We all want a Royal puppy – but think carefully before spending £6,000 on a Corgi
When I decided to get a dog, I only knew one thing: I didn’t want a corgi. The public at large may be currently in love with the breed – following the images of the late Queen’s corgis, Sandy and Muick, apparently mourning their mistress in Windsor – that prices are tripling to as much as £6,000 per dog, according to Pets4Homes. But me? No. Nasty, yappy bitey things with short legs, that was my opinion.
This had to be made clear from the outset, because I had a son who wanted us to get a corgi. He said nothing, but unleashed a silent campaign in which he sent me photographs and videos of corgi puppies every day. Have you ever seen a corgi puppy? Their enormous paws! Their floppy ears! Their freckled tummies! After a fortnight of this, a desire to possess a corgi took hold of me like a demonic possession.
Unfortunately, it transpired that this was far from easy to achieve. Corgis are still a relatively rare breed and surprisingly – to me, who had thought you could hardly give them away – hard to come by. I spent weeks calling breeders and the secretaries of regional corgi clubs, only to be met with the response: “all spoken for” and “waiting list”. That was no good. I wanted a corgi and I wanted it now. I looked up the date and location of the next corgi show. It was in Leicester. I decided I would go there and plead with corgi breeders face to face.
I went to Leicester in the snow and threw myself on the mercy of the breeders. The more the owners told me it was impossible, the more I gabbled, handing out cards, that I was the perfect prospective owner. I had the time. I had a garden. My children were grown up. I had come all the way to Leicester. The more I was disappointed, the more I beamed, hoping to look rueful-but-undeterred in the hope that this would recommend me as the sort of person who deserved a corgi. By the time I was halfway round the room, a puppy had materialised.
“He” was Mishka. A Pembroke Welsh Corgi boy, red and white, 11 weeks old, and with ears so big that they had been taped into special rolls that stuck out on either side of his head, in an attempt to make them stand up properly, making him look like an Ewok from Star Wars. It was all in vain: only one ear went up permanently, resulting in the flag-eared appearance that we consider his particular charm.
In the months to come, I often returned to the reasons I had wanted a dog. So that someone could look pleased to see me when I came home, a companion on my travels, a loyal friend who would stay with me through the bad times and good. If these are also the reasons you want a dog, get a golden retriever.
Corgis are herding animals. Their job is to watch the farm and herd the cattle. They like to be where stuff is happening and are easily bored. A day lying in your room where you are bedridden with, say, Covid, looking adoring and occasionally giving you an encouraging lick, is not their idea of a good time.
His favourite spot in the house isn’t with us at all, but lying sentry at a window on the stairs, scanning our London street in order to save us from visitors and foxes.
Mishka is not all corgis. For a start, he’s a huge brontocorgus of a dog. People are startled at the sight of him and try to work out what he’s crossed with. This adds to his greatest quality, which is to be a comedy dog. The absurd shape of a corgi, the ears for days and legs for seconds, the back view of furry harem pants with a wiggle like Marilyn Monroe, the splendidly foxy tail, the love of lying with all four feet in the air – every move and posture makes you laugh.
Where he is like all corgis is in being what the dog books call “food led”. He wakes in the morning thinking of food, thinks of food all day and deploys his famous corgi intelligence principally to discover who in the vicinity has food. While often deaf to exhortations such as “walkies” and “that’s enough barking”, the sound of a fridge door opening three floors away will bring him scrabbling in with a hopeful expression.
In principle, they are not expensive to feed: they only need two small meals a day. But a corgi would say, with King Lear, “reason not the need”. In reality, the expense of feeding them can vary dramatically, depending on what you are eating and how much of it they can get off you.
Corgis are relaxing country dogs. As herders, they never run off: you are their herd and their job is to keep an eye on you. On a lead in town, not so much, as it is a corgi imperative to sniff pointlessly every bicycle and rubbish bin en route.
It can take 40 minutes to go three streets, and I am constantly trying to establish the difference between a walk for him and a walk actually to go somewhere. Their reputation for barking at everything and nothing is well-earned. Their coats shed all year round, but especially in spring and autumn, when I can collect enough hair to make a wig and disguise him as the Conservative member for Lichfield. They can be aggressive with other dogs (but never, in my experience, with humans). Luckily, you discover none of this until they are about two years old, and by then it is too late. You – like the late Queen and I – are enslaved.
Follow Mishka’s adventures on Instagram
