Sporting greyhounds? You mean they don't all race...
... (continue)
The litter outlaws come last but not least, of the so called half/half mostly present in America, but scarcely seen to pop up with little success between tight communities of show hobby breeders in Europe or elsewhere. The once that try to have it all. Run the course, trot the show, race the track and be as loved in a home as the rest so desire.
They tend to be slower than the racers, smaller than the courser and certainly not as majestically posh as the showlines and they are rarest as it seems!
Due to close line-breeding with time the inevitable happens and the genetic diversity of a population once healthy starts to decrease the longer the years roll on by.
This is the case at the moment with the show bred greyhounds, it starts to have effects on the racers, especially closely bred Australian lines and some Irish lines with lesser degree to the USA lines due to not so close breedings in the past 30-50 years and so it goes. The genetic pool closes further due to the use of the popular sires with over 3000 offspring like Top Honcho, Brett Lee, Honcho Classic...the list goes on.
No, it is not just the closely bred (inbred) show dogs that exhibit health issues, we see problems in the racers like heart issues, skin, neurological and digestive issues, eye issues like panus and un-decended testicles. These are mutations in genes and some of the way they are passed on is not fully clear as the few cases for which we may have DNA tests already. Greyhound Neuropathy GHN is hardly the issue in showlines at the moment and since it is fully testable via a simple DNA test, there is nothing to worry about since we have tests.
The litter outlaws come last but not least, of the so called half/half mostly present in America, but scarcely seen to pop up with little success between tight communities of show hobby breeders in Europe or elsewhere. The once that try to have it all. Run the course, trot the show, race the track and be as loved in a home as the rest so desire.
They tend to be slower than the racers, smaller than the courser and certainly not as majestically posh as the showlines and they are rarest as it seems!
Due to close line-breeding with time the inevitable happens and the genetic diversity of a population once healthy starts to decrease the longer the years roll on by.
This is the case at the moment with the show bred greyhounds, it starts to have effects on the racers, especially closely bred Australian lines and some Irish lines with lesser degree to the USA lines due to not so close breedings in the past 30-50 years and so it goes. The genetic pool closes further due to the use of the popular sires with over 3000 offspring like Top Honcho, Brett Lee, Honcho Classic...the list goes on.
No, it is not just the closely bred (inbred) show dogs that exhibit health issues, we see problems in the racers like heart issues, skin, neurological and digestive issues, eye issues like panus and un-decended testicles. These are mutations in genes and some of the way they are passed on is not fully clear as the few cases for which we may have DNA tests already. Greyhound Neuropathy GHN is hardly the issue in showlines at the moment and since it is fully testable via a simple DNA test, there is nothing to worry about since we have tests.
All dogs carry mutations in their DNA and that is a fact of life.
Can we do better than just cross our fingers and hope?
''Risk goes down when COI (Coefficient of Inbreeding) goes down, for both the known and the unknown mutations.
This means that you can reduce the risk of health problems from any and ALL recessive mutations by reducing the COI of the litters you produce. Instead of adding each new DNA test to the expense of health testing your dogs, you could effectively manage the risk of genetic disease by managing the risk of homozygosity, using COI as the yardstick.''
For the full article :
http://www.instituteofcaninebiology.org/blog/reducing-genetic-risk
So why is it that still many are line-breeding too closely and producing litters with COI of over 25% not to mention 35% and up ?
DNA testing is not going to solve the genetic problems in purebred dogs if breeders DNA test then inbreed.
''I don't know if these people truly believe the fiction that there are no problems in their lines, or perhaps the more serious myth that they can inbreed yet avoid genetic problems because of their great skill as breeders (and "knowing" those lines).''
For the full article :
http://www.instituteofcaninebiology.org/blog/the-fiction-of-knowing-your-lines
Can we do better than just cross our fingers and hope?
''Risk goes down when COI (Coefficient of Inbreeding) goes down, for both the known and the unknown mutations.
This means that you can reduce the risk of health problems from any and ALL recessive mutations by reducing the COI of the litters you produce. Instead of adding each new DNA test to the expense of health testing your dogs, you could effectively manage the risk of genetic disease by managing the risk of homozygosity, using COI as the yardstick.''
For the full article :
http://www.instituteofcaninebiology.org/blog/reducing-genetic-risk
So why is it that still many are line-breeding too closely and producing litters with COI of over 25% not to mention 35% and up ?
DNA testing is not going to solve the genetic problems in purebred dogs if breeders DNA test then inbreed.
''I don't know if these people truly believe the fiction that there are no problems in their lines, or perhaps the more serious myth that they can inbreed yet avoid genetic problems because of their great skill as breeders (and "knowing" those lines).''
For the full article :
http://www.instituteofcaninebiology.org/blog/the-fiction-of-knowing-your-lines
This is what lingers in my mind on a daily basis.
This constant strive to produce ‘’your own look’’ of show dogs ( or even more questionable pursuit to get back the old lines once present in 8-12 generations back by meticulously line-breeding to the exact same foundation sires and dams) or your own fast litter of track dogs which have so much Temlee saturated in every single channel down the 4ht, 5th, 6th etc degree that it is hard but to avoid the fact that some pups will be missing a testicle and some will have panus... and yet all these offspring of the popular sires and his sons have produced the numbers never seen before. How will one avoid the fact that in the next few generation, you will not have a choice but produce a litter that will duplicate all these dogs and the pups might end up with health issue/s.
But wait! One of the pups might be a super star racing sensation and pay for my kids college with his stud carrier or win enough silk blankets and trophies to cover my living room wall!
You see, I have a problem with that and the previous. I think any dogs should firstly and fore mostly be a healthy specimen of their breed. One with skills to do the job he was bred for, looks to match his functional conformation, durability and soundness in doing his job not only on the perfectly groomed sand track and temperament to match or exceed all these put together! Stable mind, durable build and easy on the eye, which lastly should not be hard to achieve if the dog is in balance.
This constant strive to produce ‘’your own look’’ of show dogs ( or even more questionable pursuit to get back the old lines once present in 8-12 generations back by meticulously line-breeding to the exact same foundation sires and dams) or your own fast litter of track dogs which have so much Temlee saturated in every single channel down the 4ht, 5th, 6th etc degree that it is hard but to avoid the fact that some pups will be missing a testicle and some will have panus... and yet all these offspring of the popular sires and his sons have produced the numbers never seen before. How will one avoid the fact that in the next few generation, you will not have a choice but produce a litter that will duplicate all these dogs and the pups might end up with health issue/s.
But wait! One of the pups might be a super star racing sensation and pay for my kids college with his stud carrier or win enough silk blankets and trophies to cover my living room wall!
You see, I have a problem with that and the previous. I think any dogs should firstly and fore mostly be a healthy specimen of their breed. One with skills to do the job he was bred for, looks to match his functional conformation, durability and soundness in doing his job not only on the perfectly groomed sand track and temperament to match or exceed all these put together! Stable mind, durable build and easy on the eye, which lastly should not be hard to achieve if the dog is in balance.
Sounds like a task doesn't it!
A foremost a greyhound should be able to do the job the breed was designed to do. It needs to chase keenly and be swift and durable to be able to hunt if required to do so. It is a plus if the dog is stunning in looks, but it must be conformationally correct in it's build.
And most importantly sound in the head and health.
A foremost a greyhound should be able to do the job the breed was designed to do. It needs to chase keenly and be swift and durable to be able to hunt if required to do so. It is a plus if the dog is stunning in looks, but it must be conformationally correct in it's build.
And most importantly sound in the head and health.
