By Suzanne Lavigne
Our history is relatively young; it all started in 1989 in the Maritime province of New Brunswick. A gentleman by the name of Mr. Merville Landry, a French Acadian, was the first to introduce a new and rare breed in Canada , the Coton de Tulear.
Unfortunately, the only registry available in Canada at that time was with the Canadian Kennel Club (CKC); being a new breed it was unthinkable then to breed and register litters of new breeds in Canada that were not recognized by the CKC. Mr. Landry was not only the pioneer in introducing the first rare breed; he was innovatively behind the initiative of the Canine Federation of Canada (CFC).
In the course of the same year the newly created CFC recognized the Coton de Tulear as a breed having the entitlement to registration.
The next major undertaking of the CFC was to adopt the very first official description or "standard" governing the appearance of a few new breeds in Canada, the CFC adopted the standards written by the Fédération Cynologique Internationale (FCI), the World Canine Organization.
This was the foundation of an established certified registry for Canadian rare breeds.
