How would you improve the GSD of today? - Page 3

Thanks, SGBH. I bet that one's not gonna be easy. But, we must try. For the sake of the precious little skin left on my ankles, we must try. I mean it IS for the good of the breed!

Wear boots, Melissa. Did you read the message where I said Blitz sent me to the ER? GSD puppies really are accidents about to happen LOL.

OL LINE REBEL the reason is that most of these dogs dont compete in sporting events except for police competitions so people dont know about them except other k9 officers.some were titled in sport before coming to u.s. others still compete in sport but only when they have been trained in bark and hold instead of find and bite.my k9 is a blk/red showline from czeck rep. no papers on him. what i would'nt give to know who sired this dog, i'd buy a plane load of pups.

Blitzen, if it werent for some of you here, and especially you, I would no longer have this little ankle nazi. Oh, and now his favorite thing to do is refuse to go on a walk. He is willing to go to the front yard, but then he just sits and stares at me. He hates leaving the house. I can't carry him or he will fight. I cannot convince him to leave. When I did take him for a walk he knew the house from a BLOCK away. He would just start runnning his little puppy behind off. This dog is EIGHT weeks old. Sigh. But, he looks so innocent. Go here to see his pictures: www.myspace.com/BenThePunisher :)

Blitzen, if it werent for some of you here, and especially you, I would no longer have this little ankle nazi. Oh, and now his favorite thing to do is refuse to go on a walk. He is willing to go to the front yard, but then he just sits and stares at me. He hates leaving the house. I can't carry him or he will fight. I cannot convince him to leave. When I did take him for a walk he knew the house from a BLOCK away. He would just start runnning his little puppy behind off. This dog is EIGHT weeks old. Sigh. But, he looks so innocent. Go here to see his pictures: www.myspace.com/BenThePunisher :)

Why are there 2 of the same post there? I swear I didn't do that.

One of the things that people need to understand is that the GSD is a breed in evolution (oxymoronic as that may sound… aren’t all species in evolution?). GSD breeding has been under two powerful selective pressures; (a) Workability as defined partly by Schutzhund but also by other utilitarian work, and; (b) Anatomic and Esthetic considerations. The problem is that the breed was created to be for WORK. Out of this came a dog that excelled in the qualities of loyalty, devotion, courage and temperamental stability. Notice that none of these qualities indicate anything about whether the animal was pleasing to the eye. What happened however is that to the spectating public, the working qualities of the GSD created an image of all that was desirable in a companion and HENCE THE DOG BECAME PLEASING TO THE EYE!! The effort then proceeded to making what was good even better. A wag once remarked: “Better is the enemy of Good”, and so it is with the GSD. If one were to look at pictures of the GSD in the 1920's we will find specimens with a more straight back. The characteristic saddle pigmentation of the back appears to have made its appearance in the early 1900's. The dam Flora (Berkemeyer), DOB: March 25, 1911, SZ/25573 shows some of the saddle pigmentation that has now become the hallmark of the breed. However she also shows the straight back that we tend to see in some the so called "Working Lines" of the breed. By 1926 we see the the picture of our present day Saddle pigmented GSD emerging in the VA1 dog, Utz vom Haus Schütting, SZ/331999, SchH3, Kkl1; DOB: March 12, 1926. However he too has the straight back associated with working lines. By 1937 the perception of a sloping topline as desirable has already begun to gain strength as evidenced by the picture of VA Baldur vom Befreiungsplatz; DOB: March 19, 1937. By the 1960's the sloping topline, saddleback pigmented shepherd was definitely established in the breed. I do not believe anyone can totally reverse the evolution of the breed that has occurred over the last 100 years. However reversal is not what we are talking about. All that maybe needed to happen is to re-emphasize workability as defined by raising the bar for breedability. Let the sport and pet lovers have their GSD’s at the level of obedience, agility and SchH1 & SchH2 levels. However let only accomplished SchH3 dogs be bred. The reason for setting the accomplishment level at 270 score is simply a tool to weed out the weaker specimens (from a workability perspective) and the requirement of achieving that score on two separate occasions under two separate judges is to minimize the human traits of opportunism and collusion. Obviously there can be variations to the above schema however I think I have explained the theme behind it. I believe that if this is done, then over a period of time (probably within 10-25 years) we are going to see a new breed of GSD which will definitely have regained the workability qualities that it is so admired for and hopefully have retained some of the aesthetic traits currently desired by many in pigment and anatomy. I am sure some traits as they exist now will not survive, but that is what evolution is all about.

Random replies: Ah, Flora, the beauty of the breed. (BTW, her date and about every ancient dog needs to be corrected to the 1900s, not the 2000s; have no idea how that screw-up occurred, but it won't update.) A "slope" back - how is that? I linked that very Baldur on my post; he has a slight sloping croup. And the dogs later, even many in the '60s, were hardly different. Meanwhile, they are all a far cry from the ridiculous roach backs that are meant for greyhounds for all-out running. THAT needs to go. I'm no expert at all, but my gut is not to agree with the SchHIII necessity; your gene pool will go down real fast. My own emphasis would be on real working dogs, dogs that actually work - with police, military, blind people, sheep. You can show, show, show, all you want but it's not going to be the same as real, genuine work. This isn't to say I would be against SchH or against dogs with no real qualifications themselves (sometimes mere pets have wonderful character and excellent bloodlines, anyway). Ah, I don't know. It's so perplexing! Probably there should be some minimum temperament/health requirements for the dog itself, then bloodline requirements - the parents were both SchHII, etc.

Melissa Your puppy is out on the street at eight weeks, be careful there are a lot of bugs about for a young dog to catch before it has built up it's immune system. I would recommend waiting until it has had all it's jabs beofre venturing out. Best Chris

Rebel "but my gut is not to agree with the SchHIII necessity; your gene pool will go down real fast" I agree with that statement however I would slightly disagree and say that it is a desirable concequence. To lessen the impact perhaps you might be able to say that as of Jan 1st 2008 this new "rule" would apply to all puppy then born. That would give those people who wanted to preserve a particular line time to qualify their dogs.