The Holy Trinity - Sigurlaug Hauksdóttir

The Holy Trinity.

I've been thinking.. I know, not a very common occurrence my husband would say, but never the less, I've been thinking. I've been following the conversations here and looking at the lovely pictures every one has been posting of all these lovely dogs. What got me thinking is the absolute insistence many have on the breed standard when choosing dogs for breeding, and in some cases absolute insistence on championship, especially for the male. This has been some food for thought for me.

First of all, what is a breed standard? Well, obviously, the standard is a guide as to how a dog of a certain breed should look like. And every breeder should know his breeds standard. But I also think it is important to know how the breed has evolved.. because it certainly has, especially in the later years. Many breeds are and have undergone drastic changes in the 20th century, just look at the German Shepherd and many of the hunting breeds. Why is that? A big reason for changes in a breed is the repeated breeding of champions to each other.

So that brings me to: What is a champion? A champion, especially a multich. is an individual with that something extra, the “oomph”, that extra flair. Often a BIT exaggerated. He draws the eye in the show ring. By repeatedly breeding these often exaggerated individuals we make them even more exaggerated, and that becomes the norm. Closest to hand and easiest to explain is the coat. I've seen the coat change dramatically in these last 25 years or so. When I was a child almost half a century ago (my god I'm getting old!!) all Icelandic sheepdogs I knew had short coats. I grew up in the most remote part of Iceland, the West fjords, and many of the original stock to revive the breed came from the West fjords. I am almost 100% sure that every single one of those dogs had what we call today a short coat. I can't remember a single one of the longer variety.

My grannies dogs were short coated, I had a special favorite, his name was Nói. We children could do anything with him, he'd just wag his tail and lick our hands, and grin this silly grin (Reykjadals Móri reminds me a lot of him, Nói was considered a big dog for his breed). He was out of my grannies “larder bitch” as my grandfather would call her, he said she was so fat she must live in the larder, and the vicars dog across the fjord. Every time grannies larder bitch would come into heat, lo and behold, there the vicars dog was. She wouldn't have any other dog. Nói was out of her last litter I think. The puppies went all over, mostly in Ísafjarðardjúp but also over to Önundarfjörður and Dýrafjörður. And some over to Barðaströnd. I remember my mum telling of Gramps taking a puppie over to the farmers Co-Op in Króksfjarðarnes when he went to do some shopping (the farmers had to do their shopping in the Co-Op they had their contract with, the co op was a sort of a bank).

Anyway, I've been watching show after show these past years and I keep seeing fewer and fewer short coated dogs. It's been ages since a short coated dog has been BOB. Which goes to show that obviously the longer haired dogs have the favor in the show ring, they are more flashy, have that extra flair so to speak. And those dogs are bred to each other.. obviously, creating more of those long coated flashy dogs. And the coat gets longer and heavier, I'm starting to see individuals that look uncannily like a Finnish lapphund or a Keeshond. The dogs are also getting heavier with more bone than I remember.

My other breed is the Irish Wolfhound, before I ventured into that breed I read a lot, not about the breed today, but mainly the history of the breed, and about some famous breeders. Mrs. Florence Nagle was one of those breeders. She said something I've thought a lot about. She said that it was of the utmost importance to use the “honest hound” in breeding. What she meant was a good quality dog, nothing more. No exaggerations, just an honest hound. And, she also said, a good brood bitch is not necessarily a champion, and when choosing a foundation bitch to build your breeding on, you should first look to temperament, then health and easy whelping and last, conformation.

It is not preserving a breed to always breed repeatedly those “extra” dogs, it is of the utmost importance to also use the “average john”. One of the more important things in the breed standard of our breed is the diversity in colour, long AND short coat, and anything in between. And also to keep our breed healthy we need to use the gene pool as diversely as possible, otherwise we end up in a corner from which there is no escape. It only takes 5-7 generations to change appearances in a breed permanently.

The Holy Trinity should be every breeders guide, no matter what the breed, and that is: Temperament, Health and Conformation. In that order.

Sigurlaug Hauksdóttir
Thordunu Icelandic Sheepdogs and Irish Wolfhounds.

Please bear in mind that when I talk about champions, I'm talking about show champions. In many breeds there are other types of championship.

Sigurlaug Hauksdóttir 3:16pm Jan 16
You're all welcome to use these thoughts of mine.