Discover Dogs. Earls Court. November 9th and 10th 2013
Congratulations to Juliet Knight who master minded an extremely successful Discover Dogs at Earls Court. Congratulations also to our volunteers and their lovely Norfolks who do so much to explain our breed to the visitors - that they are terriers not teddy bears, pay attention to coats for a harsh weatherproof jacket - give proper exercise not a mooch round the garden - watch their diets - and plenty more!
On the Saturday the booth was brilliantly manned by Linda Philip, Heather Campbell, Steff Kendall, Fiona Macartney, Sue and Maurice Clark, with Welly, Winter, Maddie, Bembo, and Keeva who were madly busy all day and had a thoroughly happy time.
On Sunday it was Renata Beauchamp-Kerr with Gogul and Tommy, Carolyn Hoare with her neighbour's Norfolks and Hong and David Marsden with Harry and, of course, Juliet with Bilbo - thank you to you all!
Sally Willbie
Discover Dogs in the North
Discover Dogs London Pet Show 2013
Saturday
We had a great team of 5 people and 4 dogs for Saturday at the London Pet Show. Juliet Knight arrived on the train with Bilbo (red, 8 years) sporting the shaggy look. The rest of us car-shared from the Midlands - Katie Sant with Archie (red, 14 months), Emma Leathley and Steff Kendall with Sprinkle (red, 4 years), and Fiona Macartney with Mabel (b&t, 9 months) - the dogs all with a nice new coat or recently stripped.
We had a corner booth which was fantastic as we could spread out and talk to more people, and it also seemed cooler for the dogs. Sally, Ron and Juliet had set the booth up the evening before and it was looking as good as ever. The crowds were thinner than Crufts but we were busy most of the time and the Norfolks do seem to get more people than some of the other breeds! We had a family, 2 couples and a couple more people who came back a few times with more questions and seemed very keen to get a Norfolk either now or in a few months.
Archie is an old hand now at Discover Dogs and entertained many outside the pen acting as our welcoming committee! Bilbo, Sprinkle and Mabel took turns on the table. Mabel, at her first Discover Dogs, was very keen to prove what excellent kissers Norfolks can be - with everyone!
The excitement for us was when Meera Syal and Sanjeev Bhaskar (The Kumars at Number 42) came and asked about a Norfolk for their son who was about 8 years old. Whilst he played with Mabel and Archie, they chatted for 15 minutes about owning a Norfolk and went off armed with an information sheet and breeders list. Katie and I also got filmed by a team from The Guardian for an article and a video on the web - but sadly we must have hit the cutting room floor as I didn't find it on Monday!
We had all the usual questions although we are getting more every time about health. Having Bilbo with his shaggy look did give us the chance to pluck a couple of hairs every time someone thought it was cruel to hand strip and he never even appeared to notice. But the difference in coat between the dogs did lead to a new question we hadn't heard before - "What is the price difference between the long haired and short haired dogs?"!
Fiona Macartney
Firstly our thanks go to Juliet Knight who, with Bilbo, helped us set up on Friday evening and made a big difference to the look of the booth. The Sunday morning saw Annabel Buchan with Norfolks mother and daughter Daisy and Lily, adored by everyone, in the hot seat - though actually the booth was cool and calm since the crowds were less intensive and, as Fiona says, the corner site gives a spacious feel. Unfortunately Annabel deleted all her photographs by mistake while doing a good deed for a friend in Romania the next day.
Carolyn Hoare once again borrowed Florance and Dougal and they filled the lunchtime slot doing a marvellous job, as always, until Renata Beauchamp-Kerr arrived for the afternoon shift.
Her handsome Tom Tom had to work for two because his mate, poor Gugol, had swallowed a rubber glove that had lodged in his stomach necessitating a complicated operation - thank goodness he’s now fully recovered. The glove was unlike any that Renata had ever used and so Gugol must have picked it up during a walk. We answered very many questions about coats including one somewhat connected to a similar Saturday enquiry, “Does it matter if we keep the hair long if we like it that way?”
Our thanks go to everyone who put on such a good show for the Norfolks.
Don’t ask about the traffic that evening - deadlocked for hours throughout west London!
Sally Willbie
NORFOLK BOOTH WINS BEST TERRIER BOOTH AT DISCOVER DOGS CRUFTS
Another Crufts has come and gone and I would like to thank all the Discover Dogs volunteers and their dogs, Chris Davis, Juliet Knight, Sue Inman, Jill Stevenson, Bev Ackling, Linda Philip, Fiona Macartney, Gail Simpson, Katie Sant, Amanda Child, Lisa Charnock, Claire Butler, Rosalie Rider and my favourite boys Martyn Craddock and John Collins. I hope I have remembered every one. Oh yes and GINA.
You all did a wonderful job and the Norfolk booth won Best Terrier Booth.
Special thanks must also go to Lisa Charnock and Claire Butler (super sales woman) for helping on the Breed Stand on the Thursday.
Dorothy Dorkins