Inverness Labrador wins 'best in class' for gundogs at Crufts

An Inverness woman and her canine companion won 'best in class' at this year's ultimate dog show, Crufts.

Transcript

00:00 I'm Emma Bamford. We won the Gamekeeper Basque Ring, which is specifically for Gamekeepers' dogs.

00:09 You have to work on an estate. As much as I do work on the estate, I'm not employed by the estate.

00:18 It's my husband that is the Gamekeeper, but we jointly own our dogs. I still, well, I work on

00:25 numerous estates, Picking Up and also Grouse Counting and things like that. He's part of the

00:30 Picking Up team. He goes beating with my husband. He goes grouse counting, pairs and brood counts.

00:37 Yeah, he'll go flanking. He'll do a variety of different things, to be honest. He helps out,

00:42 as I'm a residential dog trainer, he helps out with all of my clients. Oh, it's a hard life

00:48 for you, isn't it? It's a lovely dog. We did a campaign two years ago, which is #BeMoreTweed,

00:54 which was for the Gamekeepers' Welfare Charity, which emphasised a lot on the mental health of

01:02 the Gamekeeping world, because it's quite quiet. We're quite a solitary, a bit like farming. We

01:08 kind of work quite a lot alone. And there was a big campaign for the Gamekeepers' mental health.

01:14 And Tweed's quite a joker when it comes to training. He'll do things like he'll pick the

01:20 dummy up and he'll roll on his back and he'll wag his tail. And just not quite a serious gundog

01:27 that we all hope our gundogs are. But it kind of gave me that, you know, he always has something

01:34 to make funny. He always has something to smile about. And that's what I kind of took in to the

01:39 Gamekeepers' Welfare Charity when I started up the #BeMoreTweed, which was there's always one

01:44 thing, whether it's 20 pence on the floor, the fact that you spoke to family, the fact that you

01:50 have a house, the fact that you've had a hot coffee in the morning, there's always that one thing

01:55 that you can be grateful for. And I'm a big believer in waking up and saying what you're

02:00 grateful for. And I kind of thought he takes that, you know, on the coldest days, he'll still find

02:06 something that's joyful. You know, whether it's someone coming up to the back of the pickup and

02:11 giving him a cuddle or me sitting down and tickling his belly, he finds that one tiny thing

02:18 and just fuels himself off it and is just a really, really happy dog. So,

02:21 yeah, that's that's kind of weed in a nutshell. It's so lovely because to be a gundog kennel

02:31 is always met with such negativity. And it's so nice to go to BASC and it's so nice that BASC

02:38 put this ring on because obviously the dogs have to be healthy and you're not going to get a dog

02:44 healthy in a month after the shooting season. You know, you've got to make sure your dogs are

02:47 consistently healthy, they're fit, they're structurally sound, they're happy because

02:53 they've gone into an environment that is huge, full of noise, dogs barking, people everywhere,

02:59 a full day of just nonstop noise from living a really solitary life where we live in the

03:07 islands of Scotland. Your dogs have got to be that well socialized and all that. And it's so nice

03:14 that even though we're a Gamekeeper family, people see that, you know, we actually love our dogs and

03:19 they're treat with such high standards. And I mean, I had my dogs at my wedding, like nine of

03:24 them, for God's sake. So they are very much a part of the family and they get the best I can give

03:29 them. I mean, we've got an amazing sponsor in Pureflax who make sure that not only do the dogs

03:36 look good on the outside, but they look, they're feeling good on the inside.