OPEN LETTER TO THE ENGLISH SPRINGER SPANIEL FIELD TRIAL COMMUNITY

Let me be clear. I am not advocating for any of the suggestions that follow. I am merely asking the community if it is time to start asking a serious question regarding the future of our field trials in the United States…Should We Leave The AKC?

While I have not had any real issues with the AKC, does leaving it provide us an opportunity to shape a leaner, more competitive event that allows us to have more control? The primary issues I see with our event is declining entries that is potentially reducing competitiveness, a shortage of quality judges, a shortage of quality help and no ability to police ourselves. Below is a suggested solution to all of these issues. True, it is simplistic. True, it will be uncomfortable. True, it will not be universally equal/fair. Welcome to the real world. 

We can do nothing and keep moving along. We could modify it and work with some of it. I cannot be any more honest when I tell you I do not care. However, as I travel around to trials in different parts of the Country and speak to people I respect and to others I do not know enough about to form an opinion, the one thing that is clear is that we are generally all complaining about the same things.

Why Should We Leave The AKC?

All things change. Our game has changed and the AKC has changed. The growth of technology allows us to do a lot of things that we once had to have completed by third parties. 

We could….

• Use the AKC solely for its original purpose as a dog registry.

• Pull the field portion of the Parent Club out and this “new” Parent Club becomes our governing body for rules, discipline and record keeping.

• Store our dogs in a Parent Club database and all existing points/titles are logged and honored.

• We could allow any English Springer Spaniel from any major registry to participate in these new field trials. We are supposed to be looking for the best dog. Why do we care where it is registered?

• We already need to provide insurance. We already take responsibility for gunning and judging programs. Why are we letting the AKC tell us what we need to do without them taking responsibility?

• The new Parent Club tracks all points/titles/awards.

Trial Structure

• We go down to FOUR regions; West, Rocky Mountain, Midwest and East (Mideast gets split accordingly).

• We reduce the number of trials. I have heard all the moaning about this or that region. Just stop it. Every region has a legitimate claim AND complaint here. The fact is that a good dog is a good dog and there are only so many of them. Higher entries often times just means more maybe dogs at the end of the day. If it was more difficult for good dogs, then why has the High Point Open dog been won three times since 2017 with a dog that ran extensively in only the Rocky Mountain or Midwest Region? And another year it was won by a dog than had almost one-half of its points from those two regions? Additionally, dogs from outside those two regions continue to have good results at Nationals. I do not have an answer for this but my reduction in trials considers this.

• We reduce annual trials to 15 in the West and East and 20 in the Rock Mountain and Midwest. This is a reduction from roughly 20 in the West (?), 15-18 in the Mideast (?) and East (?), 24-25 in the Midwest (?) and 25-28 in the Rock Mountain (?). I will be honest; I have not looked at trial numbers in a while.

• We increase required entries to 20 dogs.

• We standardize the requirement for Nationals to 5 points

• We refocus the National to judges, grounds, birds and testing to find the best dog and significantly scale back the other stuff.

The result of this has the potential to:

• Require less judges/guns annually

• Have less trials in hot weather

• Require less grounds, thus providing trials in better/challenging cover

• Force dogs to run more often to support the local clubs

• Probably no impact on entries in the Rocky Mountain, Midwest and West (admittedly, I know very little about the health in the West other than seeing trial sizes)

• Hopefully increase entries in the “new” East

• None of this is going to hurt the good dogs. They will still rise.

There are obviously holes in this outline. There are things I do not know or fully understand. I admit it. However, I choose to stick MY neck out there because I truly do not care. This is a question that I put out to our community. If the community does not care that is ok. It is not my organization, nor do I want it to be. But I do see/hear so much complaining without real action. So, I ask you, do we want to think of significant changes (whatever that is) and try to set the field trials up for continuation after us, or do we want to just let it role as it is to a potential level that is not sustainable? It will not impact me, as I do not have enough time left. Unfortunately, this way of thinking may be in the majority.

Todd Agnew