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DOG BY THE JUDGES’ EDUCATION COMMITTEE OF THE AMERICAN BOUVIER DES FLANDRES CLUB
L et’s take a trip back in time. Let’s go back well over a hundred years to the country of Belgium, prior to the industrial revolution. The land is lush and level in the lowlands, but the climate, while temperate, is frequently damp. Up in the mountains to the North, the climate gets much colder and the land is rocky and poor. It is here that you own a small farm; no more than twenty acres. It is here that you scrabble to house and feed your growing family. You own very little; a few head of dairy cattle. The days are long and you need help to complete all the chores. There is no money to pay for a helper, and a horse is expensive to buy and feed. For the farmers of Belgium, a dog was the answer. A bouvier , the Belgian word for a drover’s dog. Not a breed yet; merely a farmer’s dog. But what kind of dog to help with all the work around the farm? You needed a dog capable of moving the cows into the field in the morning and bringing them back to the barn at night. Or driving them to market down tight country lanes. Once you had milked, you needed a dog to pull a cart—laden with the heavy milk jugs—to market. (And, perhaps, to pull you home if you had spent some of your money at the local pub.) You wanted a dog to help churn the butter and work the gristmill stone. At night, the dog that you required would remain outdoors to guard the farmyard from intruders… not only humans, but the large gray wolves of the European continent. And he needed to be an easy keeper, living off table scrapes. You did not need a specialist, but a combination of a herding dog and a cart dog… a dog with no exaggerations. A dog that was willing and physi- cally able to do what you asked of him.
SHOWSIGHT MAGAZINE, APRIL 2021 | 215
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