Shandong Pingyi's Gao Zhaowei and His Wife Make a Success of Tibetan Mastiff Breeding

    "I just love dogs; our home has never been without a dog. Keeping dogs is purely for fun and to guard the house. Back then, when someone mentioned the name Tibetan mastiff, it was the first time I had ever heard of it, let alone breeding Tibetan mastiffs to make money. Now look, breeding Tibetan mastiffs has become our family's main business for getting rich." Said eagerly by 40-year-old Gao Zhaowei and his wife Sun Fumei, who live in Dongleli Village, Zhongcun Town, Pingyi County, Shandong Province, at the foot of the Yimeng Mountains. 

    The Tibetan mastiff is a world-famous large fierce dog, originally from China's Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, and is known as the "Oriental Divine Dog." Speaking of how Gao Zhaowei and his wife got into breeding Tibetan mastiffs, it was in the spring of 2007, when a relative of his far away in Tibet came home to visit and brought them 4 young Tibetan mastiffs. Due to a lack of breeding experience, plus the puppies being temporarily unaccustomed to the local climate and environment, the breeding did not go smoothly. Within 10 days, 1 puppy died, but this did not shake his determination to raise Tibetan mastiffs. He called his relative to ask questions, bought more than 10 books on Tibetan mastiff breeding to study, and even specially hired a technician from Beijing at a high salary. With the careful feeding of the couple, the 3 puppies had basically grown into adult Tibetan mastiffs. That winter, the two Tibetan mastiffs, just over one year old, bred 13 Tibetan mastiff puppies. Looking at the lively and lovely Tibetan mastiff puppies, Gao Zhaowei and his wife smiled. In April 2008, the 10 five-month-old Tibetan mastiffs were all bought by a big boss from Linyi at 3000 yuan each. With technology and profits, Gao Zhaowei and his wife began to expand their breeding scale, investing more than 100,000 yuan to build a Tibetan mastiff breeding base covering more than 500 sq m.

    "They are the most attuned to human nature. They are fierce and tall, but extremely loyal to their owner." After 2 years of raising Tibetan mastiffs, Gao Zhaowei and his wife had already formed an inseparable bond with them. Speaking of their connection with Tibetan mastiffs, Gao Zhaowei cheerfully told a little story: "That was in August 2007. I rode a motorcycle home after buying more than 300 jin of duck meat from the county town. Just as I entered the door, I accidentally tipped the bike over and it pinned my left leg. One Tibetan mastiff desperately broke its chain and ran out, grabbed the bike with its mouth, pushed it away and saved me. A while ago a customer offered 120,000 yuan and I did not sell it. No matter how much this Tibetan mastiff is worth, I will never sell it." When Gao Zhaowei and his wife started in the dog-breeding business 2 years earlier, they did not even know what kind of dog a Tibetan mastiff was, but now the Tibetan mastiff breeding center he built is well known near and far in the local specialty breeding industry, and the Tibetan mastiff has also become the "golden key" that opened the door to his entrepreneurial success.

    According to Gao Zhaowei's wife Sun Fumei: "Breeding Tibetan mastiffs has brought us considerable economic benefits. A young Tibetan mastiff can generally sell for 3000 yuan, and a good one for 5000 yuan. Don't be fooled by how fierce Tibetan mastiffs are; they are famously loyal to their owners and willing to work without complaint. They are actually not hard to raise. They only need to be fed once a day, averaging only 6 yuan a day. A Tibetan mastiff does not truly reach adulthood until after two years, and an ordinary Tibetan mastiff will breed at one year. Tibetan mastiffs are divided into lion heads and tiger heads, and their bodies are relatively tall. A purebred Tibetan mastiff has a large head, a highly protruding forehead, large, thick ear flaps held close to both sides of the cheeks, deep-set eyes in a triangular shape, and black-yellow pupils"... Speaking of the standards for purebred Tibetan mastiffs, Gao Zhaowei and his wife spoke with great fluency. We saw that the breeding base has as many as 5 Tibetan mastiff breeds, with 12 adult Tibetan mastiffs and 30 young Tibetan mastiffs. At present, Gao Zhaowei and his wife's Tibetan mastiff breeding has attracted many dog lovers from Jiangsu, Hebei, Henan and within the province to visit and buy. Business is very brisk, with an annual income of more than 100,000 yuan.