The Spaniel Annals

For the last several months, it’s been our Sunday morning ritual to attend handling classes.  Handling classes provide a training environment for us to practice the game of the conformation ring, where the dog is judged on his structure (conformation) and movement.   Here’s the ritual:

7:30 am: Reardon gets a feathering bath.  He needs one once-a-week anyway for those long feathers, and bathing right before class gets him used to a typical show day.  Here he is looking rather hangdog as we wait for some whitening shampoo to do its thing.

8:15 am: Reardon gets up on the grooming table to get blown-dry.  Today we won’t have time to get him totally dry, but at least he gets some minutes with the dryer on.  It’s all good experience for a show day, where the blow-drying can take up to 45 minutes.

9:30 am: class.  Now Reardon can start having some fun.  He likes the show ring.  After all, it’s fairly simple and involves lots of treats!   Today is a packed class as many people are getting ready for the Puyallup and Portland cluster of shows starting next weekend.  We’re practicing our freestacking while we wait for class to start.

You can see he’s still a bit wet from his bath, which would be a huge no-no in the real ring.  Next weekend, he’ll be looking much more fluffy and white. 

In the next few months I’m going to have to develop some priorities for this year.  Showing his mother in the obedience ring and Reardon in conformation is almost impossible to do at the same time.  At the end of a show day involving both, I wind up exhausted instead of enjoying it.  My feeling is, if it’s not fun, why do it?  Re-prioritizing might mean giving Reardon to a professional handler.  A professional handler will finish his championship sooner than I could, but it would be very expensive.    My last springer Champion, Hank , cost about $1000 all told, but that was 10 years ago and he finished quickly. 

Why do I want this conformation championship with Reardon?  Good question, and this is part of my re-prioritizing.  The historic purpose of dogs shows was to evaluate breeding stock.  However, Reardon will never be bred, because he carries a genetic marker for an eye disorder (PRA) and he has allergy problems.   So why show him?  Two possible reasons: if I handle Reardon to his championship, it will be valuable experience for me to show a dog in a very competitive ring.  If a pro handler finishes him, he has the championship piece of a prestigious ESSFTA (the springer parent club) versatility award.  This difficult award requires two performance titles at the most advanced level, and two other performance titles at the novice level.  Reardon shows potential to earn this award, so why not go for it? 

These various priorities bounce around in my head while driving to and from dog classes.:-)  The bottom line, though, is that we’re having fun!