Did You Know? – Great Breeders Hold All The Cards!

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116 – August, 2024

By Michael Canalizo

The main tenet of the dog show was founded on the premise of “evaluating breeding stock”… Sure, it started out with Sportsmen comparing their hunting dogs because they thought theirs were better than the others. That sort of thinking is still in play to this very day, with a few thousand variations. But there is one thing that has never changed, and that is every dog has/had a breeder!

“Back in the day”…(Oh, how that statement has been used and abused) breeds were rewarded for being able to actually perform the function they were bred to do. Some breeders had insight to make adjustments in a breed to suit the job necessary. Harsher weather conditions had a visionary breeder blend a wire or heavy coated breed with a breed known for its great scenting abilities, so on and so forth. Records of how that was done and hope of keeping it a predictable trait lead to what we now call “the Standard”. Once dog shows started to attract more participants–coupled with the emerging changes in lifestyles–dogs would become “family pets” and they no longer had to “work for a living”. It’s hard to believe that the elegant, beauteous Afghan Hound floating around today’s ring, “back in the day” had to be a strong and fast capable hunter of game, covering hours over rough, rocky, and mountainous terrain as their “job”. Somewhere along the way it was forgotten that the Royal Family didn’t put their hounds in glorious coat and open up the palace gates and say, “run down dinner:. The ones that came back with “dinner” were the ones given preferential treatment and were prized for their abilities. A judge has to be able to wrap their mind around the fact it’s their job to envision if that animal is capable to perform their original function, but that will be the subject of another article.

Click here to read the complete article
116 – August, 2024

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