STORY OF TAMAKO
TAMAKO, the brave female Echigo Shiba Inu, twice dug her bleeding paws through deadly avalanches to save her hunter owner, Karita Yoshitarō, in 1934 and 1936. Unlike Hachikō's patient waiting, Tama-kō's loyalty was active heroism: she frantically rescued two men the first time and her owner alone the second, turning snow red with her injured front legs. Born around 1929–1931 in old Kawauchi Village (now Gosen City, Niigata), this rugged ~8 kg Echigo Shiba variant embodied the fierce, agile spirit of regional Japanese hunting dogs.