About Us

Jean N. Gauchat

Jean N. Gauchat

Summerwind has been successfully breeding, raising, training and showing dogs for 30 years.

Summerwind Canines is located in Sacramento, California. We use an easy, positive training approach that your whole family can understand.

All of our dogs live in the house and puppies are raised underfoot. We are working toward our ideal collie, pom and keeshond, always with health as a first priority. We are active members of Nor-Cal Keeshond Club, Keeshond Club of America, Nor-Cal District Collie Club, and Collie Club of America.

Image
Image

Jean N. Gauchat


I grew up on a dairy farm in Wisconsin. I loved being involved with all of the animals we had there. I especially loved the dogs we had. We called the farm Little Swiss Acres! My mother and I moved to California when I was 9 years old. On the trek to California I asked my mother if we could get a collie once we were settled in Woodland. We interviewed with JoAnne Hawkins who was the breeder of Jolee’s Collies and purchased a tri-color rough male. You could say it was all downhill from there and that I started in the dog fancy in 1988. Socker and I started training together in 4-H. My first all-breed show was the Sacramento Kennel Club dog show. Somehow we managed to go Best of Variety over the specials and attended the Herding group! I learned how to groom, train and handle dogs all the while staying as much as I could with JoAnne. We traveled to out of state shows and local shows together. She let me practice with all of her collies and shelties. I even worked part time at the local pet store in town for years with JoAnne!

As I grew up I obtained a Belgian Tervuren, from Carmen Helgesen. She was an all-breed handler—I would love to learn different handling tricks from her to use in the ring. Carmen is the person that introduced me to Keeshonden. I am forever grateful as I truly think this is the best breed known to man! As soon as I graduated high school I went to college to finish the Veterinary Tech program. This has been very valuable in what I do today. I feel like God has blessed me greatly with a gift of working with animals. I love to do puppy socialization classes and continue to teach group classes to this day.

I feel very blessed to breed, show and campaign the top Keeshonden in the country. It began with winning our first Keeshond National and multiple bests in show on our home bred dog, Rumor. The photos in the gallery are just a few of the different breeds we have shown, winning nationals, finishing champions, campaigning to best in shows and top rankings in the country. I feel so honored to work with and show so many special dogs.