After about fifteen years of trying to make the McFaul/Shearer Leonhard Seppala strain sleddogs into what they already were - a distinct dog breed in their own right - I gave up trying. Because that effort had very little to do with the dogs themselves; rather it was all about people and their perceptions of the dogs. And as I’ve known for a long time, every damfool that comes down the pike - ESPECIALLY those who never even met a pure-strain McFaul/Shearer dog in their lives - is already convinced that he and he alone knows what a Seppala is. Even if he can’t explain it to you. (How many people have I had tell me, “I know a Seppala when I see one, I don’t have to look at a pedigree.”?) And in the Seppala world, as in other endeavours, “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are filled with passionate intensity” - as W.B. Yeats put it.

So I’m pretty much done with trying to enlighten folks about Seppalas. It has all taken too much of my time and attention that should have been going just to my dogs. They and I would have been happier had I never tried. So I’m just going to talk about my own Seppalas here, and maybe share some photos. Enough of the kennel-club BS (the dogs have only ever and always laughed at that side of it anyway). No more breed-development projects. No more eligibility rules, disqualifying faults, breed points, breed standards.

Just Seppalas unplugged. Like sitting on the porch with Eric Clapton listening to him play acoustic guitar for his own personal pleasure.