KC Chairman ousted... Members revolting

Yesterday, Kennel Club Chairman Steve Dean was booted out after four years in office. His crime? Professor Dean had tried to steer the Kennel Club into the 21st century. The natives, however, are determined to remain in the 19th. 

Dean believed strongly that if the KC is to be taken seriously in the modern age; if it is to enhance its stature after a difficult few years, it should be more inclusive... to be about all dogs, not just purebred dogs.

�This has been our stated mission for many years now, and yet some members clearly believe we should narrow the focus of our efforts to purely the registered purebred dog," he wrote in the June issue of the Kennel Club Journal.

This, said Dean, was an "isolationist approach" which would not allow the KC to speak authoritatively on canine issues "unless members are content to limit our remit to speaking only about health and inherited diseases in the pedigree breeds.

�The world of pedigree dogs has a vast array of experience and knowledge that can be used across the spectrum of dog ownership. The practical skills we bring to the table on breeding, genetics, training, socialisation and husbandry are extensive and form an important part of the public debate on dog ownership.

The KC, he felt "should stand up for all dogs whatever their origins."

But this stance has enraged the diehard show-head purists who simply don't want the KC to have anything to do with mutts. Hell, they even want breeders who produce purebred dogs in non-standard colours to be chucked off the Assured Breeder Scheme.

The KC's recent AGM was marked by a lot of anti-crossbreed, anti-outcrossing, pro-purebred rhetoric. Dinosaur judge Jean Lanning proposed (and won) a motion to review the KC's acceptance/promotion of crossbreeds. She also criticised the acceptance of imported dogs which may contain "alien" blood,  and suggested that recent concern about purebred dog health was a veterinary plot.

As reported in DogWorld:

[Lanning] feels that there are many thousands of dogs who on the whole lead pretty healthy lives if they come from good breeders, but she �finds it sad that a very small elite section of the veterinary profession appear to many of us to be far away in remote ivory towers, often advocating that some of our most cherished pure breeds should be crossed out to a different breed.� 

She instanced horses from the Spanish School of Riding and the Chillingham cattle which have been bred for centuries without fresh blood, and mentioned the plight of the wild cat, whose demise is threatened by interbreeding with the feral cat.

At the same meeting, breeder Pat Brigden raised concern that an outcrossed Irish Red + White Setter had qualified for next year's Crufts, clearly reflecting the concerns of many in the room. Brigden is a staunch opponent of the Irish Setter/Irish Red + White Setter outcross programme which is endorsed by the Irish Kennel Club. She has, apparently, warned about solid red dogs popping up unexpectedly in future generations of IRWS (something that's genetically impossible).

Here, btw, is sneak peek of the second-generation IRWS that's qualified for next year's Cruft's  - one of two outcrossed IRWS to do so in fact. As you can see, he's a very nice, very typical young IRWS.  More importantly, this dog and the other outcrossed progeny offer genetic salvation to a breed that is now horribly inbred and has an unsustainable effective population size.

Dalriach William Wallace - 9mths, second-generation IRWS outcross

But to some people this dog is impure... tainted... a mongrel (irrespective of the fact that there are loads of solid red dogs in IRWS pedigrees because, of course, they all used to be the same breed).  And, boy, there are way more of these Luddites than I feared. A few days ago, this comment appeared on one of my posts about the LUA Dalmatians (if you remember, dogs that descend from a single Pointer cross in the 1970s, seventeen generations ago).

I'll NEVER adopt a Dalmatian who has the LUA Dalmatians in them. They aren't Dalmatians they are crosses! Hence the word "out cross". The breeders are so high and mighty about them too, when it's wrong. Yes breeds have out crosses from 100s of years ago, but not as recently as this. It's wrong. If you want a pointer get a pointer, don't mess around with a wonderful breed.

I try not to swear much here... but really, how fucking thick can they be?

Today, I tend to move in dog circles populated by bright, educated and energetic people who are doing their utmost to marry science with good stockmanship skills in order to breed better dogs, whether purebred or not. Clearly, I have been labouring under the illusion that they are representative of the wider breeder community.

Check out this editorial in last week's DogWorld:

Clearly a great many breeders of �pure� bred dogs feel the KC has gone a step too far in its emphasis on ALL dogs.  

For decades they have coped with the club having a separate list for dogs not on the pedigree register, so they can compete in some of the working disciplines. More recently, they have accepted the club setting up yet another register, for �companion dogs�. They accepted the KC getting involved in Scruffts, a �competition� for mongrels, and making it a centrepiece of Discover Dogs, and even going so far as to giving it a high-profile �final� in Crufts� main ring. They have accepted � often with some reluctance � the KC allowing outcrosses in certain breeds.  

 But now their patience seems to have been exhausted. What was the final straw? Was it just a build-up of resentment, or is it the fact that the Assured Breeder Scheme, which the KC is so keen for leading breeders to support, is also able to encompass those who produce non-pedigree dogs? 

Most can cope with the fact that charities like Guide Dogs, which produce crossbreeds for specific good reasons, can be members, but beyond that it is perhaps a step too far for many.

And thus it has proved. And so it's out with the old... and in with the older. The Kennel Club has been reclaimed by those who believe in purity at all costs and want the KC to be only about pedigree dogs.

The new Chairman is Simon Coryndon Luxmoore - also Chief Exec of the Royal Aeronautical Society. He is - allegedly - a bit of a thug, albeit a reasonably well-bred one. He went to Millfield - a public school best known for attracting those with more prowess on the sporting field than in the classroom.

Somewhat confusingly, he was known until recently as Simon Luxmoore Ball. We duffed up his half-brother, Nigel Luxmoore-Ball, in  Pedigree Dogs Exposed for breeding a horribly-overdone Basset.

In recent years, Luxmoore has dropped the Ball (and him a sportsman!) although his wife still prefers the double-barrel.

Luxmoore is a Siberian Husky man - as is KC Secretary Caroline Kisko. In Sibe circles he is known as Damian to Kisko's Mrs Baylock (the nanny of the anti-Christ child).  The pair co-authored (with Luxmoore's first wife, Sheila, and Caroline's husband, Chris Kisko) a well-regarded book on the Siberian Husky. Indeed, some suggest that this is a an unholy coup hatched up betwixt Luxmoore and Kisko who wasn't happy that Dean was appointed Chair last time round.

Certainly, at the Dog Health Workshop in Dortmund earlier this year, it was Steve Dean who seemed to be embracing reform while Mrs Kisko remained largely impassive. We shared a workshop and in an often lively discussion about ways to improve dog health, Kisko did not speak.  She is a daughter of Mike Stockman, a former Chairman of Crufts, likely rather more steeped in KC culture than veterinary surgeon Dean - although Stockman, too, was a vet.

In the absence of much of an alternative, I guess I've been fairly supportive of the KC recently, feeling that inching reform is better than none and pleased that the KC had seemed to be adopting a more inclusive approach. Dean made it clear to me in Dortmund that he saw this as the KC's future (thus no doubt marking his card further... how dare he speak to the enemy!)

So my first response to what would appear to be a retrograde step was horror. But, actually, on reflection... let them at it. Let them bury themselves in their increasingly irrelevant, isolationist pit while the rest of us embrace the real world. Let them continue to trot their dogs round in meaningless circles in pursuit of meaningless ribbons. Let them continue to throw increasingly ineffective potshots at crossbreeds while show entries and purebred registrations continue to decline. And let them think (because this, apparently is the ticket) that better  PR  - rather than better breeding - will get pedigree dogs out of the hole they're in.

My mate Ryan O'Meara (K9 Media) sums it up perfectly:

"No bad thing. A bit like FIFA. When the choice was between an incumbent who's overseen decades of corruption or a Jordanian prince, one may assume reform could be on the way if the lesser of two evils won - a false hope. As it is, with an organisation so rooted in its insularity they picked the greater of two evils and thus the organisation continues to eat itself. In the long run, this is best. Write them off, witness their demise and continue to promote an alternative view.

"Both FIFA and the Kennel Club would rather the rest of the world just went away and left them to get on with things in private. The problem is, they also want respect, kudos and credibility despite trampling all over such values in a very public way. The fact that Blatter has (clearly) been forced to jump changes little. He was well supported. The people who supported him despite his overseeing abject failure and embarrassment are still there and they still see their organisation through a prism that is completely out of touch with the majority of the real world.  

"As a football fan, I wanted with all my heart for our own representatives to not just talk a good talk but walk it. I wanted them to remove themselves from the process, take a stand and watch others follow. I want the same for the Kennel Club. Those who are tainted by association need to think outside of the confines of an organisation that has repeatedly proven itself to want to paint an image of reform but whose deeds speak to a quite different way of thinking."

Three million page views and a couple of mutts

Overnight, the PDE Blog achieved the milestone of having attracted three million page views since my first post on 11th November 2010 four and a half years ago.

Since then I have written 344 posts (including this one) and the blog now averages around 2,000 page views a day (less during quiet times, and up to 10,000 a day during busy times).

The big spike you can see above was the coverage of Crufts 2011 centering on the terrible state of the Neapolitan Mastiffs at that year's show -  A parade of mutants is the blog's 8th most read post of all time.

The most popular post remains World's first striped pug - in fact an April Fool, although an astonishing number of people still fall for it. Second is The bald truth about the Chinese Crested which explores how the dogs are shaved for the show-ring. A new entry in the PDE Blog Hall of Fame is The demise of the Great Dane - a post raising concern about the very heavy Eurodanes published just two months ago and already the 4th post popular post of all time.  At number 6 is Bull Terriers: head case which continues to attract a lot of interest (mostly from Bull Terrier owners outraged that I should suggest that there's anything wrong with distorting this breed's head into a joke).

There are quick-link references to all the most popular posts down the right hand side of the blog if you scroll down a bit.

Four posts that have attracted over 200 comments apiece:

Pedigree Dogs Exposed - Three Years On (285)
Bulldogs @ Crufts 2013 - Part 1 (263)
Huffington Post in a huff over mongrels (251)
A topline to die for (217)

And here's who has been reading it... thank you America.. ;-)

I recently had to close the Pedigree Dogs Exposed Facebook page because it was taking way too much of my time to moderate - but I will continue to write and maintain the blog as I feel there is a need for a continuing critical eye on the world of purebred (and other selectively-bred) dogs.  

My 'proper' job is as a TV producer is very demanding - and I am currently in the middle of making a  series for BBC2 exploring a new potential treatment for Parkinson's Disease; I also run a busy dog rescue and, currently, have eight dogs of my own to care for, train and walk. 

Some of you will already be familiar with my amazing Jake - a GSD/Doberman/Setter x, now 13 and still running like the wind - perfect heart, perfect joints and near-perfect hips - as was revealed recently when we took the opportunity to x-ray his hips when he was under sedation to check a foot injury. He's a clear outlier so can't claim much for his muttish good health - but it makes you realise what's possible for even big dogs (Jake is 32in tall).

This is Jake playing/running in slo-mo a few weeks ago. 

This is the youngest of my dogs - Curly Girlie (official name Gemma but the nickname has stuck). This was shot last Sunday on Salisbury Plain where we walk every day, rain or shine. Curly is three-quarters Irish Water Spaniel and a real delight; hopefully free of the litany of health problems suffered by the purebred IWS, although at only 18 months old, it is of course way too early to tell. I was a little tempted to keep her entire as I thought she might have something genetically to contribute to the breed if she proved her health - but in the end decided it was impractical in a multi-dog household (and with even my neutered males still very interested in in-season bitches). She was spayed two months ago.

VA Secretary Puts Service Dog Rules Revision on Fast Track

Additional Note: The Monday, August 17, 2015, edition of the Federal Register contains the VA's final rules regarding animals on VA property. 80 Fed. Reg. 49157.  Those rules will be the subject of further analysis in this blog.  Also, see the summary of the final rules provided by Psychiatric Service Dog Partners. 

Slides presented at the May 19 meeting of the VA Advisory Committee on Prosthetics and Special-Disabilities Programs indicate that the proposed access regulations on service and therapy dogs, described here last November, have been given an expedited review status by Robert A. McDonald, Secretary of Veterans Affairs. 

Although no date for issuance of the final rules has been announced, presumably the Secretary�s designation will mean that this should occur in the next few months.  One of the slides in the presentation, reproduced to the left, indicates there will be training programs for police service employees of the VA since, often working at the entrances to VA facilities, �enforcement falls largely to them.�  Other affected staff have already participated in conference calls regarding the proposed rules according the last bullet point in the slide.

Leased Facilities Subject to ADA Service Dog Rules 

Another slide from the May 19 presentation, reproduced below, makes the interesting observation that leased facilities used by the VA, which may include outpatient clinics and Vet Centers, "may be covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act for access depending on how lease agreement and what access law applies."  A note under the main bullet point adds: "Care should be taken when negotiating these agreements."  This suggests to me that there has been a problem somewhere, perhaps in a facility where the VA does not have absolute control over the space, but shares it with some other entity or service provider.  

If the lease agreement did not provide that VA policy on service dogs should apply to the facility, it could mean that patients or employees with dogs defined as service dogs by the Department of Justice were bringing in psychiatric service dogs, so veterans began demanding the same privilege, or merely started bringing PTSD dogs with them to appointments or to work. (Many veterans are both VA employees and recipients of medical services at VA facilities.) Someone at the VA who had negotiated such a lease agreement is probably in hot water, though the flame should be lowered when the access rules are finalized.   

Transport Vehicles to Handle Service Dogs

Also, on May 27, the Department of Veterans Affairs issued proposed rules regarding transportation of eligible persons to or from a VA facility for examination, treatment  or care.  The proposal states that, for veterans enrolled in the VA�s health care system who need transportation, adjustments are to be made if the veteran requires transportation with a service dog (proposed 38 CFR 70.71(b)(2)).  In arranging transportation services, the veteran or other individual making the request on behalf of the veteran is to indicate �any special needs that must be accommodated to allow for transportation (e.g., wheelchair, oxygen tank, service or guide dog), and other relevant information.�  Proposed 38 CFR 70.73(a), 80 Fed. Reg. 30190, May 27, 2015.

A service dog, for the purpose of such an accommodation in transportation, is defined under the VA's service dog funding provision, 38 CFR 17.148, so will not include psychiatric service dogs used, for instance, by veterans with PTSD.  The cross reference for the definition of "service dog" should change to 38 CFR 1.218(a), the proposed access regulation, once that is made final. Otherwise, veterans with PTSD dogs, and other service dogs for which the VA does not provide funding, may be able to bring the dogs into a VA facility after the access rule is finalized, but will not be able to take the dogs with them onto VA transport vehicles in order to get to a facility. Ideally, of course, the definition of "service dog" in the funding rule should be changed as well.

Conclusion

One of the slides used at the Advisory Committee meeting is about "pseudo-service dogs," and provides that employees can ask users if a dog is a service dog and what tasks the dog performs for the veteran.  It states that handlers who invite others to pet or play with their dogs probably do not have service dogs.  Also any unruly, unclean, un-house-broken, or generally misbehaving dog is deemed likely to be a pseudo-service dog. It can be expected that such generalizations will be part of the training that security officers and others will be receiving in the future.

The fact that the phrase "concurrence process" is used to describe the completion of the regulatory review (first slide above, second bullet point) may indicate that there have been disputes regarding the proposals within and between some sections of the VA, and that the individuals responsible for finalizing the rules are trying to get some level of cooperation across the agency. If nothing will be released until there is "concurrence," the optimism I expressed in the second paragraph above for a quick finalization may be misplaced. I hope I shall be proven wrong as to this speculation.    

Thanks to Larry N. Long, who works with the Advisory Committee, for providing a copy of the slide presentation of Joyce Edmondson, VHA Animals in Health Care Committee Co-Chair. 

Jem's Big Ideas # 1: kiss goodbye to the KC register

Today, I start a series of Jem's Big Ideas: constructive suggestions that I feel have potential to improve dog health/ownership in the UK. They are intended for discussion and debate.

We can call it solutions-based-thinking if you want a fancy name for it. Makes it sound more important, don't you think? 

Indeed, I would be happy to spend half an hour talking about solutions-based-thinking at your organisation's annual conference. (I was top of the class in this module at college and my tutor said I was bwilliant). I can do a power-point presentation incorporating some fancy-sounding but ultimately-meaninglessly-titled slides. I can dress up some no-shit-Sherlock common sense as something new and meaningful. And then everyone can go home feeling much better about the whole thing.

You know where to find me!

Or you could just read the whole thang below with a whole lot less waffle and at a cost to your time of about two minutes. If you can spare another two minutes, please  tell me if you think it's a good or a bad idea and why. And if you think it's a half-good idea, tell me how you would improve it.

 JEM'S BIG IDEA #1

Get rid of the Kennel Club register.  Yep, scrap the very thing that brings in �12 million pounds a year into the KC coffers... that funds a whole heap of KC activities, genetic research, education and so on.

That KC-registration certificate? Gone..... That KC-pedigree for every dog the KC registers currently? Asta la vista, baby.

The reason?

� because the KC register has a massive integrity issue

� because there's a better way

Of course I don't mean that we forget about registering dogs. We definitely need a Register.  Indeed, we need to register *more* dogs - and in one place.

Just not under the KC banner.

And here's why.

When Kennel Clubs are confronted by those who feel they should be doing more to protect the health of purebred dogs, the response is often: "But we're just a registry!"

This has been a real sticking point for those who want KC registration to mean more.  They believe that if breeders had to jump through more health-hoops before the KC would register their pups, we'd have healthier dogs and it would set an example that would put the crap breeders out of business.

I argued this myself in Pedigree Dogs Exposed. And there are many other voices - including from within the Fancy - who would like to see their breeds subject to more stringent health-demands as a condition of registration.  But now I'm not so sure.

The Kennel Club here in the UK has resisted this at every turn, anyway. The KC's argument is that that breeders and puppy-buyers would simply go elsewhere and that once lost to any KC influence, things would simply get worse.  Indeed there is some evidence of this in the existence of rival registries which vary in quality from fantastic (individual breed registries) to total scam.

The response from the critics is that what the KC fears most is the loss of registration money which it relies on to survive. 

And the response to that from the KC is that this money allows it to do good things for dogs.

So pups continue to be sold with a KC certificate that in reality means nothing (as indeed the KC's small print now states quite clearly). Some pups will be OK; some won't; some will have been raised by breeders who care; some will have been born in horrific conditions on a puppy-farm.  It can be very hard to tell the difference.

The KC's half-way-house solution has been the Assured Breeder Scheme. The KC now urges people to buy their dogs through the ABS to avoid the risk of buying a puppy-farmed dog, something that has really pissed off breeders who eschew the scheme because they don't think it's good enough. 

So it's a stalemate... with many people thinking it is close to fraudulent that the KC (and indeed the AKC in the US and many others) will register just about anything with a pulse when the public is convinced that KC papers are an indication of quality.  (The KC's general register even includes puppies produced by breeders that have been chucked off the ABS for major welfare concerns.)

I've been thinking about this a lot recently - because we really do need a register of dogs for all kinds of compelling reasons. And, ideally, it needs to be a register that includes as many dogs as possible.

So here's my idea:

The Kennel Club makes the Register a separate entity and gives it a new and neutral name -  devoid of KC-branding and therefore devoid of any implicit value. It becomes simply a record of a dog's birth and ancestry - in exactly the same way as we have human ancestry records.

My suggestions:

canineancestry.com*

whoismydog.com*

Liberated from the KC badging and all the baggage that comes with it (while still copping the income from it), the door is then open to register many more dogs than currently - including crossbreeds/mixed breeds. 

This would  knock-out the competition in the UK - because canineancestry.com would become THE place to register every dog and the sheer volume would bring down the cost of registration). And it has the clear potential to build into an international resource that eventually mines data from every other register in the world. 

Can you imagine how incredible this would be - in years to come to be able to follow your dog's ancestry back through the generations, regardless of breed or country boundaries? Wouldn't you be happy to pay something for that, in the same way that families love to research their own antecedents?

And, of course, it goes without saying that it would be an amazing resource for breeders, geneticists and other researchers.

It could also include lots more information (and pictures) of individual dogs; not just when they were born or their pedigree, but their health, their temperaments, something about their lives, when they died. This information that could be inputted by owners who would be given a log-in code that allows them access and add to an individual dog's records when the dog is registered; or even (with an owner's permission) link to the VetCompass data already being gathered in the UK. 

At the vets in 2030: "Aha, Jemima... I can see that Jake's grandparents on both sides of his family suffered from Cushing's Disease.. making it all the more likely that the excessive thirst and bald patches on Jake's tummy are due to Cushing's".

What happens to the KC? Nothing. This is just a re-branding  - and of course a commercial expansion that should boost income considerably and allow the KC to spend more money to support its claim that it is now primarily a "dog welfare" organisation.

So the KC continues to do everything it does at the moment; free of the criticism that it affords KC-registration to sub-standard dogs.  And it continues to develop the ABS which becomes more like Debretts for elite dogs - a bit anachronistic in this day and age, but something which should appeal to the Fancy.

Of course, this doesn't solve the solution of sub-standard dogs being sold to a gullible public - you need more than one Big Idea for that. But it does resolve one big current problem,  is a massive boost to dog traceability and has the potential to give us some great epidemiological data/dog demographics - something that all agree is needed.

And the reason I would trust the KC to do this when I'm their greatest critic? Because it is already set-up to do it and because I believe that when the KC's master is not just the purebred dog, but all dogs, everyone - and every dog - will benefit.

Let me know what you think...

--------------------

* Those domain names? Mine... all mine...

Crossing the rubicon - and no going back

Link to article

There's a fabulously snobby piece in this week's DogWorld in which Dachshund exhibitor Lee Connor decries a designer-dog breeder for mating a Bichon x Shih Tzu with a Miniature Poodle and dubbing the resulting mix a "Daisy" dog. He writes:

"Yes, the very first litter of 'Kennel Certificate registered Daisy puppies' have been born in the UK. You can take your pick from a range of colours; from the run-of-the-mill blacks and chocolates to the rather more fitting creams and champagnes. 

"The advert, which has certainly caused a lot of interest and comment on social media, states that the Daisy puppies are from a �carefully planned breeding� to produce the highly sort [sic] after hypoallergenic designer toy breed, �The Daisy� (ideal for allergy sufferers)�. 

"The mother it goes on to say is an �F1 hybrid Bichon x Imperial Shih Tzu� (note, in the style of the famous Marks & Spencer adverts, this is not your usual Shih Tzu� this is an Imperial Shih Tzu) and the father is a �KC-registered show-quality Chocolate Miniature Poodle�.

"The advert then assures us that �only the very best bloodlines have gone into this breeding to produce the very best quality� an outstanding litter of non-moulting adorable Daisies�. 

"And, dear reader, you too can buy into this hypoallergenic dream of a dog for a mere �900." 

Now,  granted, the chances of this being a quality breeder are less than the chances of seeing a ridgeless Ridgeback in a show-ring. There's no mention of health-testing and the "Kennel Certificate registered" claim is undoubtedly a scam designed to sound like "Kennel Club registered". I also agree with Connor that their coats are going to be high-maintenance.  And, yes, there's the concern that "Imperial" might mean a tea-cup Shih Tzu as it's a term used by breeders pitching at the teeny-weeny-cute market.

(Been thinking of a coffee mug meme for this... "No tea-cups here... [pic of weeny dog] runts are for ....." What do you reckon?)

So all in all, I'd be hard pushed to make any claims for this particular litter. But wouldn't it be nice if Connor + co expressed the same righteous indignation about shitty breeders of Pugs or French Bulldogs or one of the other purebred dogs du jour?

Plus if you're gonna do a three-way cross (something that's often advocated in livestock breeding as there is evidence that it results in the most hybrid vigour), in principle you could do a lot worse than with these three breeds.

It is true that all three can suffer from hereditary cataracts (although may not be the same mutation) and slipping patellas, so you'd need to take that in to account when choosing your stock (and yes, we have no evidence that the breeder in this case has done this). But all three are long lived (13-14 on average) and have moderate conformation.  This is a pic of a Shih Tzu x Bichon - an attractive little dog. Throw Miniature Poodle into the mix and the result should be a really smart, athletic cookie. Kept clipped, pas de probl�me!

� Sue Thatcher

But this is ignored by Connor in favour of raising a red-herring question mark over this mix's ability to give birth naturally. 

'I would like to see the figures for caesareans among these so-called designer breeds especially among the �toy/miniature� ones like the miniature labradoodle featured on the Jonathon Ross show the other week. Surely if you breed a six pound bitch out of a ten pound mother by a four pound father you are setting yourself up for far more whelping difficulties than the uniformity, that took many years to stabilise now found in our recognised pedigree toy and miniature breeds. Of course the numbers of pedigrees needing such interventions will and quite rightly so be available but is there anyone out there collating figures for dogs such as the Daisy?"

Well no. Although we can get an idea by looking at the C-section rates for the individuals concerned (source) in this three-way cross and their average weights.

Bichon Frisee - 5.6% (3-6kg)

Shih-Tzu - 21.1%  (4-7.2kg)

Minature Poodle - 5.3% (7-8kg)

I think there's a pretty good chance that this mating would result in a natural birth. And certainly a better chance than in Lee Connor's own breed, the Standard Smooth Dachshund, which has a C-section rate of 31%.

The Standard Smooth also has a whopping  risk of back disease (IVDD - invertebral disc disease).  One in four will suffer from this condition which is at best painful at at worst paralysing. (Source)

That's a higher risk for that single health problem than for all the major health problems put together for any of the breeds in the Daisy 3-way cross.

Finally, Connor also gets aerated about the fact that some designer dogs come with a pedigree! 

I mean, how could they when they're mongrels? 

He writes:

I wondered how one would possibly go about creating a �pedigree� for what is essentially a mongrel litter. Surely, by their very nature, the background of most of these dogs would be at best sketchy.

Well no, not always. There have always been selectively-bred crossbreeds with extensive pedigrees (think lurchers and other working dogs). And an increasing number of "designer dogs" are now being bred with care and with their ancestry well-documented.  But of course, in Connor's Fancy-fuzzled head, there is no good to be found in any crossbreeding.  People who breed them know nothing, are nothing, produce good-for-nothings and are only ever in it for the money.

Ah, and it's all the fault of PDE, despite the designer dog trend being enormous in the US where PDE made little impact.

I am depressed by another anti-crossbreed report in Dog World this week, too, concerning the proposal to be voted on at the KC's upcoming AGM re a working party to discuss crossbreed registrations. (Read it here.) There are mixed messages coming out of the KC on this one, no doubt reflecting that on the one hand it sees sense more inclusivity as the way forward while having to cope with the purists who hate crossbreeds and mongrels - so much so that some would rather the KC wound back and the block and didn't recognise them at all, not even on the activities/companion register.

Dinosaur judge Jean Lanning believes that the KC acknowledgement of crossbreeds "is inadvertently encouraging the trend and the public perception of the endorsement this brings. Also, a breeder of these crossbreeds is able to be a member of the KC Assured Breeder Scheme.�

Shock horror! And so very revealing. If you loved dogs... if you truly loved dogs and your professed concern was that the poor crossbreeds were being so badly bred... wouldn't you want them to be produced under the auspices of an initiative that encourages better husbandry/welfare?

Apparently not. 

Also troubling Lanning (and indeed many others) is the KC's registration of imported dogs, some of unrecognised colours �such as blue Bulldogs and French Bulldogs�, which she says indicates that another breed had been introduced.

Yeah, because colour is sooo a bigger issue than the fact that one in four of even the "best-bred" French Bulldogs suffer from Brachycephalic Obstructed Airway Syndrome or that both breeds struggle to give birth naturally.

As you may have noticed, I  loathe the unthinking putting-down of crossbreeds when we've all seen the damage that breeding for purity can do - and the constant fretting about the ingress of foreign blood when an injection of new genes in genetically-depeleted breeds could be of real benefit.  And, boy, the fancy is just so clueless in this respect. Who do they think they are convincing now that the public is so much more aware of the health issues in pedigree dogs? Seriously, you're never going to convince the buyers by trashing the opposition when you need to put your own house in order.

There's also the small matter that it smells like racism.

So while Connor and his ilk tut-tut in their ever-decreasing circles, the public is buying crossbreeds with silly names in their thousands because they think they're fashionable and fun.

Now, some of these breeders are awful. Really, really awful.

But I have to be honest and say that until someone outlaws the crap, fast-buck breeder, I'd much rather they were putting a Shih-Tzu x Bichon to a Poodle than mating together two Pugs or two Cavaliers or two Standard Smooth Dachshunds.

There's less of a chance of producing a short-lived dog that suffers.

Best in Show Daily joins the 21st Century

Link to article

For those that don't know, Best in Show Daily is an online US magazine for show-heads.  It is marked - in my mind at least - for endless scrolling ads for dead-eyed show dogs and an almost total buy-in to the show-world paradigm.

It whinges a lot about those terrible animal rights peeps spoiling their lovely hobby and continues in the main to promote damaging and unscientific breeding practices (top-winning dogs must be the best... nuffin' wrong with popular sires... hybrid vigour in dogs is a myth... line-breeding is good).

As you might imagine, it hated Pedigree Dogs Exposed. 

"Pedigree Dogs Exposed was incorrect, totally and fantastically and horrifyingly wrong, in its conclusions," wrote one of its contributors, Cardigan breeder Joanna Kimbal, who also writes the rufflyspeaking.net blog.

In fact, although Joanna clearly disagreed with Pedigree Dogs Exposed, she writes a lot of sense on her blog. I suspect that if we sat down over a cup of tea we'd find much on which to agree.

And it was a real pleasure to see this new article by Joanna who has been off the scene for a while.

In How we must change as breeders and why, Joanna delivers a strong piece arguing for reform in the way we breed dogs. And, specifically, she makes a very strong case for genetic diversity.

"Maximum genetic variation is essential to a population that can withstand stress. If you lose genetic variation, you end up with substantially lower resistance to disease and you stand a good chance of concentrating deleterious genes. Loss of genetic variation is why we have such huge problems with cancers in Flatcoats, or epilepsy in Poodles, or Fanconi in Basenjis."

She continues (with my bolding):

1) If you�re looking at your potential breeding stock, and your potential breeding decisions, you should add a very important criterion: Genetic �otherness.� We all know the mantra � breed for temperament, health, conformation. But we must � MUST � add non-relatedness to our list. This takes two forms: First, if a dog is substantially non-related to a bitch, their puppies will be more valuable to the breed than the puppies of a closely related dog and bitch. Second, families are best used widely, not narrowly. If there are four breedings to be done, using four sisters once is better for the breed than using one sister four times. 

2) We need more people breeding their dogs. If we�re going to make wider breeding happen, we need buy-in and breeding on a much wider scale. Please note that I don�t mean we necessarily need more puppies � we need more mothers and fathers being used, more dogs left intact, more bitches making the babies. WE NEED MORE BREEDERS. We must critically examine how we sell our puppies, how we restrict our buyers� breeding choices, and how we determine which dogs are breedable. The current model is NOT SUSTAINABLE. Going on as we are doing now is 100% doomed to fail, as our human numbers dwindle and the dogs being shown and bred become more and more closely related. They are two converging lines, and where they meet (where our breed reaches a point at which it is no longer capable of being sustained in a healthy way) is visible. So this is not a choice we have. We MUST change enough to carry our breed forward.

Read the whole thing here.  

VA Advisory Committee to Discuss Service Dogs on May 19

On May 19 and 20, the Federal Advisory Committee on Prosthetics and Special-Disabilities Programs will hold meetings at the VA Central Office, 810 Vermont Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20420.  Meetings will begin at 8:30 a.m. and adjourn at 4:30 p.m. on May 19 and at 12 noon on May 20.  The meeting is open to the public but members of the public will not be given time to comment. 

On May 19, the Committee will receive briefings on, among other things, service dogs.  It is not indicated whether this will include any update on the status of the VA's proposed revisions to its service animal policies, discussed here in a blog last November. Under 38 U.S.C. 543, the Committee is to advise the Secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs on prosthetics and special-disabilities programs administered by the VA, including providing advice on the adequacy of funding for special-disabilities programs. The Charter of the Committee, which is posted on the VA's website, indicates that the Committee's advice may concern research on programs that deal with "spinal cord injury, blindness or vision impairment, loss of or loss of use of extremities, deafness or hearing impairment, or other serious incapacities in terms of daily life functions."  The latter phrase would cover mental health disabilities, including PTSD, so any discussion of service dogs should not be restricted to service dogs for physical disabilities. 

Any member of the public wishing to attend should contact Larry N. Long, Designated Federal Officer, at 202-461-7354.  He can also be emailed at lonlar@va.gov. Photo ID will have to be presented at the Guard's Desk of the building. 

Veterans and others concerned with the VA's service animal policies--at least those living in the DC area--should consider attending.  Although they presumably won't be allowed to speak, if Mr. Long receives enough calls from veterans asking about what service dog issues will be discussed, the Committee might allocate more time to those issues.

The VA's announcement is included in the Federal Register for May 4. Department of Veterans Affairs: Advisory Committee on Prosthetics and Special-Disabilities Programs; Notice of Meeting, 80 Fed. Reg. 25362 (May 4, 2015).