 4th.  Pepper strutted her stuff with Johanna in Post Graduate and got a 4th and Fennel was in Limit Bitch and managed to be placed 5th of 12!

November brought the patter of paws with our long awaited Star Wars litter, Fennel was the mum and Dad was Sarah Taylor's Jake (Bymil the Big Picture).  This litter was 3.5 years in the making and we were delighted with the 9 pups and choosing who would stay was a challenging time.

2015  brought some highs and sadly a huge Low.  We started the year helping Yvonne Caul with a blue x tri litter and they have now travelled far and wide from Harlow to the States and the Netherlands!  March brought our own litter from Pepper and Miles, and we have expanded our family to include Salix and Clover who are just like their parents and we co-own the ever busy Nella with Alison Stevens who already has a Miles son called Lister.

May brought the low when at the end of the month we got up to Dill being unable to walk, and after consultations with our very knowledgeable vets we made the horrible decision to let him go to a better place after he was deemed a poor candidate for spinal surgery.   Literally days after losing Dill, Fennel and Rubus decided to get it together to produce a litter of pups who would be known as our "Royals".  Fennel managed to hide her condition for quite some time and only at the end of July did she show her condition, giving us 10 days notice of the impending arrivals!

August and September brought about busy times with the patter of paws.  At the end of September we were invited to take the pups to the new Vet School at the University of Surrey so that the dogs could be used in a promo for the opening.  The results can be seen above.  Also at the end of September was the annual Cardigan Welsh Corgi Association show, we took along quite a few dogs, and the big awards went to Pepper, who was handled by her breeder Johanna to 1st in Post Graduate Bitch and the last 5 bitches in the show, and Clover who was 1st in Puppy bitch, beating her sister Nella into 2nd place.  A good time was had by all.

2014 saw about our first Finnish x English litter with the arrival of Mint x Comfrey puppies. From their quiet slide into this world, this litter were a joy to have.  They were our first free whelped litter and the "Coins" as they became known, showed their strong characters from very early. Sadly 10 days before these were born, Mint's father passed away, and Hanna-Kaiser, his owner, asked to come to England and to choose one of his Grandchildren.  So for Easter we had lots of laughs with Johanna and Hanna's visit to England.  Hanna choose our only Brindle male, and "Sisu" as he is now known, travelled with me as hand luggage to Finland and has helped dry the tears and is spoilt rotten!  Two others went to homes who had said farewell to other old cardigans.  Two went to existing homes of "Liebehund Cardis" and, you have guessed it, one stayed on!  We also co-own Loony with Donna and Paul Morris, so life is always busy.  2014 did end on quite a high when we took Donna and Paul to a christmas show and not only did Comfrey go Best of Breed, but Rubus was placed best puppy and went on to get our first ever Group 1 Placing in the Pastoral Puppy group.

With the pups arriving the weekend of Crufts, we stayed homed, but the "Liebehund" flag was flown by Karen and Murphy who was awarded 3rd Post Graduate Dog under judge Sandra Muckle.  This means Karen and Murphy can return in 2015!  We do hope to see them in a ring before then. The rest of the year has been quiet on the dog front whilst Jo got her back fixed and the house got a bit of a refit with a new kitchen and staircase.  We have managed to qualify Tansy, Rubus and Loony for Crufts 2015 - however they didn't get to go.

In 2013 we decided that we would only do a few shows, allowing more time at home with both the boys and the dogs.  An outing at Swindon and District resulted in a Group 3 in Puppy for Pepper.  Although we didn't do so well at Crufts this year, Dillon came home with a 1st place and qualification for next year, and Murphy (L. Dash of Bitters) was placed 2nd and a big class.  2013 brought the decision to stop breeding GSDs, as we are unhappy with where the breed is going and the health and temperament problems that we are seeing all too often.  We no longer feel comfortable choosing stud dogs.

May brought us a Sorrell x Miles "Summer"  Litter and the pups are now as far afield as Canada, Ireland, Kent and Staffordshire.

Another few shows and Pepper again did well with a Reserve Best Bitch at just 10 months old and a Puppy Group 2.  We also won Best Breeder in Breed under judge Diana King at Windsor.  Martyn took Comfrey, Pepper and Mint off to the Bournemouth show in an attempt to qualify them for next year's Crufts, only to come home with all 3 qualified for 2014 and also Comfrey qualified for life when he was awarded a Reserve Challenge Certificate.   September brought Johanna Flink and Tarja Peltola over from Finland for the CWCA Club show under Sheena Stalker.  All the dogs strutted their stuff, and Pepper & Mint joined another of Johanna's Breeding and took Johanna and the Big-Wood's Kennel to "Best Breeder in Breed" a first in the UK for any Cardigan breeder from Finland.

2012 was busy from the start, we started the year with Sorrel "Alice in Wonderland" pups, these were our 2nd generation of Cardis and with them having Dill as a father, you can imagine the characters we got!  Crufts was to bring wins from both Mint and Comfrey when they were handled by Johanna Flinck.  Next was to see Murphy (Tansy son) have his first weekend in the ring and come away with 3 first prizes and qualification for Crufts 2013, his owners Karen and Adrian Marks were delighted.  May has also brough a HUGE surprise when Fennel went to The Scottish Kennel Club show as was awarded 1st Puppy Bitch, Reserve Challenge Certificate and Best Puppy in Breed, this delighted us as you can imagine. A bit of a break from the show ring before supporting a local show who put Cardi classes on for the first time and wow didn't we do well!  Tansy got a very respectable 2nd place in Open, Puppy lineup was Fennel, Murphy and then Mint and Dill stood alone in Post Graduate before going BOB and Fennel gaining Best Puppy.  Things got in the way of the next couple of shows and then it was Martyn, Tansy and Dill's turn to go to Wales and how well they did, with a 2nd place for Dill in PGD and a 3rd for Tansy in PGB, which means they have both qualified for Crufts 2013 alongside Comfrey, Fennel, Mint and Murphy!  In November 2012 Pepper travelled with Jo from Finland via Copenhagen, Paris and the Channel Tunnel, with an overnight stop in France.  Fortunately the trip went well and Pepper travelled so well.  The year ended with Miles returning home after the death of Jo's Nan.  We look forward to all that 2013 will bring.

 

2011 has started with a blast.  First in February we qualified Tansy, Comfrey, Sorrel and Dill for Crufts 2012, then we went to Crufts and got a 1st Puppy Dog with Comfrey and 2nd with Tansy in Good Citizen Bitch.  We were then lucky enough to purchase Mint from Finland.  June brought us Tansy's 2nd and last litter, from which we kept the beautiful Fennel, and her siblings are now scattered around the country and one has even flown off to Finland!  An early christmas present arrived in the form of Mint on 8th December and this was further polished with her qualifying for Crufts in Helsinki on the 7th and in Birmingham on the 12th!

 

2010 was good, we had the joy of seeing Dillon go Best Puppy in Breed at the South East Corgi Show and then get a 3rd in Special Puppy Dog at Crufts. In April our first Cardi litter were born (Our Dreams).  Tansy also had a busy Spring as once she weaned her own litter she took on rearing a foster litter of Pembroke corgis.

 

2009 Started with a big high, when Tansy went Best Puppy in Breed at Crufts which delighted us. We brought Dillion home in April.  and then in May we had the temporary arrival of Miles, who has ended up staying in our family, although now living with Jo's mum Marion. We finished the year off in style with Dillon went on to be "Best Puppy in Breed" at the Welsh Corgi Show in November.

 

2008 was when we first introduced a cardigan in the form of Tansy into our lives and boy have things changed since then!