What with urbanization and more efficient agriculture, and general decline of crime (even if not the last year or so), there is less call for hunting, herding, watch, and guard dogs, and more for companionship. If there really is a tremendous shortage of hunting dogs who can do whatever it is that a cocker was supposed to do, I guess that’s a shame. But, in general, people don’t need as many high prey drive dogs as they used to, and that’s a form of progress.
Field bred English setters were my breed of choice for many years. Very sweet dogs.
My aunt was, for quite a long time, the president of a statewide doberman rescue. She had 3, IIRC, of her own dobermans, plus rescues/boarders/fosters etc. Walking into her house to be greeted by a dozen dobermans wasn’t uncommon. This was not a place to visit if you have any fear of dogs
My husband’s stepmother bred English mastiffs. The first time i visited my husband’s father, i was greeted at the door by three mastiffs, standing side-by-side, completely filling the door. My then-boyfriend grabbed at their collars trying to pull them aside enough for me to squeeze through.
I’m not very afraid of dogs… But that was intimidating.
We have a black mouth cur and it appears that they are not as popular as they once were in the southeastern states. They are rather average in appearance (short brown coat with few unusual features) and were bred for hunting. One of their distinguishing characteristics is that they are pretty tall, with long legs, so it’s fairly easy to spot one at the dog park or on walks. People who come to our house always say, “He looks like a small horse!” Fortunately, they do not have the massive jaws of some breeds, so they are not particularly intimidating.
Sadly, our boy is…not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
The problem that occurred with cockers when they were “put on the production line” in the 1930s-40s (as one observer put it), was not that they lost hunting drive, but that overbreeding created health problems, snappish tendencies and eventually a grooming nightmare, which are not desirable in companion animals.
Our cocker from decades ago was reasonably healthy and despite trainability problems had some of the old cocker spirit. She was a fine swimmer (braved both the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers) and good retriever.
In the early 1980s, I shared a house with a woman who had a cocker spaniel. That dog was a BRAT (and the human did not assert control over the dog). It was made clear to me from day 1 that the dog did not consider me to be higher up on the food chain than she was. I love dogs, but this bitch would not let me make friends no matter what. Until the day my housemate had friends traipsing in and out all day, moving her belongings to storage. The dog was so freaked out by all this, that at the end of it she looked at me, and clearly thought “SOMEONE FAMILIAR PLEASE PET ME!!!” and came to ME for comfort.
At the same time, we knew a family who had a cocker that they had acquired while living in England. THAT dog had not been as badly overbred as the American cockers, and was one of the nicest dogs I’ve ever met.
English cockers are considered a separate breed, somewhat closer to the stocky, low-slung hunting cockers of old (and they are still used for that purpose).
IMHO, writing from Melbourne, the whole reason why SF still had cable cars. Look at the pictures of a lot of trams, read the descriptions, and they just weren’t very popular, and were replaced by buses that were no worse, and at least came over to the kerb to pick up passengers. Look at how people had to wait and queue up to get on the cable cars, and you can understand why that style wasn’t very popular.
Melbourne replace our cable trams with electric trams, because when they did an analysis, they realized that buses couldn’t handle the volume of people getting on and off on our main city street, running out from our main city train station. So they continued with trams, with open side entry, that got large volumes of people on and off fast.
Melbourne eventually tried trams with a single door, in an effort to get rid of tram conductors. Not very popular. Led to congestion, road blocking, tram safety zones, and, eventually, big trams with more side doors …
When I was a kid in SF in the mid-1970’s they were still occasionally used by locals for transportation - I remember boarding one with my mother with arms full of groceries and lines to board were not yet hideous. I left San Francisco around 1978 and didn’t return again until several years later. The system was shut down most of 1979 for maintenance. By the time I was next around them again in the mid-1980’s they were almost entirely a tourist attraction, with long lines like a ride at an amusement park.
It occurs to me that I have never seen a Clumber spaniel in person. I’ve seen them in dog shows and I think if there was ever a dog born elderly, that would be the one. I would love to see a litter of Clumbers having zoomies, I think my brain would asplode.
The clumber is one of the few hunting dogs we’re considering for our next dog. They have lots of stamina but don’t really move that fast. Most of the clumbers I’ve seen were from Wyoming and went bird hunting several times per year.
Not the wildest and craziest puppies I’ve ever seen…
I’ve only heard of them from “choose a breed of dog” books. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one in-person, either.
Look up the Indian Ghost Hound or Rajapalayam dog.
They were bred to guard the palatial residences and the treasures inside them belonging to the very affluent traders in South East India.
Their strides are similar to a horse.
Very beautiful rare breed.
I don’t believe I’ve ever seen an Afghan Hound in the flesh, so to speak.
They were very popular back in the 1970s, but yeah, haven’t seen one for aeons since.
Which brings up another question: if all those popular breeds of the late 1900s are now rare, is there enough base stock for breeders to ensure no inbreeding?
My friend had an Afghan Hound until just recently. He (the dog) passed away this spring at age 13. Other than that, slim pickings here too.
I don’t know why I’m bringing this up, but Rowan & Martin (of “Laugh-in” fame) made a movie in the late '60s (? – don’t care enough to look it up) called The Maltese Bippy where Julie (“Batman”) Newmar was transformed into an Afghan Hound. They had identical hair. I need a nap.
Warning: Movie not worth seeking out.
All AKC breeds are inbred, for the biological definition of inbred. No exceptions. Rare breeds may in reality no more inbred than popular ones – some popular breeds came from a very small founder base and hence all individuals in that breed are related, sometimes quite closely.