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Follow the authors from the breed’s probable roots to the rocky shores of Nova Scotia. Acquaint yourself with Toller personality and achievements. Meet the top dogs. Do you know…
- What is tolling?
- How to groom a Toller for the show ring?
- What types of ducks toll the best?
PUBLISHER’S COMMENTS
Strang’s Westerlea Kennels produces some of the most famous Tollers in the world. MacMillian is an award-winning writer.
AUTHOR’S COMMENTS
Writing this book was both a labor of love and a voyage of discovery. It was begun out of love and admiration for the unique little red dogs commonly called Tollers. Work on the book soon took the authors on a voyage back in time, back to the canals and dikes of mid-sixteenth-century Holland, to the expeditions of French colonizer and explorer Nicholas Denys, and to the early decoys of England. As research drew closer to home, it became apparent how the wonderful people on Nova Scotia were responsible for saving this remarkable breed from extinction.
AUTHORS’ BIO
Strang’s Westerlea Kennels produces some of the most famous Tollers in the world. MacMillian is an award-winning writer.
REVIEWS
“…superb, with excellent graphics and artwork; clear, organized page design and a multitude of really interesting and informative photographs…” (Jan Buchanan, Dogs in Canada)
“…one of the best breed books I’ve seen in a long time…a benchmark for future books on the breed.” (Linda Bradshaw, Quackers)
“Covering all the facets of this delightful breed, the book will fast become a bible for Toller owners…” (Dorothy Macdonald, Carmel Valley, CA)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Foreword by James B. Spencer
Introduction
Acknowledgementsii
Chapter 1: History of the Breed
What Is Tolling? • Probable Origins • On To England • The Toller in North America
• The Modern Era Begins • H.A.P. Smith
Chapter 2: Harbourlights Kennel
Chapter 3: The Circle Widens
John and Mary Sproul, Sproul Kennel • Keith and Roberta MacKenzie, Tollerbrook Kennel • Jim Jeffery and Doug Coldwell, Jeffery Coldwell Kennel • Vic and Heather Dunphy, Marangai Kennel • Derek and Pam Dunn, Kare Kennel
Chapter 4: The Western Connection
Chin-Peek • Chin-Peek Offshoots • Wileen Mann, Sundrummer Kennel • Rena Cap, Jalna Kennel • Alison and Roy Strang, Westerlea Kennel • Arline and Duncan MacDonald, Ardunacres Kennel • More Recent Western Breeders
Chapter 5: Tollers Come to Upper Canada
Ken and Brenda Stephens, Jem Kennel • Ann Penner, Liscot Kennel • Terry McNamee, Rosewood Kennel • Paula and Irvin Collier, Colliers’ Kennel • Lillian Greensides and Karen Wright, Kylador Kennel • Colin and Jacquie Riley, Rideau Kennel • Quebec: La Belle Province • Susan and Paul Kish, Foxgrove Kennel • Wilfrid and Dianne Drouin, Bernache Kennel
Chapter 6: The Americans Come Calling
United States Registrations and the American Toller Club • Neil and Sue Van Sloun, Sylvan Kennel • Laura Grossman, Cinnstar Kennel • John Hamilton and Marile Waterstraat, Lennoxlove Kennel • Kirk and Anne Norton, Cabot Trail Kennel • Paul and Patty Beran, Sagewood Kennel • Gretchen and George Botner, Tradewinds Kennel • Nelson and Evelyn Williams, Lonetree Kennel • Sue Dorscheid and Mike Elmergreen, Springvale Kennel •
Lee Ann and Joe Gleason, Cayuga Kennel
Chapter 7 Back to Europe
Denmark • Sweden • Finland • Norway • United Kingdom • And the Rest
• Down Under
Chapter 8 The Toller Personality
Chapter 9 An In-Depth Look at the Standard
Canadian Kennel Club Breed Standard for the Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever
Chapter 10 The Art of Tolling
A Treasury of Tolling and Toller Tips
Chapter 11 Field Training the Toller
How to Field Train Your Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever by Susan Kish
Chapter 12 The Versatile Toller
Obedience • Top Obedience Tollers in Canada • Working Certificate • Hunting Test for Tollers in the United States 137 • Conformation Shows • Now We Go A ’Specialing: Specialty Shows in Canada • Tracking • Scent Hurdling • Flyball • Agility • NSDTR Club (U.S.A.)
Chapter 13 Toller Good Citizens
Therapy Dogs • Canine Good Citizens • Service Dogs
Chapter 14 Showing Your Toller
Show Training • Make Showing Fun • Grooming
Chapter 15 In Sickness and In Health
General Care 175 • Health Problems in the Toller
Chapter 16 The Art of Breeding
Breeding Systems • Selling Good Tollers • Breeding the All-Round Toller •
What Breeders Say
Chapter 17 Diary of a Litter
Chapter 18 Picking the Right Puppy for the Job
The Show-ring Star • The Field Puppy • The Obedience Hopeful • The Ideal Pet • Finding the Right Owner • Buyer Education 219
Chapter 19 Toller Pedigrees
Appendix
Glossary of Titles
Bibliography
Suggested Reading
Clubs
About the Authors
Index
EXCERPT
From Chapter One
HISTORY OF THE BREED
I never would have believed it if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes. Black ducks are without equal among waterfowl in intelligence and wariness, hence are the most difficult to decoy. But I had just witnessed a horde of more than 2,000 of them act as if they had been hypnotized. An entire raft of blacks, abandoning all caution, has swum more than 300 yards in a matter of minutes to within a few feet of our blind. We hadn’t set out decoys or called the ducks or enticed them with grain. Our only bait was a frolicking, foxlike dog that retrieved a stick thrown from the blind as fast as his owner could toss it out. We were tolling.
Nicholas Karas’s lively description in the widely read American sporting magazine Field & Stream of September 1966 was one of a series of articles that helped to introduce Canada’s gift to the hunting world: the Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever. Until this time, the Toller had been kept pretty well hidden in southwestern Nova Scotia, where it is still known as the Little River Duck Dog. These articles alerted the sporting world to a “new” breed, one that, thirty years later, is rapidly gaining acceptance around the world.
Actually, the Toller is far from new and can probably trace its origins farther back than many of the better-known and more established breeds. Although it was first given purebred status only in 1945 by the Canadian Kennel Club (CKC), its ancestry may be traced back to Europe before the sixteenth century. There is even mention of small dogs being used in ancient Japan to lure birds toward a falcon, but a veil has been drawn over any possible connection with today’s Toller.
WHAT IS TOLLING?
Before embarking on the historical journey that Tollers have made since those early days, an explanation of the term “tolling” is desirable. In a hunting context, the word means to entice, or lure, game. Indeed, Webster’s dictionary contains an explicit definition of “toll” as follows: “To entice game (esp. wild ducks) to approach by arousing their curiosity, as by the antics of a trained dog.”
The tolling dog runs, jumps, and plays along the shoreline in full view of a flock of ducks or geese. The dog occasionally disappears, then reappears, arousing the curiosity of the birds,
which come swimming or flying in to investigate. They are thus lured within gunshot range, and the Toller is subsequently sent out to retrieve any downed birds.
PROBABLE ORIGINS
There are several plausible theories about the origins of today’s Toller, and it is best to mention them all, letting each reader decide on a favorite.
The theory that reaches farthest back in history is that the Toller is a descendant of the Dutch Kooikerhond. Indeed, the very word “decoy” comes from the Dutch word for a cage, de kooi. Kooikerhondjen (dogs belonging to the kooiker or duck trapper) originally were small, spaniel-like dogs used by Dutch hunters to lure rafting ducks into a planned trap. Trained to move in and out of low reed fences constructed along the banks of the ubiquitous Flemish dikes, the Kooiker dog allowed the ducks only brief glimpses of himself. This teasing excited the birds’ curiosity and, following the flashes of dog, they were enticed farther and farther up the dike into canals, until finally they found themselves in mesh-covered ditches.
Described as being red and white, the colors that seemed most attractive to ducks, the Kooiker dog had a long coat and profusely feathered tail. He stood about fifteen inches (38 cm) high at the shoulder, was easily trained, and could withstand prolonged periods of wet and cold.
“Is our Toller really the descendant of the Royal Dog of Holland?” asks David Wood of Springhill, Nova Scotia, who has spent more than twenty years researching the history of the Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever. Wood believes that the Dutch theory of the breed’s origins is probably the most valid. He states, “There are presently significant differences in the two breeds, but 230 years of divergent breeding could have easily brought about these changes.” Wood’s ideas are reinforced by a Dutch visitor to the kennels of 1970s breeder Wileen Mann. Upon seeing her Sundrummer Tollers, the visitor exclaimed, “Why, these are just like Kooikerhondjen!”
ON TO ENGLAND
From Holland, the tracks lead to England. In the mid seventeenth century, the Dutch method of capturing ducks was introduced into England by engineers from Holland, who were brought in to drain part of the huge fens or marshes of East Anglia. To make the waterfowl traps effective, the little dogs and the duck cages of Flanders (the old name for parts of Holland and Belgium) were needed. At this time, Flemish people were no strangers to cross–Channel shopping, because there had long been a considerable wool trade between the sheep breeders of England and Flemish weavers.
David Hancock, in his book Old Working Dogs, suggests that what was known in seventeenth-century England as the “red decoy dog” is highly likely to be one of the ancestors of the Toller. Colonel Hancock believes that the “coy dog,” as it was more often called, was also a precursor of the Tweed Water Spaniel, one of the breeds established as being in the background of the Golden Retriever. Given the British genius for animal improvement, it is quite likely that descendants of the original Kooiker invaders changed over the years, possibly being bred with native spaniel-type dogs. The resulting offspring could eventually have lost a lot of their original white to become more of a red dog with white markings, like today’s Toller.
Sir Ralph Payne-Galloway, in The Book of Duck Decoys published in London in 1886, described an English duck decoy as a pond or small lake, either natural or man-made, with a uniform depth of two to three feet (0.6–0.9 m), surrounded by trees and shrubs. Radiating from the pond was a series of up to eight curving ditches, or pipes, covered by net hoops. (A number of pipes was necessary to allow the decoyman always to be downwind of his quarry.) Each of these pipes was approximately 180 feet (55 m) long, tapering from about 20 feet (6 m) at the mouth to no more than two feet (0.6 m) at the end. Because a silent approach was necessary to avoid spooking the ducks on the pond, the maze of footpaths around the pipes was muted with sawdust. Approximately twelve overlapping reed screens were placed along two-thirds of the length of the outer curve of the pipe. Each screen, twelve feet long by six feet high (3.6 x 1.8 m), was arranged so that the decoyman could move along the paths unseen by the ducks, yet all the while being able to see them through peepholes.
The small, fox-like “piper dog,” the English equivalent of the Dutch decoy dog, followed the same path as his master, but his job was to be seen in flashes between the screens. The ducks, for reasons no one has been able to fathom exactly, were attracted by these glimpses of the dog and swam up the pipe, only to be trapped at the narrow end, unable to escape. Thus, large numbers of ducks were ready for market long before fowling-pieces became commonplace.
H. C. Folkhard, in his book The Wildfowler published in 1864, describes a piper dog in this manner:
The breed or pedigree of a piper is not altogether material, though apparently peculiar to itself. The nearer the dog resembles a fox in size, figure and colour, the better; and, indeed, a cross between a fox and a dog is the identical result required. Such animals make the very best pipers that can be had, inheriting as they do a share of that cunning so essentially valuable in a good piper. But in absence of such, it is best that the dog be a reddish brown or red-and-white colour. It must be full of vivacity, very active and the more playful the better, but perfectly mute. If the dog barks, every bird will quit the decoy-pipe and decline to follow him.
Folkhard also explains that these trainable little dogs had erroneously been called mongrels, and, while there were not many in Britain, they were “not uncommon” in France. Even though written in the nineteenth century, this is an important statement when attempting to trace Tollers toward North America, because writings of early French explorers and colonizers make reference to dogs that bear an uncanny resemblance to Folkhard’s piper and today’s Toller.
THE TOLLER IN NORTH AMERICA
Nicholas Denys, explorer and colonizer of Acadia (as present-day Nova Scotia and New Brunswick were known) between 1630 and 1670, describes what might have been the introduction of the piper or decoy dog into North America by the French. This is, to our knowledge, the earliest documented reference to tolling dogs being used as retrievers.
When the foxes see the game approaching, they run and jump; then they stop suddenly in one jump, and lie down upon their backs. The wild goose or duck keeps constantly approaching. When these are near, the foxes do not move anything but the tail. Those birds are so silly that they come even wishing to peck at the foxes. The rogues take their time and do not fail to catch one, which pays for the trouble.
We train our dogs to do the same, and they also make the game come up. One places himself in ambush at some spot where the game cannot see him; when it is within good shot, it is fired upon, and four, five and six of them, and sometimes more are killed. At the same time, the dog leaps to the water, and is always sent farther and farther out; it brings them back, and then is sent to fetch them all one after another.
After Denys’s writings, a veil fell over the lives of these Acadian Tollers for nearly 200 years. Did they, like their French masters, become fugitives as a result of the Expulsion of the Acadians in 1755? This massive removal of French (Acadian) settlers from what is now the Canadian Maritime provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island by British troops occurred after the British conquest of that part of North America in the mid-eighteenth century. Fearful that the resident French farmers and fishermen might rise up against the minority English speakers within those colonies, the British set about deporting Acadians to such far-flung destinations as Louisiana and France.
Many Acadians, however, refused to be uprooted from a land that they had considered their home for more than 150 years, and, in an effort to escape the deportation order, they fled into the backwoods and marshes of the region. Escaping with their masters, were the little red dogs a remarkably well-kept secret of a people whose very lives became largely dependent upon their ability to catch enough game to survive? If so, the tolling dogs would have been invaluable to them during their years in hiding. No pen recorded the many years during which Acadians lived as fugitives, and therefore, no one can ever be certain that the tolling retriever dogs were not a closely guarded secret of these hardy, determined people. And, perhaps if the Tollers did indeed take refuge with the Acadians, they, like their masters, were forced farther and farther from the larger settlements and diminished in numbers. Maybe their final domain was reduced to that area of Acadia where their talents were most effective — the great saltwater marshes, lakes, and islands of southwestern Nova Scotia, now officially known as Yarmouth and Digby counties. Even today these areas are locally called “the French shore” because of the many Acadian descendants living there.
Erna Nickerson of Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, widow of legendary tolling master W. Avery Nickerson, says that whatever the truth about their origins, Tollers have been around the French villages as long as anyone can remember. She recalls, “In 1945 Avery visited a neighbor, Eddie Kinney, then in his eighties. Mr. Kinney remembered his father and grandfather keeping Tollers for hunting. That would place them in the Yarmouth area in the early 1800s.
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