The picture above is of the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show’s banner when entering the Javits Center which is where the breed competitions are held.
I haven’t posted in the last few days and regular readers may be wondering what’s been going on. You may also be curious about why I haven’t posted much about our Samoyed, Jack, recently.
The short version is that Jack has been very busy for the last few months competing in conformation shows. “Conformation shows” are what most people mean when they say “dog shows”. Technically, dog shows are a strategy for identifying breeding stock in dogs and bitches.
I should mention at this point that in the dog fancy “dog” means specifically a male dog and “bitch” means a female dog. We’re pretty casual about throwing around the “b” word. We just mean a female dog. Jack is, of course, a dog and has been competing with other Samoyeds around the country since May of last year. At this point Jack’s American Kennel Club official registered name is Grand Champion Silver (GCHS) Champion (CH) Vanderbilt’s Lucky Day. “Vanderbilt” is his breeders’ kennel name.
Without getting too much into the weeds “GCHS” means that Jack has competed in a heckuva lot of dog shows, winning “Best of Breed” and group placements in many of them.
This week Jack competed with other Samoyeds and about 2,500 other dogs and bitches in New York City in the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, frequently called the “most prestigious dog show in the United States”. Jack received an Award of Merit.
I’ll be posting more about the show and where we stayed over the next few days but I wanted to provide a “heads up” on our excellent adventure.
