“CH Katella of LeLou-an Appreciation” by Leon Warren
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CH Katella of LeLou finished undefeated shown by Leon Warren including 5 point majors won at Northern California DC and Dachshund Club of California
Thanks to The American Dachshund editor for the suggestion in the January issue of the magazine that I write an analysis of the pedigree of the late CH Katella of LeLou (March 31, 1962-November 20, 1974). I shall, therefore, attempt to give readers a thumbnail sketch of the various ancestors behind her which I saw, handled and at least had my hands on and evaluated for my own information.. Perhaps, thereby, all of us may gain a better understanding why she was such a marvelous producer.
CH Ali Baba of LeLou, a littermate to Katella, owner Leon Warren and Judge Betty Nesbitt
Let me say, however, that I will probably dwell more on her dam, Leura of LeLou. First, because I am directly familiar with more dogs in her immediate family. Second, Louise and I put quite a bit of thought and planning over four generations to produce her and, third, we felt that with all due respect to CH Covara’s Tabasco, who was, to say the least, a great producer in his own right, that Leura, when bred to him acted as the catalyst responsible for producing two really amazing litters. Out of the two litters, six offspring finished their championships, usually before one year of age. Ali Baba of LeLou was BV from the puppy class at Northern California DC and Katella, if memory serves me correctly, was shown only four times in the classes to finish at a little over one year of age with two five-point specialty wins-Northern California DC and finishing at DC of America. I handled and finished CHs Ali Baba of LeLou, Laramie of LeLou, Lou Lou Belle of LeLou and Katella. They were amazingly similar in all respects and I am sending along all available pictures to prove my point.
Now to Leura and an attempt to explain her as to what and why she was and the “happening” that caused her to be bred to Tabasco. Some of the following may sound like an autobiography and for this I apologize. However, I feel it is necessary to explain why we did what we did and the pedigree analysis can follow right along with same.
First, a description of Leura: smooth, dark red (not clear) and weight about twenty-three pounds. She had a front about as near to perfection as any I have seen, , correct length of bone and angulation, both front and rear., good tight feet and sound movement. She had two faults which made us decide against showing her or selling her for show. She had a quite common head, rather coarse for a bitch, and she was lacking in topline (too much dip behind the withers). Besides, we wanted to keep her for breeding.
When Louise and I moved to California in 1952, we brought fourteen Dachshunds with us from Texas. Of the fourteen, only two were of any consequence. These were CH Leila of Heying-Teckel and a future champion-CH Don Juan of Heying-Teckel. These two were purchased from Fred and Rose Heying while we were still living in Texas. I like to think that Louise and I both, as many people have, were blessed with what we call an “eye” for a good, sound dog, regardless of breed. But at this time we new practically nothing as to how to go about breeding good ones. Line breeding? Family breeding? Hell, we’d never heard of it. And to think at that time I was licensed to judge the Breed! Oh, yeah! We had them, too. We decided that we had to learn and to learn quickly-and we did. How could we fail when we had such teachers as the Shultis’s, Hirschmans, Heyings, Nesbitts and the Dorwards? Yes, we learned form Woodie, too. Just about everyone took me under their wing and we learned much from them. I wonder if it would be the same thing today. Needless to say, within six months or so we had disposed of everything we brought with us from Texas except for the two Heying-Teckels mentioned above and one Wirehaired bitch, Amelia of Murlake. We acquired some new breeding stock locally and managed to get a Wirehaired breeding program of sorts underway, but we were still just hit-and-miss in Smooths. Then CH Badger Hill Nobby came on the scene. We thought we saw in him a dog which would compliment the basic Marienlust breeding which we had at that time and, after seeing the great “F” litter produced by CH Annette of Gera (still my all-time pick for a near perfect bitch), we felt this to be the way we should proceed with our breeding. Remember, if you care to check back, that although Annette bore the Gera name, she was almost solid Marienlust breeding.
So, we got our program started , and here it is-with analysis thrown in-starting four generations back only, as this was as far as I actually saw the dogs and had my hands on them. Most of the comments are on the various dams instead of the sires, as I firmly believe that dams, as a rule, play a substantially greater role in shaping the get than the sire. There are exceptions, of course. I like to see linebreeding on good bitches, whenever possible. It is too bad that their fertility span and, therefore, limited number of litters, makes it almost prohibitive. What I could not have given if it had been possible to have bred CH Robert de Bayard back to his grandam, Leura of LeLou.
CH Mabob’s Lindon in a natural, unstacked state
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From the Shultis’, we acquired Floradora of Gera (red, good angulation, front and rear, but poor head and a soft topline). She was a half sister to Annette through their dam, Aria of Gera, who was a very good producer. Floradora was not, even when bred to Favorite, her grandsire, which we did. This breeding produced Chorine of LeLou. We showed her some, but did not finish her. She did some winning,but was unable to garner majors. She was again quite correct in angulation, but again lacking in head and soft in topline. Mainly to try to correct the topline problem, we bred Chorine to CH Faris of Gera who consistently improved toplines in his get. We very nearly brought it all together in this breeding. We kept only CH Mabob’s Lindon (and for some who may not know, LeLou and Mabob are synonymous). We bred and raised the Mabob dogs for our client, Dr Robert Nystrom, but the breeding program was ours. Lindon was a magnificent dog in all respects, including head, but still inclined to be a little soft in topline. Faris improved, but did not entirely correct, toplines. We now wanted to produce a close family-bred to be bred back to Faris, so we bred Lindon to Fleurette of Gera who was a litter sister to Faris. This would be a concentrated breeding to try, when bred back to Faris, to bring it all together or to at least prove our program out as to the direction in which we were heading. Fleurette was somewhat old when we made this breeding and she had had several previous litters. She was quite a large bitch with exaggerated length of body and somewhat sway-backed. We were told that her topline had become worse with age and litter bearing and considering her too long body this could have been true. We had not seen her in prime age. This breeding produced Leura. Please take note here of what I said earlier about the influence of the dam. Here we now had four and five generations of poor topline bitches bred in each case to dogs with good to outstanding toplines and the poor ones still came through. I would say that it took Tabasco to straighten the toplines up on all the get from Leura which is what we had in mind when she was bred to Faris. Among other things I feel that Tabasco tended to improve in this area quite a bit.However, with the exception of his dam, he had at least three generations of good toplines behind him. However, CH Mari-Les Pamela, his dam, did leave much to be desired.
I am not as familiar with Tabasco’s side of the pedigree as I am with Leura’s. Tabasco was a great producer and, in my opinion, a dominant force in the improvement of the Long Variety in the early sixties. This dominant force continued throughout the sixties and may for possibly another few years. His sire, CH Red Locket Stevedore, the recessive Longhair, was as sound as Tabasco plus an outstanding coat and nice head and his dam, Pamela, I have mentioned. I did not know or probably saw them only as puppies of Ingrid, Baveno, Abigail or Lisa of Gera, but, pedigree-wise, they should have been sound. I did know CH Calypso of Gera. He was very sound and stylish red and probably should have been used extensively. He was, as I recall, sold to someone in Canada and I would be most interested in knowing more as to just what he did produce.
Tabasco’s pedigree represents good family breeding. His great great grandsire being CH Badger Hill Nobby in all four cases with CH Lisa of Gera twice as great great grandam making Calypso and Baveno half brothers bred to half sisters, Ingrid and Abigail, to produce Stevedore and Pamela.
CH Katella had a beautiful pedigree, yet it was not planned. It just happened and this is the way it took place. Leura, as I said before, was destined for Faris. We sold her to Carl and Eleyigth Wolff, but kept control of her breeding. They brought her to us at her second season ready to breed, but by that time we had lost Faris. Our substitute for Faris would have been CH Mabob’s Marmion, but he was not available at the time. I explained to the Wolff’s that we wanted to breed Leura close in her family and persuaded them to wait until her next season. Suddenly Carl spotted Tabasco in one of the kennel runs. “What about him?”, he asked. “That’s one Hell of a good-looking dog, but a Longhair. You don’t cross the two coats anyway, do you? Besides, you would be clear out of her family line sure enough.” what could I say? We did cross coats and, yes, it would be a good family breeding. However, chances were good that the litter would be Smooth. That was fine with Carl. He really did want Longhairs. So what did he get? Not a Smooth pup in either litter. So, if Carl had not happened to have seen Tabasco that day the breeding would probably have never taken place.
It’s a funny game. Leura, bred to CH Mabob’s Marmion later, produced a litter of six. The entire litter was Smooths.
CH Robert de Bayard, a Katella son,shown by Bobby Barlow for owner Mary Howell winning a Specialty BV under Breeder-judge Peggy Westphal
In retrospect, who would have ever believed that Katella in the hands of a loving owner such as Martha Prendergast and careful matings could later become one of the great bitches of our time. She was “a great one”.
CH Haleajo’s Periwinkle, a Katella daughter, winning under Garland Bell for owner Martha Prendergast
from the March 1975 issue of The American Dachshund