Wheaton Terriers

[THE GENERAL 1,982]

The trials don't impress me they look like a load of men playing games track a rabbit 100 feet and stay at a badger for six minutes it's not really work and don't prove much a load of silly rules to go with it and the older people that were around for them think they know everything there is to know about terriers i know I've just offended the whole of the hunting life but that's just the way I see it let the abuse begin hahaha

in all due respect General Lee, your comment is based on that link/video alone, as for the old people thinking they think they know everything about 'terriers' ! Don't believe the stories that the game for a trial was dropped out off a helicopter!

Edited November 1, 2013 by THE GENERAL

[Naustroms 92]

Watched the video seemed pretty pointless to me. Never saw much sport in baiting, just siccing a dog on an animal shoved down a tube but then again different cultures.

[Grinder 102]

i bet GTE was on the video clip, it was only 90 years ago.... perhaps there was a young STIG too lol

Edited November 1, 2013 by Grinder

[THE GENERAL 1,982]

Without the game working terrier, no strong dog off any type would ever have had the privilege to work !

Edited November 1, 2013 by THE GENERAL

[General lee 979]

I ain't knocking the trials I'm sure they was fun and I would go if they was still on but they was only a game it don't prove much about the dogs and no offence but I've seen people that were at the trials coming on here and acting like they know everything about terriers and strong dogs just because 60 years ago they saw a dog tackle a baited badger for 6 minutes

[Tommy pepper 222]

What was the point of it ? why whuld you want to no how game a dog was against a badger what looks like half the size of them terriers they were using ? Did they dig the strong dogs as they look very big to me? I don't agree with what ime about to say but back in them days when laws were slack whuldent the best way to see how game the dogs were whuld it not have been of been to match them against each other I don't understand it to be honest one proberly missing the point all togeather but it seems like a crule and pointless way to pass a Sunday to me I can't see the reason for it

[bullx100% 681]

Suposse diffrent people enjoy diffrent things.take for instance fishing....some people I no who live for fishing but then say to me why would I won't to walk round a field in the rain and cold after fluffy rabbit....and I say to them why would I want chuck a bait in a pond and then sit there for hours playing with my thumbs to pass the time.catch a fish and then chuck it back!!....people enjoy diffrent sport and testing the mutts on a sunday againts old brock was there's.same goes for ferreting cock fighting deer shooting lamping and fishing everybody enjoys something diffrent.and if I was alive and was in to keeping strong dogs at that time I would of wanted it to be out getting tested and grafted in he fields....its a bit like owning a bougatti what does 200mph...you wouldn't be happy with having it just sat on the drive you'd want go out and hit 200 mph

[BIG G wheton machine 1,594]

Suposse diffrent people enjoy diffrent things.take for instance fishing....some people I no who live for fishing but then say to me why would I won't to walk round a field in the rain and cold after fluffy rabbit....and I say to them why would I want chuck a bait in a pond and then sit there for hours playing with my thumbs to pass the time.catch a fish and then chuck it back!!....people enjoy diffrent sport and testing the mutts on a sunday againts old brock was there's.same goes for ferreting cock fighting deer shooting lamping and fishing everybody enjoys something diffrent.and if I was alive and was in to keeping strong dogs at that time I would of wanted it to be out getting tested and grafted in he fields....its a bit like owning a bougatti what does 200mph...you wouldn't be happy with having it just sat on the drive you'd want go out and hit 200 mph

that's a good point. and theres the point I proved froma few posters above, theres no unity in hunting everybody whos into hunting id say % would vote a ban on other types to save their own. how somebody who hunts has the brass neck to call other hunters cruel is something I cant reason too. people need to wake up and smell the coffee and unite and stand together before its too late. I don't deer stalk or hare coarse but id never in a million years condemn it as its part of hunting and what other hunters like. that's where the antis won by the tactic of divide and conquer

[neil cooney 10,416]

Badger trials were not hunting. They were a trial to test a terrier, both sounders and strong dogs.

Any breed could be entered in either.

There was a man who trialed beagles as sounders and there were large mongerals trialed as strongdogs.

The sounders were a joke IMO. I had a bitch disqualified in a trial because she took more than a minute to reach the pot. That was on a Sunday. On the Tuesday the same bitch did over 6 hours in a natural dig.

A friend of mine use to use his line of hard lakelands to provide badgers for his trials but on the day he used to trial his jack russells. The lakelands wouldn't have qualified.

HOWEVER, the trial for strongdogs must have been tough for the simple reason it helped refine 2 very game breeds of terrier, the wheaten and the staffordshire.

Make no bones about it, a good game example of either of these breeds is a very game dog indeed.

Some dogs bred for the trials proved their gameness when game tested in other disciplines.

It's just my own opinion but it wasn't so much the trial it's self that made these dogs what they are but the level of competition. Men were tougher on their dogs than they were on the badgers.

Also remember, only 3 strongdogs went through their careers without ever being lifted.

 

But like I say, it's very hard to justify trialing like that in this day and age unlike badger digging, which IMO can be justified as a humane method of pest control but sadly the anti's helped by idiots with terriers, lurchers and strongdogs combined with camcorders etc. have convinced the public that digging is the same as baiting.

[Taggy123 59]

What breeds were the 3 strong dogs that were never lifted neil, staffs or wheatons? Atb taggy.

[Hot Meat 3,109]

Was any well known strong dogs real good at trials but shit in field or vice versa?

[neil cooney 10,416]

Good question Taggy. Off the top of my head the only one I can think off is C McC staff bitch, Princess or Duchess I think was her name.

Some will dispute that there were more than 3 that did it but those that know all say it was 3.

[Taggy123 59]

Cheers neil. Atb taggy.

[neil cooney 10,416]

Hot Meat, something that folk would want to realize about strongdogs in the field is that it's mostly a load of bollox.

Firstly, if the terrier you've just dug to is any good then 8 or 9 times out of 10 your quarry is there just in front of you. If your using a firearm to finish the job then it should be a handy shot if it needs taking out then use your hands. If you can't use your hands to take quarry out of a dig then you shouldn't be in the field with terriers.

If you think drawing at the end tests a dog then dream on. I've seen collies, labradors and curdogs do it.

Believe me I went through the whole strongdog thing. They're too much trouble in the field and bad for the image of terrierwork.

Also learning how to breed better working terriers and handling them and their quarry at the end makes for a better terrierman.

 

As for the question about some of the greats being as good in the field as in the artificial ?

In the field there'd only be a few lads present whereas at a trial there'd be many present. Some of the big trials had 100 strongdogs and maybe sounders entered. So you had to put your money where your mouth was.

By the way, I was never at the big trials.

But you do hear lads say where they seen some of the famous ones fault.

I've heard many times about Bruce faulting but there was a long line of dogs down of him and I also heard about Black Tiger coming away.

BUT, like I say men were tough on their strongdogs in the late 70s and early 80s.

Remember, the famous staff "Psycho" was bred for badgers. Look at the legacy he left behind.

[Hot Meat 3,109]

Cheers Neil, I been on a few digs I me life but never seen a strong dog working after a dig, having any dog other than a terrier at a dig didn't happen, the trials is summat I'd have liked to have experienced tho, I only know what I've read on here tbh but I do like reading g about the days of old when you guys post, so please keep them coming