A One's Cocker Spaniels
Cocker Spaniel Club Show September 18, 2010, at Köping
Linda Crowley, Ashalon, judged the bitches.
Best Bitch Finals:
1 Allert's Corona CAC
2 SU(u)CH Manaca's Rags To Riches
3 Apelhöjdens Shenandoa
4 SU(u)CH SVCH Honeywater's Happiness Like Jam
This champion bitch was placed but not the two bitches who beat her in the
champion class CH A One's Fingers Crossed and
SU(u)CH Manaca's Join the Joyride!
5 Backhills Ursula Andrews
Champion bitches´ class:
1 SU(u)CH Manaca's Rags To Riches
2 C.I.E NORDUCH NORDV07 SV08 NV08 KBHV08 A One's Fingers
Crossed
3 SU(u)CH
Manaca's Join the Joyride
4 SU(u)CH SVCH Honeywater's Happiness Like Jam
This champion bitch was placed in the best bitch
finals but 2nd and 3rd
best champion bitches were not!
I really like Honeywater's Happiness Like Jam and she moved just as nicely in
the champion class as in the best bitch class.
No serious judge makes such a castling without an explanation. Not OK.
5 SU(u)CH Manaca's Pull No Punches
Same thing happened in 15-24 months bitches´ class:
1 Allert's Corona
2 Art-Wave's Chubby Chic
3 Backhills Ursula Andrews
This bitch was placed in the best bitch finals but not
Art-Wave's Chubby Chic. How difficult can this be? One - two - three -
four - five.
4 Tårpilens All I Want Is You
5 Art-Wave's Happy Anniversary
6 Westerner Fairy Dance
No 1, 2, 3 and 6(!) were selected for the Best Bitch class but not 4 and 5 and 3
was even placed in the Best Bitch class but not no 2!
Junior Bitches' class:
1 Backhills Xpect a New Day
2 Surprise
3 Perchwater Queen'N'Magic
No 1 and 3 (!) were selected for the Best Bitch finals (though later not placed)
but NOT no 2. Very confusing.
I can put up with an extremely dirty showhall, much too small rings to admit sound groundcovering moving, very slow judging of the dogs, but NOT an incompetent and inexperienced bitch judge who had absolutely no clue what she had done ten minutes earlier. Not at a club show. Interesting is the fact that Linda Crowley is on the 2009 A3 list of judges and so is Jane Simmonds. Which means they have never awarded a Challenge Certificate but are considered by the Cocker Spaniel Club Committee to have sufficient experience and would be approved by The Club should their names come before the KC for approval. Have their names come before the KC for approval? Or have they been assessed in accordance with Kennel Club requirements and accepted by The Kennel Club for inclusion on an A2 list? Why invite someone from the A3 list when there are 236 names on the A1 list to choose from, i e British judges, Kennel Club approved to award Challenge Certificates? Which, of course, provides no guarantee that the judge is competent (see Club Show 2004).
(Open show rules are not as strict. If a breeder has made up at
least three champions, one of which must be of one's own breeding, the breeder
is entitled to judge at an open show.
I cannot find one single Ashalon
champion on my list of GBSHCHs.)
Ask yourselves why this kind of chaos only arises at club shows (see 2004). You never see experienced judges like Thirlwell, Armstrong, Kerkäs, Sommer, Gadsby, Johansson, Teixeira, Halvorsen, Kliebenstein, Darby, Dondina, Lester, Beyersdorf and many many others, lose count like this at all breeds national/international shows. Should a serious and competent judge 'change his/her mind' between a class and the best-dog-/best-bitch finals he/she explains this to the audience/exhibitors to show them respect. The Committee members surely have a commendable ambition to "try something new" but it has its price, at the Club Show 2010 it caused chaos, confusion, disappointed exhibitors and Club Show loss of prestigious event image.
Exhibitors pay a lot of money for entry fees and petrol and spend hours and hours on stripping and grooming their dogs. It's an insult to all exhibitors/members of the Club to invite an incompetent and inexperienced person to judge our Club Show.