Page 6 - K9News_Issue16_May2021

Brace’s
BIT S & PIEC
BITS & PIECES
WHY JUDGES DO
WHAT THEY DO
In those far-off days when you showed your
dogs on a regular basis, how many times have
you left a dog show ring, scratching your head
and saying to yourself “What on earth is he
doing”?
I believe that the greatest compliment a judge
can have from an exhibitor or ringsider is “I
could follow his decisions”. Sometimes it isn’t
easy for a judge to come up with results that
are instantly understandable from an onlooker’s
standpoint, especially in coated or trimmed
breeds, as the judge has the advantage of
having had his hands on the dogs competing.
Furthermore the dogs in the ring may not
necessarily make it easy to “judge to type” when
there is great variation, but this is the aim of
most conscientious judges.
6
K9 NEWS DIGITAL / MAY 2021
ES
But let’s go back to the beginning. When
judges start off they will begin by judging their
own breed and usually when actively exhibiting
themselves. This means that they will be in
the main faced with dogs that they know, of
breeding they know, handled by people they
know. They will be aware of the winning form
of many dogs in the ring so all this creates a
kind of mental baggage that should be entirely
irrelevant to their decisions.
The show ring was originally “the breeder’s
shop window” and the judge’s brief is to find
the dogs that most closely fit the relevant
Breed Standard, placing the competing dogs
in order of merit. The embryo judge will be
steeped in their breed and fully understand all
the breed characteristics and subtle nuances
that contribute to creating “breed type”. They