Why do they breed them like this? - Page 10

That pup is decently put together, but he's got my biggest pet peeve that I have about working lines...he has no rear.  Lack of angulation is just as bad as too much (can you say ACL tears?).  I think he's an overall nice looking dog, but lack of angulation has always been a put off for me.

Nicve looking GSD for a pet and probably a great family dog.  But he is not short coupled and actually has a long back.  But as long as it stays as firm as it looks, this should not be a problem.  Nice head, nice front and nice expression.

Must admit, I truly dislike passing comment on other owners’ dogs.

Maybe it’s just the particular shot but that roaching back of Gina does nothing for me!

Your fellow’s got a heck of a straight stifle, jettasmom! Not surprised that he’s agile.

Nice clean boys Xeph - good wither and fair top-lines. American one’s hind angle a bit overdone perhaps, to my eyes anyhow; German one’s front, surprisingly, a tad solid and more up and down than what I like to see; all mere personal bias.

 

Preston are you saying you don't think he will make a good working dog? (you stated the good as pet, family companion) Just asking. I agree though that no angulation is as bad as over though. There should be balance.

My American dog fits the American standard for angulation (as close to a 90 degree angle as possible), but not the German (120 degrees).  So I can understand why Justin would look overangulated to you...he technically is.

What do you mean by my German boy being a tad solid and up and down Chisum?  He is straight in the front, but if you mean solid by over muscled, in both pictures he's just been bathed, so he's all full of poofiness  :D

I got the wording screwed up, Xeph. Basically meant to say that he's a pretty solid-looking boy overall - camera lens exaggerates and fluffed-up coat after bath explains it. 

Some experts figure that Wienerau dog’s pinnacle probably coincided roughly with Odin’s arrival. Hardly a geneticist myself, all constructive criticism/input welcome.

Line breeding combined with widespread resort to only the top-winning studs is and has been the name of the game. A gene consists of paired alleles, each of which may comprise a number of versions, most beneficial or relatively neutral but some bad. Any one dog only carries one version though. We’ll arbitrarily assume that overall good allele types outnumber bad ones five to one.

Imagine that the GSD gene pool in existence shortly after Quanto/Canto represents a couple of packs of playing cards, with top picture card poker hands symbolizing best progeny outcomes. The fact that we’re only using a small number of popular studs means that with each succeeding generation we’re steadily losing alleles, genetic diversity in other words - as analogous to removing at certain intervals five picture cards at random plus one inferior one.

We shuffle and deal the cards a number of times and before long, and with original set of cards still relatively intact, we strike winning hands, and up pops Odin, Cello, Quando etc. The longer and the more often we shuffle and deal dem cards though, the fewer those precious picture cards become. Coming up with great hands gradually gets ever harder; the potential/opportunity to surprise with something special ever less. 

Pretty banal analogy but after decades of ubiquitous line/in-breeding and narrow stud use I don’t think it’s too misleading. The scope to effect major improvements/changes within existing genetic mix is now greatly reduced compared to what it was say thirty years ago.

 






 

Nicve looking GSD for a pet and probably a great family dog

How can you make a statement like that based on a pic??????????? You have never even seen this dog work and make a comment like that based a stack pic. Before you make stupid comments like this one think before you write.

Denise

Also wanted to add, I was not asking for a crtique on my pup, just putting up a pic that is related to this thread. The only crtique I will ask for is the day i bring him in front of a judge for  his show rating/breed survey.

Denise

Let me show you how backwards we got this thing........The dogs that have the structure to work and and the dogs that I see working in vocations like SAR, Military, Herding, Police, are usually labeled as "nice pets", and the dogs that I see are labeled as superior structure(front,shoulder,angulation,length of stifle,etc), usually don't work and more important; gentically are incapable of working that's why these vocations don't use them or their siblings. Now with mindsets like this being prevalent today, would you think the stature and working ability of "Good Dogs" should be improving or declining. Finally, can we test this prevalent mindset by the "reality" of what has the breed become with this mindset. "Why DO we breed them like this?????