A Guide To Preparing For A Dog Show

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     Showing a dog is a fascinating exercise, and requires some effort on your part to get ready for it!

After you have purchased your first dog you will wish to register it. You should have received from the seller either a registration certificate needing only to be transferred to your name or a registration application, both forms requiring the seller's signature. If you received a registration certificate, the dog will have already been named and will have a registration number, and all you need do is to sign the transfer of ownership on the back and send it to the American Kennel Club with the proper transfer fee, $1.00 if done within thirty days or $2.00 if done later.

If you received an application for registration of dog of registered litter, you should check it to see that all the information needed is filled in, particularly the litter registration number and after filling in the first and second choice of name of dog sign it on the back and send it to the American Kennel Club with the registration fee.

Bear in mind that once a dog has been registered, his name can never be changed. Of course you may give him any call name you wish, but the registered name remains the same.

You can show an unregistered dog three times by checking the box on the entry blank so marked and paying a listing fee of 25 cents. In very special cases, upon request to the American Kennel Club, you may continue to show a dog as listed an unlimited number of times.

We have been leading up to getting your dog entered at a dog show. You will need to get hold of an entry blank. Across the top of an entry blank will appear the name of the club holding the show, the date of the show, and the place where the show will be held. Also on top of the blank appears the entry fee, which is usually $5.00, the person to whom the check should be made payable, where to send the entry with fee, and the closing date and hour before which the entry must be in the hands of the person so noted on the blank.

All the information asked for on the entry blank must be given. You should have no difficulty filling it out if you read the instructions carefully.

There, now, the entry blank is made out. Just be sure it gets to its destination on or before the closing hour.

The most logical question now is, "Where do I get these entry blanks?" There are only three or four places where entry blanks may be secured: The American Kennel Club office; the show superintendent's office (or by mail from him when you are on his mailing list); the office of the show-giving club (if it has one); or from a member of the show-giving club who might be trying to get entries for the show.

Occasionally a show superintendent will have entry blanks for a show other than one he is going to superintend, but this is unusual. Dog-show superintendents usually have a supply of entry blanks for future shows at their office on the dog-show grounds.

Now you will be asking, "How do you know when or where a show will be held ?" In each issue of Pure Bred DOGS - American Kennel Gazette, and in almost every other dog magazine, you will find a list of coming shows with the name of the show secretary and the show superintendent, and from them you may secure premium lists with entry blanks attached.

At almost every dog show the superintendent can tell you about his future shows and supply you with the premium list. Another way to know when and where the shows are to be held is to be active in the dog game; join a dog club!

Now you just need to get your dog ready for the show and you are away. Good luck!