Smile for the camera, because no one else is. Congratulations on the ribbon, sorry you destroyed your breed.
I established before that Brackett’s formula is a rather non-unique scheme, producing at a minimum a puppy that is 6.25% inbred with the desired ancestor representing 37.5% Blood and a matching Genetic Covariance.
There are numerous other schemes that will produce the exact same results. In fact any 2:3 inbreeding (representing that the key dog is in the second generation on the sire side, third generation on the dam side) or 3:2 inbreeding would produce the same numbers.
The only thing unique about this particular version is that when the key dog, “Studley,” is the sire’s sire we have a conservation of the sire line, specifically the “y” sex chromosome, also known as an allosome.
An allosome is a sex chromosome that differs from an ordinary autosome in form, size, or behavior. The human sex chromosomes are a typical pair of allosomes. The x chromosome is present in the ovum, while x or y chromosomes can be present in sperm.
While this might be desirable to capture the specific genetics of that sire in the allosomes which do not recombine, the overuse of this formula and the sexism of the popular sire effect means that many breeds have vanishingly few sire lines at all.
This is one avenue where diversity can be swiftly lost and sex linked diseases can crop up very fast, undetected by COI calculations. Many sex linked diseases are also easier to express as “carrier” status (the disease appearing on the X sex chromosome) can result in full disease expression.
Although Brackett doesn’t acknowledge that his scheme isn’t all that unique, he does give the breeder permission to make subtle “modifications” if they can’t find suitable breeding stock to fit his precise formula.
In the absence of a stud with such bloodlines, those with modifications of it can be used. As one example amongst many, the sire of the sire might be the grandsire of the dam on the SIRE’S side, instead of on the dam’s.
Brackett's alternate scheme, same results
This modification makes absolutely zero difference. If anything, it gives us another glimpse of the Y chromosome characteristics from our Studley key dog in the form of Butch (was Bitch in the original formula), seeing as Bitch couldn’t display these genes as she wouldn’t carry them. The resulting puppies, however, would be indistinguishable under this alteration.
Brackett's alternate scheme, same results
Brackett presents this identical scenario under the assumption that the ideal blood lines are not available. This suggests that Brackett doesn’t understand basic genetics, at least not enough to realize that this isn’t even a variation on his stated formula in any meaningful way.
If this were my puppy, I'd put it down, not parade it as an ideal specimen.
His last explicit example, however, significantly changes the genetics.
Another: the sire selected might be the result of either a full or a half brother and sister mating, and thus inbred. And so we might go on listing differing formulas indicating inbreeding and line breeding.
While not changing the formula, here Brackett wholeheartedly endorses very close inbreeding. And we see the result in the Genetic Covariance. I’ve replaced Studley with the 25% inbred Dudley (brother x sister, as suggested).
Inbred Dudley increases the "look like me" factor, Genetic Covariance
You can see that having a highly inbred stud dog to start with increases the Genetic Covariance–the degree to which the puppies will look like that ancestor–from just over one third to just under one half, almost as much as a normal parent. This is a significantly more potent scheme to express Dudley’s genes in the puppies, but Brackett fails to put this in any context or establish how significantly different these results would be from his standard formula.
And that’s sort of the point. Why is 37.5% Genetic Covariance optimal? Why is it better than 25% or 50%? What factors are we really weighing here and what is the counter factor to inbreeding?
Brackett gives us none of these things. He doesn’t explain why this formula is optimal. He doesn’t show us why he settled on a 2-3 generational inbreeding versus any other type. For this to be a legit theory or formula, the burden of proof is on Brackett to establish the testing methodology and the optimization calculation.
All he gives us is that he likes this formula and that he’s raised a lot of show champions in a short amount of time. This sort of logic is attractive to morons and monsters who can breed and laud a dog so ugly and dysfunctional as to be a joke. A cruel, unforgivable joke. And yet they smile, instead of laugh, give rosettes instead of scorn, and they are adamant that they are creating an ideal dog.
And Brackett gave them a formula for success in destroying this once noble breed.
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I just think he was interested in doing a Bakewell-type system much more slowly.
Anyone who has read Brackett’s writings knows he wasn’t much into science.
retrieverman recently posted..Critique of the early twentieth century fancy
Yes, the actual “formula” is nothing special. The question is, why do all these show breeders treat it like “The Secret” or whatever other instant life cure late night TV has for sale?
LOL.
Anonymous photos!
retrieverman recently posted..Islamic creationist
No its copyright infringement. To remove photos from a copy righted web site. And Action will be taken with the web sites host if the photos are not removed.
Gerald
Mr. “Roach” (what an ironic name given the criticism of roach-backed dogs herein),
The photos were not obtained from any copyrighted website. They were obtained from a public forum of German Shepherd owners who posted said images in criticism of the horrible structure in the pictured dogs, over a year ago. Your failure to defend what copyright, if any, you have over said image is now forfeit given your failure to defend it against a forum much larger and with much more exposure than mine for more than a year.
Plus, unlike said site, I’ve altered the photos to provide direct criticism of their content. This is clearly protected speech under Title 17 Section 107 of the U.S. Code. The use of said images falls under the doctrine of fair use. Not only are the images downgraded in quality and clearly altered from the originals, they are also being used for one or more of “criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.”
One with a really bad back:
http://www.pedigreedatabase.com/pictures/51388.jpg
I think they all should read what Max von Stephanitz said about them.
retrieverman recently posted..Islamic creationist
At least the German style GSDs like the pic you posted have shorter rear legs to go with the deformed back, so their rear legs aren’t sticking out a mile behind them. Still grossly deformed, but they look stronger in the rear than their American cousins. More like that hyena picture you posted! (Was that you? 🙂
http://www.covy-tuckerhill.com/FlyingHighBig.jpg
Here’s an American dog for comparison.
Funny you bring up Covy-Tuckerhill, the LEGACY kennel of Brackett. I was going to touch on them in a future post.
My husband and I bought a dog from them in 1995. “Roland” had a myriad of health and temperament problems and we had to euthanize him just before his third birthday.
Gah. I love the image you have at the top of this post, because it’s exactly what I want to ask these people. His hock is resting on the freakin’ ground!
My parents have a purebred GSD. I wish I had his pedigree handy. He has a great temperament and a nice, FUNCTIONAL back and legs: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/228806960/
I think I’m glad my parents never got him registered. Less money to the AKC.
I don’t know much about breeding dog or genetics but all these “ideal” looking dogs look like they’re in pain and grossly deformed. If I saw a dog on the street with its back bent so badly and the legs looking all wonky I’d ask if they were taking it to the vet anytime soon. Looks should not be the most important thing while breeding, when I find a dog I look for temperament, behavior, and overall health first then a few other things then I pay attention to what the dog looks like. In the end I guess I just don’t understand how it can be acceptable, even desired, to have dogs that look like they’re in constant pain and will actually develop health problems later on due to their breeding.
Hi, I just read your article and thought I’d point out that you have the wrong interpretation of Bracket’s formula. When he starts with “let the sire’s sire…” he is referring to a new stud he wants to create. This means the duplicated male is the father of the new stud and the grandfather of the new stud’s mother = 62.5% contribution by blood.
It makes little difference to the context of your article but I thought I would point it out for the sake of accuracy. Also, don’t get to hung up on the pure mathematics of contribution by blood – beyond the sire & dam, the gene contributions made by ancestors deeper in the pedigree will not necessarily follow Galton’s law.
The key to the formula is that it ensures a 50% contribution of genes from the desired male but also allows a pathway for his desirable traits to be set by having him present in the mother’s side of the pedigree. Once you get beyond the first remove, breeder selection has much more impact on the resulting progeny.
I hope this is helpful to you.
Mark
Mark,
Thanks for the comment. You’re right, that interpretation is how Battaglia draws his pedigree, I’ll have to confirm with the original Brackett. That’s a horrible mess of language–referring to the offspring as “sire” and mixing generations with sires and dams. I’ll have to do a new analysis with this much closer inbreeding scheme.
I also agree in theory with deviation from Galton, but isn’t that most impactful on deeper ancestry? I don’t know that we’d really see obvious deviation in the sorts of 3-5 generation pedigrees we are dealing with here. As ancestors grow by 2n each generation back but the size of the current individual’s genome remains constant, of course we see fractional contribution levels and the smaller the fraction the more likely we are to have small contributions simply disappear (we know that genetic shuffling (crossover) is clunky, certainly not on the level of individual base pairs, and very rarely individual genes). It’s a funny revelation really… you aren’t actually related genetically to all your ancestors!
I think I’ll write a few new posts, one investigating my error and another talking about the conceptual issue of disappearing ancestors.
Thanks Mark, very helpful indeed.
Yes, Mark this indeed very helpful. I agree with Chris. Can not wait to compare studies after going over this myself. Kathy Bittorf
Why must we have breeds at all?
I’ve always preferred the look of “pariah dogs” or real mongrels (NOT crossbreeds but dogs that have actually NEVER belonged to a breed at any time in their ancestry). Look up Carolina dog (American dingo) for what I think is one of the most beautiful examples of a dog – Australian Kelpies are up there too.
I recall seeing mongrels around a lot when I was much younger – but now if you go to a rescue all you see are pedigree dogs (roughly half of the dogs in the shelter) or crossbreeds where you can more or less tell what breeds the parents were. Its rarer and rarer to get “Heinz 57” dogs where you cannot tell the parentage at all.
I really hate the show bred look. The show type (of most breeds) seems to be short and squat, with too much bone for their height and too much weight. The muzzle is too short and too blocky.The coat is excessive (who in their right mind would want such a high maintenance coat on their pet?) and the legs are… well, wrong. Parallel back legs is the standard in nearly all breeds, yet this is totally unnatural for dogs. Wolves have mildly cow hocked back legs – its an adaptation for extra stability and helps them to single track when running fast. They also have turned in elbows, narrow deep chests, narrow shoulders and turned out front paws.
Instead of sticking with the natural shape of the wild canid, We have forced onto our dogs ideals that came from the horse show world, which is not surprising since the first animal shows were for livestock and dogs were added after that. Not only is this odd shape unnatural and unhealthy for our dogs, but it looks really ugly too. I’m shocked that most people cannot see it (Plato’s cave perhaps?).
Breeds are only what we make of them. It’s sort of like asking why have different flavors of candy. Mostly because people like variety, novelty, and consistency.
The demand for breeds has certainly run the pariah dogs out of town in the First World. We have feral cat populations, but there really isn’t anything left of most landraces and wild dogs anywhere in the USA. There might be something re-forming from loosed purebreds in Detroit, but that’s dominated by a very specific type.
Plato’s Cave is right too. And the seeming inability for people to look at the end results and somehow think they are “improved” or beautiful. It’s like tolerance to poison over time or something. I fundamentally don’t understand it but I guess that aesthetics has such a strong cultural component that people can be TOLD what is beautiful.
Ugh, I don’t know why so many German Shepherd breeders breed them like that. I think it looks terrible! Are they blind? Do they actually think this looks normal?! The back is hunched, legs dragging down and hocks on the ground. This doesn’t look structurally normal, it looks like a deformed animal. This disgusts me as much as smushed-faced dogs, stubby-twisted legged dwarfed dogs, long backed dwarfed dogs, bulging eyed dogs, dogs who’s face is covered in fur or skin that you can’t see the eyes, dogs with creepy haws showing, excessive sagging skin, big drooping gowels and inbreeding.