In this blog we catch up with some of the first owners to qualify for the Buddies Yearling Stakes. The qualifier was held at the UK Toydog show and provided a wonderful start to the series of qualifiers.
It took place on March 25 at Binley Hall, Stafford showground and our judge was Terence DD Balfour-Burgess.
In the dog qualifier, he chose the glamorous Japanese Chin Javalcy Bugsy Malone, pet name Bugsy, who is owned in partnership by Mrs Rhodes and Mr Vincent from Derbyshire – he was bred by Ms J Thomas. As well as winning the Yearling Stakes, he also picked up a first in his class.
For the girl’s section Terry chose the charismatic Pug, Zobear’s Hello Dolly, known as Dolly. Her owner and breeder Julia Ashton had travelled all the way from Scotland to take part in the show. Julia took a break from her hectic showing and breeding schedule to talk to us a little more about Dolly and her 11 other beautiful pugs.
She said: “It wasn’t that far for us to travel, we show internationally so we are quite used to travelling long distances most weekends. I go to most shows with my friend and it’s like a mini holiday for us. We love to drink champagne and stay in nice hotels, it’s great – and the UK Toy is a good show to go to.”
“Little Dolly is just amazing. She has done amazingly well on the continent. When I first took her out at four months old to Holland and Belgium, she won all four international classes.” Adds Julia.
Julia has 12 pugs and is passionate about the breed. She is on the sub-board health committee and is the official press officer for the pug. “At the moment pugs are on the high-profile list. What happens is lots of celebrities have these dogs, so people want them and they are bred and bred to meet demand but the breeding is not always done with the dog’s best health in mind. We have come up with an official health scheme for pugs. It works on a star system and this will be good for the breed as well as owners and insurance companies who want to measure the overall health of an animal.”
Many of you may be interested to know Julia’s affix or kennel name comes from her love of animals and having a house that resembles a zoo! Zobear is zoo and bear mashed together as Julia also thinks her pugs look like bears.
We look forward to catching up with Bugsy and Dolly at the Yearling Stakes final which will be held at Thrumpton Hall in Nottinghamshire on Sunday 4th February.
