Where The Buck Stops

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338 – January/February, 2022

By Chris Robinson

President Harry S. Truman had a sign on his desk during his administration. It said, “The buck stops here.” He meant it as a reminder to himself and the world that there was no one else to whom responsibility could be passed for decisions, large and small. While something might circulate around the government for awhile, when it finally reached the Oval Office, the president, whoever he was, had to decide.

The same can be said for the people judging dogs in the conformation ring as well as those folks who breed and own show dogs. The judges are the ones who have to decide whether the whims of fashion are going to be allowed to change breeds to the point where they are not physically capable of doing the job the breed was intended to do, or make it very difficult for that breed to do its historical work. The breeders and owners have to decide whether it’s right for the breed to include dogs that have no instinct, desire or ability to do what the breed was meant to do in the breeding population.

It is no big secret that for many breeds, show ring fashions have not been positive. As certain aspects of conformation became fashionable in the show ring, little thought has been given to how these fads can adversely affect the dog’s ability to do its work. For some breeds, the extreme whims of fashion by dog show people have combined with an almost total disregard for the breed standard by people whose primary interest is field work. When this has occurred, it has created such stark differences between “field” and “show” types that the two barely seem like the same breed. The end result for many of these split breeds is that a conformation championship, and a Championship or even a Master or Excellent title in the field or the herding arena for the same dog have become virtually impossible to achieve.

Indeed, one need look no further than two of the most popular sporting breeds for proof. The last dual champion Labrador was in 1984 and English Springer Spaniel fanciers have not had an American dual champion since the mid-1930s. This dearth of dual champions has occurred despite almost total dominance by labs and springers in the realm of retriever and spaniel field trials.

Click here to read the complete article
338 – January/February, 2022

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Posted by AnthonyA on Jan 17 2022. Filed under Current Articles, Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.