The Working Sealyham

The Sealyham

A Working Terrier

William Baker

Master of the Kent and Sussex

Badger Club

(Photo of the author right)

Please take the time to read this article about the working Sealyham. It was published in the "Country World and Kennel News" magazine december13, 1918 .

There were great worries among the "working people" that the breeds ability to work would get lost. Today we all know how it ended.

THE SEALYHAM AS A WORKING TERRIER The following was written in 1913, but was never published. It is more than ever my opinion that the Sealyham as a working Terrier requires the outmost safeguarding. The tendency of the present day seems to be to make fashionable pets of these Terriers, to the detriment of their working quality. I have no doubt that my friends - and I have many - in Pembrokeshire will consider that I am stepping in where angels fear to tread; but I think I can claim to be one of the oldest possessors of Sealyhams in England, and so I will try to express shortly my views on their origin and on what I hope them always to be - Sporting Terriers par excellence. The Origin I have heard many opinions as to their origin, but all people to whom I have talked seem to be agreed that we have to thank the late Captain Edwards, of Sealyham, for one of the gamest Terriers and for the conformation best suited to their work. I think the consensus of opinion seems to be - and my personal experience coincides with it - that the old original type of Fox terrier, Dandie Dinmont, with occasional visits to the Bull Terriers of the old Staffordshire fighting strain, formed the nucleus of this now well-known breed. It is impossible to look at a litter of Sealyham puppies without seeing in individuals marked characteristics of these three breeds. Some that I have myself bred would , if of the right colour, quite pass for a Dandie, and some again with small alteration would do for Bull Terriers such as a Staffordshire miner would like to see in the pit. As in all comparatively new breeds, these reverts to ancestral type are to be expected.
As a Worker Now to that subject which I hope will be everlastingly pre-eminent in the aims of all Sealyham breeders - the work of the Sealyham. In spite of the few - and I hope they may become fewer - who are making this Terrier the object alone of prizes on the show bench, the Sealyham as I know him is as a breed the gamest Terrier living. I do not in this include Terriers too big for work underground, of which I know nothing, and I do not mean that there are not individuals of other breeds undefeatable ; but I do claim that there are as game Sealyhams and that the Sealyham is more consistently a worker. As a working Terrier, which a huge majority of those interested in him wish to keep him, the Sealyham on the show bench should be judged on the lines consistent with the greatest adapability for what is required of him.
Size He should be, in my opinion, of a moderate size; a 9-inch pipe should not stop him with a fox run to ground in it. He should be short on his legs, so that in holding up his badger he should be able to stand on them without crouching, and so avoid a short charge and the punishment resultant there-from. He should be active for the same reason. His head should be strong, with wide skull, that he may have room for his brains; big cheek muscle, that he may have the strength to use his powerful jaws. The longer the head the better, provided the jaw never exceeds in length, or better still is slightly shorter than the rest of the head. The coat should be wiry, with a dense undercoat. Straight as a hound, with feet like a cat, the Sealyham is beautiful to look at, but I think much harm might be done in making these points too important in so low a Terrier. No Terrier for underground work should be coarse in his shoulders, but experience teaches and nature decrees that a certain width of chest is always there in the gamest of them. The Show Sealyham The Sealyham of today is verging on a fancier´s craze - straightness, length of head , and great bone and cloddiness. If these points are carried to excess, goodbye to him as a working Terrier. Also many Terriers a size too big are winning in the ring. The excuse for his size, often heard, is that the is first and foremost a badger Terrier. As an old badger digger, and one who, with Sealyhams at all events, I think can lay claim to digging more badgers than any other man in England this year, I most strongly insist that a Terrier of a size that can comfortable negotiate a 9-inch drain-pipe with his heart in the right place can do more to help his master in getting his badger from any possible sort of earth than a bigger dog. Unfortunately, there are many people who write to the papers about Terriers and their work, whose only experience, if any, has been to see a captured badger drawn from a barrel. For this happily bygone pastime I am quite ready to grant that the heavier the dog, within limits, the better; but a Terrier to hunt a wild quarry, either fox, otter , or badger, is not required to pull him forcibly from his holt. With a badger, at all events, this is impossible for any living dog to do.
The Show Sealyham as a Worker I have been asked to send some photographs of the occupants of my kennel. Unfortunately none are available, but my dogs include two K.C champions, Whisky and Bess, and there is not one among them which has not been regularly worked with the Kent and Sussex Badger Club, and who will not do his best with fox, otter or badger. ~~~~~~~~