THAT’S a really big spaniel, isn’t it?’ and ‘Your dog’s a rottweiler’, comments more than once addressed to Siobhan Whiteway on walks with her three-year-old Gordon setter bitch, Ember, give an accurate indication of how rare and unrecognised this handsome black-and-tan gundog has become. Last year, the number of Gordon setter puppies registered nationally by the Kennel Club (KC) sank to 172. By contrast, in the same period, the nation’s favourite dog breed, the French bulldog, notched up more than 30,000 puppy registrations. On the eve of the bicentenary of its breed standard being formalised—in 1820, by Alexander, 4th Duke of Gordon, who lent the breed his name—the Gordon setter is well on its way to becoming the gundog British owners forgot.
It’s a sorry outcome. Anyone who has ever witnessed a Gordon setter at work, pointing in the field or running with long, liquid strides across open parkland, is unlikely to forget the beauty of the sight: the dog’s silky coat like molten liquorice splashed with amber, eyes set, nose aquiver, a long plume of tail extended, the feathering of legs, tail and underbelly suggesting a surprising lightness to this heavyweight of British setter breeds.
Noble both in appearance and heritage, the much-neglected Gordon setter is an attractive and lovable pet for owners capable of providing appropriate training in what can be a protracted puppyhood and who are willing and able to exercise energetic dogs bred for an outdoor working life.
‘The Gordon setter does need exercise,’ owner of four—and co-owner and co-breeder of the only two dual-champion setters (show ring and field trials) in UK history—Jean Collins-Pitman states. ‘They need to be able to gallop freely.’ Yet they are also, she notes, comfort-loving, cosy and comfortable dogs: ‘Gordons are very loving and very friendly.’
Denne historien er fra December 04, 2019-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra December 04, 2019-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
