KOMONDOR COATS: PUPPY TO MATURITY
The Coat Flying on a 14-Month-Old
Three-Year-Old Komondor Male: ‘Adult Coat’
zip off the coat and toss it into the washer and dryer! Drying takes a day or so, usually on towels or over a raised grate with big fans. Getting the dog properly rinsed and then dried is important to keeping them smelling good. When a Komondor walks into the ring with the whole coat down to the ground it is seven or eight years old. It is gorgeous and an accomplishment that the coat has been beautifully preserved. However, that dog is no better than one with a shorter coat—just older. Judging based on length of coat is not judging at all. Anyone with a ruler could do this. It is the judge’s job to judge the dog under the coat according to our Breed Standard. Judges look for “type” in a breed. Type in Komondors is not coat. Type in Komondors is the outline of the dog, from a large, strong head, smoothly over good shoulders, to a topline that is strong (standing and on the move), down a muscular rump, and a slope down to the tail. This well-boned, athletic, slightly rectangu- lar dog is much more than a rack for an unusual coat. The mature adult coat is hung on an older dog and might weigh 10 pounds dry and 25 pounds wet. After a bath, we are careful that they don’t jump out of the tub with the added water weight. The older dogs that still carry that dry coat weight with grace and ath- leticism must have had great toplines their whole lives.
pass by about one year. With cording, the dog has deflated a little and all that fluffy hair is compressed in the cords. While this is a perfectly proper coat for the age, many judges fault the dog on the move because the coat is flipping side-to-side over the topline. It is wrong (but common) for a judge to fault a puppy for fluffy coat, a one-year-old for being partially corded, or an adolescent from 15 months on, for a year or so, for having a perfect coat for their age. In the same vein, judging Komondors by degree of cording or length of coat is not judging at all. The judge must always judge the dog under the coat, by proper movement, good angles, good bone, and proportion. At about 2.5 years, the coat is long enough to not flip over the back on the move; the dog starts to gain the look of an adult Komondor. Now the coat just grows, 3-4 inches per year. The owner keeps splitting the cords at the skin and works hard to keep the dog from losing cords by the teeth of puppies, scratching, or any number of accidents. The dog needs to be kept from staining the coat because these cords have to last a lifetime in the show ring. Washing the adult is quite a production. An hour or two in the tub, first soaping up and then completely rinsing the soap out of the coat. Sometimes we lay them down in the soapy water to soak during the bath. Sometimes a “bath” means soaping up and rinsing more than once. It would be so much easier if we could just
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Eric Liebes is a longtime breeder-judge of Komondors. His first two dogs were a Komondor and an Ibizan Hound. The Komondor still shares the breed’s AKC All-Breed Best in Show record. The Ibizan Hound finished his championship and was one of the first CDX-titled Ibizans. In over 40 years in the breed, Eric has achieved seven Komondor National wins, 10 All-Breed Bests in Show, and many CDs on Komondors. He is currently the AKC Gazette columnist for the Komondor breed. Eric was first approved to judge by the AKC in 1992. His first breed approvals were Ibizan Hounds, Greyhounds, and Komondors. He is now approved to judge all Sporting, Hound, Working, and Herding breeds, Miscellaneous Class, Junior Showmanship, and BIS. Eric has judged in Australia, Canada, China, Sweden, Ireland, and Mexico as well as for AKC. In 2020, Eric had the thrill of judging at Westminster. He continues to study and learn more
about all breeds. Eric has had the honor of judging National Specialties for American Water Spaniels, Greyhounds, Ibizan Hounds, Scottish Deerhounds, Kuvasz, Samoyeds, Siberian Huskies, and Standard Schnauzers. His goal is to bring a breeder’s eye to his judging every time he judges, especially at these important Specialties. Eric is a breed mentor in Komondors, Samoyeds, Greyhounds, Ibizan Hounds, and Pulis. He is currently the Judge’s Education Coordinator for the Ibizan Hound Club of the United States. Eric and his wife, Joan, live outside of Colorado Springs, Colorado, with eight dogs and five horses. Eric is retired from his career as a Research Geophysicist for Chevron.
150 | SHOWSIGHT MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2023
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