hi all, im very new to the show world, i have a six month old blue staffy called Luna who is K.C registered and i took her to her first show yesterday.  She was the only blue staff there (not surprised) and i got chatting to a few of the other staffy people there who were very nice but did say she looked a bit too long in the leg and muzzle and slightly pitbull/old tyme irish looking. All the other staffords i did notice were much shorter, stockier with very blunt muzzles. one person even said it is possible that there may be pit behind luna's breeding as apparently her grandad (jolson's blue boy) was mated to a few pits..how true this is i dont know.

How could this be when she is K.C registered if its true? surely they wouldnt allow that to happen.

any help on this subject would be great!

Did you buy her from someone who shows their Staffords?

> How could this be when she is K.C registered if its true? surely they wouldnt allow that to happen.

Unfortunately for all breeds the KC does not require DNA profiling of parents and progeny for registration.  Therefore there are many cases of puppies being registered when there are possibilities that their close ancestry (parents / grandparents) are not pure bred, or that the actual pedigree stated is not even close to correct.   Our own breed club made a formal complaint with written evidence that a breeder knowingly falsified a pedigree in order to register at least 3 or 4 litters that had in reality been the result of mother / son  matings repeated several times with subsequent offspring, so mother / son offspring was then bred to brother / sister and their offspring mated back to siblings.  Not a thing was done, not even action by the KC to actually request DNA profiling to at least determine the correct pedigree.  Now we have several generations of the breed (all born within the past 5 years) in KC records with completely the wrong pedigrees.  The written evidence actually contained emails from the breeder to a puppy owner acknowledging the inbreeding but that they had put false pedigrees down in order to register the litters! 

Many people are breeding blue staffs for the pet market to make money, due to this many out there don't meet the breed standard as there breeders were only looking at colour rather than if there dogs met the standard. Then you get some people who purposely breed there staffs to look more like pitbull types. In the UK the pitbull is not a breed its a type so any dog that looks enought like a pitbull is by law classed as a pitbull type.
Then sometimes you get pups who's parents meet the standard but they just don't mature to be like them, not all puppies in a litter will be show quality.

If you could post a link to a photo of her I'm sure some of the staffy people could pass opyion on her type if you want. But if she isn't to the breed standard she will still be a great pet just not a show dog.

No, i bought her from a pet breeder who owned both parents. They were lovely dogs with lovely temparements but her line has not been shown for 3 gens.

I will put up a photo tomorrow when I'm next on the computer. I have also posted this on the showing forum and as i said on there, she meets the ikc breed standard more than the English kc! I think she will be quite tall.

I wouldn't bother showing her as breed showing is based on the judges interpretation of the breed standard & it doesn't sound as if she has been bred to conform the KC's breed standard.

Why not do another form of activity with her, like agility, obedience, flyball, Rally O etc IMHO more rewardingthan breed showing

or of course the pup just might not be the type favoured by the judge (assuming they were knowledgeable about the breed as non specialists are most likely at Open shows, and some may have colour bias) or those particular exhibitors.

It would be a good idea to get an opinion of a breed specialist judge (or several) who have no axe to grind (are not competing with you at the show ;)

It is unlikely that you will have a top drawer show dog from several generations of breeding where the breeder is not knowledgeable or trying to breed to the standard, bur it can happen.

As said before showing your pup can help you learn a lot before you go on to try your hand with something of better quality.  Often breeders are loath to part with their best pups to total novices as they rarely get the best out of them, and unless the breed ahs a long show life the dog is often wasted, but if someone has already gained show ring experience breeders are more likely to trust them with a promising puppy.

Tommee is right that there are other forms of dog activates, but personally most of those require a greater level of commitment of  time  and training, than showing which to the average exhibitor can be more relaxing, as you can do as little or as much as you like, once you have the basics of ringcraft.

If you have the Registration Certificate from the KC, that should mean she's purebred.   But as registrations are taken on trust (much as with DNA these days, if proof is needed it's there to be used), it could be that somewhere in her background, there was an oops, which the breeder wasn't honest about.   The KC doesn't check!   Only what's on the litter application form.

On the other hands, some purebred dogs actually barely look like the Breed Standard - and all dogs have faults too.   Could be you just have one that isn't 'top quality', in terms of being shown.   Popular interpretation of Breed Standards can vary, decade to decade too - often influenced by a top winning stud dog!

I don't think she is what the judges are currently looking for as she isn't 100%true to the current breed standard. But then i suppose they all have their different opinions.  I bought her as a pet originally but have some friends who are into showing so i decided to give it a go with her as my 'mistake' dog. This was before i was aware of the whole hatred for the dilute colour blue etc but i have learnt so much in the last few weeks! I really enjoy ringcraft and she always stands nicely and walks with her head up so i know shes a happy dog in the ring.  I would love to do agility when shes one and fingers crossed we do a bit better at open shows.

I wouldn't be overly worried by her pedigree, my SBT boy Spud came from well known lines on both sides, his dad was a Sh Ch, but Spud still came out long legged and with a distinct Pit look to him.
Despite his looks, he was one of the most loving, generous and fun dogs I've ever had the pleasure of owning and a joy to me every day of his life.

Exactly if your having fun she is enjoying it, and your finding it a good learning experience then by all means continue to show.  Lets face it most of us are showing  'also rans' at the end of the day as there are only ever a couple of winners.

My first three dogs were average, winning occasionally, mostly getting placed about the middle, rarely last, but occasionally so ;)

Since then I have been lucky to have three champion bitches in a line but also had one that really isn't show quality, and now showing two younger bitches, one of which definitely and other will probably not go all the way that Mother and grandmother did, but there is always the next one in a few more years, and the pleasure and hopes I have in a few pups in other ownership..

If your both having fun carry on, that's what it's about, enjoying time with your dog ;) we all take the best dog home at the end of the day.

Try some companion shows over the summer too, the judges there will probably be more forgiving of her being an 'unpopular in show dogs' colour, and there's always classes like Prettiest Bitch or Friendliest Dog as well. How about rally obedience? We have a few staffies competing, but I know they have brains, always happy to see more dogs trying rally!

here is a picture of her

It says content unavailable???

> here is a picture of her

I'm afraid you can't post links to photos of your dog on the forum but you can include a link in your profile for people to look at (you would have to make any Facebook links public though)