Dolittler and Terrierman: I am humbled by your presence (seriously)
By Gina Spadafori
November 21, 2008
So this morning I shoot off a quick rant on so-called “animal-lovers” who keep puppy-mills in business by making excuses for buying a family pet from this sick and immoral industry — even when they know the facts about puppy-mills.
An important subject, make no mistake, because laws will never stop puppy mills – the sick bastards who run them will change businesses only when people stop buying from puppy mills, through their retail outlets or direct-from-millers Web site. But still, this is a topic I have written about so many times that I didn’t even need caffeine to get rolling.
In the meantime, Pet Connection BFF Dr. Patty Khuly at Dolittler and Patrick Burns at Terrierman put up some incredibly thoughtful, detailed and helpful posts this morning.
I guess someone forgot to pass them the memo about “Casual Rant Fridays.”
First, Dolittler, with one of the best pet-related blog posts evah, on how to save money on pet prescriptions:
Most of what I have to say won’t make most vet hospitals happy (so you know, the following recommendations cut into my income, too) but everyone deserves to know what their economic options are, right?
Here’s some background on this:
Though it’s still not commonplace for veterinarians to accept the inevitable—i.e., the eventual loss of our in-house pharmacies—this protectionist veterinary worldview is changing. As I’ve explained on Dolittler before, at some point vets will have to realize that making money off drugs and products is not at the core of their business. Like your family doctor, they’ll send you elsewhere to have your scripts filled.
Pet owners, for their part, have spearheaded this veterinarian-circumventing movement by looking outside the vet hospital for savings on expensive medications and so-called, “vet-only” products. But the vet industry still has a long way to go before it meets your cost-saving needs.
In the meantime, it seems the downturn in the economy is accelerating this trend (if our hospital is any guide). Owners need more for less. That’s why human pharmacies and online pet drug outlets are fighting each other tooth and nail for your pet-dedicated dollars.
Then, the Terrierman considers if it’s at all possible for the closed-registry breeding system of pedigreed dogs to fix the defects caused by, uh, the closed-registry breeding system of pedigreed dogs. As in, can you manadate longer noses or some such and fix things that way? Or do you have to go to outcrosses to get healthy dogs again? From Terrierman:
The Kennel Club has scrambled to come up with a proper response to the BBC documentary Pedigree Dogs Exposed.
Their first move was to trot out in-house public relations apologist, Caroline Kisko, who ran through the standard play book for what a company does when caught in scandal. Ms. Kisko first claimed it was all a hatchet job, and that the Kennel Club had not been given an opportunity to respond. [...] To say this public relations campaign went over like a lead balloon is an understatement.
Rather than mitigate the Kennel Club’s public relations problems, it exacerbated it.
Here was proof positive that what the critics were saying was right. Clearly the core problem was not just the Kennel Club’s embrace of failed 19th Century eugenics theories, but a kind of Inbred Thinking that pervaded the Club’s hierarchy itself. [...] For two months nothing changed. Then, about a month ago, came word that the Kennel Club was writing to all the Pekingese breed clubs to say they were going to force a change in the breed standard of that dog so the poor animal could get a bit of nose and perhaps be able to actually breathe.
The Kennel Club has since said that it will be looking at ALL the breed standards with the idea of eliminating scripted deformities and obvious exaggerations which lead to predictable misery and pathology.
[...]
What remains unaddressed, even on paper, is taking action to reduce rising levels of inbreeding caused by a closed registry system and the overuse of show-winning sires which leads to massive genetic loads and phenomenal levels of defect and disease within breed after breed.
Without a fundamental change in the way the Kennel Club does business on this end, a major root of the problem remains unaddressed
Repairing the damage done to dogs by 130 years of breeding within a closed registry system will not happen overnight, of course. No one should expect an “instant-rice” miracle.
That said, a program for recovery does not have to be complex or difficult to imagine or implement.
Go read the rest. As a dog-lover utterly besotted with a wonderful breed that dies from cancer at a 50 percent rate (and often at very young ages) I can’t wait for the pedigreed registries join us in the 21st century and take the lead in formulating genetically sound, controlled programs of outcrosses to get rid of these health scourges — while preserving the best of what our heritage breeds bring us.
“Then, the Terrierman considers if it’s at all possible for the closed-registry breeding system of pedigreed dogs to fix the defects caused by, uh, the closed-registry breeding system of pedigreed dogs.”
This is one reason I like the world of breeding and showing rabbits better than the world of breeding and showing dogs- there’s no such thing as a closed-registry breeding system for rabbits. You don’t have to have a pedigree on your rabbit to show or breed it. Of course the majority of rabbits at a show are purebred, but if you feel a need to outcross to another breed to improve some characteristic in your lines, there’s nothing that prevents you from doing so and still showing the offspring as a particular breed.
Comment by Megan — November 21, 2008 @ 10:17 am
50%!?! Wow, that’s scary. Do you think the reforms could change something like that?
Comment by Lori — November 21, 2008 @ 11:24 am
Yes, I do believe reform IS possible with planned and controlled outcrosses, as discussed in our previous post here regarding a study at the University of California, Davis (third item). This, in conjunction with the dedication reputable breeders have now to screening for some defects (hips, eyes, heart) and supporting research into others.
However, whether the breed clubs and the AKC, UK Kennel Club et al will allow changes in the current system of closed registries (only a registered Labrador bred to a registered Labrador is a Labrador) is another issue entirely. As long as they cling to the old ideas of “pure” dogs as superior and desirable over all other options, nothing can be fixed.
Is change easy? Nope. Is change necessary? Yes, and every day I read on the e-mail lists of another flatcoated retriever dying of cancer at 7 or 8 — or years younger — I know we need to change the way we are doing things.
That’s not going to happen willy-nilly. There needs to be a building of consensus, a call for change and a plan of action for outcrosses to preserve what is good about these breeds while breaking open the genetic logjam that’s the source of what’s bad.
I have one 12-year-old flatcoat in good health, lucky, lucky me. She has had littermates die at 3-4 years of age (one), 7-8 years of age (one) and 10-11 years of age (four). She has one brother left, also in good health. Cancer got ‘em all. Now, you can’t kick about losing dogs at 10 and 11, really, but 4 and 7? That just sucks.
I have two 3-year-old flatcoats in good health, lucky, lucky me. I look at them and wonder: Will they be like Heather and be healthy at 12, or like her 4- or 7-year-old siblings and die of heart-breakingly cancer young?
Life offers no money-back guarantees, but you can work intelligently to minimize the risks. I can’t do this on my own in terms of genetics and the registration system. (Although I can and DO take actions in terms of preventive-care strategies, primarily diet and exercise).
To change this, we all need to be demanding an end to business as usual, and going forward together with controlled outcross programs so we can stop burying these wonderful dogs before their time.
Two of the bloggers here have Poster Dogs for genetic malfeasance — my Flatcoated Retrievers and Kim’s Cavalier King Charles Spaniels. Christie’s Scottish Deerhounds have their problems — as do any and all breeds in closed registry breeding systems — but Cavs and Flatcoats really stand out in the health disaster depaments. (Cavs = heart disease; Flatcoats = cancer.)
We need to look at these issues for all breeds and start working to fix these problems — to get the AKC and the UK’s Kennel Club to exert pressure on the breed clubs — and vice versa — to develop genetically sound programs to do so.
So, is reform possible? Yes? In my lifetime? I hope so.
Comment by Gina Spadafori — November 21, 2008 @ 11:52 am
Let’s be fair. The Flat-Coat people are heavy into research to stop the cancer. Mine has given his genetic info and blood samples just in case. And the breeders I know look at longevity as a key component in choosing which dogs to breed. And you know what? Most of the dogs in my life: a Scottie, a Border Collie, a Labrador, a Toy Manchester Terrier, and a Beagle all died of cancer. We are working on it; it’s not like it’s a part of the standard like some of the other breed problems so please don’t put Flatties in the same category.
Comment by Shari — November 22, 2008 @ 6:15 am
What’s not fair about speaking the truth? I had a Sheltie die of cancer, and a grandmother, too. That doesn’t mean either Shelties or grandmothers are prone to cancer.
Flatcoated retrievers are.
The fact that this can’t be fixed by changing the breed standard to adjust a physical appearance issue that’s causing a health problem is EXACTLY why flatcoats, like Dalmatians, need a different approach to breaking open the genetic logjam that is the reason why half of these retrievers die of cancer, often at early ages.
Yes, reputable breeders consider longevity and health as part of the equation. Unfortunately, dogs are bred before their lifespans are known and before cancer appears.
As the Pointer-Dalmatian outcross project shows, you can eliminate a problem gene and in a couple of generations have healthy dogs that can in no way be distinguished from “pure” ones.
Want to see another example of this? Look at this experiment to get boxers with naturally short tails — with a corgi outcross!
Open the mind to the possibilities, which in the new century include abandoning the eugenics movement for good and developing for each breed a controlled, known and honest outcross program to deal with these health issues.
We don’t have to just shrug and say, “Well, that’s the price of loving a [insert breed]” when we lose another to cancer at 4 or 7.
Comment by Gina Spadafori — November 22, 2008 @ 8:02 am
I read the articles about the boxer/corgi crosses and found it very interesting. But I can’t find anything about the Pointer-Dalmation Project. Where can I find it and what are they trying to correct? Deafness on the white gene? Do you know of any breed that has a good record against cancer? As I said before, all my dogs have died from it so I just see it as a foregone conclusion. My Border was only 7.
Comment by Shari — November 22, 2008 @ 9:11 am
Pointer-Dalmatian outcross:
http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/.....fm?id=1959
Comment by Gina Spadafori — November 22, 2008 @ 9:16 am
Shari, here’s another couple links (second link you need to scroll to the bottom) about the Dalmatian backcross
http://www.dalmatianheritage.com/
http://www.thedca.org/studygp.html
They are trying to correct the stone forming issue. Dals need a special diet low in protein/purines. Some dals can be pretty aggressive stone formers even on a low purine vegetarian diet. Can be a major problem for males.
Comment by straybaby — November 22, 2008 @ 11:55 am
Three flat-coats. First euthanized at 6 yrs, 11 mos. from a multifocal plasma cell malignancy. Next two died at 8 yrs, 9 mos, from osteosarc and anaplastic sarcoma (waiting to see if it was histiocytic sarcoma). Two more flats waiting in the wings…gee it would be really nice if I could have ONE of them make it to 9 years old! My mix? cancer, but made it to 12 years! We need to start thinking outside the box (gene pool).
Comment by Sara — November 24, 2008 @ 8:33 am
I know that Boxers and Goldens also have a high rate of cancer genetically, but what about diet. We are causing or could be preventing much of it with a proper diet.
I wish research would be done on Type A commercial kibble and pieces versus a natural diet of any form and watch the results. Just look at the results of what Pottenger did, oops I guess the research has already been done. When will we listen?
Comment by Danielle — November 30, 2008 @ 1:43 pm