Intro

• UK Kennel Club


  • Founded – 4th April 1873
  • 1st official registry of purebred dogs in the world
  • the oldest of the world's all-breed kennel clubs
  • governing body for dogs in the UK
  • template for other kennel clubs worldwide
  • Registrations peaked in the early 2000s at 280,000 (currently < 200,000)
  • The Kennel Club's best known event is the Cruft's dog conformation show
  • Cruft's held annually since 1928
• The Kennel Club registration system divides dogs into seven breed groups

  • Hound
  • Working
  • Terrier
  • Gundog
  • Pastoral
  • Utility
  • Toy
• The Kennel Club currently recognises 218 breeds of dog
• Breeds in the Hound Group

  • Originally used for hunting
  • either by scent or by sight
  • Scent hounds include the Beagle, Bloodhound & Harrier
  • Sight hounds such breeds as the Whippet & Greyhound
  • Require a significant amount of exercise
  • Often described as "dignified, aloof but trustworthy companions"

  
• Sight hounds


  • Adapted for visual acuity & speed
  • Hunting method is known as "coursing"
  • Prey is often sighted from a distance, stalked, pursued and neatly killed
  • Work quickly & quietly
  • Have an independent nature
• Scent hounds


  • Primarily hunt by scent
  • Used to trail & sometimes kill game
  • Hunt in packs
  • Lead hunters on a chase which may end in the quarry being chased into a tree or killed
  • Some of these breeds have deep, booming barks and use them when following a scent trail
• Breeds in the Working Group

  • Kennel clubs assign larger breeds engaged in some sort of physically active work
  • In areas of the world where livestock production is economically important (such as NZ), pastoral dogs are also placed in the Working Group
  • In the rest of the world, dogs that were traditionally bred for guarding, rescue, police or messenger work, as well as large Spitz type dogs, are placed in the Working Group
  • Large size, strength & behaviour make many working dogs unsuitable as pets for average families
• Breeds in the Terrier Group

  • Originally kept to hunt vermin
  • mice, rats, rabbits, otters, stoats & weasels
  • Some Terriers were designed to go down the holes of the European fox or other agricultural pests in order to flush them out for the hunter
  • Name is from the Latin "terra" meaning earth, in reference to the dogs going underground
  • Hardy collection of dogs, selectively bred to be extremely brave & tough
  • Today, the majority of modern breeds developed from the old terrier types are pets and companions
• Breeds in the Gundog Group


  • Dogs developed to assist hunters in finding & retrieving shot game (birds)
  • Divided into three primary types: Retrievers, Flushing dogs, Pointing breeds
  • Includes breeds of Retrievers, Setters, Spaniels, Water dogs & Pointers
  • They make good companions, their temperament making them ideal all-round family dogs
• Breeds in the Pastoral Group


  • A pastoral breed is any type of dog bred to work livestock
  • Herding or guardian type dogs
  • Herding dogs are associated with working cattle, sheep, reindeer and other cloven footed animals
  • Usually this type of dog has a weatherproof double coat to protect it from the elements when working in severe conditions
  • Breeds such as Collies, Old English Sheepdogs and Samoyeds who have been herding reindeer for centuries are included in this group

  
• Pastoral Group


  • Maremma Sheepdog
  • Border Collie
• Breeds in the Utility Group

  • Miscellaneous breeds of dog mainly of a non-sporting origin
  • "Utility" means fitness for a purpose - most breeds having been selectively bred to perform a specific function not included in the sporting and working categories
  • Breeds that do not fit in other groups are placed in the utility group, such as the Shih Tzu, which is too large for the toy group
  • Other dogs are placed in the group because the working purpose for which they were originally bred "has now become redundant" e.g. Dalmatians which were carriage dogs
• Breeds in the Toy Group

  • Small companion or lap dogs
  • The term "toy" to refer to dogs is based on tradition - not a precise classification
  • Toy dogs are usually the very smallest dogs
  • Some are of ancient lap dog types, and some are small versions of hunting dog (e.g. Spitz, or terrier types), bred smaller for a particular kind of work or to create a pet of convenient size
  • Have friendly personalities & love attention
  • Do not need a large amount of exercise & some can be finicky eaters
• Toy Group


  • Toy Terrier – 1840's
  • Cavalier King Charles Spaniel
• Working dogs


  • Large number of breeds (n=218) selectively bred and developed for specific tasks in many cases
  • Breeds still remain despite the task they were originally bred for being made redundant by: Modern technological advances, Changing laws, Changing societal fashion
  • Evidence of evolution and change in modern working dog types
• Modern Working Dogs


  • Many modern working dogs are not breed-specific
  • Utilise unique attributes of the dog
  • Scent detection
  • Predatory instincts
  • New Zealand Working dogs a good example: Huntaways, Just selected on ability or performance
• Olfaction


  • Receptive areas: Dogs 80-150 cm2, Humans 2-4 cm2
  • Receptive cell density: Dogs 1.5 x 106/ cm2, Humans 3 x 106/ cm2
  • Receptive cell No.: Dogs 125 - 220 million (Nb. Bloodhounds 300 million), Humans 6 - 12 million
  • Sense of smell 1,000 – 10,000 x better than humans
  • Area of the brain processing the information is 40x larger in dogs
• Inside the nose


  • Bony scroll-shaped plates (turbinates), which air passes over
  • Covered by a thick, spongy membrane containing: Scent-detecting cells, Nerves that transport information to the brain
  • Size of this surface varies with the size and length of the dog's nose
• Bloodhound


  • Bred originally to hunt deer & wild boar
  • Later: to track human beings by scent
  • Ability to follow scents hours or even days old over great distances
  • Long ears
  • Extraordinarily keen nose
  • Strong and tenacious tracking instinct (not easily distracted)
  • Produced the ideal scent hound
  • Used by police and law enforcement all over the world to track escaped prisoners, missing people, and even lost pets
• Hunting dogs


  • Hunting - the job that comes most naturally to dogs, as all dogs descend from the wolf
  • Since our first association with dogs in the Stone Age, humans have trained dogs to hunt nearly every animal on Earth
  • Range: Rhodesian ridgebacks bred to challenge lions in Africa, Dachshunds bred/engineered to go after badgers in their narrow dens
  • Today, hunting with dogs is mostly a sport - e.g. spaniel standing beside recently retrieved pheasants in the UK
• Land Mine Dog


  • Thailand's Humanitarian Mine Action Unit using a mine-detecting dog to search for land mines in a village near Bangkok
  • Mine-detecting dogs are used to search for land mines
• Scent hounds


  • Long ears
  • Extraordinarily keen nose
  • Strong and tenacious tracking instinct (not easily distracted)
  • Produced the ideal scent hound
• Scent hounds are used by police and law enforcement all over the world to track escaped prisoners, missing people, and even lost pets
• Types of Modern Working dogs

  • Hunting dogs
  • Land Mine Dog
  • Rescue Dog
  • Sled Dog
  • Truffle Dog
  • Acting Dog
  • Assistance Dog
  • Herding Dog
  • Drug Dog
  • Termite Dog
  • Disease Diagnosis Dogs
  • COVID-19 Detection
• Hunting dogs


  • Hunting is the job that comes most naturally to dogs, as all dogs descend from the wolf
  • Humans have trained dogs to hunt nearly every animal on Earth
  • Hunting with dogs is mostly a sport today
• Hunting dogs


  • Rhodesian ridgebacks bred to challenge lions in Africa
  • Dachshunds bred/engineered to go after badgers in their narrow dens
• Land Mine Dog


  • Trained - against their instincts - to walk in straight lines while searching
  • Usually smell things up to 10cm underground, but they can be taught to smell objects at even greater depths
  • Dogs have proven among the most effective tools for mine detection
• Rescue Dog


  • Trained to search out the odour given off by humans trapped beneath collapsed structures or natural debris
  • Handlers alerted by barking at the site where a victim lies
  • Can indicate if the victim is alive, dead, uninjured or severely injured
• Sled Dog


  • Huskies undertaking the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race
  • 1,049 mile (1,688 km) trek from Anchorage to Nome across the Alaskan wilderness
  • 9-15 days
  • 112 - 187km per day
  • Some native Alaskans in remote areas still drive sled-dog teams for transportation, most sled dogs are now used purely for sport
  • Mushers select pairs of dogs with slightly different skills at different positions in the team to pull their sleds
• Truffle Dog


  • Trained hounds have excellent noses for truffles
  • Hunters seeking the gourmet fungi usually use dogs to help locate their quarry, despite a long tradition of truffle pigs
  • Since truffles can bring over $1,500 per kg, dogs are a better than truffle-sniffing pigs, which tend to eat what they find
• Acting Dog


  • Niche Industry: Canine actors
  • Trainers select at least half of all the dogs in the entertainment business from animal shelters
• Assistance Dog


  • Dogs who serve people in their everyday lives
  • Within the last 75 years, people have trained dogs to perform numerous tasks to help people who are blind, deaf, or mobility-impaired
  • Guide dogs for the blind & service dogs for the mobility-impaired are usually golden retrievers, Labradors, or German shepherds
  • Optimal strength, size, and receptiveness to training
  • Hearing dogs (serving the deaf) can be any kind of dog
• Herding Dog


  • Centuries-old canine occupation that has a long tradition in the UK, where the border collie breed was developed
  • Dogs that develop a close collaborative friendship with their human owners
  • Undaunted by much larger animals that might kick or trample them if they're not vigilant
  • Bred for stamina, herding dogs work with their masters all day in the fields
  • Take verbal orders from a distance
• Drug Dog


  • No dog is genetically programmed to recognise the scent of drugs
  • Dogs trained for detection work can learn to sniff for drugs
  • Police & Customs officials increasingly depend on dogs to locate an selection of illegal substances quickly & without bias
• Termite Dog


  • Trained scent dogs can detect termites as the insects give off methane gas produced by microorganisms in their digestive tracts
  • Termite-hunting dogs often locate infestations in areas of a house or building where there are no apparent signs of termites
• Disease Diagnosis Dogs


  • Recent studies have begun to show how effective dogs are at detecting the chemical signals of lung and breast cancer
  • 99% accuracy in detecting lung cancer and 88% in breast cancer in limited numbers of studies so far
  • Current debate whether dogs are responding to odours associated with the cancer (inflammation, infection etc) rather than the cancer itself
  • Research concentrating on analysis of the breath from cancer patients to determine what the dogs are detecting
• COVID-19 Detection


  • Sniffer-dog scientists trained dogs to smell samples of sweat to detect signs of infection
  • Only one pilot study published so far
  • Identified 83% of positive cases and 96% of negative ones
• Estimates put working farm dog numbers in New Zealand at 80,000
• Types of working dogs in New Zealand

  • Heading dogs
  • Huntaways
  • Gundogs
  • Pig dogs
  • Guide dogs
  • Police dogs
• Heading dogs


  • 'Heading' or 'casting' means running around a flock of sheep
  • A 'heading dog' or 'eye dog' gathers sheep into a group and holds them together to stop any escaping
  • NZ heading dogs bred mainly from the 'border collie' imported by shepherds from the Scottish borders
  • Bred to have much shorter hair and stand taller so it can be seen more clearly at a distance