Vakeranti German Shepherds About

The Vakeranti German Shepherd Kennel is co-owned with my husband Rob. We are based near Kings Lynn, Norfolk.

My interest in German Shepherds began when my aunt and uncle bought a GSD 'Khan' when I was a little girl aged 7. I loved the dog and decided that when I was old enough to have my own dog, it had to be a GSD.

I bought my first German Shepherd in 1986, a 14 month old long haired male 'Kylo;. A couple of years later he was joined by my first puppy 'Tara'.

Both my children Kerri & James have grown up to love and appreciate the breed as much as I do, so much so that they both have their own GSD's now.

Over the next 18 years I adopted two dogs from GSD Rescue, 'Badger' aged 5 and 'Thumper' aged 9 years. I also had an ex-prison service GSD 'Jaker'and a beautiful bitch 'Viva'.

In 2004 I decided I would like to start exhibiting and breeding and in early 2005 purchased Mirrwood Ulysses (known as Chaos) and Mirrwood Vikki (known as Havoc). We then started going to Ringcraft classes and when Chaos and Havoc were 14 months old we began showing them. This was a family affair with my son James doing his best to handle the dogs in the show ring.

Chaos was shown and went onto qualify for Crufts 2007 where he achieved 4th place in Post Graduate.

In 2006 we were granted our Kennel Name 'VAKERANTI'. This is made up from the names of dogs that I have loved and lost in the past - (VA) from VIVA; (KE) from JAKE; (RA) from TARA and (NTI) from XANTI, who sadly passed away on 24th February 2009 aged 13 years old.

From our first litter, we retained a puppy, Vakeranti DeltaLady (named in honour of Delta XH558 - the last Avro Vulcan capable of flight and now fully restored by the Vulcan to the Sky organisation and creating great excitement at air shows and events since 2009 - visit their website on www.tvoc.co.uk ).

Since then, we have retained further females, Vakeranti IceDiamond (Cee-Cee) and Vakeranti Missouri (Arna). Both girls have excellent hip and elbow scores and have produced superb puppies.

Our old dogs are hip scored, all our younger dogs are now hip and elbow scored. We only breed from males/females that have excellent hip and elbow scores with all males being Haemophilia 'A' tested clear.

We do have occasional litters from high quality parents and hope to further our success in the future with any youngsters we retain. We strive to breed puppies that conform to the Breed Standard with a strong emphasis on temperament/character, as most of our puppies go to family homes. All puppies are well socialised prior to leaving us and are used to children and all usual household noises.

The start of my love of German Shepherds began nearly 40 years ago with this handsome dog belonging to my aunt and uncle. Khan was the most gentle, mild mannered and placid dog, a trait which is still maintained in the breed some 40+ years later.