German shepherds and sloping backs

I'm not going to enter the debate but just wanted to share a photo of our GSD.
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CaveCanem said:
As MM, says, and I explained in a reply to the OP a while back, breed delegations have been going to the KC for decades asking for health tests (hips, haem, elbows) as a pre-requisite for registration and health tests and working qualifications to be taken account in the ring, so that the right type of dog is being promoted, but all the KC can come back with is 'stop double handling and address the issue of hocks' - neither of which can be described as a serious health issue, although the latter is of course undesirable.
Meanwhile the KC will register the offspring of dysplastics, epileptics, very close relatives. There is no excuse for very close inbreeding in a breed with the gene pool that we now have.

We judge a lot more to the international breed standard. Our dogs are asked to gait around the whole ring, on a long lead, at walk, trot and fast trot, not at heel and in a triangle. During the fast gaiting especially, people call their dogs, whistle, run around the outside of the ring to alert their dogs. It might not be everybody's cup of tea but it originated in Germany where a lot of the shows take place in football and athletics stadiums and the atmosphere is electric.

We also don't go 'over' the dogs like other breeds - teeth check, balls check for the males, temperament test (pat on the head, walking in on the dog suddenly, dropping or slapping the clipboard or in German-style shows, a gun test) which is why you see dogs thinking 'what the fook are you doing?' when allrounders poke and prod them :p

And of course the show stance is different. Obviously :p

The reason the obsession on the movement? It's an economical, long, low, ground-eating gait with immense forward reach and hindthrust. It isn't meant to be a race (although some judges fail to realise this....) it's meant to show that the dog can move like that, all day if need be.
You can stand and pose a dog all you like, and you can even 'hold it up' while it moves, I see a lot of other breeds being strung up on thin collars and leads, but if it falls to pieces when asked to gait on a loose lead and crosses behind like a pair of scissors, then the dog is not put together correctly.
We want to have offlead gaiting in the adult classes - the KC will not allow it. This DOES take place at heel.
We want to have health tests and working tests as a prerequisite for entering the top classes, the KC will not allow it.
This is why a lot of clubs are going their own way - and I am sure other breeds will not be sorry to see the back of the noisy buggers :p
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Could not agree more!

I cannot bear seeing dogs shown this way. Allow the dog to move properly for chrissakes!:D
 
pedilia said:
I'm not going to enter the debate but just wanted to share a photo of our GSD.
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Well hellloooooooooooooo!!!!!
Who's this?

Cheers BS. If we could reach a happy medium between dogs being throttled with their front feet barely touching the ground and all out ridiculous out-of-control sprinting complete with air-horn blowing sideshows and people getting knocked down outside the ring, then I think everybody would be happy :p
 
Good grief..people knocked over outside the ring by double handlers? Must take a minute at the next Champ show to see this circus for myself!My breed is never ever "strung up"..loose lead ,shown free standing,no disguising physical faults or movement,in fact strung up dogs always move appallingly in my breeds.Anyway..your own award system and shows looks the way to go,but I`ll def try and get a look..it sounds hilarious!
 
In fairness I haven't seen anyone knocked flying since the mid 90s (and that person has since been banned, HURRAY!) but we're used to people coming to gawp and tut :p
We implemented an area for spectators and an area for attractors last month and it seemed to work very well :D

I appreciate most people don't string their dogs up, it is of course a generalisation, but some do and I saw a Sibe gasping for breath a few months ago because the handler kept hauling it up off it's front feet with a slip lead right up behind its' ears.
 
Re stringing up, if you look closely at the picture on page 3 of this thread that CC posted for me, Ch Gorsefield Shah, you will see his collar was right up behind his ears, It was also a very fine chain choke, that is how gsds were shown then, you rarely saw the natural movement in the ring because the dogs head was held artificially high, yet off lead and gaiting round the field shah was a lovely moving dog. Although some gsd folk do go over the top with the double handling, I would far rather see the dogs as they are shown nowadays than back in the 70s.
 
CaveCanem said:
In fairness I haven't seen anyone knocked flying since the mid 90s (and that person has since been banned, HURRAY!) but we're used to people coming to gawp and tut :p
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I have been run into a couple of times .. and the last champ show I went to fisticuffs happened between a steward and competitor :eek: ( I was told)
 
He is a Silver Sable, his name is Zach. He was originally sold as a stud but has only one testicle descended so found his way to us.
 
ridebumble said:
I have been run into a couple of times .. and the last champ show I went to fisticuffs happened between a steward and competitor :eek: ( I was told)
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Ah, heard about that one, gawd, they do like to live up to the stereotypes, some of them :o

There's a wee bitch, much tighter coated, silver sable round the corner from us.
Very unusual looking but I prefer to keep to my old boring greys :p
Mine hasn't any equipment either, doesn't make him a bad person :p
 
GSDs with really sloping backs have american bloodlines where as straight backed dogs have german bloodlines. The american lines are used for showing where as the straight backed are traditionally used as working dogs. If I remember correctly.....I read about it a while ago.

I am the proud owner of a straight backed GSD called Khai :D
 
Yes and no, Fiona :)

The American showlines are ridiculous :o, ski-slopes as they are known!

The majority of working lines are straight-backed dogs but there are plenty who could (and do) show in the breed ring (see vids/pics of Javir I posted a few pages back or a dog like Frankie Anerbi)

there are also showline dogs who work (any dog with Sch I,II,II after his or her name has working qualifications).

These days the working lines in the UK today mostly come from East Germany, Slovakia, the Czech republic, Belgium and the Netherlands and are mostly black, bi-colour and dark sable. However there are still a few old English working lines.

Of the herding lines, Kirschental are probably the oldest and biggest kennel and their dogs also do very well in the showring as well as competing in herding (HGH)
 
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