DFS Crufts 2011 - German Wirehaired Pointers

Last week saw the arrival of DFS Crufts which for anyone showing their dog in the UK is the highlight of the show calendar. This year as last, we only took Lottie (pictured here being handled by our friend Mandy Hayes) and our youngster Winnie, despite having 'qualified' had to stay at home.
Both Lottie and Winnie are docked - this is possible since the current docking ban made an exemption for certain working dogs and thus kennels like ours are still able to dock. However, dogs docked after the ban came into force (6 April 2007) may not be shown at a show where the public are charged a fee for admission. Hence Winnie was unable to attend.
Docked and Denied is a campaign spearheaded by Wendy Oxman (Wendavia GWP's) which hopes to voice opposition to this ban by people like ourselves who wish to show and work their dogs competitively and Wendy and her team did a sterling job at Crufts advertising this campaign.
The docking issue aside, we had a lovely day out. Our judge this year was Mrs Pat Dempster (Benreeda GWP's) who had a respectable entry given that so many young docked dogs were absent. As usual, Lottie showed her little socks off - she really is a pleasure to handle in the ring and we were delighted with her 3rd place in the Open Bitch class.