Illertal Kennels would like to introduce you to the Deutsch Langhaar hunting dog, a somewhat rare versatile gun dog bred by hunters for the serious on-foot hunter.  Our kennel is located 30 miles outside of Denver, Colorado.

While growing up in southern Germany, I remember listening to numerous hunting tales as told by my grandfather, father, and others.  It had always been a dream to continue the hunting tradition of my family.  My grandfather leased a hunting property, known as a “revere” in Germany, which is still the common way to have hunting grounds there.  His property was on a stretch of the beautiful Iller River.  I developed my kennel name from that – “Iller” for the river, and “tal” meaning valley.  That is how Illertal Kennels began in the mid-1990’s.

After moving to the US in 1970, I was able to follow my hunting dreams, and begin hunting upland game and waterfowl.  Over the years, I hunted over many breeds of versatile dogs and other gun dogs and still had not found one I was passionate about.  In 1990, I was introduced to the “German Longhair Pointer” by a fellow hunter.  I remember returning from the hunt excited to have found the breed I had been searching for.  In 1991 we purchased our first 2 GLP’s. 

During the first few years I had them, I started to research their breeding guidelines, and quickly realized the Deutsch Langhaar had the best breeding program for me.  While they appear similar, they are two distinctly different breeds.  Deutsch Langhaars are bred to proven strict standards that have been in place since 1879.  At that point I realized I was on the right track and decided to investigate what it would take to import a Deutsch Langhaar from Germany.  In 1997 I imported “Muck Chamavia”, an awesome young dog.  Muck was the first dog imported into the USA that was certified to breed in the German system.  Unfortunately, we lost him in 1999 after a veterinarian in Kansas had to perform emergency surgery on him, and failed to use an IV during the surgery. 

Once he was gone, we decided to continue our quest for excellence, and in 1999 we imported 2 more DL puppies – “Lady vom Hulsebusch” in the spring and “Anton vom Haselrath” late fall.  Once again, we completed all breed certifications and in 2001, we finally had a pair of certified Deutsch Langhaars to start our breeding program with.  In October 2002 our “A” litter was whelped.  It produced the first American born DL litter to later have a pup (“Alf vom Illertal”) also become a certified stud dog.

In September 2002, Anton vom Hasselrath made the cover of the German quarterly Deutsch Langhaar publication, the Mittielungen.  It was quite an honor for us as well as our breeding program at Illertal Kennels.  In September 2002, I also made the first of many trips to Germany to attend their breed shows, tests and annual meetings.  I was able to attend the Schorlemer HZP, which is the fall test where the top 30 to 40 DL’s in Germany gather for a test.  It gave me an opportunity to witness first-hand what their breeding program really meant and from that point on, I was totally committed to continuing it in the US.  Watching the water, field and tracking work of dogs still under 2 years of age was impressive.