The howls and barks of hundreds of dogs certainly didn’t hound Maryland resident Carla Strong, who said after hours of primping and preening her own prime pooches that she had nothing to worry about.

“This is our life,” Strong said, beckoning to her husband who stood across the room, readying the couple’s Italian Greyhound. “We travel all over the country.”

The quirky and most bizarre breeders from 2001’s Best in Show were brought to life at Bay Colony Dog Show in Dorchester, and though the breeders were not necessarily as crazed, they brought the same spirit for their schnauzers, shepherds and Shetlands.

More than 1,300 well-groomed dogs and equally dapper handlers packed more than 20 rings and cages, transforming the Bayside Expo Center into canine chaos for the 115th time in the history of the Middlesex Kennel Club, which hosted the event.

While hounds at one end of the arena mugged for judges in categories like sporting, working and herding, their shaggy counterparts wove through an obstacle course in the event’s agility competition.

As the leaping and tunneling dogs showed their enthusiasm once inside the course, the owners and trainers displayed a similar fervor for Fido.

“It’s a huge, traveling social gathering,” said professional handler Phyllis Wright. “We’re all a bunch of gypsies.”

Wright said the real competition begins in the fateful moment when a trainer meets his or her dog.

“It’s a game – I enjoy figuring dogs out,” Wright said. “You look at a dog’s eyes and see things. You try to get inside their head to make it the best show dog you can.”

While trainer Arlene Spooner said she has crisscrossed the country to compete, traveling from her New Jersey home to as far away as California, Littleton resident Jeff Stern, one of the Boston area’s numerous representatives, said he shows his 5-year-old Belgian Tervuren at the event every year.