Presenting pooches at their best

Teenager Paige Rees has her heart set on competing as a dog handler at the prestigious Crufts dog show in the United Kingdom, but first she has to sell some firewood to get to the New Zealand national event.

The 13-year-old Waimea College student has qualified for the National Junior Dog Handling competition several times since she took up the leash at six years old, but last year she was not able to raise enough money to get to the national event.

This year, she is determined to get to the nationals and, providing her dog plays ball – or in this case, doesn’t play ball - get to the next level overseas.

She has already shown numerous dogs all around the country, often for owners who need a dog handler for one of their dogs and ask her to step into the ring and show their dog to its potential.

Her latest show was the German Shepherd nationals in Christchurch where she was asked to show a dog, and she is heading to Wellington in the school holidays for another German Shepherd show to show a pup and an adult dog for different owners.

It doesn’t always go well and last year she showed one of her Wakefield family’s dogs, a St Bernard called Poppet, who was young and still learning.

“She’s a busy dog and I took her to a show last year when she was just under a year old. She was jumping around and not listening and cutting in front of me and trying to trip me up. It takes a lot of training to get the correct stand and allow someone to check their teeth and touch their tails and feet.”

As a junior dog handler, she is judged on how she handles the dog and controls it so it can be assessed for its breed.

If she gets to Crufts, the junior handlers have to swap dogs with other handlers as well, with just a minute to swap notes before heading into the show ring.

Like many sports, it’s not cheap to travel to events, which has led to the firewood, and she has been fortunate to have a local company donate wood for her family to sell and deliver.

All going well, she will be heading to the national show with the family’s Tibetan Spaniel who has the show name, Gwylim Whose My Daddy, but is better known as Beau at home.