Dog handler Emma Gallaway makes the big time

Qualifies to compete at Westminster Kennel Club show

MOSES LAKE — Emma Gallaway has qualified for the biggest dog show of them all.

Emma, 17, Moses Lake, will be competing in the junior category at the 2020 Westminster Kennel Club show, scheduled for February in New York City. “My goal is to show at the Garden,” she said, which will require making the final round at Madison Square Garden.

It will be her first time at Westminster, but hardly her first big dog show. Emma was named the top handler for toy dogs in the junior class at the annual American Kennel Club dog show in Orlando, Florida earlier this month.

Emma’s partner at the AKC show was a Maltese named Bently, and he’ll be her partner at Westminster. “He is one in a million.”

Emma’s job is to make Bently, or any other dog she’s showing, look as good as possible, she said. It’s a process that starts long before the dog and handler enter the show ring.

She competes in multiple disciplines, all of which test both the dog and handler. Agility, obedience and rally classes test the dog and its training. Confirmation classes evaluate the dog against a standard for its breed. Showmanship classes evaluate the dog and its handler.

Before entering the showmanship ring, the handler “grooms the dog to basically the utmost perfection you can.” (In the case of a Maltese that means “their coat has to be flat-ironed,” said Emma’s grandmother Susan Bischoff.)

The handler’s success in training the dog is on display once they enter the show ring. “Once you enter that ring you shouldn’t really have to mess with the dog,” Emma said. The dog should know what it needs to do without being prompted.

The confirmation class evaluates “what dog is in your ring that fits that (breeding) standard to a T.” The obedience and rally classes test the dog and its training. “There’s a set pattern you follow,” Emma said, and the dog is pretty much on its own, with only prompts from the handler. The rally is “taking obedience and making it fun,” giving the handler more chances at control. The agility class tests the dog against an obstacle course.

And it’s important that the dog and handler work together – and that is, Emma said, what makes Bently so special. He responds well whenever she asks him to try anything new, she said.

Emma started showing dogs in 2011, “when I was in sixth grade.” After three years of 4-H competition, she was asked to show a dog, a golden retriever that had some health problems. In training and caring for that dog she received some needed help from the Moses Lake-Ephrata Kennel Club. “There has been a ton of people that have helped her along the way,” Susan Bischoff said.

A dog handler can stay busy, and Emma is enrolled in the Moses Lake School District’s digital program to accommodate her travel schedule. “All year round you can do it (show dogs). Every day of the week.”

Emma said she’s not sure what happens after she leaves the junior ranks. She has won multiple scholarships, she said, and is thinking of going to college to pursue a business degree.

Cheryl Schweizer can be reached via email at education@columbiabasinherald.com.