Success in Show Dogs

There's a whole group of individuals that I refer to as "the trained seal cadre." They gobble up seminars and national specialties like so many fishtheir goal being to get as many down as is possible in the shortest period of time. You see them at every national specialty, observing under any and all and sitting in on every seminar, regardless of who might be presenting.

Serious students of dogs aren't remotely interested in spending the day listening to someone read a breed standard. Nor are they about to observe under someone who is a graduate of the seal cadre. Usually the serious folks have very busy lives and can only afford to be away from their duties when the learning experience is going to be a meaningful one.

If one's goal is simply checking boxes, it doesn't seem that a whole lot is going to be absorbed and if the lessons haven't been learned, how then does the person judging decide upon which dogs are worthy of consideration in a lineup? Easyopen any of the seemingly thousands of magazines published each month and memorize who's who. It's simplewho can criticize putting up the dog that everyone else seems to be recognizing? There's probably nothing wrong, perhaps even a lot right, about said dog. But it sure as he'll doesn't say much for the individual as a judge or for our judging process.

The current situation is not good. In fact, it's terrible, and it discourages the backbone of purebred dogsthe folks who knock themselves out and spend every dime they can afford on trying to produce good dogs. Some of the dogs they breed will have the advantage of expert handling and mega-advertising budgets. That's fine, they deserve everything they earn. However, that doesn't account for all our good dogs, and something must be done to reverse the trend of their being overlooked.

There's just one group of individuals within our sport that can help break us out of the box we've locked ourselves into, and it sure as he'll isn't the trained seals!

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