{"id":86325,"date":"2014-10-11T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2014-10-10T21:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tvaryny.com\/?p=86325"},"modified":"2026-09-01T17:57:28","modified_gmt":"2026-09-01T14:57:28","slug":"clumber-spaniel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tvaryny.com\/us\/breed-clumber-spaniel","title":{"rendered":"Clumber Spaniel"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Clumber Spaniel<\/strong> is the heaviest and slowest of the English spaniels: a long, low, white dog with a massive head and a strikingly quiet way of going about things. He works in silence at his own unhurried pace, and at home turns into a calm, dignified companion deeply attached to his people. He is also one of the very few breeds whose rarity is not a figure of speech but an official status with a number behind it<\/strong>: Britain’s Kennel Club places the Clumber on its list of vulnerable native breeds. More about dogs on Tvaryny<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Clumber<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The FCI standard describes the Clumber as “stoical, great-hearted, highly intelligent,” and adds a phrase absent from the descriptions of the other spaniels: a silent worker with an excellent nose<\/em>. It was quietness, not speed, that this breed was valued for. The same document warns plainly that the breed has grown heavier over time, and that fanciers should watch that the weight does not turn into weakness in the hindquarters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

History and Origin: What the Record Shows and What Is Only Story<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

One thing here is beyond dispute: the name comes from Clumber Park<\/strong> in Nottinghamshire, seat of the Dukes of Newcastle. Everything else is the territory of retelling, and this is exactly where breed pages usually part company with their sources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The popular version runs like this: the French Duc de Noailles, saving his kennel from the French Revolution, shipped his best dogs to England. Dozens of publications repeat it \u2014 recently even the introduction to a peer-reviewed genetics paper. The trouble is that the earliest printed source says something else entirely<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In William Barker Daniel’s Supplement to the Rural Sports<\/em> (London, 1813), on p. 684, the spaniels are said to have been given to an ancestor of the Duke while he was in France<\/strong> (when in France<\/em>) \u2014 by the Duc de Noailles. The direction of travel is the opposite of the familiar story: no kennel was evacuated to England; an English aristocrat received the dogs while abroad. There is no revolution and no date in that sentence at all. Later nineteenth-century writers cite Daniel directly: Vero Shaw (1881) does so openly, and Rawdon Lee (1893) dates the episode “probably about the middle of the eighteenth century” \u2014 before<\/em> the Revolution \u2014 adding that he could find no trace of Clumbers in France itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The sharpest skeptic here, tellingly, is not some outside critic but the British breed club<\/strong>. In its history essay the club calls the escape-from-the-Revolution account a “wonderful (but fanciful) story,” and follows it with a checkable claim: “There is no mention in either of the Dukes’ papers to any gift or sale being made.”<\/em> On the club’s reading, what is firmly known amounts to this: in the 1760s<\/strong> dogs were brought to Clumber Park from the Continent, with France nowhere singled out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chronology supplies another argument. The visual evidence quoted most often is Francis Wheatley’s painting The Return from Shooting<\/em>, dated 1788<\/strong> \u2014 painted, that is, before<\/em> the French Revolution began. The breed club points out that the three spaniels in it were described as “Springers or Cock-flushers” rather than as Clumbers, so the picture testifies to a long presence of heavy spaniels on these estates rather than to one particular breed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The FCI standard itself words the origin with deliberate caution: Clumbers, it says, are said to<\/em> have come first from France more than two hundred years ago, and were brought to Britain by the Duke of Newcastle, who bred them at Clumber Park. The registry, then, presents the story as tradition rather than as established fact \u2014 and that is the most honest formula on offer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for royal favor, the Clumber is linked with Prince Albert and Edward VII. The club and the registries repeat these claims in agreement with one another, yet every one of them arrives without a citation to an archival source<\/strong>. A little caution is in order: this is a durable tradition in how the breed gets described, not a documented episode.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Breed Standard: Two Registries, Two Different Sets of Numbers<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"Clumber<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

This is the most important passage on the page, because it is where the nonsensical “merged” ranges that fill directories come from. The reason is simple: the AKC and the FCI describe the Clumber differently \u2014 not only in the figures, but in which measurements they give at all<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The American Kennel Club<\/strong> standard, the one a reader in the United States meets first, specifies both. Ideal height at the shoulder is 18 to 20 inches for males and 17 to 19 inches for females<\/strong>; weight is 70 to 85 pounds for males and 55 to 70 pounds for females<\/strong>. Those are the figures a US owner hears at a show or from a breeder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

FCI Standard No. 109<\/strong> (Group 8, Section 2 \u2014 flushing dogs; current edition dated October 13, 2010) goes the other way: it gives weight only, and no height whatsoever<\/strong>. Ideal weight there is 29.5\u201334 kg for males and 25\u201329.5 kg for females<\/strong>. Britain’s Kennel Club, whose standard underlies the FCI document, publishes the same weights with an imperial equivalent and likewise states no height at all<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Measurement<\/th>AKC<\/th>FCI No. 109 \/ Kennel Club<\/th><\/tr><\/thead>
Weight, males<\/td>70\u201385 pounds (about 32\u201339 kg)<\/td>29.5\u201334 kg<\/td><\/tr>
Weight, females<\/td>55\u201370 pounds (about 25\u201332 kg)<\/td>25\u201329.5 kg<\/td><\/tr>
Height at withers, males<\/td>18\u201320 inches (about 46\u201351 cm)<\/td>not specified<\/td><\/tr>
Height at withers, females<\/td>17\u201319 inches (about 43\u201348 cm)<\/td>not specified<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table>
The metric conversions are ours; each registry publishes exactly the units shown in its own column.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The practical takeaway is straightforward. Ranges like “25\u201339 kg” or “43\u201351 cm” belong to no standard at all<\/strong>: they appear when the bottom of the range is lifted from one registry’s line for females and the top from another registry’s line for males. Male and female Clumbers genuinely differ in both height and weight, and flattening the two into a single span is not correct.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The FCI standard also records a historical shift of its own: the breed has grown heavier since roughly the 1950s, and although the ceiling for males is set at 34 kg, some individuals go past it. The gap between the British and the American figures is therefore not an error on one registry’s part but a reflection of real drift in type.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On color the standard keeps a hierarchy that popular summaries flatten: a plain white body with lemon markings<\/strong> is preferred, and orange markings are permissible<\/em>. Lemon is the favored variant, not an equal alternative. Slight head markings and a freckled muzzle are allowed. The Kennel Club lists lemon and white, orange and white, and their mirror forms as the standard combinations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

General appearance<\/strong><\/td>Well balanced, heavily boned, active, with a thoughtful expression; the general impression is one of strength.<\/td><\/tr>
Head<\/strong><\/td>Large, square, of medium length, free of exaggeration.<\/td><\/tr>
Ears<\/strong><\/td>Large, vine-leaf shaped, hanging forward.<\/td><\/tr>
Body<\/strong><\/td>Long, heavy, close to the ground; hindquarters very powerful.<\/td><\/tr>
Coat<\/strong><\/td>Abundant, close, silky and straight; good feathering on the legs and chest.<\/td><\/tr>
Movement<\/strong><\/td>True fore and aft, with an easy drive.<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table>
After the text of FCI Standard No. 109.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Set beside the lighter Field Spaniel<\/a>, the Clumber looks conspicuously more massive and closer to the ground, and it is this pair \u2014 together with the Sussex \u2014 that directories confuse most often.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Character and Temperament: Calm You Should Not Mistake for Laziness<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The standard is consistent about temperament: even-tempered, dependable, kind and dignified, “more aloof than other Spaniels,” with no tendency to aggression. It is a rare case of an official document recording exactly the trait owners describe \u2014 reserve toward strangers with no suspicion in it and no nerves either.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Indoors this really is a very quiet dog. The Clumber sleeps a great deal, often snores, does not tear around for no reason, and hardly ever barks without cause. That gets him written off as a couch dog, which is inaccurate: in the field a different mode switches on \u2014 focused, persistent, methodical. Unlike the more energetic Welsh Springer Spaniel<\/a>, he works slowly, but he covers heavy brush with remarkable thoroughness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With children Clumbers are usually patient and gentle; with other dogs and with cats they get along well, especially when raised together. Guarding is essentially absent from the breed \u2014 he is far too friendly for the job \u2014 although his size and deep voice can still work as a deterrent at the door.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One household trait deserves a line of its own: the habit of carrying something in the mouth<\/strong>. Clumbers pick up toys, sticks and slippers and “present” them to owners and to visitors. This is not a behavior problem but a breed manner, and it is far easier to live with than to fight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pros and Cons of the Clumber Spaniel<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The short lists of strengths and drawbacks sit in the card above. What a list cannot show is how those items connect \u2014 and the connection is usually what decides whether the breed fits a household.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Almost every advantage here has a flip side that follows from the same anatomy. The stillness indoors that makes him easy to live with belongs to the same heavy, low-slung build that makes weight gain easy. The dense, weatherproof coat that lets him push through cover is the coat that puts hair on every surface in the house all year. The long, heavily boned frame that gives him his unmistakable outline keeps joints and back on the owner’s checklist for life. Read as two separate ledgers, the columns mislead: they describe one animal from two directions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two drawbacks deserve more weight than the rest, because neither can be trained away. The first is health<\/strong>: a national registry publishes a required minimum of pre-breeding tests for this breed, so buying a puppy responsibly comes down to asking for results rather than reassurance. The second is availability<\/strong>: with annual registrations in the low hundreds, a well-bred litter normally means a waiting list and a drive, not a phone call. Everything else \u2014 the shedding, the drool, the deliberate independence \u2014 is manageable for an owner who knew about it in advance and a daily irritation for one who did not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grooming and Daily Care: Ears, Eyes and Weight Under Watch<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"Clumber<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The care priorities for a Clumber do not have to be guessed at: Britain’s Kennel Club states outright what show judges are to watch for in this breed. The Clumber sits in Breed Watch Category 2<\/strong> \u2014 “breeds with visible health concerns linked to exaggerated conformation that need closer attention and monitoring.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The list of points of concern for the Clumber runs to four items, and each of them doubles as a line on the owner’s daily checklist:<\/p>\n\n\n\n