By Havoc
Date 14.06.06 11:43 UTC
FTCh Haskayne Moss of Glensue won the IGL Retriever Championships (the premier field trial for UK retrievers)in 1997. Moss was owned by Gordon Holt, who made him up to FTCh in only a few field trial runs. I own a nine year old bitch sired by Moss, and have met quite a lot of his progeny. A friend of mine used him a few times at stud, and used him on recommendation a couple of years before he was made up to FTCh. He was the first male lab to have won the 'championships' since 1992, and coupled with a 0/0 hip score was used very extensively at stud. From the progeny I've seen, he has thrown some very nice natured dogs with generally very low hip scores that have made useful shooting companions. FTCh Glensue Grebe and about three open trial winners were sired by him.
Interestingly Moss was the last pup left in the litter that no-one wanted. He ended up being sold very cheaply as a pup, and yet will have repaid his owner many times in stud fees during his lifetime.
Moss had a very rough coat which has passed on to a number of his progeny, and to be honest he won't have done much for the dual-purpose movement.
I dont think that Gordon Holt has a website, but can PM you a link to a website where he advertises Grebe at stud.
Tweedshot Victor is not a dog that I'm familiar with, but will have been bred by Stan Tweedy who owns the Tweedshot affix. Tweedshot is a well-known affix within the field trialling community. Stan bred a recent championships winner in FTCh Tweedshot Kite, and Kite's brother Tweedshot Kestrel(owned and run by Stan Tweedy) has also won an open trial.
The Tweedshot dogs usually have a very strong influence from the Palgrave line of labs. The Palgrave line has had a huge influence on the modern field trial labrador, and I'm sure that the majority of field trial bred labs would have a number of lines back to the Palgrave dogs in the later generations of their pedigrees.