Husky News

She might not sing, but this award-winner may howl at the moon.

On his 19th birthday, David Qualls got a gift from his girlfriend and future wife, Sheila.
That gift, a Siberian husky puppy he named Igor, changed his life.

He soon gave up his idea of becoming an oceanographer and became a veterinarian. Today, the 1981 graduate of the University of Florida’s vet school operates the Dunn Avenue Animal Hospital in Jacksonville.

Meanwhile, for the past 33 years since they got married in 1974, David and Sheila Qualls have spent much of their spare time raising, training and showing Siberian huskies.

Some of their dogs have become champions.

The latest, 3-year-old Champion Indigo’s Hilltop Istate, who answers to the name Stacey, will be seen on television today during NBC’s telecast of last Saturday’s The National Dog Show Presented by Purina.

Stacey finished first in the associated Delaware Valley Siberian Husky Specialty competition, which qualified Stacey to compete in the working group at The National Dog Show. In the working group competition Saturday, she finished fourth.

The group winner was a Doberman pinscher named Agador. The overall winner was an Australian shepherd named Swizzle, who had won the herding group.

The telecast is scheduled to begin at noon, and Qualls said the working group competition will be shown first.

Sheila Qualls said what they love about Siberian huskies is the look of the breed and its personality.

“They are free-spirited and very independent,” she said.

Huskies were originally bred to pull sleds for trappers in Siberia, she said, and remain good sled dogs.

But they do well in Florida.

“They are very adaptable, very hardy,” she said.

They are also a highly social breed, “a pack breed,” she said. The Qualls have about 20 Siberian huskies who live in kennels at their home. Some compete, some don’t.

Sheila Qualls said they breed the dogs, though they rarely sell the puppies, keeping most themselves.

Stacey, who has been invited to compete at the prestigious Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show in New York in February, has won 16 of the 21 specialty shows for Siberian huskies she has entered. She has four best-in-show victories in all-breed competitions.

She’s not the Qualls couple’s first great champion. Champion Indigo’s Intity, known as Teeter, who died in 1988, had 20 best-in-show victories in all-breed competitions. And in the early 1990s, their Siberian husky Cindy won the breed competition at Westminster, which casual observers consider the Super Bowl of dog shows since it has taken place for 131 years and is shown live on television by USA Network.

Source: The Florida Times-Union