English Cocker Spaniel archive tees, sweatshirts and hoodies

The name is a job description. This was the spaniel that flushed woodcock from cover in the West Country and in Wales, working close and low where a bigger dog could not follow. The Kennel Club separated cockers from springers by weight in 1893, and by 1902 the two were fully distinct. The old shooting term for the temperament was the merry cocker, and it holds. The tail rarely stops, the nose runs the dog rather than the other way round, and the ears trail through the water bowl at every meal without the dog appearing to notice. In drawing the plate, the artist worked the ears and the tail together, since the fall of the one against the constant motion of the other is how a cocker actually reads in a field.