First Place in Limit - Bitch, Judge: Mr Graham Pickering (Picer)
Thank you to Driffield Agricultural Society for inviting me to judge Border Terriers at their Championship Show. I had a good entry of 169 from 162 dogs and had a large number of quality exhibits to go over. It was a shame that the weather, being extremely windy, meant that because of health and safety reasons I had to judge indoors. This meant that at first the ring was not as spacious as I would have liked and the noise from the wind in the marquee at times disturbed some of the younger exhibits. In addition, the length of the grass and the unevenness of the surface were problematic for some of the exhibitors.
I was extremely pleased with my final line ups and there were many classes where deserving dogs went unplaced due to the quality of the entry. Overall coats, were very good and temperament was excellent. However, I did find two examples of the odd tooth out of place and a number of dogs which could have been tidier particularly around feet and tail.
In my winners I was looking for a correct size Border with a harsh double coat, well muscled, correct bone and looking like it could do a good days work. I found those qualities in my winners.
A superb class full of quality exhibits that again meant that I had some really difficult decisions to make.
A true b/t bitch with lots of ticking in excellent double coat and put down to perfection. She has the sweetest of feminine otter heads, not overdone but with plenty of strength in her foreface and muzzle. A lovely reach of neck running into clean shoulders with the straightest of fronts, lovely tight feet, thick pads and is firm in her pastons. She is narrow throughout and easily spannable and good rib. Strong in loin, with correct rear angulation and is well muscled up. In profile her top line is level and this remains so on the move. She looked a real picture as she moved around the ring, covering the ground effortlessly. Despite real competition in the final line up I couldn’t resist awarding her BCC.