What I am about to explain here might be offensive to curly-coated retriever owners. It is not intended to be.
I am merely quoting what Harding Cox, a retrieverman of the late nineteenth centuries and early twentieth centuries, thought of the breed. The breed has definitely changed since then, because it is no longer a “fancy” breed. It is now bred for sound working conformation and ability by its dedicated breeders.
Cox wrote the section on retrievers in W.D. Drury’s British Dogs: Their Points, Selection and Show Preparation (1903), and to be fair, Cox was a flat-coated retriever enthusiast.
He begins his section on retrievers with this somewhat Spencerian prediction:
That the Curly-coated Retriever is doomed to practical extinction is a notable and an undeniable fact, which must be put down to the inevitable law of the survival of the fittest…For every Curly-coated dog (speaking of the recognised show type) used in the field, or exhibited on the bench, there are now a score, at least, of Flat-coats. (333).
Whoa.
Cox explains that reason why the curly lost favor in the British gun dog circles did not have much to do with their lack of tractability or their supposed reputation for hardmouth.
Cox contends that the real reason why the curly was not favored at time is that it was thought of as a show dog, not a working dog:
There seems to be a prevailing impression that the average disposition of the Curly-coated Retriever…is not as sweet and benevolent as that of the more popular dog [the flat-coat], and that he is less tractable. The writer’s only experience of these animals is in the show-ring, and he confesses that he has always found the exhibits mild and friendly enough. Probably the real reason of their unpopularity lies in the fact that they are more or less a “fancy” breed (345).
In this analysis, the real reason why the curly lost favor in Britain is because it was a dog bred solely for the show ring.
After all, this breed does have an unusual feature that is difficult to breed. Their coats do not withstand any crossbreeding. If you breed a curly to Labrador, you will have a dog with short hair and some wave to it. At this time, though, crossbreeding different strains of retriever was a common practice, and thus, the curly missed out on some of the experimental breeding that goldens, Labradors, and flat-coats experienced.
If you’re breeding for that feature, you’re not breeding for working ability. You’re breeding for the coat and for the rosettes that this coat will win you.
And that’s a recipe for disaster for a working dog.
If all the competitor breeds are being cross-bred and selectively bred for work, and you are breeding for a peculiar physical feature, your dog will not be able to keep up with them.
And the curly nearly went into extinction as Harding Cox suggested.
Of course, the flat-coat didn’t remain top dog in the trial circuit. After the First World War, the Labrador, which had been developed from breeding recently imported St. John’s water dogs with flat-coats, Chesapeakes, and all sorts of other dogs (including pointers and foxhounds), began to come into its own. The flat-coat developed a bad reputation for being hard to handle and for having possible borzoi ancestry (sight hounds are known for being terrible retrievers.) The yellow version of flat-coat became a separate breed, and it became the secondary retriever to the Labrador.
Nearly becoming extinct actually proved to be a blessing for the curly, for now the only people who were breeding them were truly interested in producing the best possible dog. The modern curly is now a dog with good working conformation and retrieving instinct, but most people don’t know about it. If the average person sees one, I guarantee you that the first question will be “Is that a Labradoodle?”
Losing popularity isn’t such a bad thing.
***
Today, the top working retriever is the Labrador. Most waterfowl hunters in North America go for Labradors.
In fact, the Labrador is now even more popular than its flat-coat predecessor. It is now the most common dog breed in the world.
The golden is the secondary dog. It is the curly of today.
However, this breed still remains common enough, although its popularity in Europe has started to drop off. In the US and Canada, it is still a very popular breed.
Most golden retrievers are rather like the curlies of the nineteenth century. They have been bred for their novel appearance alone. Working ability has been secondary.
And many working retriever people pass the golden over.
It is just a matter of time until the golden begins to really lose its status in our society.
When I first heard of them, they were touted as being very easily trained and very good natured.
A few years ago, they were touted as being very good natured and much calmer than Labradors. (This isn’t necessarily a good thing, because extremely calm dogs are on their way to losing their working ability.)
Now, their temperaments have become far less reliable than they once were.
As things have progressed, the golden is not thought of as a working retriever. It’s thought of as a fancy breed for yuppies to own.
All of these factors set the golden up for meeting a very similar fate that befell the curly in the early twentieth century.
Is this a bad thing?
Well, as I said before, losing a lot of popularity was a blessing for the curly. It allowed only the most dedicated people to breed them.
And with all the problems that the golden is facing, the only way to solve them is for the breed to lose some it of its popularity. Too many stupid people are breeding them.
If the demand for cute little golden retriever puppies would just drop, dedicated golden retriever people would be able to breed good dogs once again.
***
It amazes me how many comments I get whenever I offer even a tepid criticism of a breed. I usually don’t attack individual dogs, but I do attack breeding practices. However, these criticisms are viewed as affronts against an individual dog, which may be sound, smart, and healthy.
I have nothing against the curly-coated retriever.
In fact, if you read this post and didn’t know any better, I bet you’d think I hate golden retrievers.
The truth is that I can offer a criticism of a breeding practice or trend within a gene pool and still respect the individual dog.
Every dog breed and every bloodline within a breed or strain has its virtues and vices. We need to be honest about them.
It’s only then that we can have real discussions about improving our dogs through selective breeding.
But because this candor eludes too many people who consider themselves dog people, we can’t have that conversation.
But for the sake of the dogs, we need to have that conversation.
It’s time to detach our egos from our dogs.
I think pekes are totally screwed. You cannot talk sense to 90 percent of their breeders. Trust me. You can show them old photos until the cows come home, but they still think the dogs that came from China looked like this dog.
This is one breed were most of its fanciers operate in a kind of vacuum-type paradigm in which evidence and logic are sacrificed for approval.
If you want to see what I mean. Look at the comments on this video.
Not only do I hate song, you can’t tell me that this dog is a “beautiful mover.”
The reaction of the basset club chairperson is absolutely hilarious!
“We have improved them.”
Really?
http://www.petside.com/breeds/assets_c/2009/01/tibetan-spaniel-thumb-334xauto-291.jpg)" width="469" />The old type peke looked a lot like a Tibetan Spaniel (compare: http://www.petside.com/breeds/assets_c/2009/01/tibetan-spaniel-thumb-334xauto-291.jpg)
I’ve noticed a common tactic among those who defend the status quo in the dog world is to try to paint their critics as being in league the animal rights extremists. I’m not talking the nice vegans with whom I disagree on certain issues.
I’m talking about the people who support terrorism, theft, and vandalism in the name of liberation. I’m also talking about those who would rather tell other people how to live, rather than working together to try to find ways to reduce animal suffering. (Temple Grandin is a very good example of someone who actually does this work to improve the lives of livestock.)
I’ve always thought liberation was a nebulous term. After all, a Marxist sees liberation rather differently than a libertarian, and in that comparison, I’m talking about two members of the same species.
One can only imagine what liberation would mean to dog, a cat, a hamster, or hippopotamus. Of course, that assumes that these animals know what their liberation means at all.
I’ve known horses that were raised in stables that seem perfectly okay with that lifestyle. It is all they have ever known. When such horses are released into a pasture, they seem lost and certainly don’t act as if they are free. It’s only when they return to a barn stall that seem to feel comfortable again.
That said, I do oppose any intentional animal suffering that is necessarily prolonged. The wold is full of suffering. We all experience it. All species feel pain, suffer, and die. The only thing enlightened and moral people can do is reduce suffering. Veganism is one way to do this. However, it will never become the universal diet of the planet. I don’t do well without meat in my diet. I’ve been at my happiest and healthiest when I reduced my carbohydrate intake and embraced the hunter-gatherer blood coursing through my veins.
The way I justify these two apparently contradictory notions that lie deep within my ethical sense is that I take a Benthamesque approach. I don’t do it exactly as Peter Singer did. I am willing to tolerate a certain amount of suffering and pain so that I can live, but the main goal is to reduce it. I particularly am more opposed to actions that result in prolonged pain and suffering than those that cause the animal suffering for just a very short time.
And for that reason, I can tolerate foxes held in leg hold traps (especially those that have been designed not to damage the fox’s foot) far better than I can tolerate breeding dogs with conformation that makes their whole lives miserable. That fox feels discomfort only for the last few hours of his live, because in most states, the traps must be checked daily. A pekingese that cannot cool itself properly suffers for a longer period of time than that fox does. The peke suffers from excess heat through its entire life, while the fox got to be wild and free for most of its life.
The animal rights people may have locked onto the issues of purebred dogs. On some issues, they are correct. On others, I respectfully disagree.
You see, the animal rights lobby doesn’t have the institutional power that the dog fancy has right now. The animal right lobby does have some victories, usually in the industrial farming sector, but in stopping hunting, meat consumption, and dog showing they haven’t been that successful.
In Europe they have been more successful in stopping hunting and even stopping reasonable farming practices (like the use of sheepdogs!), but that happens because most European countries (with the exception of the Nordic countries) have had a long history in which hunting rights were the realm of only the very wealthy. In the US, the hunting culture is more egalitarian, and thus, you don’t have the major center-left parties siding with the animal rights lobby.
In comparison, the purebred dog fancy does everything it can to ensure that reforms never take place here. The registries must operate closed stud books, and breed purity is everything. Those who do try their best to breed for health are often confronted with a general loss of genetic diversity and the sudden appearance of new genetic disorders that were previously unrecognized. Breeders who go outside the strictures of the fancy are pilloried.
It’s because of all of this that I am more outraged by the dog fancy than I am outraged by the animal rights people. I might make common cause with the animal rights lobby on this issue, and I hope that meat-eaters and vegans can at least agree on trying work together to reduce animal suffering. I’m with them on that one, but on the issues of banning hunting, dog-ownership, and the consumption of meat, I’m definitely not singing off their page.
However, if you group me with the really nutty animal liberationists out there, you are setting up a straw man. And that’s one argument tactic I find particularly exasperating.
The dog fancy defenders like to portray everyone who opposes them as existing within the framework of either being with them or with the animal rights extremists. It’s a nice dualism, and in highly dualistic, melodramatic culture, this narrative certainly helps their cause.
However, the real world is always more complex than this narrative. The world exists in shades of gray, not clearly defined bands of black and white.
And that’s why it’s a mistake to assume those who want a better system for breeding dogs are also in league with those who want to ban dog ownership. It’s called nuance, and it’s something that is apparently much harder for people to see than I thought.
