These guys are often quite biology illiterate– especially when it comes to genetics.
And yet they breed dogs and love to lecture everyone on the merits of keeping lines pure, even if logic and common sense say otherwise!
Read this comment:
Judging from the appearance of that one puppy. I don’t think they are first generation border/bearded collie crosses. I’d be very surprised if that’s what they are. The shaggy beard of the bearded collie is dominant to the smooth muzzle of the border collie.
That said double merles actually do appear in purebred dogs, and in some breeds, like collies and Great Danes, they are intentionally produced to increase the number of merles in the litters they produce. The winner of the breed for the rough collie at this year’s Westminster Kennel Club dog show was sired by an eyeless double merle, who may also be deaf.
Double merles, also known as homozygous merles, often have problems with their eyes and ears. They are sometimes born without anything we’d recognize as eyes and without ear canals. Although it is possible for heterozygous (single) merles to have issues with their eyes and ears, they normally aren’t as severely affected as these double merles, which are sometimes called “lethal whites.”
I should also note that people have been breeding border collies to bearded collies for decades– often without any problems at all. David Brian Plummer often used beardie/border crosses to produce his lurchers, and it is well-known that most border collies have some bearded collie ancestry.
So once again simple facts and logic have totally destroyed this bromide from the anti-PDE Faceboo group, your source for paranoid conspiracy theories, crackpot science, and persecution complexes galore.
Now, to be fair, in Kennel Club (of the United Kingdom) refuses to register any puppies from merle to merle breedings, even if they are healthy or aren’t even merle.
But in the AKC, not only are pups from merle to merle breedings allowed to be registered, they are often quite celebrated.
And the mental gymnastics used to defend these breedings over here are every bit as bizarre as the ones used on the anti-PDE Facebook group.
If the KC allowed registrations of puppies from these unions and there were top dogs in the ring that came from these breedings, you can bet the exact same mental gymnastics would be used.
You can bet on it.
‘Hybrid Vigour.’ I do not that means what you think it means.
Irony deficiency is rife on that group, as evidenced by that post. (ie, double merle has the same statistical chance of defect no matter what you are breeding: pure, cross, multi-generational mutt.)
That post has been deleted, btw.
LOL
They seem to be missing the point that the chanses of some genetic health issues are lessened by cross breeding BUT if both dogs carry the gene it will not matter whether they be purebreeds, x breeds or total mongrels there will be affected puppies.
It really surprices me how little many of these so called educated responsible breeders know about genetics & how a dog ends up being either a carrier or affected & what that means for the on breeding of said dog.
I know i am only really learning but it did not take long for me to find scientific data to back up what I thought I may be seeing in certain breeding programes. So if I a totally uneducated but very hands on type of person can work these things out with little outside help why can these so called well educayed intelligent responsible breeders not understand what is starring them in the face?
I also wonder if they actually read what they write as they go on & on & on about putting the betterment of their breed before all else yet in the same converstaion will discuss mating a pair of dogs who carry several of the same dogs in their pedigree & quite close up too. Or will belittle someone who has breed 2 litters that dose not show about over population & go on to say they have 3 litters due this year but of course they show & are breeding for the betterment of their breeed…………………
I think the individual in question was pointing out that you can get defects from breed/breed matings. I’m not defending them. Their example was bad and yes, a lot of folk who breed dogs are pretty ignorant of the genetics involved — although you’ll find plenty of sites regarding color breeding, etc. wire or “beard” doesn’t always breed true (Laken x Mal breedings don’t always have wire or beard) –it’s one of those “semi dominants” like long/short hair. I don’t like the PDE series — yes they point out the major problems, but one doesn’t see them offering solutions — Banning breeding Cavaliers or English Bulldogs is not the answer. Imposing a standard based on the dogs as of say 1803 (or like these http://www.freewebs.com/nosnek/originsoftheoldebull.htm ) and insisting on allowing crosses to existing such dogs and for Cavaliers, crosses to either cockers or Papillion. You aren’t going to change the minds of the people interviewed in PDE, but there ARE others out there, just as there were folk who kept and perpetuated the LUA Dalmation and eventually won registration for them in AKC (and apparently now, UK). As much as it’s easy to slam the bad actors, one ought, to effect change, to hold up those who are doing good. They ARE out there. Usually, however, they aren’t the “big names”.
He is a really stupid poodle-breeder well-known in the pedigree world who seems to be completely unable to comprehends basic colour genetics based on his past inane comments.
The real irony of this post is that the poster is continually taking Jemima Harrison to task for misrepresenting facts and lying about how mutts are ‘healthier,’ and for poor fact-checking. Since this poor dogs problems are not down to being a cross, and indeed, so-called ‘responsible’ breeders here in the US actually do merle x merle breedings, the joke is on the poster.
Very true DWH.
I think the PDE programme was needed & it’s sad it was needed but due to breeders covering for each other & breed societies & kennel clubs turning a blind eye something had to happen.
I think there are good breeders out there but they are often times missed as they don’t have flashy websites, a zillion litters or frequent shows anymore due to feeling it’s a waste of time when extreme examples & well known exibithors winning time & time again.
I don’t want to see any breeds banned from being bred but I do want to see breeders having to take REAL respondsibility for what they are breeding & not to be countinuely rewarded for breeding extreme types with no thought to health, function & work ability. I wont the public & other dog fanciers to put them in their place because they are well enough educated to not buy from them & judges to not reward them for extreme breeding programes. The only way this will happen is with strong educational prime time shows, media & blogs like this 1 & a couple of others. People need to know what really goes on behind the scence & the price some of these dogs pay to be “pretty” & to know there are alturnitive breeders out there that truely do put health, function, temperment & work ability. Imho!!
Hi, is there a list of most inbred and most genetically diverse dogs?
MY wife’s stupid fucking friend just had pups for a second time with her two Merle Dachshunds. Even after having two blind pups resulted from their first litter. WTF. Even after we told her the problems she would likely encounter te first time… and she did…. then she wet and f’ing did it again. I want so badly to twist her friggin neck off.
This time there were only two pups born…. not sure if they’ll be blind or not. If I get my hands on the dogs….I’m taking them in for being spay/neutered.
It is bad.
In the UK, not a single pup from a merle to merle breeding can be registered.
I have a Dachshund book from 1970’s that talks about why someone would breed what are called “double dapples.” It does mention “some health problems,” but that double dapples are very pretty.
Pure white is not a standard color in dachshunds because one way to get a white one is to breed double dapples.
I love that the AKC will register those, but the last I heard no registry accepts dachshunds that are just normally piebald. You can get white ones that way, too, but they’d be white like Jack Russells are.
Lots of white on a Dachshund can be a tip off the dog is probably double merle. Merle dogs are easier to come by than piebald dogs. Not in every case, you have to look at the context, but if you are given a picture of a Dachshund that has a large amount of white, chances are greater it is a double merle than a piebald.
You can’t fix stupid.
It’s a toss up – i like the idea of maximum freedom with as few nagging little rules as is practical, but I don’t like the idea of dog breeders abusing that freedom to produce dogs that suffer. There seems to be a lack of certain qualities in the leadership of dog people.
With good leadership, most people follow the rules because they understand and want to be part of the party, and those who don’t follow the rules face being ignored socially.
In some countries, the kennel club seems to be an anarchy where puppy breeders do what they want to their dogs and to their customers and, so long as they don’t bother the heads of their kennel club, they are free to run muck.
Replacing an anarchy with a police state is not the answer – puppy breeders need what all groups need: GOOD LEADERSHIP.
I just don’t get it. Even when they’ve already seen the results from this firsthand. Granted they were inexperienced and did no homework the first time around… but then to go and do it again? Knowing they wound up with two blind dogs from the first litter? They might be close friends of my spouse…doesn’t mean I won’t take the dogs and have them altered. And I will. Because its clear they have caught a case of redneck-itis.
Sengimage, think of them as followers in a cult. Some people can walk through cult gatherings and lectures and read all about it or even, if they are strong minded, to laugh at it – because they are not followers, they are independents or leaders or sceptics.
However, i have met some show people who know exactly what they are doing, they just don’t care about the puppies, they only care about winning. They too are followers, that ribbon is to them like the treat and pat is to a trained dog.
Regular methods wont work with some people. The change must come from the person handing out the treats – i mean the ribbons, the club its self. Some people you can help, some people are harder.
You know Irene, show people are such friggin hypocrites. On the one hand they want you to believe how damn responsible they are. Then they go and do irresponsible things like line breeding. They say that any percentage of inbreeding between 12 and 25% is acceptable and continue to do it… WTF? The only acceptable number is 0% f’ing 0% you damn dog mafia a’holes. Then they sell you and me these dogs and say they are perfect examples of the breed. And if you decide you want to breed your dog for some pretty valid reasons…suddenly they have a lot of negatives to say about the same lines they bred from. And maybe even give examples of a few relatives that had this problem or that problem. They fail to mention the ones that were exceptional and that the majority of the siblings and relatives thrived. Just focusing on the few bad examples to try and scare you into doing what they want. Which is from what I gather…an attempt to limit any possibility of a competitor addressing the same clientele they are targeting and possibly providing a better end result.
Because suddenly these wonderful examples of the breed they sold you several years prior are flawed…. to make their point. Well, if they were so friggin flawed… why are you selling them in the first place? And if you know what it takes to fix them… why are they still so flawed? Does this really mean these long time veteran breeders in a way actually realize they are producing inferior crap and selling it for top dollar, yet still trying to control the buyers of their crap and prevent them from biting into their target audience? Why?
It has to be to limit competition. So they can still continue to peddle their crap without seeing a drop in their market value due to competition.
Why don’t they just produce a better product and stop making friggin excuses. And stop badgering those who go rogue on the “click” breed club troglodytes because they’re fed up with all the lies.
All a bunch of a’holes. For all those veterans…
PS….yes PS
Yes you are an a-hole.
LOL
“The only acceptable number is 0% f’ing 0% you damn dog mafia a’holes.”
This is not actually possible if you are working with dogs that are already in the closed registry system, nor is it possible if you are backcrossing to one of the parent breeds to regain type. I have a backcrossed litter of 75% Afghan, 25% Saluki puppies. The Afghan sire and the Afghan grandmother are NOT closely related, but the COI for the litter is NOT 0%.
Most breeds do not have aboriginal populations that are completely unrelated to the registered populations to cross to. That is not the point of COI anyways, the point is to limit the rapid loss of genetic diversity which results from line breeding by doing breedings which are not higher than the average of the parents, and by keeping breedings in general below the breed average.
Before ceilings are placed on COI a good pedigree analysis for the breed must be done for dogs born in the last decade, establishing an average, and seeing which ancestors are underrepresented and which lines are in danger of being lost. Only then can you establish a ceiling. Without this information you can only deal with individual breedings, making sure the litter COI is lower than the average for the parents.
Breederspeak about ‘tradition’ and ‘purity’ are not helpful in regards to breeding and public scrutiny, but neither are blanket statements that have no basis in reality. It’s just confusing and the pet owning public doesn’t have the tools to sort the gold from the garbage.
“Before ceilings are placed on COI a good pedigree analysis for the breed must be done for dogs born in the last decade, establishing an average, and seeing which ancestors are underrepresented and which lines are in danger of being lost. Only then can you establish a ceiling. Without this information you can only deal with individual breedings, making sure the litter COI is lower than the average for the parents.”
Is there a good way to do this on a breedwide scale? Is there a way to make a computer do it or would you have to do it by hand?
JRTCA Jack Russells have a maximum COI that can result from any breeding.
If it’s too high, the dog can’t be registered when it’s a year old.
They are the ones who registered all dogs when they are a year old.
You need a database of pedigrees that are as complete as possible. I am not sure if your average ped database software would be able to do the averages or not. I certainly couldn’t do it, I’m not tech savvy enough.
This should be, IMO, the responsibility of the registries. They are the ones with the databases, the access to registrations and litter information.
Most databases have most of the information….with a lot of missing links…Its then a lot of homework to find those missing links. Phone calls…e-mails….and lots of writing. Sometimes you get the link filled in other times you leave a big fat question mark and hope for the best.
The “responsible” breeders have the job to not only properly educate their clientele… but do justice for the dogs they keep, produce and sell. COI can be brought down to 0%. and “Type” can still be achieved without the seeded breeding stock.
Granted, the public doesn’t have the answer to this. But its the demand driven by the public that deserves a better solution. And the responsibility of the breeders to do the right thing.
There are some breeders that factor COI based on the Three generation pedigree provided by the AKC. And this is very misleading since beyond that there is a high probability of close relatives in the mix.
Unless you’re talking about outcrossing to a different breed entirely… and then reinventing the wheel…otherwise you’re never going to see a true 0% COI. Ever. If you find the links between your dogs”never meeting” going back as far as possible through the generations you can get very close to that zero. And when your talking two unrelated breeds.. its easier to get to a virtual zero. But 25% and even 12%… Come on….. I might as well go bang my cousins.
Take every registered dog from any single breed and throw them in an convention center. If they’re all from a closed registry….They’re all related. Even different breeds that have an intertwined history where one was used to create the other….. You need to dig a little deeper and beyond the known ingredients to made that “breed”.
The formula fueled by the established registries has failed. But, its been going on for so long… genetic conformity has become the result within each breed. So …. mix it up…start again. And you’ll find diversity along with a lot of 0% COI to start over from. Do that first….
Then lets talk about comparing notes.
And this mishmash of misinformed blathering is why the Pure Blood Brigade always starts nattering about about how diversity advocates want ‘all dogs to be mutts.’
Dog breeds do not all need to ‘start again.’ To make this assumption without corresponding genetic and health data is simply foolish.
Dog breeds within the closed registry system have NOT been bred to maintain diversity, they’ve been bred in such a way that diversity is lost in droves. Just throwing a bunch of dogs together just to have a bunch of 0% COI foundation stock is not the solution to this problem. Knowing the average COI, breeding along the lines of population genetics (ironically you link to Jeffrey Bragg’s article on population genetics article but you don’t seem to understand it), knowing what diversity exists in the population (we have barely touched this, technology-wise), knowing *when an outcross to another breed is warranted*, knowing disease frequency, these are the tools which will save the ‘purebred’ dog.
“Take every registered dog from any single breed and throw them in an convention center. If they’re all from a closed registry….They’re all related. Even different breeds that have an intertwined history where one was used to create the other….. You need to dig a little deeper and beyond the known ingredients to made that “breed”.”
This is just plain ignorant. So much diversity has been lost in most breeds that yes, indeed, you can regain it by going back to other breeds that figured in the make up of the original population, or the original landrace. You can even regain some diversity by going to a different *line* of dogs. Tightly bred lines that have few health problems are actually very useful for this.
From Canine Population Genetics in Practice: Principles for the Breeder:
“In cases of small, highly-inbred populations for which there is no landrace resource, it may become necessary to consider an outcross or outcrosses to similar breeds to relieve inbreeding depression and restore healthy genetic diversity.”
I own two breeds that have open registries, and they still have problems. They have problems because all organisms have a genetic load and breeders made stupid decisions. We need intelligent breeding.
‘Genetic conformity’ is the signature of a ‘type.’ Allele frequency *defines* phenotype. You can certainly maintain ‘type’ and function without closed registries *and* without throwing a random mishmash of breeds into the pot, as well. You do not need to ‘start again.’
Appendix registries are well known in livestock and in cats. You don’t need to reinvent the wheel for dogs.
In fact if people would just start using the perfectly good wheels laying all around them instead of stubbornly insisting that their log rollers that have to be dragged around and reset every 15 ft were doing a perfectly acceptable job – nay, a /better/ job – that would be a start.
The only dogs you produce that have 0 percent COI are the cocker/flat-coats.
It’s almost impossible to produce that kind of low COI within a closed registry system
I know this Scottie. And if you consider what went into creating the FCR in the first place or any breed for that matter, then when things were done in the begginning …dogs were much better off. So yes… if life has taught us anything…then an occasional reset is a good thing even for the idealistic stubborn purists who say they’re using those perfectly good wheels. They simply aren’t. If you can create a line once fromthe basic recipe of that dog… you can do it again and force a reset.
And if what you have left is not enough to put everything on course again …then YOU LOOK OUT SIDE THE BOX.
((DWH)) We’re also not dealing with traditional livestock…..we dealing with a mass produced product to feed the vanity of humankind. So going the course of the farmboys…. ain’t gonna fix this hot mess soon enough. And no matter how you compare it….cats aren’t the same cup of tea. Not on the scale of dogs.
All Dogs….are all the same genetic recipe. Therefore in closed registries for each breed there is nothing ignorant about saying toss them all in a room and they’re all related, because they are. Otherwise why stand up and complain about acceptable COI. They’re related…plain and simple. Ignorance would be trying to say otherwise. And the breeds we see didn’t just appear. They were created. So stomping your feet in frustration because you feel what you’re doing is a correct course of action is not necessary. After all, no one is telling you your dogs suck. And clearly you care about them and the results have been exceptional. And the hope is to find a better plateau for your efforts. But don’t you go on thinking you’re the only way or the best way. You’re methods are just one way.
Closed registries suck. And the Breeders who use these registries religiously knowing what they do …. suck for it. If you defend them knowing what we know today…you’re ignorant.
Ignorance is often a two way street. You need to stop and meet in the middle in order to change course. When you’re going down a street called stubborn….you seldom ever stop to see what others are driving.
Gee Senjimage you write so straight forward, honestly, and to the point, that i have my doubts that you could be a dog breeder. Why aren’t you fibbing, making smoke screens, and lying ? {note the “not” in “aren’t”}.
I don’t think that I would phrase it quite as unvarnished as you have, but basically you are correct, many dog breeders have reason to lie, and it is not difficult to find major inconsistancies, and even dog breeders who admit to their friends that they are lying.
But i believe that there is room for different types of improvement and different ways to phase in change – if only The Powers That Be want to change or if some outside situation causes change. In some countries this has happened or is happening but some places are a bit slow.
I like to read ideas on how to make the system better, but it seems that dog people are still in denial about the problems, maybe thats the idea in the title PDE 3 Years On – it has beeen 3 years plus and not much change.
Crufts is soon {next weekend?} so we will see if they disqualify or at least ignore people who breed suffering dogs.