Dog showing is an interesting sport, or game, or as many call it, a fancy. It brings together a melting pot of people who are rather obsessed with dogs and in particular their breed and their dogs. It showcases fabulous dogs and you get to meet friends who share your crazy passion. It sure is something which can be tons of furry fun!
There are numerous stories of heroic canine rescues and dogs that either have been trained or have learned to detect seizures, low blood sugar and some forms of cancer among other health issues. We all know that dogs are sensitive to our emotions. If there is tension and stress in the house or happiness, dogs respond. If you are having a good time, the dog always gets in on the fun. If you are feeling down or having a bad day, they seem to know and will put their head on your lap or a paw on your knee. If you are angry, they know to stay out of your way. But what about all those occasions when dogs do something intuitively, in many cases, things for which they have never been trained or taught? There are times when dogs display a “sixth sense” that is downright spooky.
Everyone has heard the phrase “the wind at your back”. It has been used by sailors and those struggling to succeed for decades. The idea is straightforward.
Elliott Weiss remembers when he first met Julia Gasow. It was 1967, and he was handler Ted Young, Jr.’s apprentice. Gasow, known as “Julie” to her friends, had been breeding her Salilyn English Springer Spaniels for three decades.
This issue of The Canine Chronicle celebrates the Sporting Group, an impressive collection of breeds developed to do a specific job over a specific terrain. Looking at the array of sporting breeds today, we can’t help but be amazed by the courage, perseverance, and creative eye of the breed’s founders.
We live in challenging times. Our best efforts are needed to rise to this challenge, navigate our way through the maze, and successfully find the way out. Judges face these dilemmas in ways as individual as they are themselves. Read these thoughtful responses. Try to walk in their shoes. Could you?
In 1935 he became involved with bringing in a fairly new breed just gaining recognition by fanciers, the Norwich Terrier. Looking back, in 1962 he wrote that in the fall of 1935 while in England he received a letter commissioning him to purchase a Norwich Terrier in whelp.
I recently inherited hundreds of classic and antique dog books – from breed books to instructional manuals and illustrated references.
Working breeds come into this deal facing very long odds. Really, the bar is set impossibly high before they lift a paw. Here’s a perfect example, “The Saint Bernard shares with the Newfoundland the honor of being the only two breeds of dogs whose special mission and characteristics are the saving of life, in contradiction to all other breeds which more or less, lie in the direction of destruction.” What!! In other words, if you enter life in this category don’t even think about loafing around the house doing dog stuff. That belief was so totally ingrained in purebred lore that even a hard bitten veteran of the sport like Theo Marples couldn’t resist the ideological claptrap pervading the histories of these breeds.
