HELPING THE MONGOLIAN NATIVE DOGS TO COME BACK TO THEIR HOMELAND AND NOMADIC LIFE 

To this day and just like centuries ago, herders and nomads of Mongolia relied on this special relationship with the faithful partner into keeping safe their animals. Because they literally mean the life of their family, the nomads learned how to appreciate and love their guardian dogs. Not only they are amazing at sharing and reading our emotions, but also will keep forever their duties at heart to their last day of life. The Bankhars are the symbols of this human/Nature relationship, when they all depend to one another. The trust, the work they put out together will result in having a successful life. That is why it is crucial to keep the inherited tradition alive today, even more so with the biggest lifestyles the nomads of Mongolia are facing, including the change in weather, but also the urbanization of our civilization.

Today we are really proud to work on these fundamental goals with families at the countryside. We would like to help and develop this incredible friendship with the man and the dog, and make them strive together to achieve a simple - yet a beautiful - life. Our main goal is to help herders who didn’t have access to this great partnership with the Bankhar to get a chance to develop it, and keep the growth of new generations of the endemic dog. Not only benefit from having, using and securing their lives with the Bankhars, but creating a whole new life for generations to come, for other families, and to keep the traditions and culture or Mongolian Nomadism alive. For that, we are working on 3 different phases with few families and partners like the Arslan “Mongolian Native Dog Breeding Club” to make this project a reality.

There we identified the need for working dogs to a young family we now are proud to work with, and being neighbors to one another - the family of Donkhor. 
We made this partnership alive with the Arlsan Club, and explain our dedication to the nomadic family, and brought 2 Bankhar puppies to Arkhangai. 1 female and 1 male became part of the Donkhor’s family very quickly.
Becoming the pillars of the Mongolian nomadic lifestyle, we introduced them to the family with the upmost respect, celebrating this event with a very important ceremony, involving the official documentation of the dogs lineage from the Arslan club, bringing food, advices, and the traditional Mongolian blessings with he use of the “Khadag” the silk scarf symbol of purity, goodwill, compassion and sign of a good fortune.

At that time, it is also a natural selection process for the dogs just like it used to be for all the ancient breeds, where only the toughest dogs would live a strong life and survive their first winter days. Unfortunately for our family, 1 puppy did not made it to pass its first days after the birth, due to excessive cold winds and drop in temperatures to negative 50 degrees Celsius around that time. In order to support the family and ensuring the other puppies would also grow strong, we stepped in and built a wooden home for the dogs, just outside of the family’s Ger, for them to remain warm on those terribly cold days. We believe we are connected to the existence of this generation, and will help the family with our support until they can fully be out of danger. Following the winter, we are happy to announce that the family kept strong a successful new generation of healthy puppies - 2 males and 1 female. Donkhor’s neighbors and good friends who did not own a Bankhar themselves received the female puppy dog at the beginning of 2022 to start helping them into their nomadic journey.

As this area is very wild, during the winter months many wolves go down the Rocky Mountains in search for easy prey that the nomads livestock provide. And unfortunately for Donkhor’s friend named Altanhundaga, his animals appeared to be attacked as early as 9pm, not giving him a chance to gather all his animals for protection during the night. There is here a real need for protection, and once again the Bankhars are part of the solution. As they already owned the female puppy from the second generation, we decided we could help by providing them a male puppy of the same age (now 3 months old), in order to bring to life their own lineage of shepherds dog for protection. Until they are growing strong enough however it is the entire responsibility of Altanhundaga to protect and care for his livestock facing the treats of the wolves. We traveled from the Capital back to the Yak Valley this early March 2022 in order to make this happen, and organize the ceremony at Altanhundaga’s winter campsite, for this new puppy to find home. We have met with the beautiful family, with his wife Nandinbileg and their 3 children, 2 of them being old enough to study at the Tsakhir village’s school. By accepting the puppy, their promised to help continuing the project of developing and breeding the Bakhars into the region, for both their family and maybe in the future help others the same way.

Gobi Mountain Lake and the Bankhar dog breeders who has identified the bankhars using DNA testing and has isolated these dogs for breeding the next generation of genuine working Bankhar guardian dogs.