There are a few recent discussions in this section about the differences between the working and show line GSDs. I am interested now to know when things started to change for the GSD in the UK. When did the show line GSDs start to lose their working drive? When did the huge split happen that we now see between the true working lines and the true show lines? I recall in the recent past when police force dog sections still relied quite heavily on gift dogs for their handlers, with the odd really well bred working line pup from Europe being the exception rather than the norm. Nowadays most dog sections either have their own breeding program (workline dogs) or import good working line dogs from Europe. Fewer gift dogs than ever make it through the selection process. Does anyone know whether the prison and army now use a majority of working line dogs as well?
I know in the late 90s ie 96/7 forces such as Westmids and Manpol were still buying Showlines for their breeding programmes, so maybe it was with the indruction of Pet Passports in 2000 as it then made it easier to bring dogs into the UK
Prison's with high budgets have mainly working line and army definitely use working line and a lot of Mali's as they cope with the heat better. Not many forces will entertain a showline now unless they really are desperate or have low budgets for dogs. Past 10-15 years there has been an incredible drastic change in the showlines as temperament and working ability went out the window and it was all about the "looks" for the ring. BBC 1 program a few years back in my opinion is the best thing they ever did as its opened everyone's eyes and made changes to breed standards etc.
Actualy temperments have improved - more sociable no extreme defense drives, no windyness in the WG showline although still around in the English showline, without checking my records up until 2005 various police breeding programmes still contained WG showline, there were also still some WG prison dogs around as those born in the late 90s had not retired re tv programme if you are talking about JH she distorted the true picture
There are some very good GSDs being bred in the UK now using a variety of working lines both from abroad and in this country from dogs which have been bought in etc. Westmids, Manpol, Notspol, Surrey are just a few of the forces I know that have working line GSD on their staff and of course there is some in house breeding. I know that there are several dogs in prisons bred by sports dogs owners and handlers or who have used their stud dogs.
