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Joined: Feb 2006
Posts: 2,123
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Originally Posted by
mse2ponder
I think it was 34 from the one that had won the club show BIS?
He had 34 litters in total, however 26 of these were AFTER he had been diagnosed with syringomyelia - to me this is unforgivable!
Originally Posted by
ClaireandDaisy
I thought the KC people were right in saying they could not force breeders to test or change. They can`t. They are (as are the RSPCA) a self-elected quango, not accountable to anyone outside their own organisation. However, they certainly could make a start by changing breed standards to stress `fitness for purpose` and take some of the emphasis on looks away.
However they could enforce some mandatory health testing like they do on the continent.
Originally Posted by
AliceandDogs
On the other hand, there ARE good breeders who do only breed healthy dogs, and I don't think this was portrayed at all. My Border Collie is touch wood, totally fine, but my crossbreed girl is covered in lumps & has fits just like the boxer did. I don't like the way ALL KC breeders could now be seen as terrible. BYBs will be advertising non-KC as a plus point.
This is one of my worries, whilst the program was as expected (biased towards pedigree dogs) I had hoped they might highlight the fact that there are decent breeders out there and stress the importance of health testing. It was incredibly distressing to watch the clip of the poor boxer fitting
Overall, I think it could have been a lot worse. I must admit I really didn't like Mark Evans - calling all pedigree dogs mutants? I certainly wouldn't take any of my dogs to him if those are his views (I looked very carefully into the health of the lines my dogs come from before going for those lines).
I did think they chose to omit certain pertinant information though, such as stating that white boxers were culled for looks alone - there was absolutely no mention of these dogs having a much higher likelyhood of being deaf etc. I also was unaware that white GSD's were routinely culled as seemed to be inferred in the program.
I did like the representation of the changing scull shapes though!
What are everyone elses views on the statement that "animals with genetic issues should be banned from dog shows"? Whilst this sounds like a good idea in theory, it would be horrendous to put into practice, where would you draw the line?