About Tushita

Tashila Kennels (1980) became Tushita in 1998

*If anyone should have any photos of my dogs from back in the 80s and 90s, I would be very grateful if you would send them to me.*

In 1977 I went to Nepal and India, where I lived in and visited many Tibetan monasteries - this was my first encounter with a Lhasa Apso, or "dog from Lhasa" as the Tibetans call them... Lhasa being the capitol city of Tibet. I had never been a "small dog" person and had large dogs all my life, but was instantly captivated by the Lhasa Apsos in Kopan Monastery, (Nepal) the Monastery at Sarnath (India plains) and then the ones owned by the Tibetans in McLeod Ganj (better known as Dharamsala, Himalayas, India).

On my return to Melbourne, Australia in 1978 I craved the company of one of these magnificent little dogs and so I opened our main city's newspaper (not realising the rarity of the breed at all) and there was a heading under "Dogs for Sale" which read
"Tibetan Monastery Dogs". I rang immediately to find out more and sure enough they were the 'real thing'!

I sped across Melbourne so fast in my car and was soon surrounded by a sea of tiny black Lhasa puppies, bred by the charming Melland Family. I had only come to get a pet, I thought, but one little one pushed, growled and shoved her way to me, climbed on my lap and growled at every other one that came near me - she chose me. Her stud name was Kyiring Bahika, but she was renamed a couple of weeks later by a Tibetan Lama as "Tashi"which means 'good luck'. I called her 'Tashi-la' which means 'love' on the end when the 'la' is added and so the first Prefix was Tashila Kennels: 'good luck and love'.

Tashi-la went everywhere with me and was the love of my life. In 1980 she was mated with Keela Sirkhi (Khi being his call name) () and a beautiful litter of six puppies were born. Each were given Tibetan names and a 'naming ceremony' as the Tibetans did. I kept one female from this litter, Tashila Dhondrup.

Thank you to Mr. Arnold Townson for his dedication to preserving the lines of Lhasa Apsos and his generosity in sharing those with others!

***The following litter registration appeared in the KCC Gazette of January 1981:

TUSHILA Mr & Mrs ES Morcom 23/5/80 2M 2F 70623/70626
sire: Keela Serkhi (N) 351089
dam: Kyiring Bahika (V) 17688

The litter included:

M Tushila Chombpe (V) 70623 gold, white
M Tushila Dorje (V) 70624 gold, white, black
F Tushila Padme (V) 70625 gold, white, black
F Tushila Dhondrup (V) 70626 gold, white, black

***I registered the PREFIX TASHILA and this is spelt wrongly. There is no Tibetan word to my knowledge that is TUSHILA, with a "u" instead of an "a"! This litter registration was submitted by my husband at that time as I was hospitalised and the litter consisted of six pups, not four! Also the name should have been mine and not that of my husband. I have pointed this out to the VCA, as I feel records should be kept strictly and accurately. Even CHOMBE (there is no "P" in Chombe) is spelt incorrectly, but these were the days of pen and ink and errors did occur. However, I would certainly have noticed the Registration Papers with the wrong spelling of Tashila...

In 1990 my house was destroyed by fire and I lost everything, but they were only material possessions. My heart broke for the loss of Tashi who was inside the house at the time and we were out to dinner! There was no possible way for the firemen to save her. I have no photos and the few you will see on this website are all that were saved - there were literally thousands of photos and many long movies of my times in the East.

For about three years I tried to find a "replacement" for Tashi and then I realised what I was doing and that would be totally unfair to any other dog, so I went into rescuing Lhasas for a few years, which benifitted both the dogs and me.

In 1998, I decided that my wounds were healed and I truly wanted to begin owning and breeding again.
To my dismay when I contacted the Victorian Canine Association, I discovered that I could not retain my old Prefix as it had been registered in my ex-husband's name. Without thinking twice, I chose the Prefix 'Tushita' which means "heaven", but later I saw the similarity in the two names!

I contacted several breeders looking for the 'old lines' and finally I was referred to Mrs. Pat Davis who so kindly let us have a beautiful breeding pair:
*Udelewar Tropical Wind (M) and Udelewar Jacks Sweety (F)
We called them Norbu and Madu.
*SEE TENZIN'S PEDIGREE FOR THEIR PEDIGREE AND LINEAGE

Shortly after this, while on holiday in Queensland, I saw an advertisement in the main paper for a black female Lhasa puppy and my heart skipped a beat! I rang up and said I would take her over the phone. Mrs. Pamela Blume her breeder, was kind enough to bring her to us as I was not well and even allowed us to choose her name: *Rinchen, meaning "precious one".

In 1999 Madu (then aged 2 years) had her first litter and birthed only one pup and in her second litter bore two pups, one of which was Tenzin. She did not take to mothering, so we had her spayed.

Like Tashi, Rinchen was bought primarily as a pet and also like Tashi, she had vastly different ideas on the subject! She adored being pregnant and was the most excellent of mothers! Rinchen went on to breed with Norbu and then Tenzin and has produced some of the most beautiful Lhasa puppies. She is now spayed and over indulged!

Having lived with the original Tibetan dogs and Tashi having so many Tibetan lines in her, my desire to breed back to the original dog grew stronger than ever! I began to study what was going on in the Lhasa world and my interest in breeding grew to become a fascination for me.

Since then Tushita has continued to breed better dogs with each passing year.

My thanks over the years go to:
*Mr. B. Silvers (my soulmate) for his care for our dogs
*Mrs. J. Code (my mother) for her knowledge and education of breeding
*Mr. D. Code, (my brother) for his expertise in breeding/training dogs
*Dr. H. Corbett for invaluable dedication to animals in general
*Mrs. J. Blackburn for all her help in showing
*Mr. Dorje Tsering for teaching me Tibetan Veterinarian methods
*Mrs. Rinchen Khadro Chogyel, for keeping the best original Lhasa Apsos
*Mrs. M. Popper, for her advice on Lhasa Apsos
*Mrs. Pat Davis, for allowing me to begin again with her dogs
*Mrs. Pamela Blume, for breeding Rinchen
*Lama Thubten Yeshe, for everything!

And to those who work tirelessly at preserving the original Lhasa Apsos:
*Mrs. Yolande De Zarobe for maintaing an excellent website!
*Mr. Gerald D'Aoust for his contribution to the true Tibetan gene pool in the 1980s
*The current breeders in Europe who are succeeding in breeding pureline Lhasa Apsos

AND to anyone else I may have omitted!