Last weekend I realized that the hardest part of the year was over for me. Waking up in the morning with only two or three emails and not the 50+ that I had every day since the end of April.
Letter from
Sweden
by Robert Paust
Away for the first two weeks in May, judging in the USA, helped keep me behind in my work. Hotel and friends’ computers did help to cut down the load, but a laptop from a club would have been a huge bonus. I had an unofficial show when I arrived home to take care of. At the same time entries for the Sighthound show and organizing the big allbreed show we have in the beginning of July was on my plate. Clubs here usually do all the entries themselves for the smaller shows. We do have a Swedish superintendent doing the all-breeds, which takes a lot of work off our shoulders. Entries at shows have been down, several shows had up to almost a thousand dogs less than the year before. This has been the result from the planned three day show, here in Sweden, the weekend before the World Show in Denmark, as well as the Denmark show itself. You can only go into an exhibitors pocket so many times before it is empty. And nether one of those weekends were going to be cheap. The Western Sweden Sighthound club this year had a good entry. At the moment the rules for being a Sighthound champion, includes having a certificate from a Sighthound show or official Sighthound breed club show. Yes it does give us a better entry at the shows, but the idea was to keep the quality of champion sighthounds at a higher level. Unfortunealy the breed clubs have voted to remove that rule from 2012. This year we had invited three ladies from the USA, Sandi Frei, Betty Richards and our BIS judge Edith Hansen. The rest of the panel included Fredrik Maison (France), Ulla af Huerlin(Finland);Felicty Thompson(Ireland) and Barbara Ruth Smith(USA-Sweden) The day before the show we had decent weather for most of the day, a little rain came in the afternoon, just to help keep the grass green. But, Saturday morning we woke up to a windstorm. On arrival to the show grounds, the perfect show rings we setup the day before were a mess. Five of the six large party tents were blown over. One was completely unusable and was forgotten about. The others were twisted and bent into some shape, that could be used, to have the secretaries table and judging under. Within a few minutes we had several people helping and after two hours work we had the makeshift tents put up, tied down and ready to be used with only a ½ hour delay. One thing that is always amazing is how dog people always have a positive and help fill attitude when it comes to bad weather. Complain yes, but stand there and accept the fact that it is pissing down rain, there is always a laugh and a story about a show that was worse. The show ended on a better note with the wind dying down and giving Edith the chance to examine the 16 breed winners. She gave Betty Richards BOB saluki Ch.Badavie Konquestador, owned by Anette Nihlen BIS. The weekend after I had the pleasure of judging in Finland, the Red Rose of Kotkan show, held close to the Russian border. Arriving late on Friday I missed the chance to take the sauna and a swim in the ocean! And back home in Sweden, it was the three day weekend in Jönköping. The Saturday to Monday show had an entry of 11,153 for the three days. Each day having a different dog winning the top prize. 42 Dog News
Swedish bred and owned Standard poodle Ch, Huffish Intensive Care, bred and owned by Charlotte Sandell, started the weekend for winning under British judge Brenda Banbury.. He is a champion in five countries including the USA. From Russia came Stefan Sinko´s Sunday BIS winner. The Giant Schnauzer, Gloris Rumba was bred and is owned by Olga Seliverstova. On the last day , Dutch all-breed judge Rony Doedijns found the Pembroke welsh corgie to be his BIS winner. Ch.Nebriowa Cole Haan, another American CH. was bred by Thomas Mathiesen, and the owner is Rita Wilburg and Thomas. WORLD SHOW 2010, Herning The total entry was just under 20,000, basically a good entry. But some of the club shows, held in conjunction with the World Show had a smaller turnout, than expected. One of these being the Terrier club. I was to judge three small breeds, Glens, Lakeland and Sealys. An email informed me that the entry was low and my assignment was cancelled. Strange I thought that they could do that without first asking if it would be acceptable to me. I later found out the breeds were given to not a judge on the panel, but a new judge and that my entry for those breeds were 40. Not a bad entry for three small number breeds. Unfortunately, I was not the only judge to have had that happen. Several others were also suddenly cancelled and I hope they did not lose out on money already paid to attend. Living in this area, we knew that the grounds and building were large enough for a World Show, but most foreigners were not ready for the 8 halls housing the rings. Rings were also located outside on the way to the camping area. There was also one hall for Obedience and one just for the finals. Two buildings were for the commercial sellers. The rings were of good size and one building, I felt, could have had better lighting. The trimmed down judging procedure, no critiques, allowed judges to judge more dogs and be finished in good time for the promptly started finals at 3:30.While the breed judging was done in good time, the finals seemed to take much longer. Some groups were fully represented by each breed within that group. Group 6,the Scenthounds, seem to be nonending. The poor announcer even had a hard time knowing what breed was walking into the ring. The extra lap around the ring, taken by everyone in every group, alone took up a lot of time. But, you were kept awake by the high noise level of the music being played. Parking was free of charge and there seemed to never be a line to get into the show. By now everyone knows who has won, so there is no need for me to list them. But the big talk was about the next years World Show to be held in Paris the 7-10 of July.. The French tried to be more world wide than the Danes were; five –English judges and one American are on the panel. If you are interested and want to make plans now, in 2012 the World Show will be held in Austria, followed by Hungary in 2013. •