Beagle Miss P wins Westminster Dog Show. How did she beat the sheepdog?

Miss P stuns the Westminster Dog Show and with a solid, classy performance that edged out play-to-the-crowd favorites. Beagledom rejoices.

|
Mary Altaffer/AP
William Alexander, the handler, poses with Miss P, a 15-inch beagle, after she won best in show at the Westminster Kennel Club dog show at Madison Square Garden in New York on Tuesday.

Beagledom, rejoice! Miss P, a 15-inch beagle from British Columbia, took Best in Show at the Westminster Dog Show on Tuesday evening. That’s the highest honor in the dog world. It’s like winning the canine Super Bowl, World Series, and Wimbledon all in one.

Our own two beagles, Daisy and Bingo, celebrated this morning with an extra Milk Bone and a nice nap next to the radiators. OK, on top of the radiators. Don’t ask how they get up there.

Miss P, whose official dog world name is “Tashtins Lookin For Trouble," beat out crowd favorite Swagger the Old English sheepdog, as well as a Portuguese water dog named Matisse, who is a relation of President Obama’s pet Sunny, and four other group finalists to earn her crown.

It was an upset, to be honest. Miss P is the grandniece of former Westminster champion Uno, a vocal and adorable beagle who won in 2008. But she does not have quite the, uh, personality projection of Uno. That means she does not bay as much, at least not in the ring.

Best in Show judge David Merriam said afterward that Miss P demonstrated the “beagle in the ring and the beagle in the field," according to the New York Times report of show results. This might mean lots of things but presumably it hints that Miss P seemed more of a complete package than her rivals, both a show dog and a possible hunting dog.

Lots of beagles and beagle-mix dogs are still used in hunting, particularly in the South, but as pets they primarily hunt table scraps and treats both edible and nonedible in the backyard. Pre-washing the dishes in the dishwasher is one of their specialties because they are small enough to actually jump inside the racks when their owners’ backs are turned. Also, they sleep on top of the pillows of upholstered furniture, giving everything in the living room a sort of sway-back look due to the permanent Uno-sized dents.

Then when the postal delivery arrives they set up a racket the likes of which you have seldom heard on this earth. True story: once when walking our beagles they spotted a cat or something and went to baying like banshees. A door slammed open and a panicked neighbor came running out. “Anybody hurt?” he yelled.

They’ve also been compared to the sound of a low-flying flock of geese.

As for Miss P, her win means that the beagle has now joined the Afghan, bulldog, and black cocker spaniel in the category of breeds with two Westminster wins. Of the 192 registered breeds, only 47 have ever actually won Best in Show, so it’s rarified company.

The fox terrier has won 14 times, true, including 2014. They’re the Rafael Nadal of dogs.

Where is Miss P going now? Well, on Wednesday she is attending a publicity event in Donald Trump’s office for some reason. After that she is due to retire to a life of having and raising puppies back in Canada.

As for Uno, he’s living in Texas with his longtime owner. Presumably he’s baying in delight for yet another beagle triumph. 

[Editor's note: The original version identified the wrong Obama family pet as being related to Matisse, the Portuguese water dog in the Westminster show.]

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Beagle Miss P wins Westminster Dog Show. How did she beat the sheepdog?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/Decoder/2015/0218/Beagle-Miss-P-wins-Westminster-Dog-Show.-How-did-she-beat-the-sheepdog
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe