THE WORLD OF

WORKING GUNDOGS

"One of the pleasures of shooting is the company of a well trained gundog.  The choice of the breed of gundog is a matter of both personal taste and the type of shooting one is engaged in.  Different terrain and differing quarry dictate the choice of gundog.  Some will prefer the busy spaniel quartering the scrubland for pheasants or rabbits, others the questing of setters or pointers on the moorland, whilst others enjoy the retrieving breeds when wildfowling or at the driven game shoot." Bill Beckett Irish writer and broadcaster
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Curly Coated Retriever

This was a very popular retrieving breed at one time in Britain, but now it is very rarely seen on the shooting field.  Confined to the show benches or in the hands of shooting men who appreciate the lineage of the breed the curly coated retriever’s days as a working gundog are all but finished in Europe. Like most of the older breeds of British retrievers the advent of the fast and stylish Labrador retriever spelt the end for these slower retrievers.

Supposedly established by crossing an Irish water spaniel with one of the retrievers varieties prevalent in the mid 19th century, the curly coat was popular with gamekeepers of the Victorian era who saw in it stamina, endurance and great intelligence.  They can be black or liver in colour, although black is the more prevalent colour for the breed.