Tarnedge

Tarnedge Arran (Scruff) being a Page-Dog.

Tarnedge Arran (Scruff) being a Page-Dog.

Can't we come too?

Can't we come too?

Out working with some of the dogs in the snow 2010

Out working with some of the dogs in the snow 2010

Josh having a cuddle...

Josh having a cuddle...

Welcome to Tarnedge Labradors. I have been training and breeding Labradors for over 30 years and I am a Kennel Club Assured Breeder and a member of the Three Ridings Labrador Club.

Here at Tarnedge we breed nice-natured, athletic dogs which are suitable as working dogs, competition dogs or simply well-loved family friends. They do need to go to homes where they will have plenty of exercise, love and time spent on them though. They are not 'couch potatoes'!

We have 20 working Labs at present ranging from old Kizzie, who is twelve, down to two years old Jazz, (Tarnedge Firth) and Wingbeat Skipper.

It's now January and I would like to wish all our doggy friends, old and new a very Happy, prosperous and peaceful New Year. It has been so busy here for the last five or six months, that the peaceful bit is particularly attractive!
The most recent happenings here at the kennels are the arrival of two new litters - by F.T.Ch. Pocklea Adder out of Juno (Tarnedge Carolina) and by our own Tarnedge Firth (Jazz) out of Fenn(Tarnedge Venice). Mums and pups are doing fine.
I have also recently had some brilliant news about one of our"old pups". Tarnedge Rough Diamond (Charlie) with owner Graham Reaney has won his class at the 2011 Kennel Club Championships and is now a Working Trials Champion. This is an amazing achievement for both Graham and Charlie and we are thrilled to bits for them both. W.T.Ch.Tarnedge Rough Diamond is out of our own little Tarnedge Mudlark (Katie) and by Open Stake Winner Garronpoint Ross of Drakeshead. Whilst Charlie was busy making a name for himself, his mum, Katie, was out working with me - searching for ducks, geese and partridges on a shoot near Masham.

On a less happy note, for those of you who don't know already, I have to tell you about the loss of my own darling Holly. To those of you who know us and the dogs, it will probably come as a shock to hear that Rival Lady of Tarnedge - to give her her posh name - died after a short illness in February 2011. Holly was Katie's half-sister. She was only nine. I was, and still am devastated. My daughter-in-law, Jo, has done me an amazingly lifelike portrait of her in pastels, and it hangs here in the study to commemorate the most loyal dog it has ever been my priviledge to know and to love.
R.I.P. Holly.
Holly and Katie's father, Simba (Tarnedge Sandy) died in July 2010. He was fourteen and had been active up until the day before he died. He is also very much missed but he has left me with three of his daughters together with numerous grand children and even a great, great, great, grandson in Twix (Tarnedge Classic). My newest youngster, Jazz, is Simba's Great Grandson and Holly's Grandson and reminds me very much of the old boy when he was a pup.

We took five dogs to be hip and elbow scored last year and they have all passed. Most importantly, Jazz (Tarnedge Firth) scored 3/3 for hips and 0/0 for elbows. He already had a clear eye certificate and he also tested clear for PRA and CNM when we DNA tested him, so we are able to use him at stud and to keep Simba and Holly's line going with him. He is a wonderful young dog - honest, loyal and very biddable - and he has already sired several litters. Our other young stud-dog, Wingbeat Skipper, (black carrying chocolate - by Open stake winner Garronpoint Ross of Drakeshead out of a bitch by F.T.Ch. Greenbriar Viper of Drakeshead) also passed his eyes, hips and elbows, with scores of 3/7 hips and 0/0 elbows. He is clear for both PRA and CNM too and has also sired some very nice puppies. He has recently started picking up with my husband and is proving to be a very enthusiastic and focused.

Next, since winter is once more upon us, I'd like to take the opportunity to remind you all about the dangers of flooded or frozen streams and rivers. There are any number of people who will tell you not to go into a flooded river or onto ice to rescue a dog, but the really important thing to remember is PREVENTION. Don't take your dog near rivers in flood or near frozen ponds, canals or rivers. And if you do have to walk them in these dangerous areas, do keep them on a lead.
One of my own dogs - old Kizzie - decided to try to cross a flooded drainage ditch whilst out on a moor last season. Not a particularly dangerous thing you would think - no overhanging branches or roots and only six feet wide at the most - but unbeknownst to me, there was a heap of tangled undergrowth beneath the foaming water, and Kizzie got pulled into and under it. Knowing the water could only be four feet deep at the most, I jumped in to pull her out and very nearly got dragged under myself. The power of the water swept my feet out from underneath me and left me floundering with my arms wrapped round a four inch diameter pole that spanned the ditch. Fortunately, I was able to reach down into the water with one hand and haul Kizzy out and then to drag myself along the pole to where I could clamber out afterwards. I was soaked through from head to toe and more than a little shaken though. I'll show these ditches a lot more respect in future.
On another death wish in January last year, I was faced with watching somebody else's dog drown whilst trapped in a frozen river. The dog had been off the lead and had attempted to run across the ice to the other side. Unfortunately there are often patches of thinner ice in the centre of a river where the current is strongest, and this weaker ice cracked beneath the dog's weight leaving it trapped in the freezing water right in the middle of the river. The poor animal managed to break a path through some of this thinner ice but was unable to clamber onto the thicker, harder ice that stretched from the bank outwards for some ten to fifteen feet. As exhaustion and cold got the better of it, the dog stopped even trying to climb out, and just paddled pathetically backwards and forwards down its little channel of broken ice. Fortunately, Abigail and I had all our dogs on leads and we were able to use the half a dozen or so leads, looped together, to make a long rope so that I could crawl out across the ice with the rope attached to me and haul the dog out.
Don't try this at home!
The moral to both these tales is keep your dog on a lead wherever there is danger! Dogs have no concept of this type of danger and rely on us to think for them.

The 2011/12 shooting season is now drawing to a close, and apart from the odd blizzard and one or two pretty unpleasant gales, it's gone well. I hope it won't turn out to be as bad weatherwise as last year with the dogs struggling through snowdrifts in temperatures of minus fifteen! It's incredible just how honest and dependable my dogs always are for me; fighting their way through snow-covered woodland and pulling injured birds out of the fast-flowing river.
It all looks very beautiful of course; a real "winter wonderland", but spending all day swimming in bitterly cold water and wading through snowdrifts on the moor edges eventually gets beyond a joke. And the trouble with Labradors is they're so loyal they would work until they drop, so it's important to know when to call it a day and to get them back to the pick-up for high-energy snacks and a warm blanket.
I have had my fifteen year old daughter Abigail out with me on most of my saturday shoots together with her little cocker spaniel "Tiger". It has been lovely to see Abi out in the fresh air, working her little dog instead instead of sitting at a computer or watching TV!

For those of you who have met Scruff (Tarnedge Arran; he is pictured at the top of the page) and are wondering how his operation went, he is managing very well with only one eye. His working days are over - in case he was to injure his remaining eye - but he is enjoying life to the full being a house dog now! Having been guest of honour and "page-dog" at Caroline's wedding in 2009 (he walked proudly up the aisle with the bridesmaids in his specially made matching blue taffeta collar and lead!) he is now learning - as many dogs have before him - that if you sit under the high chair, twenty-three month old Izzie will almost certainly drop something nice at your feet!

Working Trials News:
As I mentioned before, at just four years old, Tarnedge Rough Diamond (aka Charlie) got his second PD Ex ticket and is now a Working Trials Champion with owner Graham Reaney. He has also qualified for the KC Championships next year. Congratulations to them both. The PD Ex is the stiffest challenge of all, where amongst other things, the dog's courage is challenged by several men with sticks and noisy equipment attacking him and trying to back him down. And then five minutes later he still has to be a sweet-natured, dependable family friend! Not easy.
Young Tarnedge Velvet, with owner Sarah Burroughes has now had her first win at UD whilst two year old Tarnedge Daphne with Sharon Brown has qualified at CD EX and come second in UD (Utility Dog) earlier this year.
Newcomer to Working Trials, Eva Robard with Tarnedge Columbine has been doing really well in both CD EX and also in UD. She has also won several trophies for best Nosework. What a great start.
Kelly Chapman with the diminuitive Tarnedge Posy has - I heard just recently - now got her WD EX so she's Tarnedge Posy CD EX, UD EX, WD EX. Not a big dog in size, but big in heart! Well done Kelly and good luck now you're moving into TD!

On the home front, this year's Thirn charity clay shoot which takes place on some of our land and was in aid of the Yorkshire Air Ambulance together with Herriot Hospice Homecare, went incredibly well. We took four and a half thousand pounds and have already donated three thousand of it to the two charities. As an added attraction, we had a gundog test and scurry again and I was delighted to see one or two of our puppy owners having a go. I would love to see many more of you next year!!! Even if you don't get as far as competing, you can have a chat, get a cup of tea and a cake and buy a few raffle tickets. I am hoping to persuade one of my gundog friends to run a taster course on gundog/obedience training for anybody who is in search of a little help or a few tips next year, so watch this space for details on that...

All our dogs are bred from Field Trial Champion and Winning stock and mostly go back to my foundation bitch who was by Field Trial Champion Pocklington Glen out of a bitch by Field Trial Champion Drakeshead Tinker. Our dogs are hip-scored, elbow-scored, eye-tested and Optigen tested for PRA or else clear by parentage. We only breed from dogs with low scores and clear eye tests and we now have had five dogs with perfect (0/0) hipscores.
PRA stands for Progressive retinal atrophy and is an inherited eye condition which can eventually cause blindness. Although, very sadly, not all the dogs passed the Optigen test, at least we know what's what now, and we are in a position to plan our future breeding programme with even more genetic information at our disposal.
For those of you who are interested, there are three results you can get from the blood test. Optigen (a laboratory based in the USA) are checking the dna to see whether dogs are AFFECTED, i.e. they will probably eventually get PRA and go blind; whether they are CARRIERS, i.e. they cannot possibly ever get PRA but unless bred to a clear dog they may pass it on to their offspring; or they are CLEARS, i.e. they cannot possibly ever get PRA and they cannot breed a puppy that will ever get the condition. For more information log on to www.optigen.com.
With this new test available to us, it's possible to erradicate PRA from labradors completely!
Unfortunately, of course, it's not going to happen because not every breeder is going to be prepared to spend the money and go to the trouble of doing it.
However, puppy buyers can help tremendously by only buying pups from breeders who have had these tests done, or at the very least used an Optigen tested clear stud dog on their bitch. After all, nobody wants a blind dog, do they?

We also now test for Central Neural Myopathy.(www.cnmlabrador.com) Tilly, Tex, Cassie, Jazz and Wogan have all passed, Juno, Skipper and Twix are clear by parentage, but Indi, our lovely chocolate stud dog, was sadly a carrier. Since this meant we would only have been able to use him on bitches which have been tested clear, and very few people are actually testing their bitches for cnm, we decided to retire him from stud. We will keep his picture on the site though, because we have had some very lovely pups from him in the past.
Fortunately, however, we now have a successor for Indi. Twix, one of Wogan and Cassie's chocolate dog puppies has 20 Field Trial Champions in his pedigree, is clear for pra and cnm and has a clear eye test certificate. He has a hip score of 0/7 and elbow score of 1/0.

Anyway, enough of all that, for those of you who haven't been to the kennels to meet them, a little about the dogs.

Tarnedge Labradors are genuine working dogs. I have no real interest in competing myself, but I do use dogs with a good record in field trials for stud work. We live in a very beautiful part of the Yorkshire dales and have 17 acres of grassland for the dogs to run free in. The dogs work three or four days a week all through the season, from August up on the grouse moors to February down in the woods on local estates. They are in great demand from the local gamekeepers because of their wonderful attitude and ability. They are honest and reliable and have excellent temperaments. We expect them to work like troopers one day and then curl up with the children for a cuddle the next! They not only make good working retrievers, but also excellent companions, but they do need plenty of exercise and stimulation. Some of our puppies have gone on to do very well in obedience competitions, working trials and working tests. Some have simply become well-loved members of the family. If you click on "dogs" you can read about and see photos and pedigrees of some of our dogs.

We are very proud of our dogs and we only sell puppies to homes where we feel they will be happy. They need a garden to play in and somebody with the time and commitment to bring them up as confident, well-balanced and well-behaved dogs whether they are workers or companions.
We do like to talk through all the pros and cons of dog ownership with any prospective new owners, to ensure that the pups do go to suitable homes. We then give a full back up, advising and helping in any way we can through the following weeks to make sure that the pups settle in well and that all goes smoothly. Obviously, all puppies take full written instructions on their feeding and general care when they leave us.

Although all our dogs are good with children, we do not recommend mixing small children with small puppies. Puppies bite and scratch and small children drop puppies on their heads. Better to wait until the children are a little older!!



Mrs Eden Parish
Lizard House Farm
Thirn
Nr Ripon
North Yorkshire
HG4 4AU
England
01677 460014
Tarnedge@yahoo.com

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