Chocca-Shaw's Winter Wonder MH ("Jade") retrieves a duck.

The curly-coated retriever--a hard-to-find breed in the United States--has always had, from the time of its inception in Great Britain, the reputation of being a "meat dog." Generally owned by a gamekeeper or a poacher instead of a peer of the realm in its native home, the curly was developed to find and retrieve birds passed by other dogs following a driven hunt. In the hands of less reputable characters, the curly's job probably was finding and fetching birds in the middle of the night.

It is possible that the curly-coated retriever was the first of all the modern curly breeds. There are many references dating back to at least the mid-15th century to a curly-coated water spaniel, said to have had outstanding retrieving and hunting ability. Shakespeare even made a reference or two to "water spaniells" in his works. These water dogs are likely in the early ancestry of most if not all the modern retriever breeds.

In the 1800s there were a number of curly-coated breeds, including the water spaniel, the Tweed water spaniel and the Wetterhoun, that were being developed and could have been ancestors of the modern curly-coated retriever. Or the curly could have been a contributing ancestor to modern breeds with curly coats. The only definite statement that can be made about the development of the curly-coat is that there is nothing certain about how the breed came into existence.

Curly-coats are frequently mistaken as some sort of poodle mix by people unfamiliar with the breed, but although their curly coat does, in some ways, resemble the natural coat of a poodle, there is considerable dispute over whether there actually is any poodle in the breed's background. Poodles were not present in England at the time the curly-coat breed was first recognized, although poodles were present on the continent. Furthermore, the curly-coat sheds its coat at least twice a year, while the poodle does not. It is just as likely that the curly-coat may have been an important factor in the development of the poodle as it is that the poodle contributed to the rise of the curly-coat.

The Versatile Curly-Coat
Jim Crosby, president of the Curly-Coated Retriever Club of America, said that the "meat dog" background of the breed was one reason why the breed is very versatile. "The gamekeepers required the dogs to perform multiple jobs. That is one of the things that makes this breed unique," Crosby noted. "They do a good job with just about any task you ask them to do.

"In the early days of the breed, the gamekeepers even used them to help search for poachers at night. This is one reason why both colors of the breed, black and liver, have a matte rather than a shiny coat--so it didn't reflect any light when they were hunting poachers after dark. In addition to bird hunting, they were used to hunt fur and to recover large game that had been shot when the shot was not immediately fatal. They had to have the kind of calm, sensible temperament that would allow them to do whatever job was required. As a result, even now, and even when they are puppies, the breed is not 'wired' as is the case with some of the other retriever breeds."

Sue Shaw noted that this calm attitude was one of the virtues of the breed, in her estimation. "They hunt close and are not as hyper and fast as some of the other retriever breeds. As a result, they don't seem to miss birds. They are exceedingly loyal, which may be one reason why they hunt close to the gun. They also seem to specifically hunt and find birds for you rather than wanting to do it for themselves.

"While they do mark extremely well on water retrieves as well as land, I believe they excel as upland dogs. They always seem to have great noses. They were originally bred to be the 'clean-up' dog, the one the gamekeepers took out to flush and find birds the hunters had missed with their retrievers. So a well-bred hunting curly preserves that particular skill."