The Toy Trawler Spaniel is an extinct breed of

Spaniel A spaniel is a type of gun dog. Spaniels were especially bred to flush game out of denser brush. By the late 17th century, spaniels had been specialized into water and land breeds. The extinct English Water Spaniel was used to retrieve water ...

which physically was similar to the

King Charles Spaniel The King Charles Spaniel (also known as the English Toy Spaniel) is a small dog breed of the spaniel type. In 1903, the Kennel Club combined four separate toy spaniel breeds under this single title. The other varieties merged into this breed wer ...

of the 16th century. It is considered to have descended from the original King Charles Spaniel, and the older variety of the

Sussex Spaniel The Sussex Spaniel is a breed of dog native to Sussex in southern England. It is a low, compact spaniel and is as old a breed as and similar in appearance to the Clumber Spaniel. They can be slow-paced, but can have a clownish and energetic te ...

. It was originally used as a sporting dog, but became used as a toy and show dog. It was considered to be on the verge of extinction by 1920. A preserved specimen is kept in

Tring Tring is a market town and civil parish in the Borough of Dacorum, Hertfordshire, England. It is situated in a gap passing through the Chiltern Hills, classed as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, from Central London. Tring is linked to ...

at the

Natural History Museum A natural history museum or museum of natural history is a scientific institution with natural history collections that include current and historical records of animals, plants, fungi, ecosystems, geology, paleontology, climatology, and more. ...

History

The specific origin of the breed is unknown, but in 1919, it was thought to have been descended from the originally curly-coated

and the old-fashioned curly-coated

. Its original purpose may have been as a sporting dog, but it became more frequently used as a toy dog. By 1907, the breed was more popular in Europe than in the U.K., especially in the Netherlands and Italy. There is a preserved specimen at the

Natural History Museum at Tring The Natural History Museum at Tring was the private museum of Walter Rothschild, 2nd Baron Rothschild, Lionel Walter, 2nd Baron Rothschild; today it is under the control of the Natural History Museum, London. It houses one of the finest collecti ...

. Named Robin, it was bred by Lady Wentworth and was born in 1911. It died in 1920 when the breed was said to be "nearly extinct". Lady Wentworth wrote about using Toy Trawler Spaniels to re-breed the original King Charles Spaniel in her book ''Toy Dogs and Their Ancestors Including the History And Management of Toy Spaniels, Pekingese, Japanese and Pomeranians'', published under the name of the "Hon. Mrs. Neville Lytton" in 1911. Lytton (1911): p. 81-82

Description

The Toy Trawler Spaniel was considered to be a throwback to the original King Charles Spaniel. Lytton (1911): p. 80 The head was small and light, with an upwards tip on its short black nose. The top of the skull was flat and not dome-shaped, and had long ears set forward. Its coat was generally feathered quite long and was described as curly but not woolly, and its body was quite solidly built. Its height was variable, ranging from at the

withers The withers is the ridge between the shoulder blades of an animal, typically a quadruped. In many species, it is the tallest point of the body. In horses and dogs, it is the standard place to measure the animal's height. In contrast, cattle a ...

, although examples were given at , with proportionate weight given for a high dog weighing . Lytton (1911): p. 160 The preferred colour was black with a white waistcoat, then red with a white waistcoat, but they also came in black and white and red and white. They were described as being very sweet, but also very bold and courageous, with timidity considered to be a fault in the show ring.

References

;Specific ;General * {{Extinct breeds of dog Extinct dog breeds Dog breeds originating in the United Kingdom