Peacock Feet and Finding Breed Type in Toy Dogs

Dale Martenson, breeder of Touche Japanese Chin, joins host Laura Reeves for an enlightening discussion of breed type in toy dogs. He encourages judges, exhibitors and breeders to focus on the critical details of beauty and not get hung up in fault judging.

“I hear people talking about either how they judged a group of dogs or breeders when they’re evaluating their puppies and all they’re talking about is the faults,” Martenson said, “and (all I can think is they’re looking at a) beautiful flock of Peacocks and all they see is a bunch of ugly feet and crooked toes running at them. They’re missing the point of this breed and all of the work that goes into the details that make these breeds so hard to raise and so intricate and so desirable.

“I think the biggest insult somebody can give you is that you were generic because there’s nothing about the toy dogs that’s generic. And we have a whole lot of very breed specific type that you have to get into and start pulling apart.

“If you’re cute enough, somebody will bring you food … they do not need to get their own food.

“These toy breeds have very specific things in each of them that you can’t get away from. If you don’t have those, you don’t have a show quality specimen. You have a dog that’s irrelevant to the people who like the breed.

“We become a little bit like axe murderers when you miss our type because we’re trying to get markings, we’re trying to get size, we’re trying to get breed specific things in tiny litters with a lot of mortality. In Japanese Chin, we don’t have the good fortune of the Pointer where it says a good Pointer can’t be a bad color.

“The Japanese Chin, for example, their job was to be really pretty. Hang out with the geisha, you know, very quietly sit with their friends and say, ‘ohh, my gosh, she’s gotten fat.’ You know, I mean, just being that little best friend and not really liking anybody else.”