THE KENNEL.

Otago Witness, Issue 2813, 12 February 1908, Page 35

THE KENNEL.

Br Tebbor.

Fancier! »nJ breeders of dor« «re cordiallj invited lo con. tilbuie items to tbUeolunio. "Terror" will end«»Tour to make hli department uiottreitiDf and up-to-date as possible, bat In order to do thl« h« mast bave tbe co-ooeration of Ins readers, teace he trusts this imitation will be cheerfullj responded to. — Speaking on the subject "Heredity in ihe Kennel," Dr Ernest Stork, in a lecture Jjefore the Suffolk County Kennel A&sociaIfcion, said that to achieve the proud distinction of producing a champion ticketed "Bred by Exhibitor, it was necessary to bring about a steady improvement of the breed they were interested in systematically. Heredity was the factor to enable animals to reproduce in their offspring a

certain well-defined character or peculiarity. When they considered that from a single wild animal there had been produced such diveiso types of dogs as the mastiff and toy terrier, it was apparent that, working [on sound lines often pio\e c'oliinivo. This elusi\ene.-is was due to artificial dnersion. atavism, and AariabiliU and then- first diirv was to try to eliminate them. Judicious selection was the cnl\ way to do ihat , it wa«? a slow load, full of disappointments, but it must vn f j.ilinul\ hi ing thorn io the t-oal ' hey v ere aiming at. The first es-ential was a complete Riasp of type. Typo was <" erj I hum in heredity. '1 hore the great \alue of sho.us camo in. Hating the typo in th-eir mind-*, their obioct was to reproduce h. There wore necessary essential-, to (lo that. The parents must not only b" typical, but come of familit-, in which t\pical specimens were iho rule rather than ihc exception. Breedins for ii paiticular point to an extieme degioe often led to ihe destruction of anothei . — Home papers report an interesting law cace in which, rather than part with a dog which they had found, two prisons elected to be imprisoned. Anent this case Our Dcgs says:- — "There was a remarkable scene in the Brentford Court, when, despite fio appoal of Judge Howland Roberts. Mr and Mrs Smith, of Annandale road, Chiswiek, elected to go to prison rather than obey the order of the court to deliver up to it'? rightful owner a collie dog. After a long hearing, during which nearly 30 witnesses gave evidence, same time ago, the judge decided that the doe — a pedigree coilio — was the rightful prop&rtv of the plaintiff' in the action, a Mr Williamson. Dr Cooney asked tho judge to commit Mr and Mrs Smith to prison for contempt of court, as the dog had not yet been given up. The Judge: It is pcrfectlv preposterous for a man to go to gaol rather than give up a collie dog. It is not reasonable on the part of any human being. To Mr Smith: Do you realise that your wife will ha\e to go to prison as well? Mrs S nilh (emphatically): Yes, sir, he decs. For' nearly a quarter of an hour tho jud^o begercd Mr and Mrs Smith to retonsider their decision, but they remained obdurate. At last he made an order for the defendants' committal to prison, and they wore taken into custody and removed." — Our Dogs reports a case of "finding" a dog as follows: — "An impression seems to prevail largely in the public mind that a person who 'finds' a dog, takes it in. feeds it, and ad\erti»es it in the papers has done all that, can be reasonably expected of him in an endeavour to ascotain ite rightful owner. Some, indeed, go further and are under the mistaken bolief that if no owner turns up for the dog after it has been so advertieed, with the additional announcement, 'if not claimed within 6o many days,' the dog is then legally theirs. Ail this is a fallacy. There is not, and nevar was, any such thing as the legal ' finding ' of a dog. The rightful owner of a dog that, has been ' found ' can legally claim his property at any time, and ths person who may have ' found ' it, as he thought, has no legal claim whatever upon tho owner for the dog's keep, nor for advertising it, simph' because he ne\er authorised the finder to make that expenditure on his behalf. Jfet owncis will, in such cases, readily compensate persons who may have 'found' his dog and treated it well, as a matter of common fairness, especially if he or she has put forth reasonable endeavours to ascertain the dog's owner; but. this is entirely optional. On the other hand, an owner or the police may prosecute the ' finder ' for wrongful detention, and therefore, when persons 'find' dons, they will be well advised not to detain them at all. but to at. once take them to their owners (if (hoy know thorn), or, if they do not, to the nearest police station, if they wish to avoid the pain* and penalties in -which Mr Arthur Tarley has just boon mulcted." — A fancier in the Old Country, writing of the tendency to largo size in Irioh terriers, sums up his remarks with: — '"But, alas! how it ends — big men, big dogs, big prices, big profits, big fools." " Big fools," appai'ently, are the fanciers who I give fabulous suing for dojjs which have won because owned by big men, and have managed to got to the front under a certain class of iudge. — Whether there is reason to 6uspect young puppies to bo suffering from worms or not, it is well to periodically doctor them in anticipation with some mild laxative medicine, which cannot possibly hurt them, and vet will kcop tho worms in check. It is bad policy to await doling until the pups have fits— one" of the symptoms of the presence of worms. A good general THun-iv medicine which will keen puppies hcalthv and at the same time check the growth of worm 1 ? can be obtained by mixinn two parts of Jowevs of sulphur wit.h one part of ialap powder. This can be gi\en in small deses, say three grains of the mitxur© for every pound the puppy weigh?, to be given once or twice a week, accoiding to tho discretion of the owner.