Having lived with dogs for most of my life I sadly lost both my girls - Sophie, a Doberman and Yaila, a Great Dane within a few months of each other during 1995.

Not feeling able to look into a smooth faced dog at that time I researched various breeds and decided that maybe an Italian Spinone would be the dog for me. I contacted a breeder, Liz Shaw of the Sentling kennel and subsequently took a Spinone bitch – Sentling Bel Paese or Zeta as we called her.

Whilst making visits to Zeta prior to her being old enough to leave her mother I met this large white and orange dog the likes of which I had never seen before. He was so gentle but solid and huggable. The sort of dog for a child to grow up with and share secrets and troubles with. It was love at first sight – as many people who met this gentle chap will tell you because he had the same affect on them too. It was of course Tango the Bracco Italiano that Jonathan and Liz Shaw worked.
Liz & Jonathan imported the first Bracco Italiano into this country during the 80’s having been spellbound by the grace, movement & ability of the breed while visiting Italy.

Anyway that was it for me, I just had to have a Bracco and luckily was offered a dog puppy a year later from the Sentling kennel and Elmo (Sentling Orvieto) joined Zeta and Arnold (Min W/H Dax) in our home.

Elmo did well in the show ring (although in those days we hade to travel as far as Malvern for even an open show in Import Register) bearing in mind we are from Kent, that is no short hop.
Sadly, at 10 months old, Elmo was ‘mugged’ at a champ show. When he came to the dog was gone but there were several people around wondering how he was. Elmo had forgotten the other dog and transferred his fear to the people wanting to help. This had an ongoing effect and although we tried everything we could think of to help him he never got over the shock and eventually just lived out his years quietly at home with the family.

In 1999, via a very ‘roundabout route’ we took home another Bracco puppy, Carenage Tuscany del Braccanza a chestnut bitch puppy who became our beloved Dora.

As a puppy she was the usual little pickle, getting up to whatever she could encouraged by our other dogs who just melted into the background when any human appeared on the scene and left Dora to take the blame! Dora, along with some others from her litter was very shy and nervous with strangers. Having dealt with Elmo and his problems with people we felt we had a good idea of how best to help her overcome these difficulties and eventually our efforts paid off.

Dora did well in the show ring and grew to be a joy to live with, one of the best dogs we have ever had. After careful consideration we decided to try for a litter of puppies with Dora. At that time the UK gene pool was even smaller than it is now and we were very lucky to be allowed to take her to Holland to be mated with Valentino Di Ala D’Oro, one of the great continental dogs of his time and winner of the World Show. We will be forever grateful to Jaap Muller and Tina Steffens for their help and support, before, during and after this union. These two people are a mine of information regarding Bracco Italiano which they share with others willingly. Jaap and Tina came to the UK in 2005 as speakers at the Bracco Society seminar for that year.

After an uncomplicated pregnancy Dora produced 8 beautiful puppies, 4 dogs and 4 bitches the day after Boxing Day in 2002. These puppies all went to great homes throughout the UK apart from the two which we kept. Gino (Braccanza Adorazione) and Della (Braccanza Mazzo di Fiore).
The second litter whelped by Dora were sired by Man in the Middle of Sentling (Franco) who was born in quarantine from parents on the continent. Franco is a wonderful working dog trained and living with June Laing in the Scottish borders. This mating produced 5 dogs and one bitch puppy.

Both Gino and Della have also had an impact on the breeding of Bracchi in the UK, Gino having sired puppies to approved bitches and Della having produced two litters. The first by Homstar Duccio (Lucca) owned by John and Jan Ingram and the second by Axel del Monte Alago , also a winner of the World Show. Axel lives in Italy with Bitte Ahrens and Pierluigi Polcevera at the Sobers kennel, well known as a long established greyhound kennel. Axel is the son of the well known Rivanna del Monte Alago owned by Gianpaolo Poggio.
After driving to Rome in January 2007 for a honeymoon between Axel & Della we were rewarded with just two puppies! Now coming up to one year old both Esta (Braccanza Callidora) and Cosmo (Braccanza Salvadora) have both been doing well in the show ring.
Esta remains here with us and Cosmo lives happily with his family, Lucy and Marcus Green.

Dora was awarded the Top Dam Award by the Bracco Italiano Society and also Top Brood Bitch by Dog World/Overhill kennels in 2006 and 2007, joint winner of the Lucca Trophy for best veteran in 2006 and the Braccanza kennel won the Top Kennel Award in 2006.

Following the breed being accepted on the breed register by the UK Kennel Club from January 2008 the Bracchi can at last go forward to challenge at shows both in the gundog group and from there to the Best in Show ring.