Cornfield's Kennels: breeders of Olderhill GSDs

Cornfield's Kennels is run by two of us, Susan Spencer, (that's me on the left in the photo - I do the writing), and my partner Julie Prinsloo. This photo was taken in West Sussex, England, in August 1993, where the police very kindly demonstrated to us their Olderhills in action. I'm holding Ben (Olderhill Lofty) the hero of their station (and the father of our dog Wolfram). He did all the exciting cases. They'd drop him off by helicopter all over the country to track and catch criminals.

We went to England (and Germany) looking for dogs to match our own line of german shepherds in South Africa. We were lucky to have dogs that were big, courageous, fearless, protective towards children, and brilliant working dogs. The Olderhills were a match made in heaven! Not only were they huge, healthy dogs with flat backs and straight hind legs, and with rock-solid temperaments, but they'd been successful police dogs for the last 25 years and worked like a dream. The day that the photo was taken Ben and Rainer (a black Olderhill male ) pulled us along a 3hr old track at a jog and scooped up about 10 articles on the way. This was a stark contrast to the champion tracker dogs that we saw in Germany at the big annual working championships (the working 'Bundessieger' show). They moved at a funeral's pace, with the handler pausing between each step. When we pointed out to competitors that a dog would never catch anybody at that pace, they said that they did not train their dogs for real-life work and so it wasn't a criterion for them. We use our dogs for real-life work and so it is for us.

And so we discovered the Olderhills and were lucky enough to bring two back with us, Leo (Olderhill Ivy) and Wolfram (Olderhill Grandee). We had several litters from the two of them together and also crossed them with our own line. The puppies that we've bred like this have been brilliant. People who have entered competitions with them have won everything, including beating border collies at agility (jumping). More and more private groups are beginning to use them for real police work such as tracking and catching criminals and sniffing for explosives and drugs in road-block checks and building searches.

Before we imported our Olderhills we'd only bred a handful of german shepherd litters over the years for ourselves, friends, and family. We never dreamed of becoming 'breeders' because we thought that more than enough dogs were being produced already. It was only when we couldn't find a suitable dog to put to our bitches that we realized that a lot of today's dogs that are being produced are weak in body and temperament and have crippling medical problems. It is therefore very important for more people to start breeding strong, healthy dogs again. Knowing this, it became a mission of ours to keep the Olderhill line alive (as well as our own). However Ann Butler died a couple of years after we got our two and to our great dismay we discovered at the end of 2001 that her Olderhill line has died out with her. It looks as though we have the last pure Olderhills left today. 

Here's our old place. [NOW FOR SALE!] Because we had lots of dogs we tried to train and go for walks with them as often as possible (yes, all together in a huge pack! ) so that they all got a bit of attention.  We were lucky to live in the bush where we could walk with so many dogs! Except for bitches on heat, most of our dogs lived around our house in a big pack. The kennels that we had were large thatched-roofed houses with runs in front of them. Our puppies were [and still are] all born in our house and stay there for the first few weeks before going outside into these kennels.

Rescue scheme
Because we love animals and are suckers, we also have a rescue scheme  Pet Link-up . We used to train and re-home dogs of any breed (people appreciate trained dogs) and had up to 200 dogs at a time. They also stayed in thatched-roofed kennels and ate the same food as our breeding dogs. For over 5 years we bought up to 25 dogs a month rejected by the SA Police and re-trained and homed them (often within a few days). They often came in thin and emaciated (especially from the SA police) and went out fat and shiny and admired. Today, [Feb 2015] we only re-home dogs who we've bred and their friends. We still sterilize other people's dogs and give them medical treatment and have started helping donkies used for carts and starved horses.

Looking at our miniature pigs!!

History of project

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Our users

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