Barbets en Bresse

Knowing what is in a pedigree is vital when wanting to work with a breed and even moreso a rare breed.
It is a known fact know that you have to bring in new blood and if the breed is rare you can't keep inbreeding and for the Barbet, it needs to come from another breed that is similar. This breed needs to have the characteristics necessary to justify its reason for adding that particular breed's blood.
Generally only a drop is enough. Then you wait to see how it went in the next generation and so on.
Now that the French club has made public what has been known for a long time, it's much easier to talk openly about their lines.

The "Old Bloodlines"" Authentic Barbet" or "Vieux Barbet Français" have some Barbet blood in them. They are not pure.There are no pure Barbets, yet. The "U" litter of the Barbochos Reiau de Prouvenco was and still is the purest Barbets in existence. We are trying to save what is left of their genotype ( which we obviously can't prouve as DNA is recent) and phenotype through documents, photos,and archives of the breed.

The "re-incarnated barbet" by M. Hermans was made without a drop of Barbet blood. It was a mix of Poodles and Portuguese water dogs and 2 dogs with unknown origins. Lynx and Série noire were the foundation of M Hermans' breeding. They were "rescues" with no ancestry.
We will never know if they really contributed to the Barbet since we don't know who they were or where they came from.

Then,

Most of the Poodles and PWD used are documented and now with the databases available, we can find some information about lineages.

Not many photos are available on any of the "Barbet Moderne". There is no history of the lines.

In the mostly poodle "lines"( where podle types are selected), now we are starting to see some throwbacks, just as we have in the lines where "Old Bloodlines" were used.
Then, as there are more births we can further those lines and confirm information.
Below, is a link to a very crucial study on the PWD. There PWD blood in the "re-incarnated" Barbet moderne, also. There was a PWD used in the 50's in the "Old Bloodlines" who came from Portugal and we can see some similarities in the phenotype. Especially the tail.

There is a lot of information in the carriage of the tail. Poodle and PWD are similar. Not the same.

http://www.georgieproject.com/slides/GPslides1.htm
This is a very good website which explains things very simply.

They mention the famous Taro in the PWD pedigrees.I speak about him just below.

Then,as far as health concerns, look more on that site about thyroid problems and diseases...No line is completely clean of any problems.That's just not possible.

How can one resolve health problems with little or no information about who is in the pedigrees, when many are "homemade"?

The "re-incarnated" Hermans Barbet didn't fall out of the sky, neither did his ancestors. Whether Portuguese Water Dogs or Poodles and one thing leading to another, thanks to databases, we are able to do some vital research to establish families that need to cross, as cited in the Grégoire Leroy thesis.

http://www.pawpeds.com/db/?a=a0&id=784241&g=4&p=bar&date=iso&o=ajgrep

Taro is in both lines: Elsa and Luz (OBL and Barbet moderne) below:

http://www.pwdinfo.com/psgdb/dog.php?id=17019
Look at the lovely coat. Look at the hair on the tail that grows down.
That's generations of wavy type coats.

http://www.pawpeds.com/db/?a=r&id=784242&g=6&p=bar&date=iso&o=ajgrep
Going back as far back as possible to real records and not heresay will help the breed survive with the morphology described in the standard.

Perhaps a Barbet is just a bit different enough to make it "special"? and make people want one?

Food for thought?
The Barbet standard was modified in 1986 to include wavy dogs...that decision from a completely bushy-dry-coated-overgroomed-pro-poodle-re-incarnator, has to have a reason. Then, in a "volte-face" it was excluded.
Names on a pedigree are meaningless until they come to light.The same goes for foundation stock.
For more information:
http://www.pwdinfo.com/psgdb/

http://www.bom-tempo.de/fr/histoire3.htm
Carla Molinari was the judge at the WDS in 2010.