o'cockaigne

After deciding that Cytaugh was good enough to breed with her, I searched for a suitable male for a couple of years. Unfortunately I could not find it; the male in question was no longer available, the male was all too often used, the male did not compensate for Cytaugh’s errors or had errors that I absolutely did not want or the bloodline did not like me. In any case, I didn’t want all of that. So plan change; instead of first having a normal cover with a living male, I decided to let Cytaugh inseminate with the 27 year old frozen semen of Argyll Bryan from the Market Garden, one of my first males.

Of course Argyll also had his faults but I hope that in combination with Cytaugh these would been toned down or negated. Argyll had in any case a wonderful character, found coursing and show great, excelled in gait and appearance and had no heart problems, cancer or Cystinuria.   Then the search for a doctor who had experience with the inseminate in sighthounds began. I got addresses in Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Germany and after a lot of e-mailing I decided for Germany, Hannover. Partly because Cytaugh does not like travel. Dr. Goericke-Pesch had experience with sighthound (she has Greyhounds herself) and responded adequately to my e-mails. When Cytaugh came into season on October the 2th, I tried to have her examined but this was a tragedy; Madam, screamed the whole clinic  together and nothing was allowed. The next day we tried again and by a swift action a smear could be made. A few days later I got the result that she was clean and did not need any antibiotic treatment. On Monday 8 October we tested for the first time the progesterone level, it was 0.31. Thursday it was 0.983, so it didn’t increase quick. Since I didn’t want to take any risks, Simon picked up Argyll’s sperm in Utrecht on Friday. In the container it would stay frozen for about a week. After consultation with Dr. Goericke-Pesch, I took blood again on Saturday 13 October and taken it home. Sunday I travelled to Sonja where I would stay the rest of the week. For Monday I had an appointment in Hannover where they would try to examine Cytaugh again and test the progesterone value of Saturday and this Monday. The internal examination proceeded fairly well and the progesterone value proved to have risen well, which from Saturday was thick over the 9 and from Monday over 13. An appointment was made for insemination on Wednesdays and Thursdays. Also Brandir and Chidish indicated that these were the right days; they did not whine on Monday when I was with Cytaugh to Hannover but when I left on Wednesday morning with Cytaugh they have treated whole Hermannsburg to a concert. The insemination went well, both days, and now wait, in four weeks we make an ultrasound and we know if small Argyll’s will enrich the Deerhoundworld. The data and pedigrees of Argyll and Cytaugh can be found at ‘O’Cockaigne Deerhounds’-‘our Deerhounds’.