My name is Katja Stoltzenberg and I live in the western Finland in one of Finland's biggest cities, Turku. I'm studuing biology (majoring in physiology & genetics) in the University of Turku. At the moment I own two tollers, a male called Cajo who is 12 years old and a 2-year-old female called Ducky. There has been a dog in my family ever since I was 4 years old and a couple of years later my dog hobby began for real with my family's mixed breed female Viiru. At some point I however wanted to get an own dog for hobbies. I remember seeing a picture of toller in a dog magazine already 15 years ago but I actually didn't get anxious right away. It was later on when I fell for the breed when I saw tollers at competitions and our obedience trainings. So in 1998, 13 years ago, my first toller, a female called Bella, entered the house. Unfortunately Bella was found to be incurably sick and sadly we had to say goodbay to her already after one year. That difficult year with the sickness and the difficult character of Bella's definitely teached me more than I could have imagined. I learned that the health, both physical and mental, are always the most important thing. When I then began to look for a new dog I also considered two other active breeds but after all I still chose the toller. After that I spent months searching for information and a suitable breeder. The puppy was supposed to arrive in spring but it must have had something to do with the faith that my sweet boy Cajo (C.I.E. & SE U(u)CH FINW-01 FINW-02 FINW-05 EEW-02 NORDW-03 SEW-04 WWV-08 BISS Hingstbackes Red-Cajo) arrived already in December 1999. Cajo also had a strong influence for that I, after many years of searching and waiting, finally found my tollerfemale Ducky (TK1 Allydor's Powerful Bowl of Beauty) who is Cajo's granddaughter. She stepped into the house nearly ten years later from Sweden in September 2009. In dog sports I'm kind of an all-eater, having tried nearly everything from agility to water rescueing. With Cajo we tried almost every sports, it was easy to jump from a hobby to another with an enthusiastic dog. We did game tracking and trained obedience in a group whenever we had the possibility (= that someone gave us a ride to the trainings) and actively trained agility for a couple of years. I started to aim at the official competitions because the dog was fast and loved the sport. But then I moved to Turku to study and it became impossible to train for competitions so the hobbies unfortunately became just a way to activate the dog sometimes. Years later when I bought Ducky, it was clear that I wanted to start from the beginning, this time with goals. For Ducky I have already made some plans. At the moment my own interests are mainly in hunting tests (Retriever-B and WT) and also in obedience tests. Nothing is better than to see the dog doing a work that it has been bred for. Even though I naturally hope for test results, the hobbies are still to me first and foremost enjoying about working together with the dog and a possibility to learn important things about its character, instincts and its trainability capacity. My dogs are to me beloved family members and enthusiastic training companions. What comes to association activity, I was a member of the government of the Finnish Toller club years 2005 and 2006. In 2011 I'm was the secretary of the annual speciality show "TollerShow" and secretary of the show committee. I also update the show calender in the Toller club's homepage. Since 2006 I have been a show ring steward so I also work at showrings at times. Handling is close to my heart - I always enjoy handling new dogs in dog shows. I find it fascinating to try to find and show the best qualities of each dog. I have mostly shown tollers but occasionally also other breeds. The most memorable moments when handling other people's dogs are perhaps handling the BOS at TollerShow 2004 and 2006 and my Cajo was BIS 2005 :) Nowadays I don't go to shows much since I find many other hobbies more challenging and rather spend my freetime training and learning more about training. I still occasionally visit shows too. The backgrounds of my kennelname: I passed the Finnish kennel club's breeders' course in 2007 and two years later I applied for the prefix Cayora's. I wanted Cajo to be a part of my prefix because it is mainly Cajo's influence that tollers became "THE breed" for me. As a stud dog he has also given me a possibility to get to know the complex world of breeding from a close view, get to know the pedigrees, problems of the breed and and on the other hand also required me to widen my view about target-oriented breeding. As a stud owner I have seen the world of breeding from the other view and have had to make decisions whether or not to be a part of some combination and therefore if I want to carry a part of the responsibility of a spesific combination. The word cayo, that is a part of my kennelname, is by chance spanish and means a small island or a key. Even that fitted well since tollers originate from a small "island" Nova Scotia (actually a peninsula) and the toller's attitude towards life certainly opens a locked heart like a key. The future will show if I will start breeding. If I will be lucky to own a high-quality female that I find valuable for the breed and will start breeding, my breeding will always be very small scale and every combination will be a result of a careful and long-term consideration. I will focus on both physical and mental health and I find it very important to maintain the hunting abilities of the toller and do my best also to improve its working skills. I wish that the toller will also in the future remain as an active and versatile hunting and working dog because that is what it is actually bred for and also what makes it a happy dog. Besides that I still think that every toller should get to live the everydaylife as an important familymember. Contact us: Katja Stoltzenberg 20540 Turku Finland phone: +358 50 307 3643 Member in the following organisations: - Finnish Nova Scotia Duck Tolling retrievers - Finnish retriever organisation - Auran Nuuskut, a local retriever organisation - Finnish kennel club