Dog breeder John Wills has been president of the Orange and District Kennel and Obedience club for more than 20 years.
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In that time he has been involved in organising the annual dog shows at Wade Park and at the Orange Agricultural Show as well as being on the Orange City Council’s animal welfare committee.
He said the club, which has been running since 1952, had about 50 members.
“It’s a good team of people,” he said.
A key role for the club is to organise dog obedience classes for owners and their pets to attend every Sunday during school terms.
“What I enjoy is seeing the dogs evolve each week,” he said.
“[At the start] they are raw and they are barking and they are frightened of everything.
“Then after a couple of weeks they are sitting down.
“It’s a win-win situation for the dog and people.
“It makes the dog easier to live with at home.”
Mr Wills, a retired teacher, has been breeding English toy terriers in Orange for more than 20 years.
He said it was an historic breed close to disappearing from Australia when he started.
“When we started there were two breeding pairs left in Australia,” he said.
“They go back hundreds of years.
“They used to be bred for the rat pits of England.”
Mr Wills said he had imported several dogs for breeding and had sent dogs overseas, including back to England.