'Face' Judging......

Now us dog show'ers know that face judging goes on, you see it happen all the time - the dog gets picked based on the two legged creature on the other end of the lead as opposed to the four legged one. However I had, naively perhaps, hoped that these times are being put behind us with a drive towards producing healthy dogs.

How wrong I was!

My friend took a Spinone with her to Crufts, their class contained about 10 dogs and she didn't get placed. Fair enough I thought, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. However I was astounded to watch as the Spinone with the worst rear end movement ever (the dog looked lame to me tbh) got placed VHC. Now how on earth can a dog that moves as if it is lame get placed out of a class of 10 dogs???? Whatever happened to that new statement the KC have placed on schedules.....

"In assessing dogs, judges must penalise any features or exaggerations which they consider would be detrimental to the soundness, health and well being of the dog."

I can cope with face judging, but when a dog with an unsound (and therefore unhealthy) gait gets placed over others that move soundly, it makes me wonder if people will ever change their ways.

In my day it was known as the "other end of the lead" being judged!

It still is, you mustn't be as old as you thought!

That happens in all countries, we suffer the facey judging here too. If you put a mediocre dog in the hands of "that handler" he will become a Champion.

At a breed show last year we were watching open dog. A dog was being moved towards us and I commented on the dogs front movement. She said tome do you know who the dog id. I said no as I hadn't been to any breed shows that year. He had been made up to a champion the year before. His front feet turned in and his elbows were out when he moved towards you. Every one know why it won you only had to look at the other end of the lead.

Often at shows we have seen the judge look at a dog and then look at the other end of the lead.

I don't think it happened in our breed this year at crufts as I did notice a lot of the faces didn't get placed in their classes. Looking through the results and the entries a lot of the dogs that do a lot of winning went unplaced.

It happens a lot in the English Setters, I would win a class one day and be unplaced or behind certain people another...I didn't notice it so much in the Irish Setters and the Pointers...I had some cracking placings in those breeds as a newcomer

When watching the judging at Crufts there was only one champ show judge that didn't get placed in one of the classes, and I think that was because there were 6 champ show judges in the ring at the same time...and he obviously didn't have an appointment looming

That said, the judge did make some, in my opinion, good placings, but her line up was rather higgledy piggledy which didn't make me think she was particularly judging to one type or standard

sadly face's still get places more often than not

I've seen a lame Briard take top honours in two seperate shows under different judges. I've seen a lame Estrela placed over sound movers. There are people in my breed who's dogs will win under certain judges no matter how they perform on the day. Luckily we didn't get that this year at Crufts and the judging seemed pretty fair. I sometimes feel that my dogs would do better if they were handled by their breeder under certain judges!

I often feel no matter how good your dogs is, its number of years in the breed that can be placed before you,

some shows are more fairly judged than others I guess, so I tend to try and swing toward them,

sadly the top shows are a done deal before you get there more often than not. It can be very hard in a breed like rotties with such high entries to even make the placings.