Its fine mjfromga you had touched on a good point, and yes debate is never a bad thing. I should probably say that I never experienced this issue personally as it was primarily before my time with the breed docking is illegal here anyway and my imported Koura bitch certainly still has ears, any of the old guys in the AB community will tell you the same story though, we cannot deny the experience of others afterall.
I think part of the confusion over what I said may be due to the fact that when I say "hound ear" people are immediately envisaging huge scenthound ears hanging half way to the floor when this is not necessarily the case. As far as cropping styles seen on those old dogs it pretty much ran the gamut from the "no ear" you might see on for example the APBT, Bully Kutta or Alabai to the "high" style you would associate with Boxers or Dobes. As far as the aesthetic value of the cropping was concerned its almost irrelevant, an ear cannot be faulted if it has been hacked off and the standard permits this, this was later amended to close this loophole.

It may just be covered under general animal welfare laws. At least with tail docking some could argue it is in the dog's best interest if they are working dogs - but ear cropping, was only ever for two purposes really, fighting/baiting, and looks.

Pastoral and guard dogs used to have cropped ears because they were wearing spike collars. The spikes faced outwards and were there as protection from bites to the neck by bears and wolves, floppy ears would have easily been hurt by the spikes so they cropped them.
Apart from that it was mainly for baiting and dog fighting, and later on for looks. Why, I do not know. How anyone can find cropped ears aesthetically pleasing is a mystery to me.

I don't know if it's been mentioned yet but ear cropping and tail docking has a more sinister history than official breed specifications. Specifically a fighting dog had it's ears cropped to make it look more aggressive, permanently upright ears makes a tough guy statement. Also tails and ears were cut down so a competitor couldn't grab them in battle.

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