Chambray News Contrasting Points Of View Page
The entire essence of Chambray Labradors, the Partners Program, LabWell Products and Professional Canine Services is our commitment to the breed, thus the slogan "For The Betterment Of The Breed".
This website is dedicated to that principle also, for here you will find all the different activities that are provided by our love and dedication to the breed, regardless of where each came from. Through our training classes, at our home/kennel with private training & boarding, at our seminars & workshops, through our LabWell Products and through our professional handling services we extend out to the "ENTIRE LABRADOR COMMUNITY".
On a monthly basis we work with hundreds of Labradors that come from all "walks" of life, providing each dog and owner with our 35-plus years of knowledge and expertise with the breed. May they come from the most recognized, top-ranked kennel in the country to those that were purchased from a pet shops, each dog is given the utmost of attention and care. There is no looking down the nose on any dog and owner that reaches out to us for training, information or help. All dogs are treated with respect, regardless of so-called conformation elite-ness or owner self-implied royal-ness.
FOR THE BETTERMENT OF THE BREED
Dialogue is essential as it provides a stage for differing ways of thought and expression, thus we have provided this section of the newsletter for Contrasting Points Of View.
Anyone may send an article, essay, or short post that expresses an alternative "positive" view from those expressed by the editor/author of this website. Each communication must be signed by the author and there must be a return email address. Each communication must be presented in a civilized, educated manner. No personal attacks, foul/obscene language or otherwise negative inflammatory material will be accepted for publication. We reserve the right to return any and all communications that are not deemed worthy of public viewing. Submission of a communication does not automatically guarantee publication.
Send all communications to the
following email address for review. They will be posted here at the
Contrasting Points Of View Page.
Feedback to the postings that follow these.
(samples of emails sent to me from a recent thread at a forum)
04/11/08
Q. From the Q. & A. section at the Contrasting Views Page are you saying that your Labradors are better than all the other Florida breeders?
A. I went back and re-read the whole section below and no where does it state that. In fact there are several breeders in Florida that actually breed very competitive Labradors on a national level. What I do state with much conviction and prove with overwhelming results is that I have the ability to field multiple entries at dog shows that can and do win at a higher percentage than all the rest. There are many reasons for that and it is all stated for the record below in my answers to some of the questions that were posed by many first time visitors recently to the website.
Q. Some breeders question your claims about knowing which puppies are really show quality and they say you place all your puppies as show quality.
A. Those same breeders that say all those things will always keep the "best puppy" and "sell the rest". So, how is it that they can tell which ones are the best that they breed, yet they question my ability to tell which ones are in fact Show Quality. Furthermore, I guarantee show quality; if the dogs does not turn out to be show competitive, I will provide a replacement as soon as one becomes available. In addition, I evaluate each and every puppy that is born into our program and I keep track of all those evaluations and then I follow up with each at 6 months, at 1 year and even further for those that stay within the program.
Puppies that do not have the competitiveness for show are placed with the AKC's Limited Registration as "pet puppies' and may not be used for breeding nor for show.
04/08/08
Q. Recently at a Labrador’s forum there was a discussion about your kennel. Is it true that the entries at Florida shows are more than 75% dogs from your kennel?
A. I actually think that happened once at a Miami Dog shows a few years back when gas prices went through the roof and the entries for all breeds at that venue were down across the board. Out of the 30 Labradors entered for each show that weekend, 19 actually came from owners who happen to live right here in the area and were fortunate enough to have purchased one of my dogs.
More reasonable figures would be around 20 to 30% at selected shows. One of the main reasons for those numbers is that we seldom keep the top puppies out of a litter. Our policy is to place our best puppies with people that want the most competitive show puppies available.
Another huge difference in the way we have done things is that we would rather keep our best puppies in Florida so we have been placing them with people that want the best and then we would be able to extend all the amenities that come with those top puppies and eventually we would be handling them and winning with them here. Most breeders do not want to place their best puppies in the same area that they show their dogs in, so they will do their best to send off any top quality puppy that they sell. We have had to modify this policy a bit in the last year as we are receiving many requests for top show quality from people outside of Florida and we are taking each case on its own merits.
Since we offer lifetime free show training to those puppies, encouraging the new owners to get interested in training and showing, the great majority of them will end up in the show ring, hence the larger numbers of dogs from our kennel.
Keep in mind that we hire out to handle dogs at dog shows. That includes my daughter, my wife, me and my son if he is not at a baseball game, we all handle dogs at these dogs shows. We do that for a living, as in we make money handling dogs for clients that will hire us to present their dogs, so the more dogs we handle at a weekend of shows, the better it is for our family’s economic situation.
We very seldom handle dogs that are totally owned by us, except for the one or two that my daughter had kept for training and handling as a junior handler. Now that she has turned pro, she realizes that it is better to place our top puppies with clients and then we get to handle them later as adults.
If you check out any catalog, you will readily see that 99% of those dogs that we handle are primarily owned by others. Now, if I had more handlers to take in all the winning exhibits as happens frequently, then I would bring many more dogs, so that the percentages might really be all that the whiners and complainers lament about.
On another note; what those rebel rousers do not know is that with all the moaning and groaning that they make on public forums, they create a tremendous amount of interest towards the object of their hostilities. From this most recent episode, our website registered the highest visitor traffic for a 7-day period ever and a 1-day total that was 5 times higher than the mean average per day visitations.
Our email traffic was the highest ever since opening the website in 1997. There have been 100’s of inquiries about our puppies, training, handling and even our supplement business has experienced a surge in orders! With all the increased visitor traffic, the search engines such as Google will reward our URL with huge spikes in the rankings for searches for Labradors and Labrador related queries.
So, although the intent of the few instigators, whiners and complainers was of malicious intent, the effect was the exact opposite in reality. It exposed 100’s if not 1000’s from those chitchat rooms to Chambray Labradors and the Partners Program for the Betterment of the Breed and all the offerings that we have created for the largest Labrador owner’s community of its kind.
Most of those people that did visit the website for the first time could readily see for themselves why we are so successful and why the program is growing by leaps and bounds. In the foreseeable future those percentages will actually grow as more people join the Partners Program for the Betterment of the Breed, however that growth will be a testament of the success and of the satisfaction that all those that joined are experiencing.
Q. Is it fair to show so many dogs from your kennel? Doesn’t this stack the deck for you to win?
A. This question comes up quite a bit and in all reality, if someone poses the question, then they know very little about Chambray Labradors and the Partners Program and how all those owners benefit by participating in this Labrador owner's community. To begin with, the vast majority of our dogs that go to the shows are owned by other people, satisfied owners that purchased a show quality puppy from us. They have taken advantage of the Lifetime Free Class Training, Lifetime Free Private Training, Lifetime Support System, Lifetime Management Program and many also hire us at great discounts to handle their dogs in the ring. A true Win Win situation if there ever was one.
There is that old saying "to good to be true", well just ask any of the dozens of Partners Program owners and associates at any of the shows that they all travel to and hear what they have to say.
Now the owner and or breeder of those dogs may boast and brag that his dogs are winning and if that breeder/owner has that many dogs that can actually win, then why not brag about it, that is human nature! How many people whose dogs win take it in stride and not celebrate, not many that I have witnessed in 38 years of involvement with the breed. In fact, I have witnessed people scream and shout and run around like lunatics after their dogs won points, some have even “fainted” while others sobbed torrents of tears and a few have done all of the preceding at the same time! So, if any of my dogs win, watch me thump my chest a couple of times!
If you take your 1 dog to a show where there are 50 Labradors competing, you still have to beat 49 other dogs regardless of who owns them or who they were bred by. The competition is about the dogs and not who owns or breeds them. The judge doesn’t know who the owners or breeders are by name and he/she will pick out one winner in the males and one winner in the females.
For those with limited experience in dog show matters, it is about the dogs and only one will win regardless of who owns or breeds them. If you take 10 inferior exhibits to a dog show, you have not increased your chances of winning whatsoever, what will happen is that you will have paid 10 entry fees and probably paid 10 handling fees and you will go home a loser multiplied by 10!!
NUMBERS DO NOT ADD UP TO WINS!
It doesn’t get any simpler than that and there is no valid argument to this situation. IT IS NOT ABOUT THE HANDLER OR BREEDER OR OWNER, IT IS ABOUT THE DOGS!!!! PLAIN AND SIMPLE!!!!!!!
You can enter 100 dogs and if they are not up to standard, they will not win!!!!!!!! You can’t stack the deck UNLESS YOUR DOGS ARE BETTER THAN ALL THE OTHERS, AND IF THAT IS THE CASE THEN YOUR DOGS DESERVE TO WIN!!!!!!
To be totally honest here winning is the name of the game and that is what each and every person at a dog show wants. I have yet to meet a single person that goes to a dog show to lose! Oh they may very well leave as losers over and over again, but each and every time they wake up in the morning on show day, they want to win with their dogs.
I love to compete and win, either as a handler, breeder or owner and no matter what the complainers say or do, I will continue to breed the best and bring on the best of those best and if I have 10 OR 20 awesome dogs, then expect to see them at a dog show near you and of course expect that one of those dogs will be in the winners circle with one of the Herzons more often than not.
Q. Doesn’t entering many dogs increase the odds for you to win?
A. Ok, here we go again. Keep in mind that the majority of those dogs entered are owned by someone else other than ourselves and these owners decide whether they want the dogs shown or not.
Our stipulation in handling a dog is that it has to be top show quality! So to answer your question, only if the dogs are superior will we manage them at the shows! Say you had 5 dogs and none of them was worth showing, would you waste the money on entries and handling to have those dogs out at a dog show? NOT!!!!!!!!! Although this situation is a real no brainer, there are those people that just don’t know any better and continue to show up at the dog shows with dogs that are just not competitive. This of course is a good thing, as these dogs add numbers for the good dogs to win over.
Having extra dogs at a dog shows means zilch, unless you have the winning exhibit!!!!! That’s because only one dog will win and usually if the judge is worth his salts, it should be the best dog. Now say you owned 5 dogs that were really great and you had the financial resources to have those dogs out showing, would you? You bet your sweet BP you would, just as would any other breeder that felt his dogs were competitive and could win. The problem is that none of the breeders in Florida have that many dogs that can truly be competitive to bring out more than one or two!!!!! Take a look at any of the Florida shows and see which breeder has been fielding multiple entries and then check the winning record of those dogs and see at what percentage those dogs win at and it will become clear why so many of those breeders only bring one or two dogs. Simply put, their depth of top quality is very shallow to say the least.
So, what I say to all the party poopers and nay-sayers is BRING ON YOU BEST DOGS (like in as many as you have) AND MAY THE BEST DOG WIN!!!!!!!! It will be the losers that complain and bitch and get absolutely nowhere real quick and in some cases never ever get anywhere with the lower quality of dogs they bring out year after year and seldom ever win a class, much less points.
Q. There was someone complaining that you were showing a dog that was not registered and had some points taken away from them, what was that all about?
A. That was true. One of my clients registered her dog and did not sign the registration papers when she sent it in to the AKC. She entered the dog at some shows and the dog was good enough to win points at a year old. What she didn’t know was that the AKC had sent her a form to sign and she just filed it away without reading it or returning it as instructed. So, those points he won were forfeited and awarded to the dog that came in second that day (Reserve Winners Dog). So the owner of that runner up dog was fortunate because of the oversight of our dog’s owner. That RWD dog was shown around quite a bit and never finished.
I also understand that the person also stated that they don’t show at all-breed shows in Florida because of the un-sportsmanlike situation, whereas the real reason might be that they seldom ever win at either all breed shows or at breed shows and that can become real discouraging after a while or after several decades as is the case with this breeder.
Q. The problem with the people at the forum seemed to come from a dog that was moved up into the breed competition before it really finished, what happened?
A. Poopoo happens! I made the change and I will accept responsibility and whatever the consequences that comes my way from the AKC. No one would have objected had that dog not won Best Of Breed!
There was some confusion as to how many points the bitch had on the morning of the Sunday show following her 6th or 7th Winners Bitch the day before and whether she had received a 2nd major at some point in time in the many wins that she had had in the 5 months of showing. I decided to move her up for the practice rather than not show her at all and give another bitch a chance at the Winners Bitch points.
Who would have thought a 13-month bitch puppy would take breed? However it did occur and the AKC will make her forfeit the BOB. Had she shown from the Bred-By class she would have won the points and she would have taken Best Of Breed as the judge stated that this was one of the best Labradors he had seen in recent years. So, even though she may not have been eligible because she had not accumulated the required numbers of points for the title yet, she was the BEST LABRADOR there, plain and simple!!!! The judge made that statement while taking pictures with my daughter and our dog!!!!
Although she will lose this BOB award, she will have many wonderful days ahead of her as a “special’s bitch” in the near future.
The fortunate winner out of this situation was the bitch that was awarded Winners Bitch, as she would have been relegated to a Reserve Winners Bitch had this bitch not been moved up, which happens to have been bred by Chambray and WinQuest Labradors, so a win situation for a dog bred by our program.
Of course, the losers for the day at that show created the ruckus at the forums since their exhibits were totally overlooked that day by the knowledgeable judge, Winners Dog, Winners Bitch and Best of Breed all from the same breeder!!!!! That’s a Trifecta in my book, in fact the 28th such occurrence for our kennel. Most breeders are lucky to enjoy that special occasion once in their lifetime of showing.
UPDATE: May 2008: The AKC has notified us that the dog may continue to show for up to 90 days from having moved up to the Best Of Breed competition and may keep all awards during that time, however if we can not prove that she indeed has attained her championship, then all awards after the 90 days will be cancelled.
So, she keeps the Best Of Breed in question, however we have since come to the conclusion that she indeed does not have the required points to be titled and in the best interest of fair play, the dog will only be entered at shows where a major is expected.
Chambrays Charmed N Counter 13 Points 1 Major 2 BEST OF BREEDS
UPDATE July 15th 2008: Charm finished her championship on June 8th 2008 and the BOB in question will stand, so all the lamenting by the lamenters was in vane.
Q. Doesn’t it bother you that all these other breeders trash you and your kennel.
A. I haven’t lost one minute of sleep over it and never will. There are 3 types of people in the world WINNERS, LOSERS & FOLLOWERS. I choose not to be one of the latter two. I strictly deal with 100% positive ventures and refuse to dwell in the negatives as these complainers do.
These people are born losers and will trash themselves if given the opportunity. They are at each other's throat constantly and will turn on each other as the weather changes. Here are some of the ditties that they call each other when they are away from the complaining and whining lynch mob. I hear them all the time and I hear it about me as well, it is human nature and it will be until the end's of time. It is amusing because it is the child in each of us that causes people to act this way and say things about each other as they all do about each other and about me.
Unfortunately the way it is set up at the dog shows, only the gifted few with the superior dogs will win and the rest are bound to bitch, moan and trash. It is the nature of the beast and there are some beasts among us and they do most of the moaning and screeching.
Q. Why don’t you speak up when this occurs?
A. Are you kidding me? Validate these wannabees with a reply, not in your dreams. Can you honestly tell me the name of any of the complainers from that recent lynch mob forum, other than some made up nickname to hide behind?
There is no explaining anything to a bunch of faceless/nameless cowards that hide behind anonymity.
The moderator informed me that one particular IP address had been churning out almost 35% of the posts and using different names!!!!! That’s 1 in 3 of the post coming from the same lunatic. Plus, there were a couple of other IP addresses that accounted for most of the other postings, so it was the same loony people over and over again posting.
How do you address people that could be held as certifiable obsessive compulsive pathological lunatics? You don’t, because they don’t have all their marbles together in one bounty sack and they have no way to discern reality from the fantasy world they live in. They are self-indulgent and have very few people around them because of their unpredictable behavior and mannerisms.
These people are so infatuated with everything I say and do that I sometimes wonder what kind of life they live being so hooked on someone else! I have a tracking service that monitors visitations to each and every page at the website and I can pull up all the IP addresses from those visiting the website. I have even created "backdoors" to certain pages that can only be reached from doing a specific search on any search engine and I can track those people that go on those pages and sort out who visits our URL and I can tell you that some of the biggest detractors are the ones that peruse our website the most.
I say to these people, “Hey people get on with your lives because once I am done handling my assignments in the ring, I don’t think an iota about any of you until I see you again in the ring the next day and then I am going to do the absolute best for my exhibit to win!”
Q. Someone labeled you a mill breeder, how do you answer that?
A. Once again, someone without a name and a face lurking about in the shadows with no guts to express their opinions as themselves.
How do you deal with that? You don’t! What value do you place on an opinion from “someone” you know nothing about? If you have any smarts, you find out for yourself and make your own conclusions before you jump off a cliff because “someone” said that you would have a safe landing!
Here are some real numbers for you to decipher and make a conclusion about.
· I manage over 80 Labradors that are part of the Partners Program for the betterment of the breed.
· That probably entails 50 different owners, breeders and exhibitors.
· 5 of that 80 total actually are wholly owned by me and live with me.
· These dogs participate in our training programs, conditioning programs, handling at the dog shows and when they have been deemed worthy of breeding, they will be part of our breeding program.
· The last 5 years, ALL THOSE DOGS/OWNERS PUT TOGETHER HAVE AVERAGED 5 LITTERS A YEAR!!!! In simple language, there have been 25 (actually 23) litters in 5 years from 50 or more people that are participating in the Partners Program. Here is a fact for you, if all those people had been on their own and not part of a very selective breeding program, they could have all very easily have had 50 litters in 1 year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So, if you do the math you will see that we are limiting the numbers of puppies produced in favor of the quality of the puppies produced.
I know of a couple of well-known Florida-based breeders that have 20 to 30 litters a year!!!!! Notice I say Florida-based, as there are a few that live in other states and maintain a Florida address in order to market their large production here in Florida.
20 or 30 litters in 1 year, that’s more than Chambray Labradors and the Partners Program have in 5 years!!!!!
Here is another point to ponder. Each and every one of those puppies that comes from Chambray come with unparalleled guarantees, amenities and training packages, unparalleled because no one else in the country is qualified to make that offer, nor do they.
Search about, ask questions, seek all the information available to you and then make a conclusion all on your own. Can hundreds of people for over 20 years that have benefited from a win/win situation be wrong? Do you base your opinion on the frustrated few that go head to head with us at the dog shows weekend in and weekend out and mostly go home without the wins?
Q. I know that a few of the people complaining actually own some of your dogs, why have they fled the coop?
A. Personality differences account for a few of those who are no longer in our program. Each of them was cast out because of their inability to act in the betterment of the breed credo. They did not drop out, they did not go independent on their own, they were asked to leave, like in “hit the road Jack”!
Their behavior and mannerism were not in the best interest of the breed or for the Partners Program. I reserve the right to forfeit my rights to any dog whose owners do not fit the program. In most cases I end up losing what was owed me in the terms of puppies back from bitches and stud service back from males, however the loss is insignificant compared to the gains in not having to deal with these volatile, negative, aberrant and unpredictable people.
Besides, since most own a dog I bred and sold to them and that dog is the foundation to their breeding program, it all comes back to Chambray as major credit. Knowledgeable people in dogs give very little credit to owners for the accomplishments of any dog they bought and rightly so. Those in the know, realize and admit that it takes several generations of producing top dogs to be recognized as a bonafide champion breeder and it just doesn’t come overnight with someone else’s produce.
Q. Why don’t you educate those that don’t know about you and the programs you have to offer?
A. There isn’t enough time in the world to personally speak to every person out there, so I created the most extensive Labrador-related web presence on the Internet. I have chronicled our entire 38-years of involvement with the breed, everything is there,
· Our credentials,
· our experiences,
· our accomplishments,
· our volunteer activities in multiple dog clubs,
· our training classes,
· our breeding program,
· our handling program,
· our expertise in nutrition,
· our programs for conditioning dogs,
· our participation in the Therapy dog sector with our reading program K9 For Kids and also with hospital visitations
· our volunteering free training for Paws With A Cause program
· there is more, too numerous to mention here but readily available with research at the website.
I really know of no other way than this to reach out to people that don’t know what it is all about and as is the case in our free speech society, at times people tend to speak too freely when they don’t have all their facts
.
Q. I have been to several dog shows and have seen you and your group there and you all seem to have a clique or something and you all give the impression that outsiders are not welcomed.
A. Do yourself a favor and at the next dog show go over and speak to any of those people with our dogs. I can assure you that none of them will bite you and you may be surprised at how much they were like you a short while ago before they joined in with the program. I can’t tell them what to say or whether they should like and embrace you, but I can tell you that all of them were at one point looking in as you say you have done. Each of these owners is an entity unto themselves and each has the free will to act as they please and speak their mind as they assuredly will.
Stay tuned for more fun and games as I receive them and have time to upload and publish them to this column
.