FACTS & DOGS
Crufts has an international following and more than 20,000 pooches from 45 countries compete. Here’s your guide to the World’s Greatest Dog Show..
IT’S THE most famous dog show in the country and gathers owners from all over the world desperate to take home the most coveted title in the canine world.
The annual Kennel Club gathering has just begun in London, with more than 20,000 dogs from 45 different countries in exhibition and competition.
Here’s our guide to the biggest weekend for man’s best friend.
The event is named after pet treats salesman Charles Cruft, who left the family jewellery business when he left college in 1876 and started work in a dog cake sales business in London.
This took him all over Europe and led to a gig promoting the Paris Exhibition’s dog section, before he continued his success by running the Allied Terrier Club Show at the Royal Aquarium, Westminster, in 1886. Five years later, he launched his own show at the Royal Agricultural Hall in Islington, and it has been going strong ever since.
The first Best in Show award was presented to greyhound Primley Sceptre in 1928.
When Cruft himself died in 1938, his wife Emma took over the running of the show.
The event had taken a break of two years during World War I and had a five-year hiatus from 1942-1947 during and after World War II. The only peacetime cancellation came during an electricians’ strike in 1954.
Shortly after it returned from its wartime break, Emma Cruft passed control of the show to the Kennel Club, who took over in 1948, holding their first show at the Olympia Centre, featuring 84 breeds.
It now features about 200 different breeds every year.
In 1979, it moved to Earl’s Court to cope with increasing crowds, and then in 1991, left London for the first time, setting up home in Birmingham’s NEC.
It became a three-day event in 1982, then four days in 1987 as interest grew.
Heroic lifesaving dogs were first celebrated in 2004, with the Hero Dogs competition, now known as Friends for Life.
This year, it is being shown on Channel 4’s More4, who took over in 2010 and have renewed their deal to show it until 2022.
The show was first televised on the BBC in 1950. In 2008, the BBC suspended coverage after airing a documentary into breeding and living conditions of show dogs, stating: “Unfortunately we were not able to reach an agreement about how to handle televising the so-called ‘at-risk’ breeds of pedigree dog and therefore we decided to suspend coverage in 2009.” It was streamed online only that year, before More4 took over the following year.
In 2008, the RSPCA pulled out of Crufts saying there should be more attention paid to the health and welfare of dogs rather than their look, and condemned some “morally unjustifiable” breeding programmes which can cause illness and deformity in show dogs.
In 2009, to protect the health of competition dogs and monitor standards, the Kennel Club introduced the Health Zone, where judges and scientific experts offer advice and monitor entrant dogs for their health. They are able to exclude an animal if they suspect it is in need of treatment or care. In 2012, a new rule meant all high-profile breed winners had to be vet checked before awards are confirmed.
The English cocker spaniel is the most successful Best in Show breed, with seven wins. The Irish Setter, Standard Poodle, Welsh Terrier are in joint second, with four each.
Of the groupings, gundogs are most frequent winners with 23, and terriers second with 22.
Thefirst Cruft’s show saw 36 different breeds represented, 2437 entrants in total. It is now known as C ru fts, having dropped the apostrophe in 1974.