workinghprs.myfastforum.org

Goldie · Posted: Tue Apr 11, 2006 5:18 pm Post subject: Howdy from Oregon, USA

Hi All-
I have been involved with Brittanys and recently Epagneuls Bretons for over 30 years.
For those that do not know there is a push by many in spliting the American type Brittany From the European type Brittany which in the USA is aften refered to as "French Brittany/Epagneul Breton".

As far as I am concerned they hunt the same and are trained the same
but their body type and build is slightly different, as well as the color variations. But there are many American dogs that are build like the European dogs and if they were not "show clipped" would look very similar. The European dogs seem to have more health issues for me at least in what I have run accross in the few years I have had them along side of my American dogs.

Any way looks like this might be an interesting forum.

My Dogs are run in American Kennel Club Field Trials and Hunting Tests,
I do FCI shows with the French Dogs in Mexico, and of course the AKC shows with my American type dogs. Have Dual champions and Field Champions and lots of Show champions.

Goldie

Helen · Posted: Tue Apr 11, 2006 5:52 pm Post subject:

Welcome to the board.

Interesting to read about how brittanies are evolving.

Helen

Mike · Posted: Tue Apr 11, 2006 7:57 pm Post subject:

Hi Goldie welcome to the board, what is driving the split? Is it splitting along show / working lines as well?
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josie · Posted: Tue Apr 11, 2006 9:35 pm Post subject:

Hi Goldie & welcome to the forum Very Happy

I had no idea that Brittanys had 2 different names for being slightly different breeds Smile

I wonder - do we have US style Brittanys in the UK, or only European style ones?? Question

I look forward to hearing more about the US style hunting tests and field trials for HPRs - I know about the retriever tests but know nothing about the HPR ones, so looking forward to hearing all that Smile

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Goldie · Posted: Tue Apr 11, 2006 11:08 pm Post subject:

The biggest contributor to the split is that like most of the breeds in the USA they do not belong to or follow the FCI breed standards.
USA - AKC brittany standard disqualifies Black pigment, just like in GSP & GWP. The AKC standard follows the old standard of the 1920's and since that standard did not allow black it was bred out of USA dogs. Importations stopped for the most part in the late 40's and early 50's so the "American" type evolved without fresh blood and infusions after France changed the standard in 1950's to include Black.

Unlike the UK the trial scene also evolved in favor of the professional.
Prior to 1960's Brittanys were mostly Field trialed on foot, Brittanys had to compete in Trials held by a Brittany club in order for a win to count towards its championship (there were very few Brittany Club events at that time), so the professional grew and developed a fairly large string of dogs to work, and to facilitate handling so the horseback handling also grew in popularity so that these "professionsls" could handle dogs all day and save their legs for miles of walking Cool

The term All-Age as you would understand it to mean is for dogs of all ages...but in the USA the implication is for a much more hard driving and independant working dog as compaired to lets say a Gun Dog which shows or checks in more freequently as if the handler is on foot.

Pointing breeds in the USA are not required to be trained to the "UK" style of retirever work even as you use them for HPR breeds as you call them.
We are not required to traind Brittanys to do marks or water work for our trial titles. In The wesern USA we do have retrieving stakes and dogs are required to retrieve to hand, in the Eastern USA there are fewer Retrieving stakes probably due to safty and grounds availability, and as insurance companies make rates higher is forcing the issue to stop retrieving events where game is freshly killed for the dog.

German breed clubs still ofer water tests as part of their breed requirements for a title in many cases, but Brittanys do not have any such requirement.

There are other organizations that offer german system testing like the NAVHDA which has traqcking and water work. But AKC is striclty upland pointing and retrieve if in GUn DOg events. All pointing breeds compete agaisnt all other pointing breeds, so Pointers,Setters, will be against GSP,GWP,Weims, Brittanys, etc. Naturally some breeds are not going to fare well against the style of some other breeds...that is the difference with the American program it seems we want a generic "Pointing Breed" probably why it has become popular to import European strains of dogs for those who want those nifty breed specific traits once again...

I have attended France Trials and while similar to our system, especially the Fall trials seem more like a training session that a competition... All of our dogs from the time they are pups compete in braces or couples, it seems the European system in most cases have the dogs compete in singles until they reach a certain level or number of wins. So very different. USA dogs are expected to have a much more open search pattern and not so formal a quartering pattern like say a spaniel type trial as we are accustom to in the USA.

So this is probably an explaination on why we train our pups with a lot less control and more freedom when young so they will run farther and show a bit more independance and not be underfoot. Plus the kind of and ground we have in different parts of the USA can make a big difference in how a dog searches.

Helen · Posted: Wed Apr 12, 2006 3:35 pm Post subject: