Good Morning,
My name for those of you who don't know me, is Alan Johnston. My Grandfather
founded our kennel, The Oregill Kennel in 1921 and I suppose this is the reason
that I have been asked to do this talk on the history of the breed. When I first
agreed to do this talk it sparked comment from some that I should make a video
and have subtitles added. However, this is a talk about Lakeland Terriers and
I'm afraid you'll have to put up with the Lakeland dialect!
A poster at Crufts showing
the history of the Lakeland Terrier
I'd like to start at the beginning with the reason for the existence of the
breed. As anyone who has visited the Lake District knows, the fells are grazed
by Herdwick sheep, a very hardy breed with extremely wiry, dense wool. The
Herdwick has been bred in the lakes for hundreds of years because it is best
suited to the fells as it can withstand the climate, and as one old farmer once
told me it's the only breed that can stand hunger.
So imagine if you will, a fell farm in the 19th century , very picturesque but
not the easiest of places to make a living. On these farms, one would find three
different breeds of dog, all connected to the keeping of sheep. Each of the dogs
of the fells had to be different from their lowland counterparts.
Firstly the sheepdog, not quite the same as the type you see on "One Man and his
Dog", these dogs are expected to drive and gather the sheep out of crags and
gills and a good one will work independently out of sight of the shepherd.
The second breed you would meet on this farm is the Fell hound which differs to
it's lowland counterpart in that it is lighter in build to aid agility and
perhaps whiter in colour so that it can be seen at a distance. The fell hounds
usually belong to the Fell pack and will return again when the hunting season
starts. The Fell pack hunts on foot because it would be simply impossible to
follow on horseback.
The third breed to be encountered and the one that we are concerned with is of
course, the terrier. These little dogs have been bred in the lakes for centuries
and have been molded into a terrier best suited for the work and conditions they
will encounter.
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However
to establish the purpose of these terriers, I'll tell you more about the fell
farm. The sheep are gathered and brought down off the fells three or four times
a year for dipping, clipping and lambing. The sheep are brought down into the
fields near the farm in April to lamb; this is later in the year than the
lowland flocks because the climate is so cold. The birth of the lambs coincides
with the weaning of the fox cubs. |
Not all the foxes take lambs but the ones that do play havoc with the lambs at
that time of year. So the fox has to be controlled. Many of the shepherds would
go round looking round the known places where the fox might have cubs and try
their terriers to ground hoping to catch the vixen and her cubs. Our terriers
share the same ancestry as the Welsh terrier and I suppose they are bred for the
same job in a very similar terrain. These little black and tan dogs were bred in
the Lakes for centuries mainly on the farms and later by the packs of Fell
hounds and Otter hounds of the area.
The Fell fox usually gives birth in a scree bed or a disused slate quarry spoil
heap, so when hunted it often goes to ground in these places. A Scree bed is
fonned by stones that have fallen off a crag. These stones that fonn a scree
vary in size from the size of a car to the size of a pebble. When a fox goes to
ground in these sorts of places it is the job of the terrier to try to drive out
the fox for the hounds to kill. A fox that has been chased for a few miles is
usually tired and does not want to bolt. This is when the terrier is expected to
kill the fox underground. A scree can be a dangerous place for a terrier as the
rocks may fonn caverns from which a terrier may not escape. This is why the
short-legged terriers are no good for the job, they might get into the fox but
they haven't got the leg length to jump and scramble out again. The heavy broad
fronted dogs are also no good because they can't follow the fox into tighter
places underground, and can also get stuck there. The weather in the fells is
very changeable and it seems to be the only place on earth where you can
experience all four seasons in one day! It might be bright sunshine when we set
off hunting, but the higher in the fells we get, the colder it gets and the wind
blowing in off the Irish sea brings in the clouds, that may fall as rain in the
valley bottoms, but will fall as sleet or snow higher in the fells. This is the
reason that the terriers must have a good hard weather resistant coat. A soft
coated dog when wet soon suffers from hypothermia and many dogs have perished
for this reason.
Tommy Dobson the founder of the Eskdale and Ennerdale foxhounds introduced
Bedlington Terrier into his strain of hunt terriers, they prove very game and
worked well, but their coats were their downfall. Most of the terriers were bred
at the hunt packs but many would end up on farms, some of them returning when
the hunting season started again. Not all of the terriers belonged to farmers,
some were owned by miners and other tradesmen for sport. This was mainly badger
digging, rabbiting, ratting or fox hunting.
Much new blood was added from time to time. It is thought that Cornish miners
working in the ore mines in west Cumbria brought terriers with them and crossed
them with the local terriers. It is also thought that some Irish miners did the
same.
The local shepherd Meets started to put on classes for Foxhounds and terriers,
mainly to create some variety in the meets. You can imagine it was inevitable
that terrier classes would take off. Before long, people were keeping terriers
for show and some of them would never see a fox. They were first classified as
coloured working terriers, this was to separate them from the white terriers,
although many of the white terriers could have been out of the same litter as
the coloured-working terriers.
Interest in the coloured working terrier grew and competition got harder. Even
today, the shepherds meets and Dales shows have terrier shows, but just for the
working terriers, Russell's, Borders and Lakelands. (Although Lakeland Terriers
are sometimes referred to as Fell Terriers). In 1921 the Lakeland Terrier
Association was formed. This was the simplest way to include all the different
strains and names that had been used up until then. They included Patterdale
Terriers, Ennerdale Terriers, Fell Terriers and Cumberland and Westmorland
Terriers. Many were also referred to by the packs they belonged to, for example,
Coniston, Eskdale, Melbreak, Blencathra and Ullswater .
Now they were all sailing under the same Flag, It wasn't long until the Kennel
Club recognized them as a breed. The first certificates were given out in 1931.
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Although many
dogs were being bred throughout the lakes, and a few even further afield, the
majority of the dogs were bred in my hometown of Egremont. These dogs were the
descendants of the Eskdale & Ennerdale and the Melbreak and the local working
dogs that had belonged to ore miners. There were well over 20 breeders in
Egremont alone, and many were breeders of Top class Lakelands, some made it to
the big shows but most breeders could only afford to show locally. Remember;
during the 1930's depression many working class people were out of work and a
few pounds from the sale of a litter of pups would have been very welcome. |
Fell Foot Park Fieldstone
fences that the dogs
chased the foxes over until they reached
their dens in the
craggy rocks |
What the breed needed was some money thrown at it. This happened when Tom Magean
of the Mockerkin Kennel became interested in the breed. He was a very wealthy
man who owned the Cumberland Bus Company. Magean asked my Grandfather, Alf
Johnston, who was also an employee of his, to retire from driving buses and
handle his dogs. Magean bought most of the Oregill dogs and changed their name
to Mockerkin. Many of these dogs at this time were half bred Lakeland and Wire
Fox Terrier. A lot of Fox Terrier was introduced to try to improve the shape of
the Lakeland. In the 1930's the Mockerkin Kennel was the leading Kennel and
because it was exhibiting country wide, many southerners became interested and
took up the breed. In the 30's and 40's competition was very stiff in Cumberland
and it was much harder to acquire best of breed in a local show such as
Whitehaven and Workington, than to win best of breed at Cruft's today. The breed
as a show dog was developed between two world wars, only about 21 years.
Although as a breed the Lakeland had come a long way, many improvements were
still to be made. When the Second World War commenced most of the shows were put
on hold and many breeders cut down their stock in numbers because of food
shortages. At this time a lot more Wire Fox Terrier and Welsh Terrier blood was
added and when the dog shows started again after the war, the breed came out
vastly improved and almost a new breed. The breed that we all recognize today as
the Lakeland terrier. “
