Natural History

From Charles St. John’s A Tour in Sutherlandshire, with Extracts from a Sportsman and Naturalist (Vol. 2) (1849):

[H]owever good a water-dog your retriever may be, and however hardy, the less swimming and wetting he gets the better. Nothing is so ill-judged and useless as sending a dog into the water without good reason for it; doing so is always taking something, more or less, from his strength and injuring his constitution. When standing waiting for ducks in cold weather the poor animal has no means of drying or warming himself, and lies shivering at your feet, and laying up the foundation of rheumatism and other maladies.

A dog who has much water-work to do should always be kept in good condition, and, if possible, even fat. It is a mistake to suppose that allowing him to come into the house and warm himself before the fire makes him less hardy; on the contrary, I consider that getting warm and comfortable before the kitchen fire on coming home gives the retriever a better chance of keeping up his strength, health, and energy when much exposed to cold and wet during the day; a far better chance, indeed, than if, on returning, he is put into a cold kennel, where, however well supplied with straw, hours must elapse before he is thoroughly warm and dry. Most rough dogs stand cold well enough as long as they are tolerably dry, but frequent wetting is certain to cause disease and rheumatism. I am sure too, with regard to water dogs, that a good covering of fat is a far more efficacious means of keeping them warm than the roughest coat of hair that dog ever wore. In wild animals, such as otters, seals, &c., which are much exposed to wet in cold countries, we always find that their chief defence against the cold consists in a thick coating of fat, and that their hair is short and close. In like manner dogs who are in good condition can better sustain the intense cold of the water than those whose only defence consists in a shaggy hide. Short-coated dogs are also the most active and powerful swimmers, and get dry sooner than those who are too rough-coated (pg. 149-151).

This little excerpt raises some important points.

Among them is that it suggests the current custom for running retrievers in straight lines through water– though very impressive at trials and tests– is probably ill-advised. However, I don’t think anyone these days thinks that rheumatism is caused by exposure to the cold, but exposure to the cold can aggravate pre-existing arthritis.  Never mind that as a dog becomes more chilled from the water, the less likely it is to enjoy swimming or be willing to do so.

The comment about fat is always of interest, as is the discussion of coat.

Both golden and Labrador retrievers tend toward pudginess.  I’ve always assumed that this tendency was related to their functions as water dogs. Fat is a very good insulator in cold water, which is why every marine mammal– except the sea otter– has some blubber as its primary insulation against the cold. St. John goes on to explain how different mammals use fat as insulation when swimming in cold water, concluding that a retriever should have some fat on its body if it is to be in the water regularly. (I don’t think anyone is claiming that fat dog is a healthy dog, but it does suggest that having slightly more body fat content might be an advantage for a water retriever.)

A very oily, very dense long-coated retriever won’t take on as much water as one with lighter coat that is lacking in oil, but it goes without saying that the Labrador has the more functional coat than any of the feathered retrievers.

In St. John’s writings, one gets the impression that he was deeply concerned for the welfare of his dogs and greatly appreciative of them as individuals. He was also willing to break convention, using his retrievers to track otters and flush foxes, as well as using them to hunt deer. In another text, one of his retriever is attacked by an otter while swimming. The dog would have been severely injured but for its wavy coat, but as a result of that attack, the dog becomes death on otters, hunting them out no matter where they are found.

So maybe the “rough” retriever may have had some advantages if the poor dog happened to be swimming where aggressive otters were known to frequent.