Experience: My dog is the ‘ugliest in the world’

I have been a heritage breeder and exhibitor of pekingese dogs for more than 30 years – though I’ve rescued more than I’ve bred. Eight years ago, one of the dogs I rescued had canine distemper, a nasty disease that can cause developmental problems, and he spread it to one of our puppies.

Sadly, despite thousands of dollars’ worth of vet bills, we weren’t able to save our rescue dog, but we were able to save the puppy. We called him Smurf. Later we changed his name to Wild Thang because he looks like something from Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are.

Puppies rarely survive distemper, but Wild Thang got round-the-clock care. Other than the fact that his teeth never came in – which is why his tongue is always hanging out – he’s healthy. He really is our everything.

We live on a farm in Coos Bay, Oregon, and Wild Thang loves to run around and play with the other dogs. We have chickens, but he just struts by them as if they’re not there. He’s not scared of anyone or anything. If another dog tries to be the big dog, he just looks at them as if to say, “Yeah, don’t you know I’m the main dog here.”

I entered Wild Thang into the annual World’s Ugliest Dog contest at the Sonoma-Marin Fair in California after someone told me that he was the ugliest dog they’d ever seen. Lots of people say ,“He’s not ugly!” I tell them that he’s perfectly imperfect.

This year was Wild Thang’s fifth time entering. He didn’t place at all in the first year, but I didn’t care because I had so much fun with the other owners. You can imagine the kind of people who sign up for an ugly dog contest – they’re goofy and fun. In the third and fourth years, Wild Thang came second. Most of the dogs who enter the competition were in shelters before being adopted, so the event also raises awareness for an important cause.

This year Wild Thang had a huge audience because he’d been going for five years. People were screaming and going wild. He was kind of the underdog.

Each dog starts at the back of the audience. This year, eight made it through to the final stage. They announce them individually and we walk up the red carpet together. I always carry Wild Thang because he’s only got four-inch legs. As we walked up, people were yelling, “Wild Thang, Wild Thang!” It was crazy. Then you get up on stage and each dog struts back and forth before being placed on the judges’ table. When it was Wild Thang’s turn, one judge didn’t know which was his head and which was his tail because his hair’s so wild.

After all the dogs had their turn, the judges said, “OK, we’re down to the top three, and the audience is going to choose the winner.” The audience screamed twice as loud for Wild Thang. It was clear that he was the winner. He was barking so much that his feet nearly came off the ground.

Afterwards, people told me that they’d come from all over the country just to see him. One little girl started crying when she got her picture taken with him. We got $5,000 for first prize; I used part of it to reimburse myself for the money I’d spent going to the previous four competitions, and also donated some to a local rescue.

After he’d won, they whisked me off so I wouldn’t give any interviews before we were flown to New York to do The Today Show the next morning. Imagine all that fuss over a silly little eight-year-old dog. It was a neat feeling.

Since the competition, John Legend and Chrissy Teigen invited us to their house to do a livestream to promote their pet brand. They’re nice people. I had a hard time prying Wild Thang from Chrissy’s arms when we had to go.

The reason I got into breeding and rescuing is to tackle the problem from both ends: we need to start training breeders to be responsible, as well as encouraging adoption. I’ve stopped breeding in the last few years, but I only ever bred one or two litters a year, and I drew up contracts with everyone I sold to.

Wild Thang is my little woolly bear. There’s so much going on in the world that’s bad, so it’s nice to just take a few minutes to do something totally ridiculous that makes people smile. That’s what we need at the moment: less agenda; more silly, ugly dogs.

As told to Kate McCusker

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