Sesame in the Hokkaido Ken

As people have become involved with the Hokkaido, and interest in the breed has grown overseas, it is natural that interest in all the coat colors increases. Recently there have been sesame Hokkaido pups popping up here and there, and I get a lot of questions about them and 'sesame lines' etc.

A Hokkaido Ken in Japan might be registered with one or more of the associations that recognize the breed. Generally they are either Hokkaido Ken Hozonkai (DOKENHO or HKH as I refer to them), or Hokkaido Ken Kyokai (HKK). There are also small numbers of Hokkaido registered with the Japan Kennel Club (JKC), and the Nihon Kennel Club (NKC) recognized Hokkaido Ken Tourokukyokai (HNA).

The HKH had around 200 pups registered with them last year, HKK around 100. Sesame as a recessive would pop up every now and again, but for all means and purposes was close to extinct in the breed. I know of a few that popped up over recent years in the HKH, but none produced sesame pups when bred. That all changed when a litter of Hokkaido was born in Niigata prefecture to red HKK parents (but with sesame back in the pedigree). There was a nice sesame male in this litter named Souryuu. Souryuu was bred to a red female (one parent sesame), and there were 2 nice sesame males in the litter from what I have heard. 1 male was kept for breeding, the other sent to Hokkaido. This male is named Hokuou, and essentially all sesame that are being produced now are being bred off this one dog and his progeny. There has been a lot of very close breeding going on to try and increase the appearance of sesame in the puppies produced, and it looks like the kennels involved have finally started to produce predictable numbers of sesame pups.

This is Mizuou, a son of Hokuou.


So as always I imagine I will continue to receive requests for unicorns (a new unrelated sesame line!), but most likely all that exists will be the once every few generation recessive sesame's, and the progeny of Hokuou. Unfortunately his brother has not produced any sesame pups.

Comments

  1. Wow, what a blog! I mean, you just have so much guts to go ahead and tell it like it is. Youre what blogging needs, an open minded superhero who isnt afraid to tell it like it is. This is definitely something people need to be up on. Good luck in the future, man

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  2. Seems that they were able to find an unrelated sesame pup born in Akita prefecture to help diversify future sesame lines :D (posted by Mr. Sato)

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    Replies
    1. Yes, that and a few that are semi-related are around. Hopefully enough for a resurrection of the color in the breed (without getting ridiculously inbred).

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