Derwenthow Dusty Dogwood

First of all I would like to thank the committee and membership of the border terrier club for inviting me to judge this show. I would also like to thank all those who entered their dogs under me, and for the sporting manner in which my decisions were accepted. I only found a couple of teeth out of position and one level mouth. There were no kinked tails, although there were a lot of long tails. I thought that on the whole movement was somewhat better than I have judged in recent years. There were some tremendous coats but not many thick pelts. The one shock I had was the poor physical condition of some exhibits, although all exhibits were clean, some had no muscular condition at all, and I found two that were severely under conditioned. There were very few exhibits who were in good hard condition, the ones that were, mainly took the top places. A working terrier has to be in good physical condition with plenty of hard muscle in the right places. Some exhibits today would be hard presses to get to ground, never mind stay there and work for a few hours. Please be reminded that this wonderful breed is a WORKING terrier, and therefore, should be shown in a condition that reflects this.

I would like to thank the officers and committee for their invitation to judge their open show, and their warm welcome and hospitality. I would also like to thank my two efficient stewards on the day, Ian Hopper and John Thomas. The entry was very pleasing but there were quite a few absentees on the day, especially the dog classes. However I enjoyed my day and was pleased with all my class winners, making a very satisfactory final line up, including some promising puppies, with some difficult decisions to be made. I found one bad mouth and one kinked tail.

I would like to thank the Officers and Committee for the judging appointment and for their hospitality on the day, the lovely gifts, also my stewards Alison and Callie and not least the competitors for a lovely entry and for allowing me the opportunity to go over their dogs. I was pleased with my final line ups, some close decisions particularly in the two hotly contested Junior classes where all the placed dogs and bitches could change places on another day. I felt my top winners all met the breed standard in that they would be capable of getting to ground and have the strength and stamina to do a good days work if called upon. There were a few with acceptable level bites, all tails were good, one or two could have been a little cleaner, some that would have benefitted from better coat tidying and presentation and surprisingly one with undescended testicles. However I felt that I was presented with some good representatives of the breed to have the pleasure to go over.