Labs today vs labs of yesteryear/

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Originally Posted by tank47

i feel hunt tests are more for the handlers, meaning the guy who loves to train his hunting buddy and is rather good at it but can afford nor do the field trail life style. i feel thats wut it is, your whole life revolves around trials, right? i think hunt tests are meant for the "average" guy who wants to show the skills of his dog and its fun for him n his dog. i kno for some hunt tests are just as serious. Guess what im trying to say is wouldnt making hunt tests harder can push out those "average" guys with great dogs?

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Kinda where I wanted this to go!We ran the first AKC hunt test Buckeye put on.We took 16 dogs and passed everything!!!I can remember the trip back to the kennel and dad said,"this is going to do nothing for the retriever breed"but will be great for people who can`t afford the FT game.Then he said "mark my word,people are still going to want to know who has the better dog"

Several yrs. later along came the master national! Just some observations of years gone by!!!! Jim

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Originally Posted by walt8@cox.net

I would say couldn't beat Corky, etc... Otherwise all true, at least in my opinion.
Walt

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Ahh! but he was beat! Tremendous animal but he was still human.....ha, Jim

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Originally Posted by jd6400

Ahh! but he was beat! Tremendous animal but he was still human.....ha, Jim

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Short check down bird catch him every time.

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Originally Posted by Tim Carrion

IMHO the FT lab of the past would mark and handle as well as those of the present time given modern training methods applied.
As an unofficial personal observation today's lab tends to be smaller and faster. Could this be related to the frequency of various orthopedic conditions? Is the FT gene pool shrinking allowing more diseases to manifest? Time will tell.

Tim

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A great question to ponder Tim! Jim

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Originally Posted by Criquetpas

Short check down bird catch him every time.

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Well almost every time , haha!

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Originally Posted by Criquetpas

Short check down bird catch him every time.

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With a looong flyer! Jim

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Originally Posted by walt8@cox.net

I would say couldn't beat Corky, etc... Otherwise all true, at least in my opinion.
Walt

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it was a typo it was supposed to say Couldn't


and FTR Clint/Judge beat Corky head to head at the RMRC for his first OPEN win on the weekend Judge turned two tears of age,couple with the Amateur win at Lone Star two months earlier, he was the youngest dog at the National Amateur that year at 25 months of age...

the first person to congratulate Clint after he completed the 4th series was none other than D.L.Walters when he came up to Clint and said " son, I didnt think it was possible for a dog so young, but I think you just won yourself an Open"

Clint always tells me that was one of his fondest memories of his FT career

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Originally Posted by jd6400

With a looong flyer! Jim

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Yup. When John had him before Mike bought him he loved those birds with some noise too.

jd - i've erased the quote for ease of answering -

Heres a few things I`ve noticed about what has been going on in the last 30 yrs.

An influx of cruciate ligament tears. Somewhat bigger dogs, longer tests, more training - I have always been partial to smaller dogs - Code Blue, Watergator Sam, Paha Sapa Chief size - they hold up well over their lifetimes.

Cancer is more prevalent - When it strikes a high profile dog we notice it more - I would say because of a lot of use of a limited gene pool we are seeing more conditions - food allergy, skeletal, CNM - in the old days the best local stud was bred to the best local bitch, pups went to the good trainers, sometimes that worked, but we actually saw the dogs so knew their issues.

Markin ability is better - I started in '63, the guy that taught me a lot of what I know was a guy named Bob Sparks who owned at the time a pup named Moon - In my days of watching dogs I have never seen a dog that could consistently mark better - on occasion dogs like Ray's Rascal & Corky could come close or equal, but none better. 9 Derbies, 30 points, 5 wins, 1 second, 1 third, 2 greenies against some very high powered Derby dogs - I've ran against Lean Mac, trained with & ran against Charmain -

Trainability is better - training tools & techniques are better - help is more available - people who know are willing to share what they know - people have more leisure time to devote to this pursuit

Ability to get in water has greatly diminished! (this has me concerned) - Don't agree, water for training is at a premium - unless you have the knack of reading dogs it is an easy part of the process to screw up - I have seen some great water dogs all through my trialing experience.

now realize this is a generalized statement and I don`t get a ton of super well bred FT bred dogs through here to work with also.

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Originally Posted by Criquetpas

Yup. When John had him before Mike bought him he loved those birds with some noise too.

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Thank God,Hunters Creek was around!