First dog show as spectator

[Polydor]

I got to go to my first dog show to watch my sister in law show her keeshond (non sporting). Not a small show but didn’t seem to have a huge number of dogs but did have a bunch of professional handlers there.

Sister in law had the only keeshond so automatic entry to group where she was up against pretty stiff competition. Bulldog won over one of the top standard poodles in Canada. This is the first year and first dog that my sister in law has shown so she’s still learning and her dog ( well actually a female) only just turned 1 this week. She’s doing a lot on her own and seems to be having fun with the fluff ball

I had fun watching the other groups in particular the herding class. And i seem to have a good eye since I picked the top 2 - german shepard and Bouvier des flanders. Sooo want a bouvier now! Gorgeous dog!

And now having fun reading through the breed standards for different dogs so i’m ready for tomorrow

One question: dogs are clearly mainly marked on conformation and gaits ( everything shown at a “trot”?) but does trainability/behavior come into play as well? Just seemed like some dogs were always jumping on handlers. And not just young dogs either.

I’m taking lots of photos so will try and post some soon.

P.

[Donkaloosa]

The judges like to see personality, so a dog who may jump on the owner at the end of their pattern isn’t really a problem. The dog needs to behave during the pattern so that the judge can get a good look at how the dog moves. And the “trot” is the best way to see if a dog is moving evenly, has good movement, etc. — and it would be hard as heck to keep up with a big running dog anyway! Most of the dogs love showing and know when they are being judged, and they are excited — and showing off! — so they may jump a little but are all business when they need to be.

Whats interesting is to watch a ring full of dogs and you can see one of them clearly saying, “Me, I deserve to win!” When a dog is “on,” he’s just begging for the prize.

[LaurieB]

[QUOTE=Donkaloosa;7684030]
The judges like to see personality, so a dog who may jump on the owner at the end of their pattern isn’t really a problem. The dog needs to behave during the pattern so that the judge can get a good look at how the dog moves. And the “trot” is the best way to see if a dog is moving evenly, has good movement, etc. — and it would be hard as heck to keep up with a big running dog anyway! Most of the dogs love showing and know when they are being judged, and they are excited — and showing off! — so they may jump a little but are all business when they need to be.

Whats interesting is to watch a ring full of dogs and you can see one of them clearly saying, “Me, I deserve to win!” When a dog is “on,” he’s just begging for the prize.[/QUOTE]

^^ exactly.

Also, the trot is the best gait to check for soundness–the same way you’d trot a horse if that’s what you wanted to see.

[S1969]

Nothing is worse than showing “the dull dog”…the one that hates it and slinks around the ring with their tail down and looking miserable. So lots of handlers play with their dogs in the ring so that they are happy, and look happy. I’ve never really seen a judge take issue with an exuberant dog, and in fact, I know some handlers that have encouraged their dog to be a little naughty in the ring to show off their personality – sometimes allowing them to jump or bark at the end of the down and back. A spin and bark was apparently the signature move of one of my dog’s grand-sires.

Yes - the trot shows the type and the evenness of gait, the reach and drive, and topline in dogs. And depending on the standard, that should look different in various breeds.

Have fun and good luck to your sister in-law!

[Where_sMyWhite]

I love Bouvs - had them for over 25 years. Do or your sister still have the catalog that would have the Bouv’s registered name?? Just curious as a few of mine came from Edmonton.

[Mara]

Is there a good resource that can clearly explain all of the different levels of awards in dog showing? “Best In Show”, “Best In Group”, etc., I get. But then there’s “Winners Dog”, “Winners Bitch”, “Best of Winners”, etc.

Also would like to know how points are accrued and how many are needed before the dog gets a championship title.

[S1969]

[QUOTE=Mara;7684340]
Is there a good resource that can clearly explain all of the different levels of awards in dog showing? “Best In Show”, “Best In Group”, etc., I get. But then there’s “Winners Dog”, “Winners Bitch”, “Best of Winners”, etc.

Also would like to know how points are accrued and how many are needed before the dog gets a championship title. :)[/QUOTE]

Well, AKC has a page for this, but I don’t think it’s very helpful:

http://www.apps.akc.org/classic/events/conformation/counting_points.cfm

Basically you can think of the breed ring as two separate shows – points for dogs that are trying to become champions, and then a competition for the “best of breed” which usually includes dogs that already have finished a championship title.

Non-champions compete boys against boys, girls against girls. There are a bunch of different classes you could enter, like “Puppy Dog (boy) 6-9 months” or “Puppy Dog 9-12 months”, “Open Dog”, etc.

For every class, the judge awards 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc. Then, all the 1st place dogs (boys) compete for “Winners Dog”. The best one wins points toward their championship.

The same happens for bitches. Eventually there is a “Winners Bitch”. Then the judge compares the Winners Dog to the Winners Bitch and picks the better of the two – that’s Best of Winners.

That’s the thumbnail version. A dog needs 15 points to finish their championship, and points are based on how many dogs are entered. At least two wins have to be wins of 3 points or more (called a “major”)…this prevents someone entering their one show dog and their own two “pets” fifteen different times and earning a point each time.

[Polydor]

Where’s My White: Yup I can definitely have a look at the catalogue for you today at the show. I had heard of the breed but never seen one before yesterday and oh my Love them! Will try and get some more pics of him today as well.

Thanks for the info everyone! Keep it coming! Would love to hear more about the details the different titles and classes.

Hoping the weather clears up…looking like it is going to rain and the entire show is outside.

P.

[S1969]

Oh, should have mentioned my post above was for AKC Champions. I am not sure how the Canadian Championship works. I think it’s similar, but not sure of how many points.

[LaurieB]

[QUOTE=Mara;7684340]
Is there a good resource that can clearly explain all of the different levels of awards in dog showing? “Best In Show”, “Best In Group”, etc., I get. But then there’s “Winners Dog”, “Winners Bitch”, “Best of Winners”, etc.

Also would like to know how points are accrued and how many are needed before the dog gets a championship title. :)[/QUOTE]

I write a mystery series that is set in the dog show world (17 books so far!). I go into a fair amount of detail about how the judging works, especially in the first book, A PEDIGREE TO DIE FOR, which for the next day or two is available as a free ebook download from Amazon, Google, and possibily Barnes & Noble.

For more info, check out the link to my website below.

[Polydor]

Laurie : I found and downloaded your book last night though oddly it didn’t come up when I looked it up under your name. Only 2 of your books did but then when I clicked on your name all the rest of your books did.

Where’s My White: The Bouvier name is : Can Ch.Rocheuses Play Something Country at DND (born 9/5/2011)
Breeders: Michaelanne/Colton Johnston & H Silva

Ch Quiche’s Iron Man x Am Ch Rocheuses Pink Passion

The show was really fun and the sun did eventually come out. Lots of interesting dogs a lot that I had never heard of before ( the Lowchen and one I can’t spell but is a large mexican hairless). Wasn’t a huge fan of the Lowchens- seemed fairly cute if they didn’t get the lion cut. This show was also a booster show for them so there were lots of them out showing!

SIL went through to group since she was still the only Keeshund. Her dog was doing a random hitch when she trotted out. Did look better when she was in group. The judge also seemed to really like her and thought she was pretty cute. Coming from the in hand horse showing I would say she just needs more consistent training (overall and in ring- didn’t seem to fuss with the dog all that much in the ring and “on” in case the judge looked their way) but it is only their first year so that will come.

My fave the Bouvier won his group again but was beaten by a smooth standard dashund.

Question about the non sporting group. Why are the standard poodles in this group with a ton of small dog breeds ( toy and mini poodle I can understand) but the standards didn’t they use to hunt or retrieve?

Watching the junior handling classes was insanely cute. A couple of the dogs were clearly veterans. Puppy class had one puppy doing spins when trotting. hehe and one almost 1yrs old dog ended up stopping and rolling in the grass right in front of the judge.

We ended up watching the obedience trials as well and oh my those dogs are trained! So cool to watch and very much more my thing. Two mini poodles rocked it. Two big newfies were good. One was probably to chilled out , would do everything just at her own pace and slightly distracted. lol The handler kept trying to get her a bit more excited - didn’t work! lol Would have taken any of those two home.

Will try and get some pics up soon .

P.

[Where_sMyWhite]

Rocheuses is a breeder actually local to me (Colorado Springs). You can see their dogs often in the ring at Westminster… both the Bouvier and the OES (Old English Sheepdog).

Quiche’s is a fairly well known Canadian breeder…

Thanks for looking this up. Two of my Bouvs came from Nebadon in Edmonton.

[Anne_FS]

[QUOTE=Mara;7684340]
Is there a good resource that can clearly explain all of the different levels of awards in dog showing? “Best In Show”, “Best In Group”, etc., I get. But then there’s “Winners Dog”, “Winners Bitch”, “Best of Winners”, etc.

Also would like to know how points are accrued and how many are needed before the dog gets a championship title. :)[/QUOTE]

15 points are needed for a Championship. How many points you get depends on how many dogs are competing that day. Here’s the current point schedule for my area: http://images.akc.org/pdf/events/conformation/point_schedule/2014/Div2.pdf

The 15 points must be won under at least 3 different judges and there must be at least 2 “majors” (shows worth 3, 4, or 5 points. 5 is the maximum). IOW, you can’t win 1 point 15x and be a champion. Some of the points at least must come from enough competition to be worth a major.

Only the Winners Dog & Winners Bitch get the points.

So you have all these classes - Puppy, American-Bred, Bred By Exhibitor, Open, etc. Dogs and Bitches (males & females) compete only against their own sex at this point. Puppy Dogs, American-Bred Dogs, Open Dogs…Puppy Bitches, American-Bred Bitches, Open Bitches, etc.

Okay, so all those classes for the Dogs are judged. Then all the 1st place winners come back in the ring and the judge picks Winners Dog. He gets the points. He then picks Reserve Winners Dog. No points for him but just in case the WD gets disqualified you know who is the backup.

Then all the females are judged: Puppy, American-Bred, BBE, etc.

All the 1st place winners come back in and the judge selects Winners Bitch (gets the points) and RWB (Reserve Winners Bitch).

After this both the WD and WB plus any dogs already Champions come in and the judge selects Best of Breed. This is when the boys & girls compete all together. So say you have 3 female Champion Bouviers and 2 male Champions. They come in the ring all together along with the WD & WB and the judge picks the one in their opinion who is most correct of all of them. It can be any one of the Champions or even the WD or WB.

Say a female wins and gets Best of Breed. The judge will then look at all the males and choose Best of Opposite Sex. That way you know who the judge has selected as best female and best male that day.

If a male wins BOB the judge will look at all the females for BOS.

The last award is Best of Winners. You have the class dogs, right? The ones earlier who got Winners Dog & Winners Bitch. If one of them wins BOB they’re automatically awarded BOW because they just defeated the other Winners, right?

If not, say Champion Blowfish goes Best of Breed and Ch. Lady goes BOS. The judge then picks either the WD or the WB and says you’re BOW. The reason you want that is because say your bitch went WB but only got 2 points, but there were lots of dogs (males) entered that day and the WD got 4 points. If he goes BOW he keeps his 4 and you get 2, but if your girl beats him and goes BOW she’ll automatically be awarded 4 points. Not in addition to her own 2, but instead of.

[LaurieB]

@Polydor;7685403

Question about the non sporting group. Why are the standard poodles in this group with a ton of small dog breeds ( toy and mini poodle I can understand) but the standards didn’t they use to hunt or retrieve?

In the beginning there were only 2 groups: Sporting and Non-Sporting. The Standard Poodles were originally bred to retrieve but the two smaller varieties were developed as companion dogs. When assigning groups, all three Poodle varieties got lumped together under the same banner “companion dog”.

The Non-Sporting group has always been a bit of a catch-all group. Anything that doesn’t seem to really fit well somewhere else, ends up there.

I hope you enjoy the book!

[Polydor]

Thank you for the point explanation Anne! Followed most of it but do you get points if you win your group and/or best of show?

P.

[scruffy_the_cat]

And another question- what’s the point of Am-bred if most of our puppies are bred here? Why not just one Open class? Is it just a path to have better odds of getting in the BOV ring?

[Anne_FS]

[QUOTE=Polydor;7685608]
Thank you for the point explanation Anne! Followed most of it but do you get points if you win your group and/or best of show?

P.[/QUOTE]

You’re welcome.

Yes, IF another breed had more points.

Say your puppy Bouvier wins its class, then goes Winners Bitch for 2 points. She goes Best of Breed over the WD and over 5 specials (dogs that are already champions), so now she gets 4 points (I’m making up the point schedule because I don’t know how many Bouviers it takes to make 4 points, so that part is made up).

So she now has a 4 pt major and wow, lucky day! she goes into the group and lo and behold, she goes Group I. Even though her BOB win was worth 4 points there were huge numbers of Shetland Sheepdogs at this show and their competition was worth 5 points. So your dog’s point gain for this day is now 5 total.

But say she had her 4 points and wins the Group but no other breed had big entries, only 1 point, or 2 point numbers. If no breed earned more points in its entry, then your dog would keep her 4 points and not get 5.

[S1969]

[QUOTE=scruffy the cat;7685650]
And another question- what’s the point of Am-bred if most of our puppies are bred here? Why not just one Open class? Is it just a path to have better odds of getting in the BOV ring?[/QUOTE]

My understanding is that once upon a time there were so many imported dogs that it was difficult for dogs bred here to make it to the Winners Ring, and in an effort to increase American breeding programs, this class was created. (I am paraphrasing, and may be wrong, so don’t quote me!)

Today, though - yes, it is often used as a path to Winners without having to compete against certain other dogs. For example, if there is a huge class of Open Dogs and you know it’s very competitive, you might enter Am-Bred. In theory, it shouldn’t win you any points if your dog isn’t better, and some people think that judges rarely pick a winner from Am-Bred and avoid it.

I actually won my first major out of Am-Bred - a single entry - at a specialty, but I entered it because I didn’t want to compete against one of my dog’s own littermates. So in one show, I entered my dog in AmBred, and my friend entered 12-18 month dog; in the next one we switched (two shows in one day, two different judges). Maybe I got lucky…maybe just our day. I didn’t win the 12-18 month class later that same day.

[Anne_FS]

[QUOTE=scruffy the cat;7685650]
And another question- what’s the point of Am-bred if most of our puppies are bred here? Why not just one Open class? Is it just a path to have better odds of getting in the BOV ring?[/QUOTE]

Yep.

It is kind of a leftover from the early days when there were more imports.

The “serious” competitors will enter the Open class. Of course “Bred by Exhibitor” is cool because you’re showing your own breeding program, not something you bought, but GENERALLY SPEAKING, the Open Class is the most competitive.

However, in a breed that usually has huge entries people might enter American Bred because they feel their dog will get lost in the crowd in the huge Open class so they want it to get a good look and a better shot at winning. Then if you win AB, you go back in the ring for Winners with the other 1st place dogs, and your dog might get a better look, because in a huge Open class there might be 6 nice ones, but the Open winner will have already knocked them off for you and now you’re just going against him and the Puppy winners.

Myself, I never showed in AmBred but headed right for Open to show the judge “i KNOW my dog is good.” But again, I wasn’t showing a breed that had enormous Open entries, either.

I won a 5 point major once from the puppy class by going BOS over a bunch of Champion bitches. It was great.

And I also finished a dog once when competing against only Champions. I only needed 2 points to finish a nice dog and these really obnoxious people who showed a lot of dogs at every show & won a lot until I moved to their area pulled their class dogs. So no points as my dog could then only win 1 point because of the absentees. I asked them why they pulled and they said “we’re not going to help you finish a champion. You want to finish him, beat our specials.” (They also had a couple of Champions entered the same day). Ooooo, that ticked me off. But I smiled and said, “Okay, I will.” And we did. My dog won over their Champions, so their own Champions ended up making the points for my class dog when he beat them.

I don’t know why people are so mean. Happens everywhere.

[Polydor]

[QUOTE=Anne FS;7685733]
Yep.
I won a 5 point major once from the puppy class by going BOS over a bunch of Champion bitches. It was great.

And I also finished a dog once when competing against only Champions. I only needed 2 points to finish a nice dog and these really obnoxious people who showed a lot of dogs at every show & won a lot until I moved to their area pulled their class dogs. So no points as my dog could then only win 1 point because of the absentees. I asked them why they pulled and they said “we’re not going to help you finish a champion. You want to finish him, beat our specials.” (They also had a couple of Champions entered the same day). Ooooo, that ticked me off. But I smiled and said, “Okay, I will.” And we did. My dog won over their Champions, so their own Champions ended up making the points for my class dog when he beat them.

I don’t know why people are so mean. Happens everywhere.[/QUOTE]

That must have felt good! lol

What breed do/did you show?

P.