Area Co-ordinators
IFRR - AREA CO-ORDINATORS 
All our co-ordiantors are available to offer help and assistance for any flatcoated retriever owner needing help or advice.
SOUTH WEST - SHARON TAMBLYN - email [email protected]
I have lived in Cornwall all my life and grew up with flatcoated retrievers. I now have three flatcoated boys of my own. I love spending time with them and doing various activities including Rally, Showing, Gundog training and picking up on my local shoots.
I become an area co-ordinator with the IFRR at the time of the restructuring in February 2019 and this role has been very rewarding and I have made many new friends, four legged and two. I had been raising money for the IFRR for a few years before the restructuring by organising flatcoat walks on the Cornish beache
I have been a Volunteer for the Rehoming for nearly 20 years. That anniversary will be reached a little later this year ~ having first met Mary Haines at the Surrey Flatcoat Training Group Summer Picnic in July 2000. As a Volunteer I have home-checked for prospective new homes, received or reported on dogs being surrendered to the Rehoming, adopted, fostered and provided transport.
Before meeting Mary, I had been regularly undertaking Home Checks as a Volunteer for 15 years with Friends of the Animals League at Biggin Hill in Kent ~ F.O.A.L. Farm.
My wife & I have had Flatcoated Retrievers within our family of dogs and cats since 1997 (and before that it was a Golden Retriever boy … and I grew up with Goldies owned by my own parents). Our first Flatcoat boy came to us as a pup, joined about one year later by our first rescue girl. Since that time we have rehomed a further 6 boys & girls ~ two of whom are/were FlatcoatX, and the rest pedigree. Our current family, the Windover Flatcoat Gang, comprises three ~ with ages from 3 years to 13.5 years.
SOUTH CENTRAL - SUZI TAGG - email [email protected]m
Suzi writes: having lived with dogs all of my life of varying shapes and sizes, I was out walking and saw a beautiful black dog. I spoke to the owners about the dog and as they say the rest is history. Now I have been owned by flatcoated retrievers for over 30 years and I would never have a different breed. I have had both dogs and bitches which are worked and shown but primarily they are my friends. I currently have two girls.
I have been involved with the Southern Flatcoated Retriever Club (SFRC) since it started and I am the Honorary Secretary. I am very much involved in the running of the SFRC and organizing events. I have supported both the Flatcoated Retriever Society and the IFRR with rehoming our beautiful breed.
I am looking forward to being part of the team at the IFRR and getting all of our flatcoated retrievers to have waggy tails!
EAST - GEMMA JACOBS - email [email protected]
After years of pestering my parents for a dog I finally saved up enough money and I bought my first flatcoated retriever in 1990. Hatti was my constant companion and started my obsession with the show ring; she was closely followed by Fossi who tragically was killed when he was just 15 months old but this tragedy led me to my first "rescue" flatcoat.
His name was Boots and he had been bred and kept by his breeder but was a typical lively and naughty adolescent who liked to push boundaries. Via a friend of a friend I heard about him a few weeks after losing Fossi and that he was looking for a new home with somebody who could do a lot with him...and that I did. He competed in agility and obedience with a degree of success and he also won well in the show ring, we mated him to Hatti and he produced the top winning Champion Gemswin Perhaps Love.
Since then my family have been heavily involved in the show side of the breed and have now owned and breed three champions and a number of winning dogs.
I have served on the general committee of the Flatcoated Retriever Society (FCRS) and I am still, 23 years later (!) a member of the FCRS judges and show sub-committee. I am also the membership secretary for the Southern Flatcoated Retriever Club and I have been a serving committee member since it formed over 10 years ago.
In the time I have been involved with the breed I have supported the FCRS rescue, rehousing and welfare scheme and more recently I have taken up the roles of breeder liaison and the east area co-ordinator for the IFRR.
When attending a number of shows throughout the year I have found it reassuring that the new role of breeder liaison has been well received and I now have breeders happy to approach me to talk about any rehoming issues they may have, either with dogs they may own themselves that may need to be rehomed, or with dogs returned to the breeder. I thank those breeders who have put their trust in me and in the IFRR to deal with these dogs sensitively and confidentially as we do with all our rehomings.
I look forward to my continued work with the IFRR and if any breeders would like to know more about how we operate and whether we can help then please feel free to contact me.
MIDLANDS - MELANIE SALT - email [email protected]
I work for the PDSA Pet Aid Hospital in Stoke on Trent. I got my first flatcoated retriever, Rafferty, in 2001 and have not looked back. I live with my husband Dominic and our four flatcoated retrievers – Tweed and Musto and their two daughters, Stevie and Miss Babs.
In my spare time I enjoy showing and judging flatcoated retrievers and I am currently on the A3 Breed Specialist judging lists for the Flatcoated Retriever Club of Scotland, Flatcoated Retriever Society (FCRS), Northern England Flatcoated Retriever Association (NEFRA), and Southern Flatcoated Retriever Club.
I am also the FCRS area representative for Staffordshire, and serve on two committees – Lichfield Canine Society and NEFRA where I am also the editor of their newsletter “Wagging Tails”. I enjoy representing the breed in the Discover Dogs events at both Crufts and London ExCel. It is wonderful to talk about the breed, hearing and seeing the joy they bring to people’s lives. I am looking forward to taking on this area co-ordinator’s role.
WALES - JENNY ROSS - email [email protected]
NORTH WEST - PAT ROUND - email [email protected]
I live in St Helens with my wonderful husband who adores this breed as much as I do.I grew up with a variety of dogs including cross breeds, springer spaniel and a cairn terrier.
Following our marriage 44 years ago we had several German shepherds followed by a few rescues.It was one such rescue led me to the special breed that is flatcoats.
Buffy was a very licky clever, loving, black bundle of joy. In retrospect she was probably a spaniel/ collie cross but she started my research.
At crufts the only destination was to seek out flatcoated retrievers in real life. I wasn’t disappointed and got my first girl in 2004.
Since then we have had four flatcoats and I am a member of the Flatcoated Retriever Society and NEFRA.
We presently have two flatcoat girls aged 5 and almost 12.
I’ve always enjoyed training and competed in obedience with some success.
I look forward to working with the IFRR team with the help of their extensive rehoming knowledge.
SCOTLAND - ALAN STEWART - email [email protected]
I have owned, shown and bred Flatcoats for 33years, getting our first boy Brodie in 1991, the love of the breed started there!We now have 6 Flatcoats in the house, Betty 12.8yrs, Kyla 12.8yrs, Leah 7yrs, Harris 5.10yrs Winnie 3yrs & Amos 3yrs. We have done a little Gundog training, but mostly showing. I have also been on the Flatcoated Retriever Club of Scotland committee for over 20yrs and I am the present Show Manager and Calendar Co-ordinator
NORTH EAST - GORDON HUNTER - email [email protected]
Hi, I am Gordon.
I live in Northumberland in the North East of England. It's one of the most beautiful places in the UK in my opinion.
My wife Tina and I have owned Flatcoats since the late 1980s and we can say that they have all have been wonderful, loyal and typically crazy family pets.
Being retired, we get to spend a lot of time with the two flatcoats girls we have now. Magic and Pickle bring us so much joy and we get out and about with them several times a day. They are siblings, aged twenty-eight months and doing well in their training.
Both Tina and I also volunteer for the local Red Squirrel group. I am really proud to be asked to become a Contact for the IFRR and look forward to
working with this wonderful organisation.
BREEDER LIAISON - Gemma has kindly offered to liaise with any breeder that may have a dog returned to them that needs a new home. It is hoped that with Gemma's help we will to be able to work with breeders offer them help if needed.
MARY HAINES - Enquiries for Eire and Northern Ireland - email [email protected]
Barney, a black flatcoated retriever, inspired the founding of the IFRR in 1999. Barney had arrived on Mary’s doorstep in March 1995 and his story is on the IFRR’s website under flatcoat files: https://www.flatcoated-retriever.info/flatcoatfiles.html