Page 26 - ShowSight Presents - The Keeshond

refer to them as nearly anything else. True purists pronounce the nickname of “Kees” as “Kayz”—mostly from the Ivy League states.
The 7th word of our Standard is “nat- ural.” I will return to that later—like it or not.
HANDSOME
“Handsome” is a word that needs to be looked up in the dictionary along with beautiful, pretty and cute. Decid- edly different meanings; a handsome male dog looks somewhat like a stallion, it does not look cutesy-wootsie. A hand- some bitch is statuesque yet feminine. Like all of the male/female species (save the human being—jus’ sayin’), the male is most commanding and is nearly total- ly referred to in our standard. I rather like the reference to lions later on in the General Appearance paragraph, even though we are discussing the ruff or mane. A male Keeshond should be impressive like a male lion; the female should be equally impressive as is a lioness. There should be a decided dif- ference between a male and a female. A former President of KCA referred to huge-coated bitches as “bearded ladies.” That was stated about 40 years ago and, for me, it still fits.
WELL-BALANCED, SHORT-COUPLED
“Well-balanced, short-coupled” is meant to describe a male dog in full bloom; i.e., including his hair. When a Keeshond is in motion the Kees has a unique gait (when moved at the proper speed) and they should have less angu- lation than nearly all breeds but more angulation than, either, a Chow Chow or many of the long-legged Terriers. Because the Kees has less angulation, is more short-coupled than many breeds and moved at the correct speed, you will see a bit of a suspended gait that is truly unique to our breed. There is such a thing as too much of a good thing if the Kees looks like he was squished from both ends and is overstepping himself when viewed laterally.
The KCA Illustrated Standard is an excellent tool to help judges learn the breed standard and is available from our KCA Judges Education Chair. In the Illustrated Standard, we show “Color- ation”. It can get tricky in that if identi- cal twin puppies were born but when they became adults, one was very dark
and the other very light and if the mark- ings as described later in the Standard are present and accounted for, both dogs are equally correct. However, when you put those two identical dogs next to each other, an optical illusion can occur. It might be size, it could be length, it could even be grooming. Your hands will tell the story and we, as breeders, need both extremes to get to our ideal dramatically marked—a true thing of beauty! The only accept- able coloring on a Keeshond is gray, black or cream—all on a level playing field. Cream is as valid as light grey on the undercoat and the standard calls for both legs and feet to be cream. We have haggled over just what cream means. There should be no white on a Keeshond, the standards over the years have never included the word silver and cream can best be described as winter white. We need cream dogs to clean up offensively smutty critters with gray and black legs and feet—ick. What is “tawny”? Back to the aforementioned lion; rusty brown is too tawny. Do not penalize puppies under the age of 18 months if they are too yellow. When they blow their puppy coats, in nearly all bloodlines, they come back with the right coloration. When they’re correct and are dramatically marked, I person- ally feel the breed is breathtaking.
ALERT CARRIAGE
“Alert carriage” means just that. They ideally are stand-up dogs on the move and while at attention. They should be square appearing. In that a Doberman Pinscher is a truly square dog, we are saying the Keeshond is a bit off square when out of coat. Alert carriage means they should not slink or sink due to run- ning downhill. They’re a very curious breed so do not expect the 100% show dog you may be used to in other breeds. They’ll stand like a statue for a while, until something else interests them more. Expect them to happily greet you by jumping up on you or bouncing off their handler. It’s just who they are!
INTELLIGENT EXPRESSION
“Intelligent expression” and “fox- like expression” are somewhat the same. It is important to know that a stupid Keeshond is smarter than the average dog. They are a thinking breed and most of them are clown-like and a little bit evil—particularly the bitches.
A Kees is pretty fixated on his owner and we have a lot of owner handlers in our breed. Some are extremely talent- ed and know that in order to have the judge appreciate the dog’s expression and intelligence, we are big into bait and/or toys. Most are free-stackers and many resist being hand-stacked, save a minority of exhibitors who train them from puppyhood to hand-stack. Even a seasoned champion likes to wait until the instant a judge focuses on them to wiggle around and look like a pile of Pick-Up Stix—just for fun and amuse- ment on their part. By “foxlike” we do not mean their head shape; we are indi- cating the sly intelligence of the breed. A small oddity is that the English red fox more closely resembles a Keeshond than does the American red fox. As the Brits rewrote the Dutch Standard, that’s how that term came into play.
STAND-OFF COAT
“Stand-off coat” means that the Kees- hond is a double-coated dog. The under- coat is soft, gray or cream, downy and spins into a very nice wool. The outer coat is to be long, straight and harsh. In color genetics, the Keeshond has agouti coloration. Each hair of the outer coat is partially black. Depending on the depth and length of each hair, you will have a lighter or darker Keeshond. Both are correct. Smutty feet and lack of defini- tion to the markings is not desirable and difficult to breed out.
RICHLY PLUMED TAIL WELL CURLED OVER THE BACK
“Richly plumed tail well curled over the back”, what is correct? One, two or three curls. Understand that the tail is supposed to be set on high and tightly curled over the back. It should lie flat and close to the body. The tail must form a part of the silhouette of the dog’s body, rather than give the appearance of an appendage. Curl #1 is that which lifts it way over the back, curl #2 goes under and curl #3 does another loop. The answer is: curls #2 and #3 are cor- rect as long as it’s lying close to the back and forming part of the silhouette. A blob sticking up isn’t what we’re trying to achieve.
A dog’s tail set enhanced by trim- ming should be severely penalized. Do not try to uncurl a tail as some of the 3 or, even, 4 curled tails cannot be uncurled. If you want to, lift the whole
SHOWSIGHT MAGAZINE, AUGUST 2017 • 307