Mix owners! New DNA test!

Mixed breed owners will not have to guess anymore! I found out from my friend who is a vet that there will be a DNA test available to determine the actual breeds a mixed dog is made of! The test is coming this summer and is vet administered!

Here is more info! http://www.marsveterinary.com/about.aspx

I would love to have that done.....

I know! I think it's great news and I am thrilled that the source I heard it from is actually reliable!

I wonder if all veterinarians will offer it??

wow, thats pretty interesting. for all out dogs would be intersting to know

Hmm...the letters BSL just popped into my head.

I can see it now..."they" will be able to prove that the dog is 1% pit/staffy/whatever the hell they want, and the dog will vanish.

As a lab something owner, I would love to know for sure what else is in my boy, but this makes me nervous.

Maybe I'm just a skeptic (and heck, I don't know anything much about genetics), but I think the whole thing is a load of crap. A way to scam money from hopeful mutt owners.

Cass.

Yes, isn't that nice?

Now imagine that you live in a community where certain breeds are outlawed. (more and more common these days). Imagine also that this testing and microchips are mandatory. (along with spay neuter, of course, thank you, State of California's lawmakers)

What a great way to make SURE you are eliminating certain breeds.

This is a double edged sword for sure.....

Ditto. ^


It would be fun to see what my boys really are, but really, there is no need. They are my dogs and they are the loves of my life, I don't need to know anything else. I cringe at the thought that people will be able to use this to further BSL or something just as detrimental to the dog loving world.

You too, huh? If this is legit, I agree, it makes me very uncomfortable. We argue that on a genetic level, all dogs are essentially the same. (I'm not talking about breeds here, I'm just talking about the basic structure of canine DNA.) But here is a test which claims to be able to pick breeds. So now there will be irrefutable "proof" that some breeds are genetically different. Of course, the one thing I read on something similar to this only was able to identify a handfull of breeds, and the APBT thankfully wasn't one of them. We'll have to wait and see, I suppose.

I wonder how much it costs . I'd love to know what Ollie's Mom or Dad was !

I seriously doubt the accuracy of this test. I am genetics major. A couple of years ago we could not even distinguish between wolf DNA and domestic dog DNA, much less between individual dog breeds. That was actually a big argument against outlawing wolf hybrids in some areas because there was NO way scientifically possible, either through DNA testing or by looking at a dog, to prove if a dog had any recent infusions of wolf blood or was a husky type of mix.

In order for us to be able to distinguish between different breeds, someone would have needed to find a distinct marker on the DNA of EACH individual breed. Because there are a lot of modern breeds (created in the last 200 years) that share common ancestry, or are composed of breeds still in existence, those breeds would share the same markers and you wouldn't be able to tell the difference between them.

A good example of this would be ACDs, made of dingo, collie, dalmation, etc.

Or Dobermans, made of (possibly) weimaraners, rottweilers, german pinschers, etc. There seems to be some debate about what exactly went into them, but all the ingredients bandied about are still breeds in existence today so they would share markers with those breeds, or possibly have lost markers in the mixing.

This is assuming that they managed to identify markers for all the foundation breeds in the first place.

I agree with everyone about the BSL. It is scary. Politicians are not scientists, and they are easily swayed by pseudo-scientific tests and studies. It's scary, and no one has any business knowing what my dog is, and telling me I can't keep her based on what her supposed ancestry is.

Hmmm...

Interesting feelings everyone has on the issue. I never thought of the BSL side of it. I personally still think it's neat. Think about how many posts a day are on forums titled something like "Guess my dog's breed" etc. I guess I just look at this glass half full instead of empty.

I am also thankful that I come from the #1 dog friendly city is the USA with no BSL...

There has been some more recent work on dog origins, and it seems that as a side product, they were able to identify dog breeds, most of the time.

Oddly, it was the beagle which had the worst record of identification.

What do you mean new ?? I had Whiskey tested over 3 years ago. It is very expensive. I paid $ 1800.00 for it. I was not 100% sure as a pup he was all ACD.
They have been offering this dna testing for years here.

Well, that's the first I have heard of it and the first my vet friend who told me about it had heard of it. Maybe this test is different, and hopefully a lot less expensive.

Were your ACD's sire and dam DNA'd???

No he was a rescue but I wanted to know for sure if he was all ACD. Banfield ( yuck) pet hospital told me where to go have it done. It is costly and being that Whiskey was taller then normal ACds I just wanted to know. The answer is that he is pure bred although I would never have considered breeding him because he has too many flaws to even had thought about it . I don't want to breed any dogs I wanted to know for sure because it gives me a clue as to their genetic defects if they were to come up.

I read about this in a past issue of Dog Fancy magazine a while back. There are a couple of companies that do this and I choose MetaMorphix's Canine Heritage Breed Test. I sent the DNA sample about a month ago and I'm still waiting for results. (It's supposed to take about 6 weeks.) The cost is $65. For that price I thought it would be interesting to see the results. They have a short list of breeds, but I believe my dog's heritage is contained in the list. I also heard that terrier mixes will be nearly impossible to discern because of the relatedness of the different terrier breeds. (or something like that).

No real need to put my money into it.

Hmm.. Novelty value only surely?

I just think - what's the point in paying that much money to satisfy your curiosity - seems like a waste of money to me.

I am lucky, I know what Bodhi is (all 5 breeds!), but if I didn't I wouldn't pay a grand to find out....!!!!!! £20 maybe LOL