CRUFTS 2010
The number of dogs entered for Crufts shows a three percent drop from 2009 to 21,947 from 22,637, which of course was the third highest entry in the history of this revered show. The major supporter of the show this year is the largest furniture maker in Europe (DFS) and marks the first time that a food company has not held this prestigious role. There is a two or three year understanding between the owners of Crufts, the Kennel Club and DFS for this support to continue. This could have a major impact on shows in the States as organizations other than food companies may pick up on the advantages of sponsoring shows here as well. Certainly the DFS relationship with Crufts should prove a positive arguing point for American clubs in pursuing all companies related to the dog or not as possible sponsors. Getting back to the entries, the drop is anything but disastrous since it is in the gamekeepers’ classes that the drop has been the most significant – 17 percent down from 2009. This is due no doubt to the fact that all the dogs in these classes are working gundogs, many of which have been legally docked to help perform their duties. And of course in the UK docked dogs cannot now be shown where the public pays an entry fee! Yet another reason to oppose those so vehement in their opposition to docking. On the other hand entries in what the Brits call the “vulnerable” breeds, many of which we call low-entry breeds, have risen over those of 2009. That’s a most promising indication for the future. In the recent so-called “Independent Inquiry into Dog Breeding,” which was not so independent as far as these pages are concerned, dogs shows were highlighted as being a powerful lever for change insofar as the health and welfare of the dogs are concerned. It is through the rewarding and encouraging of responsible breeders and exhibitors and their healthy dogs in the show ring that the bar can be set for others to follow, states the Bateson report. But hasn’t this always been the case both in the States and the UK, one must ask? Certainly this has been true in most instances where the longtime and concerned hobby specialist breeder has been involved. Where many commercial breeders fall in these arguments and instances are about what reasonable men and women may argue. However, since AKC’s involvements of the last decade or so requiring visits and examinations of the premises of all breeders, both commercial and those who breed a large number of litters annually, there has been a marked and determined improvement in the concern for the health and welfare of all dogs whether commercially or hobby specialist bred. That few people can deny.

ONE FOLLY OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS
Inbreeding, linebreeding; whatever you want to call it is a hard sell to certain segments of the American public for sure and a total anathema to urbanized Brits in the UK as well. Emotion rules over reason in these cases as the matings of relatively close relatives among animals is regarded with the same taboo as among humans. But let’s face it, while the Kennel Club in the UK has stopped registering puppies from brother-sister and parent-child matings, Lord Bateson in his “independent inquiry” proposes taking this a step further and would ban combinations that many dog breeders and breeders of other livestock regard as often the most successful, such as grandparent-grandchild. Staying within ones own lines and breeding closer than most people would venture has been in the past a marked success for many a stockfamily. This is where the breeding of dogs has been a consuming passion and where the people involved have an encyclopaedic knowledge of bloodlines, and their faults and virtues. One is not referring to the puppy farmer who indiscriminately breeds litter after litter regardless of consequences but of the true breeder who when faults creep into a line eliminates those dogs from a breeding program. Dogs bred in this manner can be and frequently are, regardless of closeness of lines, outgoing, sociable, long-lived and healthy in-bred examples of their breed. In-breeding when properly applied is an excellent way to eliminate deleterious genes while maintaining high quality, healthy dogs and the desired breed type. And this of course is accomplished as well in every form of livestock from chickens to sheep to cows to horses. The problem of course is at least two-fold – most people refuse to consider dogs today as being livestock. They are family members subject to the same rules and philosophic concepts which guide the families thinking. The fact is that some of our inbreed lines are the healthiest dogs in the world because of the selective breeding involved. This message was delivered masterfully last week by Denise Flaim in her article written for DOG NEWS when she wrote:

“Purebred dogs are a link for us to where we have come from, to where we have been, to the generations on whose shoulders we stand. With modernity, the world has lost countless species of heritage sheep and cattle – and, irretrievably in the process, their gene pools. If and when those breeds teetering on the edge of extinction – Caspian horses and San Clemente goats, Milking Devon cattle and Hog Island sheep – are gone, we have lost a bit of who we are. They connect us to something bigger and more ancient. In these families of dogs that we nurture and cherish, we keep the flickering flame of history alive, from the wind-whipped solitude of the Scottish shepherd to the arduous trek of the Boer farmer to the genteel parlor games of the Victorian dowager.

We need to remind the world that purebred dogs are not just about a ‘look’ or the aesthetics of the show ring. The initial appeal may be based on appearance (do we not do this in selecting our human companions, as well?), but what secures our devotion to them is their character. Each breed has its own, impossible to capture in exact words, but obvious to anyone who has taken the time to know them even a little.

I cannot imagine the world without my breed … can you yours? This is the message that beats any animal-rights placard, and one we need to deliver, as eloquently and effortlessly as a pointer points, or a setter sets, or a Cavalier cuddles.”

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK
The February Board meetings are now posted and probably in The Gazette of March as well. Most of the language is the usual mysterious non-meaningful stuff – you know what we mean – Mr. So and So provided a report, Mrs. So and So participated in a meeting! But no one ever says what was in the report or what happened at the meeting!! Except when a vote is taken on a particular matter then the vote is given. The Financial Report by Mr. Stevens does give minimum specifics. Surprisingly there is a detailed conversation reported out of Executive Session. That’s a first for those Minutes as usually the only thing reported out of Executive Session are the results – if that – and not the conversations. It seems apparent that a particular message was delivered through this exercise perhaps to certain Delegates, perhaps to certain news reports. Whatever, this marked a decided departure from the normal routine. Candidly these pages were sufficiently surprised at this procedure that we wonder if in the future other conversations are to be reported out of Executive Session as well. Or perhaps this was an exception to Roberts Rules of Order which makes it illegal to report what goes on in Executive Session in the altogether. A new interpretation are these Minutes for that procedure for sure!!!