| As part of our 2006 European trip, we visited Germany to attend the World Sieger Show. While in Germany we also visted a couple of kennels. I am attaching connecting pages to show pictures and desriptions of our travels and experiences. The Sieger show was held in Oberhausen at a large soccer stadium complex. The venue was not as accomodating as the venue we attended in Karlsruhle in 2004. The grounds were not as well maintained and the support staff did not work as hard to keep the area clean. Th number of vendors was still pretty good and lots of good training gear was for sale. I am not a real show enthusiast, but really like to watch a seiger show versus a typical American dog show. Day one was my favorite with the infamous courage test. Each of the competitors in the working dog class has to pass the courge test in order to make it to the show ring. The courage test consists of 2 events; one is a heeling routine that has the handler heeling the dog and a bad guy pops out from behind a blind. The dog must attack the aggressor and must release on command. The second event is a version of the long bite. The dog must attack an aggressor in open field. The dog and handler are on one end of the field and the aggressor exits a blind from the other side of the field (about 80 yds away). The bad guys starts walking towards the the dog team, at which point the handler tells him to stop or I send my dog. The aggressor does not stop, but increases his pace and approaches the team at a fast paced jog, and appears very threatening. The dog is commanded to attack and the dog must meet the aggressor at mid-field with an aggressive bite to the sleeve. This is usually the most entertaining and dramatic event of the entire show. This is designed to show the dog's character and courage. Although many of the dogs did well, there were a surprisingly high number of dogs that did very poorly. I was very disappointed in the quality of training in many of the dogs. It is my opinion that many of the dogs that failed, were just not trained well. The handlers did not have good obedience on the dogs and the actual drive to do the protection work was not properly developed. I know that show line dogs are generally softer and not known to be the best in the protection arena, but I have seen some dogs that can do the work and truely earn their Schutzhund Titles. Many of the Show dog enthusiasts tend to focus on the appearance and visible traits of the dogs versus the character and training of the dogs. It must be a balance, and show dogs only best represent the breed if they can "function" as they were originally intended to. |
