Features

This is a new page which has been added to our website and I hope the content is interesting and informative for all who read it.

I would like to thank Bob Connelly from Ashintully Estate, Perthshire for his valuable contribution to this feature and also to Roger Skinner for giving us an insight on how the past 3 years difficulties have impacted on his company, suppliers and customers.

IN THE BEGINNING ..........

In February 1963, yes, before the moon landing and the demise of JFK, a meeting was held in Kilmarnock at the behest of 28 men and women who were interested in creating a Working Gundog Club and for that to serve the South West of Scotland area. The meeting was attended by 23 people and 5 apologies were received. From this meeting it took 12 months to acquire affiliation to the Kennel Club and be granted a licence.

The proposed Office Bearers are probably names some of our older existing members will well remember. The President was Thomas Ramsay with Vice-President being Donald Campbell and General Secretary/Treasurer, Douglas Squires. The Office Bearers were supported by a committee made up of 7 other ‘like minded’ folk and they handled both Retrievers and Spaniels.

The application to form a ‘Society’ was submitted to the Kennel Club by Thomas Ramsay (proposed President) in March 1963 and correspondence went between the Scottish Kennel Club and The KC in London for several months. The proposed names submitted for this new Gundog Club were as follows:-

The South West of Scotland Gundog Association
Scottish Western Gundog Club
Ayrshire and West of Scotland Gundog Association

(The first in the list being the preferred name of the new Gundog Society).

The application for Registration of Title cost One Guinea (21/-) and had to be endorsed by two Canine Clubs within a 25 mile radius of the centre at which the new Club would operate. They were:-

Irvine and District Canine Club
Kilmarnock and District Club

Irvine and District’s endorsement was signed by Donald Campbell (Chairman) and Robert Crawford (Secretary) of the Sponsoring Club at their committee meeting on 20 March 1963.

Kilmarnock and District’s endorsement was signed by their Chairman and Secretary at their committee meeting on 26 December 1963. This document was then forwarded along with confirmation of the 25 founding members signatures/names and home addresses to the Kennel Club and their donation of not less than £2 each to a fund for the establishment of the Society on 12 January 1964.

The Kennel Club Committee Meeting was held on Tuesday, 21 January, 1964 at 11.00 a.m. The result of which was that The South West of Scotland Gundog Association's application was granted Kennel Club status and was bestowed the Registration number of 178 . Work was just beginning for the 25 original founder members.

(Thanks also to the member of staff in the KC Library Archive Department, who researched and provided me with the above factual information)

LIFE ON A TYPICAL PRIVATE ESTATE IN THE 1950’s -1970’s

Being born and raised on a Private Estate in Scotland was a real privilege for a child. Life could be hard and lonely at times and a mother and father worked hard to provide for their family but the children had free reign of the countryside…..shooting, fishing and being with your dogs, or ponies if you were lucky, as well as many other country activities were on hand to be enjoyed.

Commercial Estates were relatively rare by comparison as shooting was an expensive hobby and was out of the reach of most individuals and considered very much an ‘upper class’ pastime. Many of the older children of employees on the estates were offered and paid to do beating on shooting days and payment for this job was generous. Dogs were always part and parcel of the day. Many of the Guns brought their own dogs who would sit at the peg until sent for a retrieve. Spaniels were used to flush and could also retrieve. There was a clear need for good, steady and well-trained gundogs and so the need and desire for Working Gundog Clubs grew.

1980’s……

Socio/economic changes in the early 1980’s witnessed many changes and this helped open up the country sport for many of us who could not afford such a hobby in years gone by. Disposable income was now more plentiful to the ordinary working man or woman and life on Estates changed dramatically.

Owners and their Factors looked at diversifying their interests to secure a continuous income and sustainability for their Estate going forward. If the land which they owned could offer forestry, grouse, mixed game such as partridge, duck and deer and provide good stretches of river and lochs then most of the boxes were already ticked. There are around 340 Sporting Estates in Scotland and with so much opportunity and activity of a physically demanding sport, our canine companions’ health, stamina and wellbeing are of paramount importance if they are to function at their optimum and for their handlers to hone the dogs much sought after hunting skills.

Game Keepers aka Land Managers are key to the quality and quantity of the game to be harvested. They constantly have to think ahead and manage what nature may present at any given time. Nature has been particularly cruel to all interested parties connected with Country Sport over the last 3 years. There is no need to explain the difficulties Covid has wrought on individuals and businesses. Brexit too, has had an impact as has the war in Ukraine. There is a myriad of diseases which can affect the young poults and Keepers are for ever vigilant in this regard but Avian Flu this year has resulted in the lack of birds which were available to buy and put down on the ground for rearing. Such a ‘knock on scenario’.

Author:- LHM - 12.7.22

I have asked two of our supporters for a statement on how the challenges of the last 3 years have impacted on their livelihoods and those of their family of employees. Here are their stories…….

Bob's Story 2019-22

Bob Connelly, Keeper at Ashintully, Perthshire was asked to give us some feedback on his experience over the last 2-3 years. Bob wrote this for us back in April. The scene at that time was different than that of today only 10 weeks later. Here is what he had to say……..

During the Christmas and New Year of 2019 a bug went through our area here at Ashintully, Perthshire, the main symptoms seemingly to be a cough that cut you in half. I went down with it at the end of the Hinds and literally could not walk the length of myself. This was mid-February and within 2 or 3 weeks we were introduced to Covid 19.

As it ravaged its way through the world, crystal balls were dusted off and decisions had to be made, furlough schemes rolled out and plans were made. My Laird had already deserted London so maybe he had a more wary opinion than others. We sat down together and took the difficult decision to NOT expose ourselves financially and not release birds but would see if some walked up days would be feasible. I think it is to the immense credit of Estates that only a handful of Keepers were furloughed in Scotland while ‘conservation’ charities used it wholesale.

I set about my usual spring work, muirburn, traplines, dens, larsens etc and I was asked to do several jobs of Estate maintenance but for some strange reason I broke my arm on the 1st of June. I literally had Perth Royal Infirmary A&E to myself ……. if that was a benefit. We were slowly getting used to Covid, pubs were opening and we were wondering as to whether we’d played it right or not.

Grouse time came, thankfully there were some on the hill. Guests arrived and we had to take precautions of supplying hand gel and masks etc when travelling and any other safety measures which applied at that time as noncompliance of the rules would severely impact on our livelihood. I managed to get out quite often during this time, picking and flanking and the general mood was quite buoyant, Guns and Shoot folk glad to be out.

As the Pheasants started, so the numbers of cases rose. We had a day for the Laird which was ‘dreich’ to say the least and finished early. I clearly remember one Gun leaving the shoot at 4 p.m. exactly so he could be back in London by midnight to beat the curfew. This was the start of everything getting tighter and tighter to the point shooting was untenable and the financial implications started to mount up. Birds had to be fed, nobody could come and shoot, days being cancelled but held over to the following season. We at this point were glad that we had taken the decision we had back in March as we wouldn’t be carrying a headache forward. The lack of pheasant work also enabled me to do a fair bit of October heather burning and as winter wore on more time than usual was spent on the Hinds.

As a knock on, the devastating winds of this last season means the catch up from Covid didn’t happen as expected so shooting clients may have to suffer more yet and with the bird flu situation being what it is, mayhem will rule again this season.

Author:- Mr Robert Connelly, Perthshire - April 2022

Roger Skinner's Story 2019-22 ........

British Manufacturing Remains Strong Through Challenging Times

Stradbroke Mill in Suffolk dates from 1688 and the Skinner family have traded from this same site as millers, corn merchants and animal feed manufacturers since the middle of the 18th century. In the mid 1970’s the family decided to concentrate on the manufacture of high-quality dog foods for working breeds and over the past 50 years the business has continued to grow year on year and is still owned and run by the Skinner family.

Like many other businesses, Skinner’s has been affected over the past three years by Brexit, Covid and more recently the war in Ukraine.

Apart from generating more paperwork in respect of our sales to the EU, Brexit made very little difference and sales to the rest of the world have continued apace. On the plus side the UK is now able to trade more freely with the rest of the world and the absence of EU tariffs may in time lead to lower commodity prices.

When the UK went into lockdown in March 2020 it obviously made our business more complicated, however, as a food manufacturer we carried on producing dog foods and none of our staff were furloughed, including our area sales managers who continued to work from home. That said, our on-line sales rocketed, particularly on the announcement of lockdowns and everyone from the marketing team, to warehouse staff and the CEO, spent their mornings packing up orders ready for dispatch from our Suffolk mill. In order to keep up with demand our amazing staff worked around the clock, seven days a week and thanks to the stringent rules applied by our health and safety team we managed to keep Covid out of the mill.

There is as always another side to the story and we became painfully aware that many of our loyal retail customers had been affected by the consumers rush to buy on-line. However, our ASM’s did what they could to support the trade at a time when they were no longer able to attend shows, field trials and other working dog events. As we emerge from the pandemic, we are grateful that most aspects of the business have returned to normal and that the majority of our customers continue to support the local retailers and pet shops that stock our food across the country.

In some respects Covid did kick-off some of the inflationary pressures we are feeling today. It caused log-jams at many ports around the world, particularly in South East Asia and China. This effectively pushed freight / container rates up by 500%, leading to an increase in the price of imported raw materials such as rice, which is included in many of our diets.

Without doubt, the terrible war in Ukraine has had a greater impact on the pet food industry than any other single event in its history. The price of some grains has more than doubled and the rocketing oil price has made a significant impact on the price of other ingredients, packaging, energy and distribution costs. Despite these challenges, Skinner’s are well placed to meet demand at their Stradbroke and Ickburgh factories where they produce high quality dry extruded and wet foods respectively. One thing our customers can be certain of, is that although we may be forced to increase our prices, we will never compromise on quality - that has been part of our ethos for 50 years and will never change.

On behalf of the Skinner family and the entire Skinner’s team, we would like to thank our customers for their continued support in these challenging times. We also hope it won’t be too long before you meet Ben Skinner, who is the 7th generation of the Skinner family to run the business; Ben wishes to continue our tradition of supporting the working dog community.

Author:- Mr Roger Skinner CHAIRMAN Skinner's Dog Food - 7.7.22