Anyone who has ever been owned by a Weimaraner can understand how we were bitten by the “bug” and have never looked back. Since the early 1980’s we were Great Dane “people” having owned 3 of the gentle giants in our lifetime. But in 2000, a small grey overgrown mouse came to live with the Big Dogs at our house and things were never quite the same. Gandalf was our first Weimaraner and he was a surprise birthday gift to Nancy from Brandon (BJ). Surprise was an understatement. After realizing another canine member of the household had just been added, I (Nancy) started reading and researching the breed and quickly found out this is not a breed for the faint of heart and I’d better be up for a challenge.

But I quickly fell in love with the furball and he bonded to me very quickly and that made all the challenges worthwhile. Gandalf learned quickly from the very alpha senior Dane, Max and his counterpart, Dahnia and to this day, we still see traces of Great Dane influence in his personality.

In late 2001, Nali came to live here and the balance of 2 Danes to 2 Grey Dogs seemed to work nicely. Everybody got along and we got to see how diverse weim personalities can be because Gandalf and Nali were very different.

In the fall of 2002, the Dane, Max went to the Rainbow Bridge at the very early age of 7. Gandalf at age 2 wasn’t mature enough to take over the leader role so the responsibility fell on Dahnia. She stepped up and ruled with a quiet powerful presence that earned her the nick name “The Queen” Dahnia was certified and registered as a Delta Society Therapy Dog and had been working as such since 1999. She handled both roles as gentle submissive Pet Partner and Queen of the Grey Dogs with grace and dignity.

When Dahnia needed to retire from Pet Partnering, I went on the search for another therapy dog. I knew I wanted another Weimaraner instead of a Dane. Neither Gandalf nor Nali were good candidates for a therapy dog. Gandalf was way too hyper and typical weim and Nali was way too shy and backward. So in late 2002, I started searching and came across Duncan. He came to live with us in February 2003. He passed his Delta Society certification in October 2003 and began actively working as a therapy dog in early 2004.

Everything stayed pretty much the same at the home of the Great Dane and the Grey Dogs until August 2006. My good friend Mary Karrels, a fellow weim person called to say that the pick of the litter from a litter born in May in Atlanta, GA was available. Mary’s dog, Tally was the grandmother of this litter and it was a good one. This dog was going to be a breed ring quality dog…something that Mike had been wanting for awhile. Were we ready for another weim? …and a puppy to boot? …Check out the link to Strider and get the answer.