“Having great mentors in my beginning has prepared me for the future of breeding better dogs.”
I was fortunate to have a great mentor for teaching me the basics of whelp- ing. Oh, no! What had I gotten my- self into? Would I even survive this necessary step? First came the list of supplies that I would need for the ar- rival of new puppies. My goodness! I thought the mothers could take care of everything! I became friends with the UPS driver as orders began ar- riving. Dental floss, hemostats, liquid blood stop, lubricant, thermometers, a nice scale for weights, goats milk, Karo syrup, tube feeding supplies? Wait! I faint at the sight of blood! Thank goodness I wouldn’t need any of these for a while. My advice if you are considering this breed is to find a great breeder mentor! I repeat, a great breeder mentor!! At this point, I joined the Breed Club. We traveled to all areas of the coun- try to promote our first Biewer Ter- riers. The judges seemed to love this new breed and were complimentary. I soon met others who loved and pro- motedour breed. Althoughcompeting for those ribbons was surely competi- tive, I enjoyed developing friendships with people who appreciate the same passion for this intriguing little dog. I asked for advice on grooming tips and was pleasantly surprised that a few fellow owners with years of experi- ence gave recommendations freely. I realized that I would soon need
advice from others who were success- ful with drop-coats as my only goal was to show up with my dog looking as if she just came from the spa! It is a work in progress, but I couldn’t have had the successes without my grooming mentors. I enrolled in classes that teach us how to breed better dogs. I implemented this policy immediately and began keeping the best puppy to move the breed forward. (I didn’t realize the instructor did not mean I had to keep one from every litter... After a few years I had accumulated a full house!) It was at that point that I realized I needed advanced training for what “the best” actually meant. I traveled hours in order to attend seminars from leading experts on this matter. My first question for the instructor was, “Can you show me how to locate the rear angulation?” I can still see the look on his face! He must have wondered how I could be a “breeder” and not know this important part of evaluatingmy dog. I readmany books, but I didn’t “get it” until I understood that putting hands on a dog shows so much more. Once again, I needed a different type of mentor! It was called, Evaluating a Puppy. After being accepted into the AKC FSS program, I knew that I had to face another challenge if I wanted to
continue: Learning the AKC ring pro- cedure. It was overwhelming, to say the least, but we jumped in with both feet.We began inFSS in order to learn the proper ring procedure. (A differ- ent approach than the International Style Shows.) I am sure I showed up at ringside an hour early until I fig- ured out the listed ring time was “on time.” The point schedule in order to obtain the title of Certificate of Merit seemed impossible to achieve, since it required 15 points. After all, there was rarely ever a handful of Biewer Terriers in the ring. We needed 16 in the breed competition in order to earn five points. There were only two options for points in the breed: Best of Breed and Best Opposite. I was fortu- nate enough to earn several titles in our foundation and Miscellaneous Groups in preparation for breeding future Champions. After five years of preparation for the Toy Group, here we are once again learning a new way to show! Now there’s Winners Dog, Winners Bitch, Best of Breed or Best Opposite. We now start over with earning points that count toward a champion title. Having great mentors in my begin- ning has prepared me for the future of breeding better dogs. Now I realize that I, once again, need another mentor!
50 • T op N otch T oys , J anuary 2021
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