Why are breeds excluded from Hunt Tests and Field Trails - Page 1

I contacted the AKC with this same question and have yet to hear back. 
Here is the list of eligible AKC recognized breeds: http://www.akc.org/events/hunting_tests/retrievers/eligible_breeds.cfm
It consists of retreivers, pointers, spaniels and others from the sporting group. My question is why is it so exclusive? Why isn't it open to all breeds who put in the time and training to be effective hunting/ sporting/ retrieving dogs. I know shepherds and other dogs from the herding and working group would kick butt in trials and have no problem earning titles.

I have a very well rounded GSD and I'd like to be able to earn titles and maybe even compete in any sport that he would excell at. I was bummed to see that GSD's aren't eligible for testing or trialing. My GSD currently retrieves dummies from a launcher on land and in water and loves it. I'd like to find a group or club to get him on real birds but I'm not sure GSD's are welcome in local retrieving or hunt clubs... I'll have to do more research on that :P

My guess is fairly simply and rightly breed preservation and loyalties. organisers of these events put their heart and soul into it. there are limited resources, limited time for expensive logistic heavy trials, limited prey targets limited everything and people working there asses of for free to enable it. so yeah they will put there breeds up first.

bite sports do the exact same thing.


bite sports in general are the most exclusive and snobby people i know. they don't just discriminate on breed but they do on blood line. same thing decoys are scarce training is expensive and time consuming trials are a lot of work to run. they will get picky who they invest their limited time into. and fair enough.


gsd people imo experience are fickle time wasters many want a pic of their gsd trotting next to sheep, doing agility, wearing a k9 vest....etc and most are not serious about any of it, they waste time and resources to fulfill their fantasy that they own the world's most versatile and best breed.


all just my opinion.


spend the time in years volunteering at a hunt club i am sure they will find away to accommodate you.

otherwise yr just another goofy time waster.

The first paragraph is spot on, the rest????  I guess you show just how much you know :)  You can enter any breed of any dog in almost any trial of any bitesport in this country.  About the only restrictions are a Mal or GSD only national, but then you can still do the same exact sport and trial in an AWDF national if that's what you want to do.  Otherwise, USMRA, Schutzhund USA, WDA, etc, you can trial at almost any level with any breed or mix.

I don't know why they don't allow other breeds at the lower levels of hunt and field trials, but I imagine it is a time and space issue with so many dogs competing already, maybe they don't need the entries.

Our Sch club has ACD mixes, AmBulldogs, GSD, Malinois, Rotts, G Danes, Mastiff etc... Maybe its just our super club, but everyone who wants to work their dog is welcome to train and trial. They have been the most wonderful, supportive group of people I've met!

 

Melissa

Melba, the op is not asking about wonderful sch clubs, they are inquiring about AKC field trials.

To the OP, try UKC. They encourage the total dog.

There have been some Labs doing IPO with success.  Snobbery, elitism, self preservation, money, politics, and pride would seem to cover the waterfront on the sins and why to only allow certain breeds and not others.   I think there is plenty of sin to go around in the dog world regardless of sport or organization.   I am proposing a new sport called the ATNRA .. American Truck Nutz Retriever Association.  It combines bite sport with retreiving.  Scoring is simple .. whoever has the most balls wins.  Sponsors will include the NRA because we have the letters NRA, Truck, and Nutz all in our title.  In the UK we will be known as the NBA .. National Bollock Association.  I think this sport could include all breeds and weight classes would depend on truck size.   

Joan, my post was in response to Vks post about elitism in the bite sports.

For the same reason the black and whites won't let us come play with their sheep., to answer the op.

I think many sports/test events take a LOT of time and resources to organize and pull off so breed clubs may be reluctant just to open it up to everyone with no limit. One of the sports I do right now is flyball and my team is trying to organizing a tournament this fall and will likely limit our entries.  Has nothing to do with being snobs or elitist and only letting certain clubs play, we just don't have the amount of people or the space to run a two-ring tournament which is what is necessary when you allow unlimited entries.

Or maybe they just don't know there is interest? I've never owned a sighthound but have been lure coursing one of my dogs for a few years now.  The LC club that hosts events near me (they are actually from Canada) opened up their events to all breeds and were surprised by the amount of interest.  Now it seems more than half of their entries are non-sighthounds.  But imagine if they made special events/titles for all breed and only 3 dogs showed up?  Not worth their time traveling across a border to host an event.  If someone is serious about getting a non-traditional breed into a certain type of event then I would not just complain but try to work with the breed club and get some mock events setup so that you can prove there is interest and the all-breed folks will actually bring in entries and help with the events.