J's Crew

I agree as well. Great post

First off, most all purebred dogs have very little diversity in their ancestory. Breeding relatives, no matter how distant creates defects. It's not about passing diseases on. It's about genetic drift. So, no matter how careful a breeder is to breed perfectly healthy dogs, a certain number of these mutations will occur. Secondly, there are no perfect dogs.

Take Dobermans, for example just because I'm familiar with that breed. They have so many potential health issues, it isn't even funny. Dilated cardiomyopathy and cancer is in ALL the lines. Not every dog will have it, but it's in the genes. Should no more Dobermans be breed ever again? They also have a very high incidence of Von Willebrans Disease, a bleeding disorder. Dobermans have a higher incidence of this than any other breed. However, in Dobermans, it happens to be usually the less severe. (there are 3 classification of severity) I think it's something like 30% are affected. Affected dogs are not all clinical bleeders. So, it's not normally (but it can be) as severe in Dobermans. There are other diseases too...hypothyroidism, liver malfunction, occassional dysplasia (although that is not a big problem in Dobes). There is always temperament to consider.

Now, take Lyric's sire's breeder who actually bred his mother but another breeder owned her. Lyric's grandsire was the #1 Dobe in the country a few times. His breeder got breeder of the year award not too long ago. She breeds wonderful dogs. Lyric's mother was affected with Von Willebrands. His sire was a carrier....on the face of it, that is not a good idea because you can get 50/50 carriers and affected. Lyric's mother had a C-section...no bleeding problems at all.

Ok....so should Lyric's breeder not have bred these dogs on account of the Von Willebrands? The titles these dogs had, the conformation was close to perfect, not an easy feat. The longevity in the lines was relatively good...not too much cancer or cardio...a little, but not much back there. The temperaments were good. Let me tell you. It is impossible to get dogs who have it all....every single thing perfect. That doesn't exist. Reputable breeders, such as Lyric's breeder who has been doing this for 40 some years do the best they can. They make decisions which will improve the breed. To get dogs who do not have one single problem is impossible. There could be a dog who is clear of Von Willebrands, but has a lot more cardio or cancer in the recent ancestors or one who has a crappy temperament but has little cardio in the back ground. YOU CAN'T HAVE IT ALL. I don't care what anyone says. So, Lyric's breeder had a bitch that had just about everything going for her. The sire had everything going for him. EXCEPT that darn Von Willebrands. Now, after a few generations, it may be probable to breed a carrier with a clear who also has many good attributes. But trading Von Willebrands for cardio isn't a good trade.

If all these Dobermans who are bred weren't bred because of some health issue, there wouldn't be any Dobermans at all.

The goal is to improve the breed and strive to erradicate these things, even if it may take a few generations. However, like I said, even with the most careful, mutations or defects will occurr every now and then, regardless, because of how genetics work. Actually, the best bet would be to infiltrate another breed every once in a while to diversify the gene pool a little more.

So, my take....Red is doing nothing abnormal at all. This is a trade off. One hip or elbow (can't remember which) and everything else is probably excellent. You can't have it all. Genetics don't work like that.

:hail: Great post Dober

:hail: :hail:

You guys kick so much butt. Thanks for saying what I wanted to!

The following comments come from this site, OFA:

http://www.offa.org/edanswers.html


"Examination of the OFA database reveals the following mating probability results for 13,151 breeding pairs of dogs with known elbow status:

Normal Elbows x Normal Elbows = 12.2% offspring affected with ED

Normal Elbows x Dysplastic Elbows = 26.1% - 31.3% offspring affected with ED

Dysplastic Elbows x Dysplastic Elbows = 41.5% offspring affected with ED

In this very large breeding study (primarily Labrador Retrievers, Golden Retrievers, Rottweilers, and German Shepherd Dogs), the rate of ED more than doubled when one parent was affected, and more than tripled when both parents were affected. In any breed where the overall percentage of affected dogs is already lower than the percentage that can be expected when a dog affected with ED is bred to a normal dog (26.1% - 31.3%), one would find few circumstances in which progress can be made by breeding a dog affected with ED."

So, 26% versus 12%. Pretty big difference, IMO.




And another quote from a well respected member of Rottweiler.net

"I believe that people do not realize how very important the elbows truly are. In many respects they are more important than the hips as they carry the majority of the dog's weight, and must absorb all the landing pressure even when just moving, and especially when any jumping is involved. A dog can shift weight forward to compensate for a lesser rear end, but they cannot shift weight to the back. The Rottweiler is a heavy-bodied dog and those elbows must be able to do a lot of work."



And red, don't worry. You won't receive any PM's from me.

J's, VERY interesting post. I looked on OFA for statistics like that and couldn't find anything. Figures, I must've just glossed over it.

Thanks for the info.

I think that if 40% of Rotties are affected by this problem, the dog shouldn't be bred, for the following reasons.

1. If it's that common, it greatly increases the odds that even a stud with excellent or normal elbows will be a carrier, thus resulting in affected pups.

2. This isn't a rare breed, it's a rottweiller. There are tons of them. And 60% are without this problem? That's a huge number of dogs.

Just my two cents . . . I'm not trying to attack anyone or rag on the dog.

What member? How is an un named source, from THAT bulletin board, credible when it is un named and unverified?

THIS:
In any breed where the overall percentage of affected dogs is already lower than the percentage that can be expected when a dog affected with ED is bred to a normal dog (26.1% - 31.3%),

does not apply at this point in time to the Rottweiler breed, since the percentage of dysplastic dogs is over 40%.

So I lied about the final comment. I had to correct this post. IF the un named source wants to come here and ream me about my decision to breed this bitch, let them step forward.

And now I'm PLENTY done.

It doesn't have to be verified, it's an opinion that many share. Sounds like an ethical person to me. Are you trying to say that comment wouldn't be considered ethical?

And the reason for the higher percentage now is because of breeders breeding to dogs with DJD.

Ok...so take the 60% that are without this problem. Out of those, find dogs who also have excellent temperments, no cancer, cardio, VW, (examples, since I don't know what they're prone to) excellent conformation otherwise, whatever other diseases they are prone to. Find one who doesn't have one other problem. Which is better...breeding the dog who has a lot of cancer in his lines or one with a slightly questionable elbow? Or one who doesn't have a lot of cancer, but has a strong history of some other disease or the elbow? I bet there are no breeding of any Rottweilers or any other breed that do not have some kind of inheritable problem.

Ok...lets cut out all the dogs with cancer in their lines and cut out all the dogs with elbow discrepencies. Now, how many dogs are there to breed from? Oh...wait a minute, what about the dogs with lousy temperaments? We better remove those from the gene pool. Now how many dogs are there to breed from. And the other diseases. Remove those dogs too. Now how many dogs are there to breed from? The pool has shrunken to a very, very small grouping. So, now the founder effect is really going to take affect. Defects from such a small gene pool are going to crop up more than ever. Inbreeding causes defects, period. When the diversity is decreased, mutations are increased.

There's the ideal world and there's reality. Purebred dogs are in trouble no matter what we do unless we mix in other breeds or mixed breeds occassionally. It's about biology.

Yes, but you have to look at it from another standpoint. How many are OFA'ed? You are REALLY limiting your gene pool if you cut out that 40%. On top of that you can't make this type of decision based on registration numbers. I would be willing to bet that 90-98% of all dogs registered will never be health tested. Just because most litters produce more pets than dogs that will go on to show and reproduce. So ALL of those registered Rotties out there mean nothing as far as OFA statistics go.

Honestly, in my breed there isn't any one problem that plagues us more than deafness. There is no genetic test for it. It is always a gamble. You can breed two full hearing dogs and get an entire litter of deaf puppies, or you may not get any. Of course we all do BAER testing to determine if the dog hears bilaterally, unilaterally, or is deaf, but no one actually sends those results in to OFA. There is no way to track it through the pedigrees, and if you could, I don't think it would give any fast, hard statistics.

Someone I knew bred her full hearing bitch to a full hearing dog and had two deaf puppies in the litter. I bred my unilateral bitch to the same dog and had a litter of all hearing puppies (one unilateral). Was it wrong for me to do this breeding? I don't think so. My bitch is OFA good, elbows normal. She is an AKC champion with multiple group placements. She also has her NA and RN and is working on more titles.

To each his own, but I think in this case there are a lot of people saying "oh no I wouldn't breed the dog" when they don't know what something like that can do to a breed. In a lot of breeds people are in denial, they don't test for problems so they don't know they have them. Toy breeds NEVER x-ray hips and I would be willing to bet that if they started they would see a whole heap of problems that have gone unseen. Another thing, people are so uptight about the OFA patellas,but do you realize that there is no x-ray required for that? The vet manipulates the dogs patellas and if he can luxate them he write down what 'grade' the luxation is, and that is the extent of the OFA, so don't tell me that there arent people out there who have a vet for a friend who will essentially fudge a test for them. At least Redyre has tested, recognized the problem and is working to correct it.

Redyre - Thank you for clarifying. I was genuinely curious.

I dont know that I would agree with breeding a uni female. I am not familiar with ACDs but am familiar with Dalmatians who have the same problem. There arent a lot of homes that would be suitable for a deaf dog. Not to mention the fact that a lot of people simply do not want a deaf dog.

I personally wouldnt take the chance. I dont know a lot about the genetics but I do know unis are more likely to throw deaf puppies.

I also take into consideration it is different then dalmatians because the people who breed uni dals and end up with deaf pups euthanize the deaf pups It's the DCA stance that all deaf puppies should be euthanized because they are "so unpredictable". (Yup, that is why my deaf dal girl has the most stable temperment of all my dogs)

So I guess it is different. Maybe there are more people in ACDs who are willing to take a deaf puppy but I know in Dalmatians, those homes are few and far between.

Sorry to get off topic.

As for the Rottie breeding, to be honest, I know nothing of the breed or of the elbow problems. I can say it seems like Red has thought this over, and made what she thinks is the best decision.

Honestly, I am just thankful that she has worked so hard with her dog. I knew someone who had 3 Rotties. One female, and 2 males. His favorite was the older male. The older male was the younger male's father. The older male had hip dysplacia. None of them, of course show dogs, they were all BYB dogs. Knowing the older dog had HD, the guy bred the younger male to the female. (He wanted a puppy to remember his older dog by, I tried & tried to talk him into rescuing a puppy instead) The female had 7 puppies. She killed (literally) all but 2. They were both females. The guy who "Bred" them wanted a male. So he was asking me what I thought about him breeding her again *sigh*. I gave him the emails of some respectable breeders I found online and told him to ask one of them, knowing what they would say. Dont know if he ever contacted them or not (he told me he didnt) but he decided against breeding her and decided to keep both puppies instead. But what are the chanced they will have HD? VERY high.

I dont have the info nor do I even come close to knowing enough to "take a side". I do know though that Red seems like a very responsible person who has really thought about this. It is also obvious to me that Red has worked her bum off to earn Penny so many titles and to make sure she was tempermentally, and conformationally solid.

I guess it would help if I knew more about DJD too and how it affected the dogs who had it. Like can the dogs still get around or is it so bad you have to euthanize them? Is it like arthritis or is it cripling?

I think it's ridiculous to cull out all dogs with minor problems such as this. You'll be hard pressed to find a perfect specimen that doesn't carry any issue. No dog is perfect. Suggesting culling 40% of the gene pool is also a very scary thing. And who's to say that other 60% is entirely healthy in all other ways. I don't know much about DJD but I do know about patellas and PRA in papillons. Whoever said toys are hardly ever X0rayed for hips is completely right. Patellar scrrenings are just as they said, and PRA is basically a hit or miss. You can have a dog CERFed but that doesn't mean the dog won't have retinal problems in the future. You can be sure the dog is healthy at the time of the breeding, but that's it.

I think what it comes down to is a decision by the breeder on whether the breeding is worth it. They need to evaluate the dog in a non biased way and ask themselves seriously if breeding this dog would be beneficial to the breed. There's a lot more than one elbow to look at with breeding- temperament, type, conformation, work ability, overall health, drive, etc.

I know one person who had a top 10 great dane. Gorgeous dog, wonderful type, beautiful color, great personality, you name it. He was insanely titled and gorgeous, then began developing retinal issues. He was neutered and never sired a litter. I also know a very well known papillon who has produced several pups with grade 3 luxating patellas. And they still breed him. Sometimes being honest is looking past all these titles and seeing what is really there. Kennel blindness and focusing on titles can lead to devastating results.

I don't know the specifics, but I'd hope and I'll assume that Red and the other people involved with this breeding have weighed out all the factors involved and have come to what they feel is an educated decision. I really think the way this was brought up on the other thread was highly rude and could have been done in a much more mature way. If anyone wants to talk about DJD and rottie genetics, I'd be more than happy to discuss on a thread that has less to do with personal attacks.

I couldn't agree more.

This whole thread smacked of a personal attack. While I am not into Rottweilers, I did a minimal amount of research last night and found that many breeders have bred DJD1 rotties. One such rottie breeding was announced on the Rottweiler.net forum and their was nothing but praise for this breeder.

Just seems rather snide to me. If concern was geniunely for the breed, this could have been handled in a MUCH more educational and civil manner rather than a backhanded attempt at smearing Red's name.

My last post on this discussion. There is way more to the whole story than meet's the eye.

If you do a search and read ALL of my posts they 98 % of the time are geared towards rescue, animal abuse, etc. With that comes the health of dogs being bred. I have concerns that I am not alone in. Everyone has their own opinion and is entitled to it. Like I stated before, maybe my standards are higher than others because I see the problems every single day, I know of breeders who do not breed dogs that have a close history of DJD. So I know it can and is being done, without problems.

I also wanted to mention that even though I disagree with this breeding I in no way want to discredit Redyre's training ability. I believe she is a valuable resource to this board in that regard.

Since the original poster was Redy to J's Crew and both have stated their last posts , I see no reason for this to continue here .