Show dog VS field dog conformation

[Larry G]

To address the speed issue, the major fault of the show bred beagle in the field is not lack of speed, but rather too much for its nose. They tend to be very tight mouthed and hot nosed as well as rough. To offset these faults one needs to breed them to cold nosed, slow trailing, free tonguing, close checking hounds preferably with better than average looks. Add to that the lack of desire and voice quality in most of them and it becomes a real challenge to get usable hounds from them which is why most who do it work down to 1/8 to 1/4 show blood and won't even start their half and 3/4 show stock. I've got some 3/4 show stock that does fair but a lot depends on where that 3/4 came from, it sure ain't all the same.

I have a planned mating that will be half show and I admit that while it's fun, it could certainly fall flat and the pups might be fit for nothing more than pretty pets.

As for the Brit duals, the only answer is the Brit community is not as stubbornly polarized as the rest of the hunting breeds fanciers. Put an AKC Pointer or Setter show champ in a 3 hour stake and he would be left his bracemate's dust and run over by the gallery as he trotted along. Also, you have to remember that the Brits only compete against each other in most cases, not against Pointers and Setters. However in NSTRA I believe the winningest dog ever is a Brit, N. Carolina's own Nolan's Last Bullet from just up the road in Connelly Springs. He wouldn't likely win any shows.

[Beaglebrit]

To address the speed issue, the major fault of the show bred beagle in the field is not lack of speed, but rather too much for its nose. They tend to be very tight mouthed and hot nosed as well as rough.

I have found that to be very true also. And if you address that issue with show breeders...ya may have as well been speaking in Mandarin Chinese.

As for the Brit duals, the only answer is the Brit community is not as stubbornly polarized as the rest of the hunting breeds fanciers. Put an AKC Pointer or Setter show champ in a 3 hour stake and he would be left his bracemate's dust and run over by the gallery as he trotted along.

having had brittanys for a long time Brittany folk are driven...and it is difficult. I have never achieved a DC...just not enough money time and the right combo of dogs with beauty and brains. I have had some nice juvenille field winners though.
An interesting point is DC Brittany#499 BeBop N"Awlins Jazz was owner handler to all her wins both show and field,and was broke by the owner, not trained by a professional. The owner is a cancer survivor, with 2 Total Knee replacements, and finished that dog in horseback handled stakes. That is the kind of drive and dedication that keeps a breed Dual.
[

However in NSTRA I believe the winningest dog ever is a Brit, N. Carolina's own Nolan's Last Bullet from just up the road in Connelly Springs. He wouldn't likely win any shows

A Nolan last bullet Gransdson recently recieved an AKC group 4, and he also has juvenille and adult placements handled by a Junior handler to all wins. One of his daughter placed at the gundog Nationals several years ago and has had multiple specialty show Winner points.
About the show/field Beagles....
If you are looking for someone to start those field/show pups...send one our way! if you got too many on your hands!
Betsy

[Larry G]

As for the Thoroughbred and Arabian comparison. Arabs are bred to go all day, have been for thousands of years. Put a Thoroughbred in one of the endurance races of the Arabs he will get the head start, but will never make the finish line.

I too belong to the 3rd group. I would love to see the 2 lines come together. I would love to take one of my Patch hounds to an AKC ring and take home a few ribbons. But I know in my head that Patch are built for the all day hunt. I think I could take some ribbons home with Lacie, but I also know, she could never compete with the Unos of the world. Maybe if I bred her to a Parker (Moore's or Leah's), I would get the head that will get me a little further. But I would never want to do it at the cost of losing her hunt, cause that is her first passion and I know that comes from 110 years of dedicated Patch breeding.

Do I live in a fantasy world, probably. But dreams are free and tax exempt!!

Tiff, you are right about the horses, nothing beats an Arab for endurance. I bred them for years but for show, not any kind of racing. Actually the Arab racers are not much to look at. The show Arabs can't do too much except trot around and look pretty. Many of the show breeders would say their horses (drinkers of the wind) could outrun the word of God as well as anything on four legs because they had better conformation. Of course they never entered them in anything to prove that. They could also run across the Sahara desert without even needing a drink of water. Say, those folks would fit right in here on this board, wouldn't they!

[Lance]

....ARHA dogs and UKC....pursue accomplishment with little regard to line control....
Betsy
(trying hard to breed something for AKC Show and AKC SPO Field!)

Funny how some people just seem to know it all. How many ARHA Progressive Pack hunts have you been to?

[Larry G]

Betsy wrote:

A Nolan last bullet Gransdson recently recieved an AKC group 4, and he also has juvenille and adult placements handled by a Junior handler to all wins. One of his daughter placed at the gundog Nationals several years ago and has had multiple specialty show Winner points.

"Buddy" is not a bad looking dog, not quite as good as his son Brave IMO, but comparing him to pic's of Brit duals I don't think he would make it. Far as I know his owner does not show anyway and certainly needs no more proof that his dog is outstanding.

[Beagle Huntsman]

I've probably bred as much show blood into my hunting pack as anyone, so I'll make a few comments. I agree with some of what has been said, and disagree with some.

Speed and endurance is easy to get from show lines, if you use the right crosses. My last full show cross was to an Echo Run male in 2006. I have 2 females from that cross who have tremendous hunt and desire, and could run with the hare dogs, except that I have no interest in that type of trialing, for many reasons. (Hmmm...Do hare trials really still run them 7-8 hours?) My point is, they have the necessary speed and endurance and are built to have it for many years. And one of them could certainly finish in the AKC show ring, and maybe both.

Nose and mouth are concerns when crossing onto show lines, generally speaking. To offset that, you cross them with hounds of a type YOU LIKE who have good nose, line control and good voices. I never would cross them on something from the other extreme in hopes of gaining some mythical middle ground.

But the biggest issue I have seen with show crosses is the lack of patience on the check. They don't seem to have the desire or ability to bear down when the going gets tough like some of the field bred hounds can. Of course, some field lines (including some mentioned in this thread) aren't known for their ability to carefully work a check either.

As far as 1/2 show, 3/4 show, etc, being "throw aways" and no good for hunting, that's baloney. I have full show, half show, and every other percentage that hunt very well. I would never not start a half show hound because of any thoughts it might not be good in the field. Most of my hounds have so much show blood (from 40 years of mixing show and field) that I can't tell what the percentages are anymore, anyway. But you can definitely see it when you look at them.

[Larry G]

Funny.... my half shows were outstanding check and search hounds. Lacked the voice I want, and the ability to run the line like it was painted, which some of mine do.... sometimes . Of course in a big pack that is not a big deal, good pack work is.

The thread was about how the physical make-up of a show dog is different from an ordinary field hound and what is the reasoning behind breeding a dog that looks like a show dog. For me, it is just that they are much more pleasing to the eye and reflects an appreciation for the traditions of beagling from the old country where the hounds originated. If some like to pretend that it makes them perform better, knock yourselves out. Like Tiff said dreams are free and tax exempt, too.

Now would those using show blood in their breeding program say that breeding it in enhances performance, or sacrifices performance? I think we all agree is usually sacrifices some of the qualities we want. Now, Beagle huntsman, if you had a seesaw with a weight on the right end, and you wished to balance it, would you put an equal weight on the left end, or right in the middle?

[Bev]

If you breed a hot-nosed hound to a cold-nosed hound, you're more than likely gonna get a litter where half are hot-nosed and half are cold-nosed. I don't believe one can blend traits at the gene level. Ya can't create new genes by mixing 2 different genes. It just doesn't work that way. The genes are either there or they aren't. If some of the pups happen to have a correct nose, then there were some correct nose genes back in there somewhere that came to the front. So, the smartest approach (in my opinion) is to start introducing the exact genes you want into the bloodline...i.e. breed to the type mouth you want, then breed back to it again. Make it so that a "correct mouth gene" begins to be dominant in the pedigree. Do that with every trait, every generation, and you'll be there eventually.

[Larry G]

Bev, I knew you couldn't resist! Ha ha and if you want to believe that, as you said to Oakhill, rock on, girl friend! My grandmother believed the earth was flat, and I didn't waste too much time trying to convince her otherwise either.

[Bev]

Smart man.

[Larry G]

Could someone post a picture of Uno from front to side and show us the different parts that make him conform to the breed standard?

I have been to quite a few trials and seen my share of bench shows.
I rarely see a dog built similarly to Uno. Most running beagles are built much differently.

Right, and if you click this link you will see Scott's brood bitch that is a very good example of the "form follows function" concept..she's built to get the job done.

viewtopic.php?f=30&t=34189

Came from breeding dogs that got the job done.

[buckridge]

Man did this get way out of hand

The show dogs and the field dogs are two total different types of dogs. for the most part, (there again there are some exceptions)

Seem like most of you hunting people put SPEED over everything else... this in my 50ys of exp. is so wrong. Speed equals over running 99% of the time. A dog must control his or her speed not to over run the line.
You got to have the total dog

You hunting people should not even think about show dogs if all you want is speed and poor conformation.( there are always exceptions)
Lets respect each others type of dogs.
This board is for show events not each other. go back to your hunting events and enjoy your own type of dogs and respect show people for what we enjoy in life. 99% of the show people will never go in the field and 99.9 of the field people will never go or enter an AKC all breed show.
I am love to do both

[Beagle Huntsman]

I think Bev explained the answer to the seesaw question very well.

Back to the original thread.....Standing still, I thought Uno represented the Beagle Standard quite well. I would have liked a bit more reach in his stride while moving. If you see beagles at trials that don't look much like a Uno, they probably are not really close to the AKC Standard for Beagles.

Show beagles can help us by providing proper movement, but you have to use the right lines. They can help get hounds that move straight, front and rear, and with ground-covering reach to their strides. They can eliminate crooked legs, cow hocks, sway backs, splayed feet, lack of bone, and poor heads, etc etc etc. All of these traits are valuable to a hunting hound, especially over the hound's lifetime. Beagles should be bred as close to the Beagle Standard as possible, since every part of it relates to hunting in some way. Show lines CAN help us get closer to having hounds that meet the Standard.

One thing not mentioned that I have found to be a great benefit from using show lines for hunting is intelligence. Generally speaking, I have found hounds with show blood to just be a little more intelligent than your average field hound. They are much more biddable and easier to break from off-game. They seem to want to please the master more. I have always thought this came from show beagles being bred for many years to be good pets.

[Larry G]

Bev previously admitted she knew nothing of genetics. She is still entitled to an opinion as is everyone else....maybe more so!!! Anyone agree with me? No? Not a soul on the board ever heard of gene modification or incomplete dominance? Why am I not surprised.... if you breed a pony to a horse, you get something in between, neither horse nor pony... not once in a while, every time. You breed a jack to a mare and you get a mule, not a jack or a mare.

You breed a raccoon to a skunk, what do you get?

Ans. A dirty look from the raccoon.

Believe me, I didn't write this... I can provide a link.

Note all traits are simple Mendelian types. Many traits demonstrate incomplete dominance, where no gene is expressed over the others. Traits will be blended together to form an intermediate trait. An example of this is hair color. The combination of a brown-haired gene and a blonde gene will most likely produce light brown hair. Other traits, such as skin color, are determined by multiple genes.


Explains why a black a white couple produce chocolate babies.

[Bev]

Explains why a black a white couple produce chocolate babies.

The "chocolate babies" have some white genes presenting and some black genes presenting at the same time in different ways. There are no chocolate genes. I bred a mostly white, tri-color bitch with nothing but tricolors behind her to a male with mostly blueticks and some tri-colors behind him. Out of 5 puppies, I got 3 blueticks and 2 Red/whites...not a tricolor in the litter. It may appear that way at times, but it ain't like mixin' paint. The genes have got to be there...somewhere. You either double up on those recessive genes, or you minimize their influence.

Keep breeding cold-nosed hounds to hot-nosed hounds Larry, and let us know how it's workin' for ya.