pet connection

I promise this is the end of my Westminster “a Scottish Deerhound won the Hound Group and his daddy was a field hound!” squee-fest.

But I couldn’t close this chapter without sharing with you all this charming video from a young girl with a bright future as a dog journalist, reporting from the benching area at the Garden, where she’s interviewing the dogs.

No, that wasn’t a typo. She’s interviewing the dogs. And Tiger, the Deerhound who won the Hound Group at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show Monday night? It’s at the end, and it’s worth the wait.

If you’re hoping to add a particular breed to your family and got a couple of ideas after watching the Westminster Kennel Club dog show, the folks at Petfinder want you to remember that some 25 percent of the 140,000 dogs looking for a forever home on the Web site are purebreds, or pretty close, anyway.

Incredible for a breed as rare as the Sussex spaniel, there are even three dogs available from Petfinder’s more than 12,000 affiliated rescue groups and shelters  who may well be related to Stump, the 10-year-old charmer who won the big show last night.  Yes, Petfinder reports three Sussex spaniels in their database. Along with all kinds of poodles, akitas, setters, greyhounds, terriers of all sorts and lots and lots of dogs whose breed is all their own.

Heck, Petfinder will even help you if you want to adopt a cat!

She’s the epitome of the phrase “growing up in dogs.” Sari Tietjen, tonight’s Best in Show judge, finished her first breeder/owner/handled champion when she was 7 years old. She continued that early start by breeding, showing and handling more than 14 different breeds by the time she was a young woman. She’s best known, however, for her Japanese Chin, a breed she’s had for more than 50 years. Tietjen no longer actively breeds or show but still keeps several Chin from her line. I interviewed her about the breed once, and she takes a philosophical and accepting attitude toward their imperial but impish manner: “They let you live with them as they run your household and everyone in it.”

Most recently, we briefly discussed her upcoming judging assignment for Westminster. Here’s a transcript of our interview:

Kim Thornton: When were you approached about judging Best in Show and how did you feel when you were asked?

Sari Tietjen: I was asked in March 2007. Needless to say, as someone who grew up in the sport and who has attended more Westminsters than I care to admit, I was thrilled and deeply honored.

Kim Thornton: Is there anything one can do to prepare to judge something like Westminster?

Sari Tietjen: Pray a lot! Seriously, at that level, you know you’re going to have some beautiful dogs in the ring. You have to keep your wits about you, judge each dog against its breed standard and then how it measures up against the other dogs in the ring. I expect it will be a very close, very difficult and very challenging assignment, but one that I will treasure for the rest of my life.

Kim Thornton: Are there any restrictions on what/where/when you can judge once you’ve been invited to judge BIS?

Sari Tietjen: The only restrictions are that you cannot judge whatever you are assigned at Westminster anywhere in the United States four months prior to the show. Also, as BIS judge, you are completely sequestered. You cannot attend any parties, other than the official Westminster dinner, nor the show until just before you step into the main ring.

Kim Thornton: How many other times have you judged classes or groups at Westminster?

Sari Tietjen: I have been fortunate to have judged Westminster nine previous times: six were breed judging assignments and three were groups–the Toy Group in 1984, Non-Sporting in 1996 and Toy in 2008. To say that I am thrilled is an understatement. To say that I, who believe so much in tradition and everything Westminster represents, am honored does not do it justice. It means so much more than that to me, a child of everything good about the sport and the dogs we love so much.

Tietjen is approved to judge all Sporting, Toy, Hound and Non-Sporting breeds. She has been writing about dogs for more than 25 years and is working on her fifth book. No, we didn’t talk about PETA protesters or the state of dog breeding or the decline of the AKC empire, but it would be interesting someday to see if she–and the other breeder/exhibitors/judges I speak to monthly if not weekly–would address them. But that’s a topic for another day.

Safe to say the bloggers here at the PetConnection enjoy watching the Westminster Kennel Club dog show. Yesterday was Christie’s day, and she was delighted to see a Deerhound from dual work and show lines win first the breed and then whole Hound Group. Today, Kim and I will pay just a little extra attention to results from the Toy and Sporting groups — and maybe even Phyllis will be doing so, too, since her shelter boy Dodger is a setter. One of my “dog-in-laws” is there with her dog Casino, but really, I just enjoy it all.

Of course, that enjoyment is always tinged with sadness over the state of our heritage breeds and the desire for change. Every breed — and Kim’s Cavaliers and my flatcoated retrievers are among the worst effected — has a breed-related health problem, or maybe several. Some breeds are flawed by design, their “breed standards” calling for an appearance that’s not compatible with normal canine activity (short faces causing breathing difficulties, long backs causing injuries that lead to paralysis, etc.). Other breeds look and act athletic and normal, but secret dangers lurk, such as the cancers that take wonderful dogs of many breeds in their most youthful, active years.

We know what caused these problems, and we know how to fix them.

For the dogs who are flawed by design, changes in the breed standards need to reverse the years of extreme selection for traits such as flat faces. And for all breeds, the closed gene pools systems of registrations that dictate mating within a breed only must be changed to allow for planned outcrosses to elminate health problems while continuing to preserve breed type.

The voices for these reforms are getting louder, and few are more constant in the call for change than Patrick Burns, a/k/a Terrierman. Patrick was given a copy of an independent veterinary-authored report commissioned by the RSPCA in the United Kingdom. The 76-page report explains how we got to this point, what the problems are, and possible solutions.

The report needs to be read by anyone who cares about the future of our heritage breeds. Check it out over on Terrierman.

Black Poodles are the devil in disguise. That was the thought that popped into my mind as I watched Surrey Spice and the Standard Poodle, Ch. Randenn Tristar Affirmation (call name Yes), during the Non-Sporting Group. Those eyes! That haughty expression! They just scream “I’m clever, I’m cunning, I have the potential to be deliciously evil.” All that and beauty, too. Yes, even with that clip. Or maybe because of it.

I took over Jerry’s recliner at 6 sharp, with Bella at my side and Harper in my lap, only to discover that we had missed the Hound Group and were now on to Terriers. My least favorite Group, with apologies to Terrierman. As an art lover, I can appreciate their sculptural appearance–artificial though it may be–but our personalities just wouldn’t mesh. I think I could live with a Skye or a Sealyham, though. Maybe.

I call my friend Tamela to make fun of the Bedlington’s name: Ch. Velvety Angel Eyes. We discuss the fact that judge Peter Green has dismissed two dogs from the ring because their handlers used to work for him. Wouldn’t you know that ahead of time and send in a different handler? Maybe it’s against the rules to change handlers. Stupid rules, if that’s the case. What’s the point of winning your breed if you know your dog is going to be excused from the ring because he has the wrong handler? Maybe someone can clear this up for me.

Harper does not like the Border Terrier or the Wire Fox Terrier. She jumps off my lap each time, walks up to the TV screen and growls menacingly at them. She doesn’t care for the terrier mix-looking dog looking at himself in the PetCo ad, either. Great, my dog has the same prejudices I do. I wonder if she would growl at a Re, oh, never mind. Wrong blog.

Peter Green is a terrier man from way back–and funny. He walks down the line, quacking at all the dogs to elicit expression from them. “Well, he is a former handler,” David Frei explains. The Norwich barks at him. I think it ought to get extra points for that, and indeed it goes Group 3.

Although I miss sitting at the press table, I have to admit that I’m enjoying being at home, having Jerry bring me ice cream because there are dogs in my lap, and getting to hear the color commentary for once. The Wheaten has a breeder/owner/handler, Frei notes approvingly.

The Staffordshire Bull Terrier is a good-looking dog. I have a soft spot for them. One of my early moves as editor of Dog Fancy was to hire former AKC Gazette features editor Marion Lane to write a column about life with her new SBT puppy. We called it Raisin’ Nell. She’s a super writer and I was always entertained by her adventures with Nell.

The Pedigree Foundation has a wonderful series of ads promoting shelter adoptions. Most of us saw the first one during the Super Bowl–the Westminster of football games, as Frei likes to say–but they’ve added a couple more. “Tonight as we celebrate the best purebred dogs in the world, let’s not forget about the ones who aren’t so lucky,” the narrator says. “Remember Echo, Otis and Frankie.” They have a nice website with information on how to adopt, volunteer or donate. Dogs rule, indeed–and so do cats.

As we watch the Non-Sporting dogs, Frei says the AKC is considering reworking the Groups, adding more and moving some breeds around. It’s about time. I’ve been saying they should do that for years, but no doubt they didn’t want to look as if they were copying the Federation Cynologique Internationale. There should be a Nordic Group, they should move the Dalmatian to the Working Group, and the Toys should be renamed the Companion Group, with many of the Non-Sporting Dogs moved under that category. That’s just for starters.

The Schipperke looks like a cross between a hyena and a warthog, Jerry says. I assume he means in silhouette because they’re not unattractive. Actually, neither are hyenas and warthogs. Warthogs were our surprise favorite animal in Africa because of the cuteness factor. But I digress.

We’re watching the Herding Group now. I decide early on that I have to root for the Australian Shepherd because his name is Copyright. The Beardie bounces up and down for the judge. Here comes the poor German Shepherd. It horrifies me every time I see that sloping rear. They did not look like that 35 years ago. It horrifies me, too, that it has been 35 years since I was a kid and we had German Shepherds. Oh well.

Harper has lost interest in my lap and the show. She is rolling on the floor, clutching a toy to her chest and gnawing on its head. Twyla has taken her place in my lap, and Bella hasn’t moved. I was going to rant about the extra weight show dogs are required to carry to be competitive in the ring, but I can’t remember now what set me off about it, and I want to go back and watch the Hound Group. I think I’ve lost my chair, though.

Update: Always a bridesmaid, never a Best in Show. I’ve been watching my friend Susan’s Bloodhounds for years at this show. She’s come so close, winning the Breed and the Group several times. Her current bitch, Rita, went Group 3 tonight. In other Hound news, will the WKC never update the announcer’s script so he will quite saying that the Ibizan Hound and the Pharaoh Hound date back 3,500 and 4,400 years? DNA evidence says not quite.