BY THE LATE 1960S the then existing
population of pure Seppalas, descendants of Leonhard Seppala's
original sleddogs, was in grave danger of extinction. The third
historic Seppala Kennels operated in Maniwaki, Quebec, by J.
D. "Donnie" McFaul had closed in 1963 without giving rise to
a lasting successor kennel. The bulk of the McFaul kennel
stock had been purchased by Earl Norris who had no personal
interest in the preservation of Seppala Strain as a separate
bloodline. At the end of the decade the surviving McFaul
Seppala animals were seven to ten or more years of age.
The Siberian Husky
breed had become dominated by American show
dogs in the 1960's. The flashy appearance of these
exhibition dogs generated a wave of public popularity that
brought with it an upsurge of cosmetic breeding to supply
show and pet markets. Canadian fanciers discarded the old
Canadian bloodlines in favour of show dogs from the USA.
Little or no attention was paid to working qualities.
At about the same time the sport of dogsled racing had
developed in the direction of shorter, faster races on
highly-groomed level trails. The new type Siberian Huskies
engendered by the show ring success of Mrs. Lorna B. Demidoff's
flashy-looking black and white "Monadnock" dogs
could not compete effectively in those races. Dog drivers
began to assert that Siberians were no longer of any use for
dogsled racing.
The dwindling Seppala strain was ignored in the late 1960s by both racers and show-dog fanciers. Endurance sleddogs cut no ice in short, furious sprint races where Coonhounds and the newly-discovered Alaskan husky were major competitors. Show buffs disdained Seppalas' offbeat colours, asymmetrical markings, and "dirty faces." By 1970 Seppalas faced imminent extinction due to a narrow breeding base, lack of public interest, and the ageing of available breeding stock.
IN 1969 J. JEFFREY BRAGG, then living in Pefferlaw,
Ontario, acquired ten-year-old DITKO OF SEPPALA, a McFaul-bred male
who had been selected by Seppala's partner Elizabeth Ricker Nansen for
her daughter Bunty who also bred Siberians in the 1950s and
60s. (Mrs. Nansen had wanted for her daughter "to have at
least one Siberian that was like the ones Seppala and I had
in the 1920s.") Ditko impressed me with his beautiful
flowing movement, his stable temperament, his resemblance to
the photos of Siberia import dogs from the turn of the
century and his dissimilarity to the oversized, Malamutish
show dogs of the 1960s.
My
interest aroused by this unusual Siberian male, I learned
that the Seppala strain had somehow managed to survive through
the decades from the 1930s almost as a breed unto itself,
bred slowly and separately within CKC and AKC Siberian Husky
registries as a working sleddog rather than a beauty
contestant. I managed to buy or lease three Seppala strain
broodbitches, DUSKA OF SEPPALA, FROSTFIRE ANISETTE and LYL
OF SEPSEQUEL, and finally (after Ditko's death from cancer)
another fine male, SHANGO OF SEPPALA.
I BEGAN TO BREED SEPPALAS under the Markovo Kennels name (Markovo was the little Siberian trading village from which the 1909 Ramsay imports had come). An American dog driver, Gary Egelston, became involved in the effort to rescue Seppalas, breeding first as "Manahtok" and later "Seppineau" Kennels; Egelston and I exchanged stock and used other pure Seppala sires he had located (MIKIUK TUKTU TORNYAK and VANKA OF SEPPALA). Larry Prado of Milton, NH (later of Poland Spring, ME), also acquired Seppalas from New England and Quebec, though of the little breeding he did, none seems to have survived.
IN1973 BETSY LESUEUR BUSH, a veterinary
parasitologist at the Western College of Veterinary Medicine
in Saskatchewan, joined the Markovo project, which was based
in Saskatoon during its final two breeding years. By spring of
1975 Markovo had produced ten litters of young Seppala stock,
ensuring the future survival of the strain. Egelston added
additional litters to the gene pool in the USA. In all ten
animals of McFaul/Shearer background (now known as the "Second
Foundation") made their contribution to the revived Seppala
gene pool during the Markovo period.
In summer of
1975 the project was terminated and the young Seppalas
dispersed to other breeders. 1976 saw publication of The
Seppala Siberian: A Breeder's Manual summarising the
past history of Seppala breeding and setting forth a
breeding standard for a new generation of breeders. Survival
had been won for the descendants of Seppala's sleddogs, at
least for the time being. Unfortunately the battle for survival
was not yet over; the post-Markovo period brought success
at middle-distance racing for Seppalas and with it, a renewed
risk of extinction through assimilation and dilution by
non-Seppala bloodlines.
