About the Kennel
The whole story began somewhere in my childhood, when I came into direct contact with domestic animals. Where I grew up, in the Budapest metropolitan area, my parents and grandparents kept dogs and cats, and we even had a poultry yard. One of my grandfathers also had pigeons, which lived in the attic and could breed freely. They went up only occasionally to take a handful of squabs to cook a tasty soup from them. Until one day I noticed that the existing pigeon family had “brought down” with them, during one of their daily circles above the house, a pigeon that was unknown to me but certainly had a special color and appearance. According to my grandfather, this is a common story in the life of a pigeon family: they may bring in a tired carrier pigeon, or a pigeon that belongs to another loft. As it later turned out, this was a female “Monor Tumbler.”
After a few months, her offspring also appeared in the yard, and to my great surprise I realized that these were descendants of the new hen—because all of their distinctive external traits, their special plumage and color, were inherited from their mother. This sparked my interest so much that at the age of 12–13 I became interested in animal breeding. I watched the chicks hatching in the poultry yard and how their color and shape changed compared to their parents. Then I also saw what suffering a dying young animal can go through, and how depressing the sight of their passing can be, and I gave up on building a breeding career. So I turned toward another field close to my heart: horticulture—so much so that after elementary school I attended a school for ornamental plant cultivation. Later I graduated as a horticultural instructor at the GATE teacher-training faculty in Gödöllő. After a long entrepreneurial career related to horticulture and trade, I currently teach in Veresegyház, at the country’s largest public education institution, in an elementary school.
I must have been around 16, in my high-school years, when one afternoon they screened the then newly released and hugely successful film “101 Dalmatians,” which captivated me so much that I was infected with it for life. The characteristics of the Dalmatian breed shown in the film appealed to me so much that now (after 30 years with the breed) I am sure that whoever drew it knew the breed—and may even have kept Dalmatians—because the film portrayed the breed completely realistically, including the individuality of different dogs. Then I was 20 years old when, in 1988, I bought my first Dalmatian from what was considered the most successful Hungarian kennel at the time, the Hadrianus Dalmatian kennel, and two years later my first litter was born in 1990—this is when the founding of the Falcatus (pronounced “fahl-kah-toos”) Dalmatian kennel is dated.
Where did this name come from? My first dog, a female, had the registered name Hadrianus Aphrodite—so the ancient influence was there. Then, because I attended a horticultural school, I had to learn plant names in Latin as well, and from here comes the word and sound “falcatus,” and the name Hadrianus also influenced me a bit. Back then I read a lot about the breed; it was often mentioned as a “pack” dog (in Hungarian “falka,” which sounds like the pronunciation of “falcatus”), and slowly the idea took shape. As a result of these naming influences, we became the “Falcatus” Dalmatian kennel.
For me, the Dalmatian has become part of my life; this fact defines my everyday life. I could identify with its never fully satisfied need and desire for movement. I have the same need—to be able to exercise outdoors. I satisfy my daily need for movement with them; this gives me the strength and endurance to carry out my work and tasks well, precisely, and in a balanced way. Keeping my body, soul, and well-being in good condition is something I also achieve through the Dalmatian’s element: movement.