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No GO! Really?

Spent a day with a trainer and got to watch 5 "show" bred Labs run set ups. 4 different bloodlines. One is my boy. I laughed with a few people, including the trainer, about where people got show Labs have no GO in the field. I used to think they were all a bit more easy going, slower (but not all slow) going. All these dogs have plenty, and mine has a little extra. I hope people get to watch all these babies work (in the south east mostly) at hunt tests and maybe some can become more open minded. So far just one is running hunt tests, so the other 4 haven't been seen by many. Hope people keep up the good work producing great working Labs.

Re: No GO! Really?

At least the days where the judges would sneer "oh look at the pretty show dogs" is mostly a thing of the past.

When my show bred Lab earned her JH with all 10s in all 4 passes, I had offers to buy her. With my current dog, I had a judge offer to buy her and when I wouldn't sell, offered to buy her entire litter when she was bred. I turned that down also.

It's nice to see good looking dogs out doing what they were bred to do.

Re: No GO! Really?

It is the same thing with stereotypes regarding field bred Labs being ugly and out of control - most of the ones I know make good family pets and house dogs. I was over at my trainer's recently and his dogs were just lounging around the house - I walked in and none of them reacted at all, except for maybe a wag of the tail. And most of his dogs have decent structure because his wife used to show Labs years ago and knows what to look for - they all have better reach of neck than many I see in the show ring. They are not necessarily my cup of tea but I do appreciate them for their consistency in looks and work ethic.

Each dog is an individual and should be evaluated as such, which is why we as breeders should get out there and regularly evaluate our dogs. I have show dogs with MH and SH titles, and I have some that easily earned a JH (dog does all the work - "handler" is merely an escort) but when it came time to shoulder the responsibility of being part of a team (upper level field work), they lacked interest. I have judged the different levels of hunt tests and have seen show dogs with a lot of drive who did very nice work, but have also seen several that refused to get in the water, refused to pick up the bird upon finding it, hunted without perseverance, etc. I have seen field bred dogs with other issues.

Understanding what we have is critical to breeding better dogs.