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been the subject of a couple of these interviews This was a first for me and I only agreed after
and I have enjoyed watching dozens more being
questioned. One thing that struck me when
listening to a huge cross section of personalities
from a variety of different countries is that most
of them made constant reference to those who
had helped them in their early days. Many refer
to them as “mentors” and it has been refreshing
to hear so many famous faces displaying great
humility as they acknowledge how icons from
the past had invested in them when they were
starting.
Lots of these interviews have included
fascinating, and often amusing, stories of
legendary names that would be – to the current
generation – nothing more than names in the
history books, but they have added colour and
depth to the individual interviews.
Another common thread that has surfaced
in many of these interviews is the belief that
newcomers to the sport do not have the same
attitude as the subjects did when they were
in their formative years. It has been quite
concerning to hear so many people suggest that
many of the younger generation do not seek out
mentorship or search for knowledge on a one-
to-one basis like past generations did.
Something else that I heard repeated time
and again was the limitations of academic
examinations when it comes to learning about
breeds with a view to eventually judging them. It
seems that many of our leading experts believe
that examinations have their place, but nothing
can replace practical experience in the form of
physically seeing outstanding dogs on a regular
basis, visiting kennels and talking in depth to
experienced and successful breeders.
Another online product that has mushroomed
during lockdown is the “webinar”, a seminar
that is broadcast live and is in varying degrees
interactive with its viewers. As with the
interviews, I have seen this new learning tool
from both sides. I have watched several breed
productions with interest and, at the request of
the Russian Kynological Federation, after a lot
of planning and preparation broadcast a live
webinar on judging the Pekingese.
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very heavy persuasion on the part of Ekaterina
Domogatskaya. Having set a broadcast date I
emailed a copy of my PowerPoint presentation
on judging the breed to Katya so that she could
translate the text on all 40 slides into Russian.
People from around the world were able to sign
in free of charge via a much-publicised link and
once we went live they were free to comment
and ask questions.
Obviously as there was the need to give the
commentary in both English and Russian the
presentation took longer than usual, the whole
webinar lasting for 3 hours. The logistics were
a lot slicker than I had anticipated. The text
on each slide was separated into clauses by
bullet points. I gave each clause in English after
which Katya provided the Russian translation.
At the same time there was a written translation
that appeared in the comments column of the
screen. Many of the viewers were of course
Russian but it was interesting to note comments
and questions from people in a large number of
other countries.
At the end of the presentation we had a brief
Q&A session and the feedback afterwards was
extremely positive, resulting in some much
appreciated comments on Facebook. The
conclusion was that there is still a great thirst for
knowledge amongst genuine dog people.
One consequence of lockdown has been
the rather depressing confirmation that dog
people are adept at public in-fighting and don’t
seem to grasp the concept of pulling together
in times of trouble. The first manifestation of
this was the quite overwhelming tirade of abuse
that surfaced in some social media groups that
were confined to judges when numerous online
“dog shows” appeared. Basically these were
competitions based on a standard dog show
structure where dogs were “judged” on the
strength of their photographs.
This was, in my opinion, a harmless
exercise that helped to keep the interest of
keen exhibitors who were missing dog shows
so badly. The reaction of some judges was
unbelievable and the arrogance of some
people quite disturbing. Many objected to