Nightcaps dog trials, 1930: Kip’s head and Don’s hunt

Key facts

Reported event dates

8–10 April 1930

Publication

Otago Witness, 3 June 1930, page 30

Published class winners

Maiden Head: Kip; Open Hunt: Don

Three April days reported in June

The Nightcaps account was published in the Otago Witness on 3 June 1930, but explicitly dates the meeting to 8, 9 and 10 April. This gap is important: the newspaper’s issue date is not the trial’s starting date. The report describes ideal weather and a paddock lent by Frank Boyle, with McGregor presiding and Prendergast judging. Purdue and Johnston acted as joint secretaries. It also records higher entries than the preceding year and sheep-weight guessing competitions. Those details place the formal dog work within a locally supported rural gathering rather than an anonymous result sheet.

Kip’s Maiden Head

The Maiden Head had twenty-one entries. Tilson’s Kip led with thirty-one points, followed by Ramsay’s Scot with thirty and Fraser’s Tweed with twenty-nine. The report describes Kip casting to the right, heading in forty-five seconds and bringing the sheep into the ring in two minutes forty seconds. It specifically praises the quiet lift, line of pulling and ring work. This gives a compact explanation of what the observers valued in that run. The elapsed times describe stages of the performance; the winning figure remains the published points result rather than a claim that the fastest dog necessarily won.

Don’s Open Hunt was a different exercise

The Open Hunt had twelve entries and was led by Gibson’s Don on thirty-nine points, ahead of Ramsay’s Fan and Purdue’s Moss. Don’s narrative follows progress through three sets of poles. It records a deviation between the first and second sets, a correction, then a better line through the later work, finishing in five minutes ten seconds. Noise formed part of the described huntaway performance. The two reports therefore preserve contrasting working tasks at the same meeting: a quiet heading-and-ring exercise and an outward hunt through successive markers. Neither should be treated as a modern class specification merely because familiar words appear in the report.

Common questions

Sources & further reading

References for this guide. Rules and services can change; check the responsible organisation for current details.

• Otago Witness, 3 June 1930 — Sheep Dog Trials, Nightcaps section (opens in a new tab)

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