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European Dog Show 2016
More than 12,000 meet to compete in Brussels .
BY PAULA HEIKKINEN-LEHKONEN
Best in Show under judge Hans v d Berg was the Lakeland Terrier Aiola von den Schönen Bergen .
The FCI European Dog Show in Brussels , held August 26 to 28 , went well in spite of the terrible heat wave that struck the country that weekend . The huge fair center was air-conditioned , but it still was quite warm indoors .
The rings were large and covered with carpets , and some seats were available at ringside . No written critiques were given , but each dog got a marked diploma . In some rings , judging went smoothly , but there weren ’ t enough experienced , knowledgeable and bilingual ring stewards to cover every ring . They had iPads in the rings for immediately publishing results online , but sometimes there were problems . Special thanks to them for marking the home country of each dog with the flag of that country ! The catalog was available each morning to download and view on a mobile phone or tablet , and the final competitions were filmed and available online .
Entries and Breeds
The total amount of dogs , 12,000 plus the specialty show entries , might have been somewhat less than expected . Maybe the Moscow World Show was too close , time wise , and there were some smaller shows in various European countries at the same time , so Brussels was not the only choice that weekend . There were only 1,422 Belgian dogs entered , 1,780 from France ( more than the host country ), 1,289 from Italy , 1,181 from Russia , 876 from the Netherlands , 635 from Germany and 423 from the UK . Some of the UK entries represented breeds that are not recognized or can ’ t get CCs in the UK , so traveling gives them the opportunity to get some titles .
Even exhibitors outside of Europe are interested in European Winner titles . From the US there were 17 dogs entered , also 17 from Thailand , four each from Argentina and Japan , three from South Korea , two from Australia , two from China , and one each from Malaysia , the Philippines and Tunisia .
There were only 25 German Shepherds and just over 100 Labrador Retrievers entered . The most numerous breed was the English Bulldog , with 238 entered . There were 202 French Bulldogs , 109 Boston Terriers and 162 Pugs . There were a
BRUSSELS : BASICZTO / SHUTTERSTOCK ; WIN SHOT : TEXTERRI
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