Jupiter Piquet, from Pinellas Park, Florida, is no stranger to the big stages of the dog sport world. At 23 years old, Piquet, who uses they/he pronouns, has already been doing dog sports for over 15 years. Now, Piquet and his Beagle, “Watcher” are taking on the biggest AKC Rally stage in the country: the AKC Rally National Championship.
This year, the competition, which is being held in conjunction with the 2025 AKC National Obedience Championship, will take place at Purina Farms in St. Louis, MO. Watcher, Lokavi Longhorn Satellite Girl CD BN RE BCAT, is the only Beagle competing in AKC Rally this year.
Starting Out With 4H
Piquet got his start in dog sports through his local 4H Club, Crazy 4 Canines 4H Club. Their mom, who led the club, let them join when they were 7 years old, but at 6 years old, Piquet already had their eyes on the dogs. “We started with obedience, Rally, and drills,” Piquet recalls. “Heeling a dog, stuff like that. I really enjoyed training dogs.”
At 8 years old, Piquet discovered Junior Showmanship and conformation, and quickly fell in love. His parents also have a background in dogs: his father does scent work, and mother, obedience, Rally, and agility. “I came along and go, ‘I want to do conformation.’ They didn’t know how to do that, they didn’t have the equipment,” says Piquet. “I was mentored by a lot of people in the dog community’s conformation space.”
And soon, they got really good at it. Piquet began showing all breeds of dogs and even won a Junior Versatility Scholarship in 2020. Piquet often showed hounds, starting with a Beagle, then a Basset Hound, and then another Beagle before Watcher. “I would take pretty much anything I was able to handle, but I really enjoyed Beagles. They, in my opinion, are very easy to understand,” they explain.
Back to Rally for Nationals
“Because I was able to stick around the dog show community so heavily, I’ve fallen back into my love of Rally,” Piquet says. And when they whelped Watcher’s mom, they knew Watcher wouldn’t be a conformation dog. Piquet used to show Watcher’s mother in conformation as a junior, but knew immediately that Watcher was meant for other sports.
“There’s something in her psyche that I really wanted,” they recall. “There was a point where she had barely opened her eyes, and I was like ‘You’re able to recognize something, and I can’t put my finger on it. But I need you.”
Watcher is almost 9 years old now, and Piquet says even after training and being with them all day, she still has energy. “She’s quite the workhorse. I’ve never seen a Beagle with more drive — she doesn’t seem to get tired.”
Having dogs before Watcher that didn’t enjoy Rally as much as Piquet did, made it harder for him to enjoy it. But being in the dog show community gave them the confidence to give the sport another try. “I’m quite the perfectionist. What if my skills aren’t as good as I remember them being as a junior?” Piquet wondered. Initially, they had their mom showing Watcher in Rally, but started carving out some time to do more obedience competitions.
The invitation to the AKC Rally National Championship came as a shock. When Piquet did a Rally trial with Watcher, they envisioned going to Nationals, but actually going? That was another story. “I was not anticipating that,” they say. “But we’ve started weekly training again to help ourselves prepare.”
Always at Jupiter’s Side
Watcher helps Piquet in many ways. As a transgender, non-binary individual who is autistic, he says it’s not always easy to be out and proud. “Being gay and transgender definitely painted a lot of my dog showing career in my youth,” he says. “I had to deal with people who did not want to allow me in their spaces.”
Watcher isn’t just Piquet’s teammate in the ring. She’s also been their service dog since she was 4 years old. Piquet trained Watcher themselves. “She’s the first dog I’ve ever trained for service work. It was definitely difficult,” Piquet recalls. “Luckily, she already had two years of obedience and Rally skills, plus training to travel. She already had a concrete base to build off of.”
Watcher accompanies Piquet everywhere he goes, including his job, where he works as a literary intervention teacher. In this role, Piquet helps kids whose reading levels are below their grade level improve their skills. “She gives me my freedom,” he says. “She’s the reason that I’m able to hold a job and have independence.”
And when her service vest is on, Watcher knows she’s working. “When the vest is on, she’s a little soldier, Piquet says. “She’s a completely different dog when the vest is off.”
In the ring, more of her Beagle mindset comes out. “She’s still a dog. When she gets in the ring, she’s like, ‘I’m not working right now,'” Piquet says. But her service training has come in handy in the Rally ring just the same. Even though most of her training is a long stay underneath Piquet’s desk, Watcher’s also getting practice while she’s working. “She gets tons of heeling work already, maneuvering around a space, circling me, sudden stops, sudden space changes. All that stuff is bread and butter for service animals. It’s something that they have to do constantly, and of course, not get distracted.”
The Best of the Beagles
Watcher is the only Beagle competing at this year’s Rally National Championship. It’s not a breed that you commonly see in Rally and obedience, and Piquet is excited to for them to represent the breed at the championship. “They have a reputation that I don’t really think is true. They’re a lot smarter than you’re giving them credit for, which makes them creative enough to find their own jobs. And that might mean getting into your pantry or digging up your yard,” Piquet explains.
Giving a Beagle something to do is vital for the breed’s energy levels. “They’re very driven, and even if it’s not by food, it’s by a toy,” says Piquet, who has already trained multiple Beagles as a handler. “Every Beagle has a drive. As long as I can find what drives them, they’re pretty easy to train.”
Now that the team is heading to Nationals, Piquet’s already setting some ambitious goals for them. “I’d love to see two perfect hundreds in a run, because I know that she’s capable of it.”
But mainly, they believe it’s important to have more stories like theirs out in the dog sports community. As a former Junior handler, Piquet hopes that younger competitors recognize that there are people like them in the dog world, and that they’re welcome.
“I want to see the story of a gay, trans person going off and having joy in the world. I want to contribute to little beacons of hope,” he says. “I’m going to Purina Farms to go show my dog, and that’s awesome.”