Pat Hastings Workshop

Yesterday  I attended a workshop by Pat Hastings.  Pat Hastings is reknown for her Puppy Puzzle presentations in which you can predict the adult structure of the dog by evaluating the dog as a puppy at 8 weeks of age.  The workshop consisted of 4 parts.

• Evaluating Mechanical Structure Powerpoint
• Evaluating 2 Litters of Puppies (Australian Shepherd and Australian Cattle Dog)
• Evaluating Structure of Adult Dogs that had imperfect structure
• Talk about How Poor Nutrition can affect Puppy Development

I really found this workshop helpful since there aren't a lot of structure mentors in the Jindo or Poongsan breed.  I've been reading books and going to Shiba shows, but I always came away feeling that I would need to bring someone along to evaluate the structure of a dog.

The information really comes alive during Pat Hasting's talks.  I feel more confident that I'll be able to pick up several structurally sound pups if or when I ever visit Korea.
 

This Dogue de Bordeaux has one slipped hock.  Still breeding quality.

Here are some choice insights that I picked up from Pat Hastings:

• Standards are written by committees and are the result of compromises, often after everybody is tired and just want to end the discussion.
• Need to ask whether you want to evaluate by the standard or by reality (meaning standards can be far away from physics and mechanics).
• Eliminate from the vocabulary "pick of the litter."  A "pick of the litter" from a subpar litter doesn't mean it should be bred.
• It's easy to learn faults.  It's hard to learn virtues.  When looking at a dog, try picking out 5 virtues before stating the one fault. 
• All dogs have faults.
• For the show ring, nothing is more important than breed type, but in context.  Breed type means 3 things that should not be budged from:  ability to do its job, breed ID possible on only seeing the head, breed ID possible by only seeing a side silhouette of the dog.
• A fault becomes the worst or most serious fault in a breed when it becomes so prevalent that people come to accept it as normal.  Newcomers, both breeders and judges, come to think that's what it's supposed to look like.
• "You shouldn't see pieces before you see the dog,"  meaning no one feature should distract you from seeing the entire dog.
• For a puppy, if his structure in the air is better than his structure on the ground, this is an indication of poor nutrition.