Judges past and future

In my reviews of 2019 I didn’t mention the judges. So here we are. We had two judges at the Welsh Corgi Club so 31 people handed out green cards. Of these 17 are or have been regular exhibitors of Pembrokes including one, Liz Cartledge, who is also a leading all-rounder. One of these was from overseas, Betsey Orman from the US. Two further judges are Corgi people best known for their Cardigans. That leaves 12 best known in other breeds, a higher than usual proportion. Of those, Anne Macdonald was brought up with Pembrokes and Graham Hill has for many years owned a Cardi or two. There were three first-timers, Betsey, Cardi specialist Peter Clifton and from other breeds Sue Hewart-Chambers. Some future judges from the latest Journal: for this year Alison Benson (Corben, nowadays in Cardis) will do bitches at South Wales Corgi Club and Allan Taylor (Belroyd) BIS; Belfast Keith Nathan who used to show the Supernova Poodles; Sheila Burgess (Shallianne) will do the first ch show of the South West Corgi Club (the combined West of England and Devon & Cornwall clubs) with Karen Hewitt (Cardhew Cardis) doing BIS. WELKS next year has Dawn Woodey (Barawood) and Welsh KC John Burgess (Breconmohr, Australia). I see one or two judges (not for Corgis) have been fined for not submitting reports. I don’t know if anyone keeps track of Pem critiques but it would be good if someone did. One can complain to the KC but this can only be done between three and six months after the show. Would make sense if one person coordinated the task, I’d have thought. The current regulation is that they must be submitted to Our Dogs though of course many of us also put them on the Kennel Club critique site and on various other sites or Facebook groups. Not much news this week. I see Tracy and Kath Irving’s Twinan Shake The Tree was G2 at Lichfield open show (judges Angie Allan and Joe Smith) and the next day Twinan Finger Licken Good was PG3 at Coalville (Jane Powe and Jenny Shorer-Wheeler). SIMON PARSONS