This is Saiga and this picture illustrates exactly who she is: Independent, stoic, serious - a dog with a mind of her own. In this picture, Saiga is in a yard full of other dogs, her siblings, mom and dad. She is not apart from them because they've chased her away. Saiga just doesn't have much interest in puppy nonsense. Here, at only 5 1/2 weeks, Saiga is very much her own dog, wandering about fearlessly investigating her world, aware of and guarding her fence, no use for the "confidence in numbers" tendency practiced by most young puppies in wide open spaces. Saiga was born confident and drivey, born an alpha female.

Here's Saiga at four weeks of age. The human in the picture is Nick, our friend and odd-jobs-guy. Nick has gone into the yard to mend the fence. All the other puppies are focused on the baggy blue jeans, while Saiga watches his face and hands - an alpha dog characteristic. Just before mom arrived, Saiga had been barking at Nick, trying to drive him back, raising the alarm that there was someone trespassing in their yard... In contrast, her siblings congregated in careless play around Nick's feet.

Seeing it was only Nick that Saiga was raising the alarm over, Georgia leaves, glad to have a break from the puppies, and Nick gets to work.

With mom gone, Saiga assumes she's in charge now. As the other puppies climb all over Nick wanting to be pet, Saiga launches an attack - playful yes, but what's the game she's playing? The game is called "guard the pack," again, an alpha dog tendency seen even at a young age.

At four weeks of age, note how the other puppies run behind mom. Saiga seeks to head mom off at the pass. Look at the pic; you can see the little alpha girl Saiga is more confident, and exhibits higher prey drive in play. It's her yard, and she feels no need to follow anyone's lead. The yard mom and puppies are in is more than 3,000 square feet. Saiga patrols every inch of it alone, and barks at the fence at sights, smells and sounds in the distance. By comparison, the other puppies have ventured onto about half of the yard, never been more than 30 feet away from mom or dad, and don't bark at anything distant unless mom or dad start it.

Time for another bath... Notice three puppies standing compliantly - been through this before, ain't fun, but there's no escaping it. Let's just stand here and deal with it.

Over on the left, notice Saiga's rear legs and tail, as she stands up on the edge of the tub trying to get out. The other puppies are really not that much less mentally developed at this point, just more compliant. Saiga's attitude: To heck with this, I'm outa here! - An alpha dog mentality.

Sorry about the picture quality, go ahead and try to get good pics of never-sit-still puppies!

Here's Saiga at about 15 weeks, in a natural stacked position. That's a pretty dog. At this age, Saiga's alpha female ways have begun to be tempered a bit. Almost all our litters stay together 12 weeks, for that very reason, to smooth them out behaviorally, give them a bit of maturity, and now at this age, Saiga has become much more polite, less rowdy, less apt to start trouble with siblings. Alpha dogs are only trouble makers if you allow them to be. Saiga is an all around pleasant dog to be around, for other dogs and humans alike.

This is the beautiful Saiga dog still youthful and not yet begun to really fill out. I can't remember how old she was in this shot so I won't try to guess, but well under a year and still just a puppy.

Notice that Saiga has retained her perfect structure. Dogs don't always do that. Few things will make you crazier than having a puppy that's just perfect in every way, start getting sloppy as it grows. Not the case for Saiga, who is very correct from nose, to tail, to nice tight toes. She's just a gorgeous girl.

Here's Saiga with Maria. As you can see, Saiga is a sweet and spoiled house dog at the moment, who loves to just lay around and snuggle.

Now here's Saiga looking a bit more like a young adult bully type American Bulldog. You can't say that dog ain't pretty...

This pic was taken just before I sent Saiga to her new show home. Hopefully she'll one day become another Blasco Family Bulldogs© Champion American Bulldog.

Here's a shot of our pretty Saiga dog at her new home, in training for her upcoming show debut.

Saiga is not some lay-about dog, to be trotted into a show ring puffed up with food weight. Saiga is the real deal, a mountain bred Blasco Family Bulldogs© American Bulldog, who grew up running acres. This girl doesn't gasp and snort for air on hot days, out in some little concrete kennel, looking and acting more like an Olde English Bulldogge than a traditional American Bulldog. Regardless of our girl's smaller size and bullier good looks, Saiga is an athlete, with the efficient, high speed metabolism of a real live southern catch dog. Saiga is ready and able to work (in any weather, any temperature, on any terrain), and real American Bulldogs look best when they've got the hard, cut up muscles of running dogs.

Many folks can't tell the difference between the high water content muscles of food weight and fat, and the rock hard working muscles of a born and bred athlete. Here's a tip, don't look at the bulge of the muscles, look at the cuts. Any well fed bully bred dog can have what looks to be bulging muscles, but it's the depth and the frequency of the cuts in the muscles that clearly distinguish well bred working dogs from pretty posers. Another tip is whether or not the dog's stomach is high tucked and tight, or a bit thicker and showing little muscle tone. A well bred working dog is higher tucked, and shows muscle tone in the stomach region.