Rules about Breeds and Methods used for Judging

In order to try to combine to some degree the methods used for judging and avoid the risk of individual preferences of the judges be too dominant, the different clubs for breeds of Great Britain came up with specific rules for breeds which indicated the ideal characteristics for each one of them. These rules, which were later translated to other languages, make up the base of the judges' decisions, without denying him or her, the right to give his or her personal opinion when the rule needs an individual interpretation.

The interest in the dog shows quickly transcended into the Continent, however here the judging methods developed in a different way. It was believed that the results attained in the dog shows would be useful for breeders. They did not have much interest in the competitive aspect. For them it was less important what dog had been the overall winner, instead the merits of each participant. Thus, the most predominant factor in the Continent for judging was a quality evaluation and that the competitive aspect is limited to a few classes and even then, these should be principally for training of show dogs and for spectators.

The interest in dog shows has increased enormously in the past few years, and this rise reflects in the number of shows and participants. The growing interest of the general public is shown by the increase of visitors to the shows. This is a tendency that is not only noticed in places like North America and Great Britain, which traditionally have had a great number of followers with regards to events that include dogs, but also, in most countries all over the world, obviously without forgetting Scandinavia.

In Scandinavia the continental system is applied for judging purposes, based on a quality evaluation, but in these past years, more competitive classes have been added. It has been observed that the competitive classes consist of a more significant appeal to the competitors and the spectators, than the long and rather monotonous judging of "quality" classes. When it deals with a breed, which numerically speaking is big, such as, the German Shepard, the quality evaluation of a class of one gender, may take the judge from 4 to 5 hours. From the point of view of the spectator, nothing special happens until the judges have finished judging, since the competition between two dogs does not start until the judge is finished looking each one over.

It is probable that the importance of the quality and competitive aspects are inverted, with regards to the order, if the current tendency persists.