COL. C. J. COTE’S CHAMPION FIELD TRIAL PITCHFORD RANGER ON THE RUABON HILLS
Mr. Arkwright has the best black pointers the author has seen. Their bodies are distinctly greyhoundy in form, but not their heads. The last-mentioned fact does not preclude the possibility of a remote cross of greyhound, as colour is a truer indication of blood, although not of paper pedigree, than is head formation. By “paper pedigree” no suggestion of false testimony is intended, but reference is made to the recently ascertained facts that two of a litter may be widely different in root origin. Some of the self-coloured pointers of Mr. Arkwright’s kennel have been fawn colour, a well-known greyhound shade. It may be that these are throwbacks to the greyhound blood. But that would not be the author’s explanation. As observed above, a blend of colour very seldom comes by crossing one colour with another, when both are pure bred and neither have the blend of colour in their ancestry. But a little more often than a blend of colour comes a heritage of the colour of one parent and the markings of the other. So that when Mr. Arkwright has crossed a lemon-and-white with a black, there would be nothing wonderful for an occasional puppy to come with the markings of the black parent, but of the colour of lemon, in this case called fawn, which is the same colour. On the other hand, a blend of colour and markings would require the offspring to be whole-coloured and liver-coloured. That liver colour is occasionally obtained from blending the red or sandy with the black, the author has proved beyond question in his own experience where neither parent inherited the colour, but it seems to require a violent out-cross to give rise to it, for black-and-white and lemon-and-white dogs of the same family may sometimes be bred together for many generations without giving rise to this blend of colour.
Mr. Pilkington at one time had as good liver-and-white pointers as anyone who was then running dogs in public. His Garnet was very much of a pointer; and Nicholson, who engineered him to victory, has continued to win at field trials with some of the breed; and another Salopian keeper who has been a most successful breeder is Mawson, who bred Faskally Bragg and Syke of Bromfield.
As the sire of Mr. A. T. Williams’ Rose of Gerwn, the stud dog Lurgan Loyalty cannot be passed over. Rose was full of vitality and pointer instinct, but far from handsome, and very small. Lurgan himself was a small dog and very well made, but he had rather a terrier-like head. His daughter, Coronation, although long held to be the best pointer on the show bench, was obviously too shelly for hard work, and can only be mentioned here to show that exhibition points need have no relationship to the essentials for a working dog.
In these days of wild grouse and partridges, all the fine qualities and beauties of a pointer are absolutely useless unless the individual is endowed with the very best of olfactory powers.
The length of a pointer’s “nose” is determined by the day; but the author is inclined to believe that the relative distances at which any two dogs can find game always bear the same proportions to each other. One on a fair scenting day may find game at 100 yards and another at 10 yards; another day, or in other circumstances, the same two noses will be effective at 50 yards and 5 yards respectively. Even this great difference does not convey all there is between the best and the worst. Such differences have been observed even at field trials, where each sportsman only enters his very best. But behind those is the rest of the kennel, and every breeder of dogs must occasionally breed the very bad indeed. The author has, at any rate, sometimes seen a dog with a total inability to find game although both its parents had exceptional olfactory powers. What the explanation may be cannot be suggested, but there may be a kinship between the organs of sight, hearing, and smell, and as there are some colours and sounds the human eye and ear cannot detect, and some scents that the human nose cannot recognise and the dog’s nose can, it seems possible that even a dog’s nose may occasionally be found either below or above the range of sensitiveness usual in the canine. But “nose” is the only quality in the dog that does not seem to be within the control of the skilled breeder, who may expect success within limits from proper selections of parental form, pace, stamina, and heart, but in inheritance of olfactory powers must expect the unexpected occasionally, but not often.
FIELD TRIAL WINNER PITCHFORD BEAUTY ON THE RUABON HILLS
FIELD TRIAL WINNER PITCHFORD BANG