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Afghan Hound Database and Breed Information Exchange
(The Afghan Hound in Australia - A Brief History)AFGHAN HOUND BREED HISTORY - AUSTRALIA (see also "Afghan Hound in Australia A Brief History" by Jim Hickie Gengala Afghans)With particular thanks to Jim Hickie of Gengala Afghans (Australia) who has documented the breed history from 1935 - 1990's and which provides the backbone of information for these pages. Jim Hickie also generously provided a computer database of Australian pedigrees. Also thanks to Wendye and Stuart Slatyer of Calahorra Afghans (Australia) who have provided hundreds of paper pedigrees and also information on their AI breeding program. Finally thanks to Alain Trenca (Timour Shah), France for providing extensive pedigree records and many other useful details.As usual, we'll start at the beginning and move forward
(See also the 1990 Barbara Skilton (El Tazzi) Interview)
1930 - 1950 An early observation is that Australia is very remote from other parts of the world where the Afghan Hound had existed since the early 1920's. This remoteness may partially explain why Australian Afghan breed history started a decade later than in Europe and several years later than in many other countries. After all, Australia is "down under" in the southern hemisphere and the foundation imports from Afghanistan arrived in the northern hemisphere. Distance is presumably a factor, however, we note that the original foundation imports to England had to journey by sea thousands of miles via India, so is distance really an explanation? The Afghan Hound arrived in England in 1921 (Bell Murray), followed by Ghazni type in 1925. By 1926 Bell Murrays were exported to Europe and America, the latter involving quite a long sea journey. It's noted that the US foundation stock (as exists in the pedigree history) didn't actually arrive until 1931. So perhaps Australia's start in 1935 is not as late as at first seems. There are a couple of differences between the early development of the breed in Australia, and the US which we could (perhaps?) consider a "peer" (young and remote) country in those early days.
The difference between Australia and US breed development is interesting, and its one that I have documented before when comparing US/UK foundations. Its all to do with foundation bloodlines. By the 1930's, the two types (Bell Murray and Ghazni) had become intermixed in the UK, few Afghans of the individual type remained. Later, other imports entered UK breeding such as Lakki Marwat, Shahzada and Afroz and increased the intermixing. By comparison, the US foundations involved two pure Ghazni hounds, and a Bell Murray/Ghazni blend (Badshah and Tufan of Ainsdart), initially free of the UK blended lines. Early breed development in the US was based upon interplay between these three foundation hounds and their offspring. Thus the US developed its own and quite different bloodline mix's compared to the UK, and, as we shall see, also different from Australia.
Apart from rumoured imports of Afghans into Australia which kept company with camel trains in the days of the gold rush and establishment of settlements in the outback, the earliest documented imports occured in 1935 when Mrs Olive MacDougal imported Farkhoonda El Kabul, a fawn bitch in whelp to Lakki Marwat. A year later Mrs MacDougal imported a gold dog Dharma Reja Of Geufron, and the blue-grey bitch Morita in whelp to Tash Garift I Pushtikuh. Apperently, the first ever Australian Afghan BIS winner came from the Morita litter. These imports were blended lines, Ghazni, Shahzada and Afroz etc, quite different to the US foundation lines, allthough only seperated by four years (1931/1935). In the event the issue of early Australian imports and any differences to the US imports of the era is academic as world war two intervened and these early import lines were lost. This is perhaps the second difference between the US/Australian breed development. The UK and Australia were colonially tied at this time, and the war curtailed normal activities in Australia much earlier and to a greater extent than it did in the US, who were able to continue breeding throughout this period. I wonder what would have happened if Australia and the UK had not been tied. Would Australia have developed its own lines in the same way that the US did by growing from the small pool of 1935/6 imports and interplay between them and their offspring?. This is a suitable point at which to leave the diversionary story of US and Australian breed development. I thought it relevent to include this aspect because both the US and Australia have synergies in terms of geographic size and the outback/wilderness which made travel and exchange of bloodlines more problematical in comparison to the smaller more compact European countries.
With normal activies, such as dog breeding curtailed/impacted during the war, Afghan breeding seems to have ceased entirely, the above lines being lost. Activities in Afghan breeding were not resumed until 1950, via UK imports. It's noted again that there is a delay from the end of the war up to 1950,before Australia resumed active breeding interest in the Afghan Hound. It would be interesting to understand the reason(s) for this, after all, Afghan breeding in Europe continued, albeit it severely limited, throuhout the duration of the war, with rapid recovery once hostilities had ended. Its academic perhaps, but its part of the story, so if you can add to it, please do.
1950 Onwards - to be continued
Steve Tillotson, April 1996