Scotland in 4 Seasons Magazine Winter 2020

Me & My dogs

By Caroline Campbell “when I went out everyday hunting for strays, they gave in!”

I went on to get two yellow bitches, Brooke being the first, and a year on I got Braan.

Both were from good stock and well-bred quality parents, but neither took the show ring by storm. This was when I realised that rearing a puppy for the showring was an art, “As a child I was always dog mad. My parents did all they and it was going to be my next apprenticeship. By that could to stop us having a pet dog, and made every excuse time, I had met various keen show people who became possible. But when I went out everyday hunting for strays, friends. I adopted a lovely yellow dog Antonine Harry they gave in. My first dog as a child was a crossbred black Potter for Tullochmohr JW who became my dog of a male called Sweep. lifetime and showed me a side to showing I never thought My first Labrador I bought myself at 16 years old, I saved I would accomplish. This boy took me down south to up for months so I could get a yellow bitch, eventually compete at championship level, we went on to win our Candy became my new companion, she sealed my love 1st at Crufts in 2004. Harry was consistently placed at for labs and lived to the ripe old age of 13. I left home at champ shows and we went on to win a RDCC which was 19 to house share with my friend and she came with me, a dream come true for me, his father (Sh Ch Tullochmohr we adopted a small, crossbred bitch named Kizzy and they final edition JW) taking top honours that day winning the quickly became best friends.

DCC. In 1994, I was diagnosed with lupus and found myself I bought a brood bitch in, Bonnie (Antonine Amarantine) reading Labrador Retriever books and joined a few breed and formed my own kennel, also securing a Kennel affix clubs. I would go and spectate at local shows and went which is Binnaig (short for Binny Craig ) my first litter was to breed club shows. There was a litter advertised in the born in 2008. paper, I recognised the sire from the books I had read up on, he was a black dog from the Cambremer Kennel Sh Ch When I was showing down south, I had seen a dog that I Cambremer Tom Sawyer. The dam was also black and was liked and he became the my first stud dog him being Sh a working lab. I went to see the litter and came home with Ch Rocheby Statesman. a black bitch and called her Cree. That’s when my show career started.

I had never handled a dog or trained one for the ring, so I had to learn as much as she did. I signed up and went to ring craft classes in Bo’ness, before I knew it, I was hooked and my new apprenticeship began. The first few months I attended local open shows, which soon became my new weekend hobby, it kept my mind away from my illness and gave me something to focus on.

There was so much to learn and take in and my eye became my main tool, I started looking at dogs in a completely different way.

50 Scotland in Four Seasons Winter