By David Alderton

Under the British Kennel Club’s new official breed standards, the Shar Pei is set to lose its folds of skin on the head, neck and legs.

The British Kennel Club has recently announced the most far-reaching changes ever made to the official breed standards for dogs.

These follow a television exposé, which highlighted weaknesses affecting a number of purebred dogs, including Cavalier King Charles spaniels and Rhodesian Ridgebacks. The impact of the Kennel Club’s “Fit for Function: Fit for Life” campaign will be far-reaching, curbing the trend toward an exaggerated appearance in breeds such as the bulldog, and extending out beyond the show rings of Crufts and elsewhere to the dog-owning public.

Not everyone—especially breed organizations—has welcomed these changes, however, claiming they will remove the distinctive character of their particular breed. The British Bulldog Council has even threatened to mount a legal challenge against the Kennel Club’s moves to alter this breed’s appearance. Chairman Robin Searle, speaking on behalf of 18 specialist clubs across the U.K., proposes that bulldogs will be unrecognizable, based on the new standard, compared with leading examples of the breed today.

“There is no jowl, no upturn of the nose and the legs will no longer be wide in front and narrow behind,” he said.

Certainly, representations of the proposed new-style bulldog portray a longer-legged and more narrow-bodied dog, with a smaller head. In many ways, this is more representative of appearance of the bulldog of the late 1800s, although contemporary commentators have suggested it will look more like a boxer today.

Other breeds will also undergo marked changes. Pekingese will have longer muzzles in the future, harking back to the original examples of the breed brought to the U.K. from China. The Shar Pei—a relative newcomer to the British dog scene, having been unknown until the mid 1980s, following its rescue from almost certain extinction in Hong Kong—is set to lose its folds of skin on the head, neck and legs. Major changes will also be seen in basset hounds, bloodhounds, Clumber spaniels, mastiffs, chow chows, German shepherd dogs and the dogue de Bordeaux.

The British Bulldog Council has threatened a legal challenge against the Kennel Club’s moves to alter this breed’s current appearance; representations of the proposed new-style bulldog portray a longer-legged and more narrow-bodied dog, with a smaller head.

Additional regulations to encourage healthier bloodlines include the outlawing of close pairings, such as mother to son. Judges will be encouraged to undergo more training, which will include hands-on assessments for novices, emphasizing issues surrounding poor conformation and associated health issues. There will also be refresher seminars for existing Challenge Certificate-awarding judges, ensuring they benefit from the most up-to-date information when judging at Championship shows.

All judges are to penalize any features or exaggerations that, in their opinion, will be detrimental to the soundness, health or well-being of the dog. Conformation and Movement seminars will reinforce this. Judges will learn how poor conformation is detectable from the dog’s movement and the effects of such weaknesses.

These changes come into force immediately, although it is likely to be several years before the radical shift in the show standard for the bulldog, for example, actually becomes apparent in the show ring.

Although it is easy to suggest the Kennel Club is simply reacting to the BBC’s withdrawal on welfare grounds of its Crufts coverage this year, the fact of the matter is the organization has been very active in addressing such issues. It spent millions of pounds on research programs at leading universities, sponsoring work into inherited and congenital problems associated with purebred dogs.

This work will continue, with the aim of increasing the elimination of canine diseases by means of DNA testing. Already, there have been major advances in this rapidly advancing scientific field at the boundaries of veterinary medicine and genetics. Thanks to the determined efforts of both the Kennel Club and breeders of Irish setters, it has now proved possible to eliminate from this breed canine leukocyte adhesion deficiency (CLAD), which results in puppy death.

In addition, the Kennel Club also announced its Accredited Breeder Scheme would now include spot checks on breeders. The aim is ensuring that would-be purchasers of puppies have the assurance the breeder is committed to putting the health and welfare of the litter first and foremost. There will also be health seminars where breeders, and indeed all dog lovers, can learn about health issues and the latest advances in this field.

Finally, in a separate development, following a request from the Kennel Club and the Dogs Trust, which is the U.K.’s largest dog welfare charity, the government has agreed to set up an independent inquiry into dog breeding, registration and showing. The task of chairing the committee has fallen to Sir Patrick Bateson, emeritus professor of Ethology at Cambridge University, who is also president of the Zoological Society of London. He plans to form a committee of experts, including a geneticist and a veterinarian, to investigate these issues, and aims to have a report completed by the fall of this year. <HOME>