About us

We are Hanno and Rachel Dijkhorst and we live with our daughter Charlotte, our son
Valentijn and our dogs in a small village called Maarn,
located in the beautiful area of the Utrechtse Heuvelrug, fully surrounded
by woods and historical estates.
Hanno started off with the pembrokes, under his kennelname “Hillberry”.
He bred his first litter in 2005. Several Hillberry Pems obtained different titles and many
Best of Breeds out of different classes. We are still building up our kennel by importing
beautiful but above all great natured dogs from world’s most famous kennels. Certainly
should be mentioned Ch. Whitepoint Orlando Bloom (Irl), bred by Laura Campion and
Ch. Llandians Royale Affaire, bred by Dianne Connolly (USA).
Rachel started with the Cardigans under the prefix “Waggerland”.
Her first Cardigan was Ch. Floatin’ Cyntaf in Blue, a beautiful Blue with a great character.
Rachel still cooperates with Mrs. Ph. Bitter-van Sliedregt from Floatin’ kennels in Holland.
Also should be mentioned, the late, Mrs. N. van Gelderen-Parker, she passed away in 2009,
was a good friend and a respectable breeder (kennel "Green Beret") and a well known judge
for many breeds but particularly both Corgi breeds.
Last but not least should I mention late Mrs. I. Maier from “Rarebit” kennels in Germany, who
sadly passed away in 2007. She was a good friend and bred Rachel's first bitch Ch. Rarebit
Black Cressida.
Ch. Dragonpatch Big Papa Foster was bred by Mr. and Mrs. D. Anthony in the USA, he is not
only a big winner, he is a true Cardigan, a once in a lifetime dog!
Some of our dogs are now and then having a great time with ther fostermums,
Carrie Russell-Smith and Lisa Croft-Elliot, we are very grateful for everything they do for them.
We both love the two breeds and when we came to live together we decided
to move on in Cardigans and Pembrokes.
Rachel is a FCI judge for the Dachshund (FCI group 4), Bearded-, Rough- and Smooth Collies,
the Old English Sheepdog, Border Collies and the Australian Shepherd (group 1).
She would like to judge the complete British section in group 1.
Group 10 has her interest as well. For years now she’s a member of the ASCN, the Dutch
breedclub for Australian Shepherds, the last year as president.
She also was a dogtrainer for almost 15 years at 2 dogclubs recognized by the
Dutch Kennelclub, teaching puppies, ringtraining, obedience and so on.
We show our dogs throughout Europe and are members of several breedclubs, including:
the NWCC, the original breedclub for both the Pembroke and Cardigan in Holland,
the Dutch Club for the Pembroke (NVP), the German Corgi Club, The French Corgi Club,
the Welsh Corgi League, the Cardigan Welsh Corgi Association (UK),
and the Cardigan Welsh Corgi Club of America (CWCCA).
We score all our dogs on hips and eyes, we tested our dogs on Degeneratieve Myelopathy and
von Willebrand (Pembrokes), we do this to know what is going on in our lines. For example,
talking about DM, we don't want to exlude carriers or affected animals from our breeding.
We think that it is very important to know what is going in a breed before you exclude dogs.
We are lucky to have some DNA-tests in the breed, therefore we can use the carriers and even
the affected dogs and within some generations we could breed clear dogs again.
As more DNA-tests will be available in the future, there's also a danger.
Eventually any dog will score bad on one test...
Testing is good but it al comes down to making the right breeding decisions.
In our opinion breeding should not become a "filling in exercise" by checking defects
or diseases. We think of breeding as an art and as a breeder we have a very clear picture or
wishlist in our head, therefore we keep trying to find better combinations everytime.
We think of our corgis as individuals with their strong and weaker points, if we use them within
our breeding program, we are convinced that they will contribute to the breed. Of course now
and then we will encounter deseases or abnormalities in our dogs and puppies, but that comes
with breeding and having dogs. Breeders who say that they don't have any problems
concerning health are hard to believe as every dog, every animal and any human being carries
bad genes and with every breeding or birth they might turn up.
Unfortunately we can’t guarantee that every dog is as sound as we would like him to be, but we
can guarantee how we will deal with such circumstances, we guide the puppy owners and their
dogs and by the contract of sale we have made financial agreements.
We now and then give our dogs for stud but we don't want our dogs te be used over and over
again. Regarding our own breed plans, we look at health, construction and temperament and
we are very internationally orientated.
Although we have a heated building for our dogs as well, most of them live with us in the house.
We only breed occasionally and we select our bitches and studdogs very carefully.
Our puppies are of course born and raised in our house.
Socialising our puppies and young dogs is very important to us, we think a good cardi
is one with a sound and even temperament.
Health and soundness come first, as comes behaviour!
We would also like to introduce our “kennelmanager” but above all our good friend Wilma.
Whenever we leave our house, Wilma takes care of our dogs.
She’s also great with our puppies. She lives next door and owns a Hillberry Pembroke
and a Waggerland Cardigan. We are very grateful for all her help as we could not do all this
without her support!
Thank you for visiting our website, we hope you will enjoy looking at our dogs
as much as we do!