training her dogs — Rusty, Scotty and Luke — for American Kennel Club and
United Kennel Club agility competition, a sport she took up in 2000. She travels
the country competing.
A lifelong dog lover who has had poodles as pets since she was 12 years old, Joan Davis ’91 began entering her dogs in American Kennel Club and United Kennel Club agility competitions back in 2000.
“Almost any dog over three pounds can do it,” she says of the contests that were first held in the late 1970s.
Some of her dogs have also competed in conformation competitions, which assess overall appearance and structure as indicators of a particular dog’s potential to produce high-quality offspring.
Now retired from her position as a medical technologist at Wesley Medical Center, she and her father Barker Davis have racked up thousands of miles traveling across the country for national competitions, and the dogs have earned hundreds of awards and accolades for many an outstanding performance. “Rusty, Scotty and Luke come from a long line of my poodle pets,” she says of her current four-legged competitors. “Beau and Jeff were my first competitive poodles, littermates who were quite successful as I began to learn the sport and how to train for it.”
Davis, who has an agility course set up in a barn at her Colwich, Kan., residence, doesn’t only train her own dogs. “I teach 4-H over in Reno County,” she says. “I had 12 kids and 22 dogs qualify for the state fair this year.”
Whether in the ring with her own dogs or watching from the sidelines as her pupils compete, Davis is always delighted to be around dogs. “They are companions,” she says. “They teach us unconditional love, forgiveness
and devotion.”
