When Line Breeding Where Do you Cross The Line: - Page 1

I raise pomeranians. And my male and female both share one dog in their 5 generation pedigree. It says 3 % inbred when they are bred together.  And I have other pairing I want to do but it's 7% together since they share two dogs in a 5 generation pedigree. Where do you draw the line? Thanks.

One or two dogs doesn't seem bad, but it also depends on where in the pedigree these dogs are. For example, you wouldn't breed dogs together that have the same mother or father because that would be a very tight breeding. Some people do this, and they'll even breed a son/daughter back to their mother/father. I wouldn't advise doing this unless you're very knowledgeable on what you're doing.

If the dog is further back, like on the third generation for one dog and the fourth for the other, I'd say it's fine. For German shepherd dogs, I believe line breeding a dog on the sire's second generation to the same dog in the dam's third generation is as tight as is permissible. I don't see why this wouldn't apply to other breeds as well.

The only thing line breeding does is make the resulting puppies be of a similar type. It also can expose good/bad traits in the line.

Depends what the dog(s) being line-bred on might be carrying, genetically.

If it is 'all good' and no suspicions about health issues / failure to use available testing, then 7% is still a very low figure in the scheme of things.

If there ARE doubts, however, 3% is too much to repeat.

May I suggest you invest in an education since your post raises some questions about your knowledge of dog breeding, it's practices , conventions and purposes (other than a income).

A good place to start is http://www.breedingbetterdogs.com/. Mr. Battaglia gvies a very good presentation. I suggest a seminar as well as the book or dvd since it will allow you to raise questions you may have.

You may also want to look online for articles by Lloyd Brackett of Longworth Kennels published originally in Dog World. Mr. Bracket was a highly successful GSD breeder for more than 3 decades who established his own strain within the breed. Written in the 50s still highly informative tho be careful many writers misinterpret his "formula" for a successful linebreeding.

Also many good breed books will include a discussion on breeding and the methods used. While the book is directed at GSD fanciers the old Goldbecke & Hart books on GSD had good example of linebreeding, inbreeding etc.

Most dog breeders use a notation system of #s to designate linebreeding not the %s used in the Wrights & Hardiman's inbreeding coefficients which are used more by scientists. Thus a 3-4 linebreeding on dog A tells me the dog I am looking at to buy or breed to had a common ancestor in both his sire and dam lines. Here dog A is his great grandsire or dam on his sire's side ( the 3) and great great grandsire/dam or the bitch side (the 4). The numbers on the left of the hyphen always indicate the sire side of the pedigree and the numbers on the right indicate the bitch side of the pedigree.

I will give you a link to a pedigree so you can easily see what I am talking about but first you also have to know the purpose of linebreeding  is to concentrate good traits and hopefully eliminate negative ones. To do this you need to know the trait(s) the dog expressed - good& bad (his pheno type)  and those he produced ( his genotype). So for example if the dog being linebred on had a correct front and you need to fix that area in your breeding this is his phenotype but before doing the linebreeding you need to know if he produced that good front and did his progeny continue to produce it. If not the linebreeding will not produce the desired results - better fronts. Be careful of inadvertent linebreeding if you do not have any knowlege of the dog being linebred on since you can concentrate bad genes as well as good ones.

I will link a pedigree in the next post and dicuss it to show you the intersection between the common notation and the inbreeding coefficents and why it is important to gather as much information as you can about the ancestors being linebred on.

Please pull up this pedigree in a new tab. http://www.pedigreedatabase.com/german_shepherd_dog/dog.html?id=402863-avon-prince-of-alumvale You will see that he is a classic 3-4 linebreeding which generally is strong for setting type. In fact tho he is closely line bred on two individuals his inbreeding coefficients are only in the 1-6% range.

But wait you say he's not 3-4 he's 4-3 AND the inbreeding coeff are different for the two dogs being linebred on even tho both show 4-3.

The 4-3 just tells us once again the position of the dog being linebred on . Most breeders shorthand this and say it is a 3,4 linbreeding  breeding which it is in reverse because we have come to understand that certain breedings 3-4;2-3 are strong for setting type and it is our way of talking about them. You will also hear us talk about litter linebreeding. That is where the dogs being linebred on are full siblings or litter mates. Technically that moves the linebreeding up one generation to their parents since linebreeding designates a common ancestor. So instead of being line bred on A if the 2^nd position was occupied by A’s brother or sister the linebreeding shows as 4-5 on their parents. But the reality is while A and his siblings are not identical they draw from the same basket of genes and one sibling may offer something the other one does not so you hope to get a strong breeding with an additional

 

Why are the coefficient’s different for both dogs? Both use complex formulas that rely on  more than 4 generations so there may be more inbreeding on these individuals that you do not see in a 3 or 5 generation pedigree. Under linebreeding click on 7 generation and you will see that is the case here. There may also be additional linebreeding  beyond 7 gen that you will discover by going back in the pedigrees. Is that important? Hotly debated question. Many breeders believe in only looking at the upfront 3-4 gen saying anything else is too far back and too dilute. I belong to the school that believes you have to know what’s in the “back forty” since massing back there unknowingly on dog or dogs can bring nasty surprises that pop out and catch you – more in the moment. I compare it to a painting. While the forefront is the focus of the painting, the sharp detail, the background sets the tone and feeling.

Ok I keep saying 3-4 is a strong breeding but you say the coefficients are so low how could that be. This next paragraph is my humble opinion only and others may have a better explanation. I think the difference lies in what we are looking at and the hands on experience we have with our animals. Always always look up from the pedigree and look, evaluate and know the animals you are dealing with. Make informed choices – they may work out or not but at least you have done your due diligence. I have found the inbreeding coefficients used mostly by scientists and geneticists most of whom have little or no practical hands on breeding experience. They are paper breeders. Also they are looking at the total # of animals in a pedigree and basing their decision on a purely statistical measure forgetting that we apply selection and knowledge and yes sometimes instinct or gut reactions to the equation.

Next up a discussion of the dog I linked to and why all of this is important.

.

 I mentioned things popping out of the back forty to bite you in the a**.  Please keep in mind my experience is with GSDs though I am also a student of genetics. Have I seen this – yes for example in our breed  things like off colors, missing teeth and epilepsy – all recessive or multifactored traits. Which leads us to Avon Prince a dog born in 1948. Why would I care about a dog born 68 years ago? Surely any effect he had on the breed long disappeared. Maybe – Maybe not. In this case not because you see even tho at the time this was probably considered a very good breeding – a strong breeding on the stars of his time, a successful show dog and he was incorporated into many breeding programs, it turned out he was a producer of epilepsy. Some say he himself was epileptic – this I do not know but it has certainly been established that he produced the disease.

In Shepherds this we know about epilepsy. Typical onset is not til 2 to 6 years of age making it difficult to eliminate from the gene pool since many dogs will have been bred before they have seizures. Males have a higher frequency than bitches and tend to fit at a younger age and more severely. While no means limited to the UK, the UK has the most public problem with epilepsy arising from several factors not germane to this discussion but also to some degree because of that offers us some of the best information about it. When in the late 50s and early 60s the problem started to show up my understanding is the GSD league bought up some of the affected animals and gave them to Malcolm Willis to conduct test breedings  to learn the method of inheritance.

Malcolm Willis was a rare individual. A geneticist who was a dog breeder – of GSDs and Bernese Mountain Dogs.  A gift to the dog world. Mr. Willis wrote several books on dog genetics including two specifically for the GSD – I recommend both to GSD people if you can lay your hands on one ( My original one went a walking when lent to a “friend”) since they contain a wealth of info on the GSD as well as it’s genetics and dog genetics. The genetic part can be tough going at times because it is written at a high level. An excellent way to continue your education would be to find his books on dog genetics.

Mr. Wills hypothesized that in the GSD epilepsy likely had multifactored basis which operated on the threshold model. There are several ways to look at this model the simplest being that a threshold # of factors  must be present for the disease to express itself and that males will fit at a lower threshold than bitches. This makes it even tougher to track and eliminate this disease.

Again why should I care. Two reasons- in the UK this remains a serious problem often generated by puppy mills specializing in off colors or oversize who continue to mass on these lines in the back of their pedigrees and as a result still producing heartbroken owners of fitting progeny because of the dog producer’s refusal  to  cull affecteds and producers.  But I am  in the US why does this matter? As noted above I am a student of genetics and have long been studying GSD pedigrees. Before the web it was difficult to find out information about the bad things that cropped up in dog breeding but some would almost always leak out. So I know/knew about a few dogs that were rumored to produce epilepsy and personally knew a wonderful young dog a friend had bred that probably had rage syndrome- back in the day when it was just getting known but is now thought of as a variant of epilepsy. When I traced back the pedigree of that dog and of the other suspects they all had one thing in common. In their back forty there sat an import or two that came from the British fitting lines.  Some of this was expressed generations later suggesting that this disease is particularly good at hiding in the genome either not showing or showing at a low level which is misinterpreted as a behavior problem and then boomeranging back.

More concerning is we now have a German Sieger , who will be bred up the kazoo whose dam lines go back to  these very same lines. Yes way back but like I said in the pedigrees I looked at it was remarkably persistent over generations.

 In doing my research I also used the wonderful tool Oli has given us called a progeny tree which if click on it you can follow Avon Prince’s progeny down and down and down.  Looking only at dogs that came to the US or were bred in the US what I found was several small breeders who had wonderful dogs with lines I loved and I often wondered why they had stopped breeding. Now you and I know there are many reasons for this including economics, age , changing life responsibilities but the sad fact is it now turns out many years later I can see that several of them came to an end after incorporating one of the English Fitting lines (not known as such then) into their breeding program.

I do not know enough about Avon Prince to know what good he may have brought the breed but today his legacy is to be cautious in your linebreeding and to learn and know as much as you can about the dogs in your pedigree. Ask, ask and ask again, use the tools we now have in this age of technology and finally be responsible. If it turns out that a breeding produced a serious problem or problems step up and be responsible. Do not deny it or hide it. Cull producers and affected ( this can mean neutering and placing as pets) even if means you have to start over.

BTW I personally found that going to shows, trials, seminars and reading breed magazines , forums and blogs as excellent ways to find out information and new friends as well.

Hope some of this helps. Good luck.

You have crossed the line when you do harm to the breed, to the puppies or dogs, and to others. If you line breed ( inbreeding ) for glory or gold then you will reap what you sow. Most people line breed to find the purple squirrel all the while ignoring the fact that most people don't need a purple squirrel. In the case of pocket dogs such as poms they were screwed up getting them to obscene small sizes and pretty/cute squashed nose conformation so line breeding them some more is not going to end well for the dogs or you.   The GSD is also afflicted by those who believe cookie cutter looks and over the top aggression are important.  Trying to bring some ancestor back never succeeds and inbreeding is a dark art best avoided by most.  I am not opposed to inbreeding to develop new lines but breeding is best done looking at the sire and dam with an eye on the future and for the most part ignoring the past.

When anyone mentions epilepsy in the GSD, I immediately think of this thread: http://www.pedigreedatabase.com/german_shepherd_dog/community.read?post=674162-benvillarosa-all-that-jazz--pts-after-horrific-seizures&p=4

Of course, Avon's Prince of Alumvale is in this dog's pedigree. If you want to see some insane linebreeding/inbreeding, take a look at the pedigree of this dog! 

 

Two points.

When I was a child, I bred another livestock and kept records. Suddenly a certain "color" showed up and there was absolutely nothing with it. The factor was basically as recessive as could be in that livestock. That factor had never ever shown up in any of my breedings and looking back many of the parents had to have carried that factor. I immediately researched my records to find the original culprit--7 generations back on one side and 8 on the other. The culprit was wonderful specimen for improve of the next generation or to test if the partner was carrying another less recessive factor. No need to describe more the whys of using the culprit.

At the time a child proclaiming such a proof of a hidden gene showing up after such a time was unheard of, so I kept quiet. This is a perfect reason to watch the back 40's.

Number two: what Willis book did TIG lose?

Excellent point, Alamance!

Another question for Tig: who is the German sieger you're referring to?