Sunflower Cluster pictures - dobes, collies, GSDs, and more

Well, I didn't say they're *good* pictures lol. The lighting at the Coliseum is TERRIBLE. But I got some pictures yesterday when I got to watch instead of compete.

Collies - I only saw the smoothies, and after watching I wish I would have entered Logan. Even without top-of-the-line grooming he would have done fairly well I think.

I did not like this collie - reminds me of a husky the way it's groomed. But I prefer natural groomed without all the stuff anyway






I liked this boy! He got BOV too ^.^




Something looks off about that little female. She is TINY, but something just looks strange about her front. I was sitting at a funny angle, though, so maybe that's it.


Best Male and Best Opposite Sex lol. The male is about Logan's size.


Other than size they're practically twins!


Random Dogo


Random SBT


MORE

Dobes! There were about 345687873452 dobermans, I just saw the tail end of their judging.








I LOOOOVED this dog.



GSDs...there were some good looking ones and some bad looking ones. None of the ones I liked did very well :/

Like! This is from AJ's breeder.


Too low in the back for my taste. I think it got BOB or BOS though.




REALLY liked!


Pile of shelties passed out after agilty



Done!

I like the second last GSD - looks like it could actually run

Thanks for sharing

Yay smoothies! I have to agree, the first merle does not do much for me either but I like the second one quite a bit. That female looks tiny!

She was VERY tiny! The male next to her was the largest collie there, and she was the smallest. They look so funny standing next to each other lol!

Always fun to see pictures from shows! I always loved Smoothies I think what you found weird about the girl's front was an issue with two of the males as well including BOV. They appear to have a very straight front and fairly straight rear. The girl in your photo is rocked back, which makes her look odder and I'm thinking she maybe doesn't have a great topline? Both looked like they were a bit cowhocked as well. I'm guessing neither of them looked great moving. The first sable male was very straight, more so then the other male and female. Of course it's hard to really "judge" based on a few pictures.

I think the collies were all fairly young, or at least inexperienced. None of them stacked very well or held a stack for very long, so the pictures I have are NOT at their best stack. That said, that little girl was standing like that pretty much the whole time, so I think her being rocked back is what threw me off.

Holy cow at the white on those GSDs!!

The size difference in those two dogs blows my mind. I didn't know collies varied that much.

Keegan and Logan are about 15 pounds different and they're half-brothers.

Interesting observations. I know, in my limited experience, that I'm usually a little dissappointed with collie conformation. It seems like a lot of breeders spend more time getting the head right than worrying about the rest of the structure. You can REALLY tell it in the movement - most collies I've seen have very clunky trots.

Of course Keegan's breeder is different. She focuses on movement more than any other collie breeder I've talked to, and it's very clear watching her dogs' smooth gaits.

Yes this is my experience too.

A few years ago I was at an event with multiple judges education seminars going on, including one for Collies. The presenter for Collies told the judges-to-be that Collies should be judged 75% on the head. That structure/movement should never be selected for over head type in because head type is what defines the breed. The modern ideal Collie head is very hard to maintain from a breeding standpoint. It's almost impossible to consider also maintaining structure while so heavily selecting for all the little things that go into that perfect head. I'm not saying that no Collie breeder cares about structure because that is obviously not true. But it definitely isn't as easy to find a well put together show quality Collie as it is to find the same in other breeds. It wasn't always that way but currently it seems to be.

Do we know they were both adults? Confo dogs can be as young as 6 months old.

^I've heard this before (IRL but not sure where) and it's scary.

I *think* they were both adults, but I suppose it's possible the female was younger. I really don't think she was under a year, though.

I really do love Logan's movement. I know when I went to pick him up his breeder spent a lot of time explaining head structure and gait to me, even showing me proper collie footprints lol.


Keegan is also still growing (trust me, he is lol!). Logan just recently, as in the last 6 month, put on weight so he doesn't look like a skeleton. But I do think Logan's a good deal taller than Keegan, if I remember right. Heck, Gala's a lot smaller than Logan, and they're littermates!

Honestly I added a few pounds to Keegan to make up for his age, LOL. They're literally probably about 20 pounds different. I think he's about as tall as Jordan, and if I remember right Loki was MUCH taller than Jordan, and Logan's about Loki's size, right?

(Sorry for the threadjack.)

I'm pretty sure Logan's a bit taller than Loki.

I'm so jaded, every time I hear "AKC" or "American confo show" and "GSD" in the same sentence I flinch. The last 2 GSDs are great compared to so many I see, though. It's hard to tell with the first. His stack is a lot more extreme than the others. I try to be open minded but yes, he's making me cringe a bit.
The dobes are gorgeous!

The first GSD is definitely a more "extreme" dog, it is not how he is stacked. The difference is not in the "sloping" of the back but the length and set of the rear legs. His stretched rear leg is pretty far from his body. If you were to drop an imaginary line from his tailbone straight to the floor, his rear foot would not be anywhere close to that line. And he is not overstretched because his hock is still perpendicular to the ground and his foot is not stretched beyond it. This dog is "overstretched: - you can see his hock is not perpendicular to the ground and his foot is set beyond it: http://germanshepherdbreeder.ws/user_images/9871698.jpg

All of the GSDs pictured are fairly typical for Amline dogs really. Most people think of only the most extreme of extreme dogs when they think of Amline GSDs but the truth is, there's quite a lot of variety in the lines. When I took my Amline girl to the SchH club, they couldn't believe she was all Amlines and guessed she was an Amline/German Working line cross because of how she was put together and her general look. Having lived with a more extreme Amline dog as well, I can tell you there's not really any reason to "cringe" when you see them. It isn't the most functional build for sure but they are not in pain due to it. My boy ran around daycare every day with the other dogs, did agility and went swimming and hiking like any normal dog. His structure limited his speed, his ability to turn corners sharply and his jumping style but it didn't cause him pain or limit his life. Of course, our dwarf dog does all of those thing too and he is limited by his structure in some ways as well. The difference being of course, that his structure is more or less correct for the breed he is but the GSD's was really not, except by modern show standards.

Yes, definitely. He moved funny, too (well, to me...I'm not used to GSDs built like that).

I definitely like the structure of my trainer's GSD better. She's from German working lines. She should be at the UKC show with me in a few weeks, I'll try to get pictures.