workcocker1983

I admire the Faroese people. They are doing exactly what the generations of their people have in the years before. Not everyone get their food from a polystyrene tray in the supermarket. They take what they need and there is little waste. What will eventually stop them is the high levels of pollutants that are in the whales. Anyway this is completely OT. Carry on....

Savages??? Seems a bit rough for a culture that is 100's of years old.

If you you were walking towards me and told me that uour bitch was in season you would get a mouthful of not very nice words! Part of the responsibility of keeping you bitch entire is leaving her at home when she is in season. Walking a bitch in season even on a lead in a public place is irresponsible and asking for trouble.

NZ summers are warm and can be damp. NZ also has rats. I personally would be vaccinating against lepto.

It might pay to vaccinate against leptospirosis

There isn't enough. I recall reading somewhere that a breed population needs to be greater than 500 to be viable. But what happens if a person imports a dog from a country where the two types are recognised as the same breed? Who decides which breed register it goes on? What happens if the people if the people with uk lines want to have their own breed seperate from the American lines? The register works fine now, why change it!

This is starting to become all too common. People changing the goal posts. Everyone just needs to be honest and upfront with each other from the beginning. If the stud dog is the best thing since sliced bread why is it in a pet home? If I put one of my stud dogs in a pet home I would be awake at night praying that it doesn't get run over by the local Sunday school bus!

But what if they don't have a job to do? I know that an off switch must be trained to some degree in most dogs. Can they be happy without significant mental stimulation or "work"? All dogs needs mental stimulation. It comes down to how intelligent the individual dog is. A smart dog will require more. (Regardless of breed)

Where do people get the impression that working spaniels have no off switch? It is all about training. When they have a job to do they give 110%, when the job is finished they curl up and go to sleep.

I did this a few years ago. Frankly it wasn't worth the hassle but didn't really have the option as the UK was changing its import rules to allow dogs from the continent over with the basic rabies vaccine and Australia had no vacancies. NZ quarantine kennels are privately owned and run so can charge whatever they want. I think it was about NZ$1600 four years ago. The other downside is that when the dog was reregistered here in WA they put IMP NLZ on his name not UK!

I have no idea how to upload them here. I send people wanting information and decent photos to google. I have three UK imports here sired by maesydderwen cockers and a couple sired by one of Will Clulee's. He has Poolgreen Gundogs.

Retrieving and Gundog work is done in an environment where they are required to jump and twist. There are no rabbits on flat open spaces like ovals.

I have 12 of them and their off switch works fine for me. They are all resting in the warm sun. They have to have an "off switch" because they will not be getting worked until the snakes have disappeared. It doesn't matter what the breed is, it needs to be trained to switch off. I've seen show-bred Labradors without an "off switch". Generally people training dogs (spaniel or other breeds) for detection work don't want an "off switch"

Get rid of the chooks. This will only end in tears. Not fair on anyone.

This thread has turned a bit mad. I think there are a lot of Cooks here and not many chefs. There are plenty of good reference points on the matter of working spaniels in Australia and overseas. I suggest a few people do their research before mentioning completely stupid statements regarding topics that they know nothing about. Lucky we all live in a free country and Luke GSP can do whatever he see fit with his own money. It takes balls to do something outside the square. Best of luck