Purebred Dogs and Problems

Purebred Dogs and Problems was Originally Posted on February 23, 2010 by lavarock

I received a link to a video describing a problem with some purebred dogs. As you may know, many dogs are bred with the desire to increase a particular trait. For example, Labradors with a drive to search and retrieve, makes them good drug-sniffing dogs. Thus if you were to take two parents with these traits, the resulting litter would have a good chance of similar traits. Without going into all the genetics, I can tell you that genetics plays a major part of the breeding process.

A pair of tall dogs mating would result in puppies with tall genes and eventually, their offspring and their offspring all being bred to tall dogs would cause very tall offspring. Most breeders would not continue this process; however, some do.

It appears that some breeding clubs have gone way out on the edge to create dogs to a standard that may be quite dangerous to the dogs. If you are interested in purebred dogs, please see the video.

Also understand that many breeders and clubs want nothing t odo with sick dogs, but I think the video will be interesting and give you cause for thought.

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=44215931

In my case, I do not want to breed for show, but rather for quality. I had Koa, my stud’s eyes checked for clarity and when his preliminary hip Xray came out less than perfect, I had him tested again. I spent many hundreds of dollars to ensure that he was in good health and could not pass on a congenital problem. It turns out his hips did not pass the most rigerous test and thus, I will not breed him. Although he may never have hip problems himself, he would have passed on that gene and his children would also have the possibility of problem and would pass along that problem. That is being a responsible breeder; certainly moreso than some of the ones in the video.

Now I have to consider if I want to get another dog to breed and if so, what kind. I chose a male because then I get a stud fee without having the expense of a female and Vet bills and whelping all thos epuppies! Time will tell what my decision is.