About Us: I have owned, bred, hunted and shown curly coated retrievers for more than 35 years under the prefix Ptarmigan. 

 

Served as president, vice-president, division director, and judges' education coordinator for the the Curly Coated Retriever Club of America, the AKC national parent club.

 

I was a founding member of the CCRCA, started the Great Lakes Curly Coated Retriever Club, and was chairman of the committee which wrote the current AKC breed standard. I served as the Curly Coated Retriever Club of America's first Judges Education Coordinator. I kept that position for 15 years.  After resigning that post, I served on the Judges' Education Committee for an additional 15 years. I also was a member of the CCRCA Illustrated Standard Committee for many years but had to leave that committee due to time constraints and health.

 

 I have bred AKC all-breed BIS, BISS, and 4 group winning curly coated retrievers.  (Two liver male group winners, one black male group winner and one black female group winner.)

 

Dogs I've bred have produced 4 AKC master hunters.

 

A Ptarmigan bitch produced the only QAA curly coated retriever in history and the first curly coated retriever to win an AKC licensed field trial stake in more than 70 years. (I not only bred this dog's dam but his grandsire and 3 out of 4 great-grandsires as well as other dogs in his pedigree.)

 

One of my curly coated retrievers sired the  first Master National qualifying curly and the first Master National passing curly. 

 

Dogs I bred have won the national specialty 6 times, which is second all time among breeders and first among active breeders. (Not bad even after taking 20 years off breeding.)