About Us
Blue Moon Scottish Deerhounds
Deerhound owners since 1997, Chris and Margaret started Blue Moon in 2011 with their foundation bitch - CH Highlander's Violet O'The Heath (Lyric).
A SOLID FOUNDATION
Lyric was one of the pick girls from the final litter bred by the highly respected Clay Finney of Highlander Deerhounds. A breeder with over 40 years experience, Clay also served many years as Club Historian for the Scottish Deerhound Club of America. Clay’s swan song litter produced 2 Grand Champions and 3 Champions, including Lyric.
In 2014, Lyric was bred to the magnificent GCH Lehigh Ennis Carmichael JC. Bred and owned by renowned breeder Paula Pascoe of Lehigh Deerhounds, Ennis had the distinction of winning Best of Breed at the National Specialty – not once, but twice!
In June of 2014, the Music Litter was born – 4 girls and 2 boys. The Ennis x Lyric litter produced 1 Grand Champion, 1 Champion and the winningest Obedience Deerhound Champion of all time.
On this solid foundation – grounded in the considerable combined knowledge and experience of Highlander and Lehigh – began Blue Moon Scottish Deerhounds.
"On Founding and Managing a Kennel. Now a sound foundation for the kennel has been secured by the purchase of one or two good bitches bred from winning strains and who are themselves free from serious faults - at least so far as their novice owner can discover." (The Deerhound)
The kennel name of Blue Moon was chosen in honor of one of Chris and Margaret’s Nokota horses – Blue Moon Rising (called Moonshine). His sire was Blue Moon. Nokotas are a rare heritage breed, native to the Northern Plains, and descended from war ponies confiscated from Lakota Chief Sitting Bull in 1881.
Either fitting or ironic, Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer – who was famously defeated by Sitting Bull at the Battle of Little Bighorn in 1876 – was an early and avid fancier of the ‘Scotch Staghounds’. He customarily traveled with a pack numbering 10 to 20 strong. He documented his admiration for both their hunting aptitude, and their loving demeanor towards their people.
Moonshine was widely exhibited by the Odgers on behalf of the Nokota Horse Conservancy. The story of Sitting Bull’s ponies – some with scars from Little Bighorn – was often retold. It wasn’t until getting Lyric, and a subscription the Breed Club publication The Claymore, did they learn about Custer’s passion for big sighthounds.
With their Nokotas of Sitting Bull fame and Deerhounds of Custer’s fancy residing peaceably together at their farm for over 15 years, the name Blue Moon Scottish Deerhounds seemed a fitting choice.
“Did I tell you of Tuck catching a full-grown antelope-buck, and pulling him down after a run of over a mile, in which she left the other dogs far behind? She comes to me every evening when I am sitting in my large camp chair . . . First she lays her head on my knee... A pat of encouragement and forefeet are thrown lightly across my lap ... and she lifts her hindfeet from the ground, and great overgrown dog that she is, quietly and gently disposes of herself on my lap . . . She makes up with no other person.” (Letter to his wife, Libby)
Deerhound character remains unchanged. Still fierce hunters. And still try to be lap dogs.
