History repeats itself and Wyndlair Avalanche isn’t the only intentionally bred double merle sire to have his progeny rewarded with Best of Breed at America’s biggest dog show. He’s merely the most recent.
At the 2010 Westminster Kennel Club show, the offspring of a double merle sheltie stud also won Best of Breed. The handler even had the same lucky number 7 that Renee Beals wore when she showed her dog Wyndlair Cherokee Vindication to Best of Breed in Rough Collies.
7 Ch Shadow Hill’s Star Chaser
Breed: Shetland Sheepdog
Sex: Bitch
AKC: DN 03050303
Date of Birth: February 18, 2003
Breeder: Jane Hammett & Don E Bright
Sire: Shadow Hill’s Polaris
Dam: Shadow Hill Satin Pillow
Owner: Jane Hammett & Don Bright
Photos: Breed judging
Shadow Hill’s Star Chaser is not a double merle, but her father Shadow Hill’s Polaris is, and he’s already a “Register of Merit” sire, meaning that although he can’t be shown himself, his offspring are winning show championships left and right. The breeder claims he’s perfectly fine. I have my doubts. Oreo, like most double merles, appears to have very small eyes.
This Boomer son has really proved himself as an outstanding sheltie sire and has numerous CH and pointed offspring. Polaris is an outstanding shetland sheepdog with a beautiful headpiece, exquisite balance and outline, legs and movement. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this dog only that he can’t be shown in the ring for being a double dilute. He really stamps his look on his offspring and placed 3rd in the stud dog class at the 2005 ASSA National Specialty. Oreo is the sire of BIS BISS CH Shadow Hill’s Discovery, an ASSA Award of Merit winner.
Polaris recently earned his Register of Merit Title for his exceptional Siring abilities. The following are his champion offspring:
Ch Misty Mt’s North Star (8-15-2007)
Ch Sandance Stargate
Ch Norwood Saloona (3-30-2008)
Ch Shadow Hill’s Discovery (9-24-04)
Ch Shadow Hill’s Star Chaser (9-3-04)
Ch Shadow Hill’s Satin Dove (11-5-05)
Ch CH Shadow Hill’s Dot Com (7-31-08)
Ch Shadow Hill’s Satin Bows (3-24-04)
Ch Armitage Avalon (2-24-08)
Ch Carloway Clairvoyant (4-1-06)
Ch ParRay Purple Label (11-14-08)
You can confirm here that both of Oreo’s parents are merle dogs, BIS BISS Am Ch Shadow Hill’s Air Force One OA OAJ x Am Ch Shadow Hill’s Satin Doll ROM, and the breeder admits on their website that he’s a double merle.
One might think that this could have been an accidental breeding of two merle dogs, but a little searching shows that this isn’t even a rarity for this breeder. Here is another double merle stud ROM dog they produced and used:
Shadow Hill's Double Trouble, a double merle stud matador.
I actually find the cheeky name offensive given how often double merle is associated with eye and ear issues. Is it really funny to name a dog “double trouble” when you’re so cavalier with health?
History of Shadow Hill’s Double Trouble ROM
Shadow Hill’s Double Trouble ROM: homozygous merle dog, bred by J. Hammett from A/C Ch Shadow Hill’s Blue Dynamic ex Ch Harvest Hill’s Soft Spoken Blue and whelped June 30, 1980. This dog’s pedigree breaks all the rules on color breeding. Not only was he a double merle from a merle to merle breeding, his sire was from a blue to sable mating and his maternal grandsire’s dam was also a homozygous merle. Highly successful in this case – he sired 10 blue merle champions from black bitches – but breedings of this type should not be undertaken by anyone not thoroughly familiar with the genetics of the merle gene and willing to take the risk of severely defective puppies. He is Line CHE Part IIb and Family 2 Part IV.
This is the breeder’s justification for creating and using this dog, named “Powder” in honor of the crack they must be smoking to think this is ethical:
This lovely sheltie left us with some the most impressive offspring. Powder lived to be 15 years old and earned his Register of Merit. He is one of the top producing double dilutes in the history of the shetland sheepdog breed. His progeny have played a fundamental role in creating the modern Shadow Hill Shelties’ line. This dog was truly a “gentlemen” in every respect. Everyone who saw him would stop and stare at his beauty. He turned heads wherever he went. Powder had a strong pedigree which emphasized beauty and brains with correct movement, balance, detailed heads, wonderful temperaments and beautiful blue markings. His descendents possess these qualities and are a joy to live with.
There are plenty of other double dilutes coming out of Shadow Hill dogs:
Shadow Hill White As Snow is an intentionally bred double merle.
Karashome Sunbury Elegance is a double merle sired by a Shadow Hill stud.
Shadow Hill's White Horizon is yet another double merle dog intentionally bred by a dog from Jane Hammett and Don Bright.
The callousness of these breeders brings shame to all of purebred dogdom, and with greater awareness of these unacceptable breeding practices will come unwanted scrutiny and legislation that will hurt all of us in purebred dogs. It might have been the policy in the past to keep your mouth shut and accept that these things are just part of the game, but I don’t believe that’s a winning strategy for dogs, for breeders, or for simple ethical behavior. To not speak out is tacit approval, and when the ship goes down, all of us will be hurt, guilty or not.
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You know the breeders are either greedy & uncaring or they are totally stupid, then again maybe they are both in many cases.
But WHY do the breed clubs & AKC allow this to go on? They then reward them by placing these double merle studs offspring so highly. I would think any club or council that cared even the slighest about the ongoing health of a breed would never allow these dogs any paperwork that allows them to compete & be breed on with in the first place.
WHY if other countries can manage to ban these types of high risk matings can the Americans not do the same?
I really can not get my head around why this is allowed to countine & the only answer I keep coming back to is money.
Wow. The Shetland Sheepdog owner on my Facebook who wants to become a breeder said no one breeds double-merle.
Yet there it is.
Dave recently posted..Research Request: History of the Black Norwegians
In my experiences, when a show breeder says “No one does” this or that, esp when saying it emphatically, you can bet the opposite is true.
“The callousness of these breeders brings shame to all of purebred dogdom, and with greater awareness of these unacceptable breeding practices will come unwanted scrutiny and legislation that will hurt all of us in purebred dogs. It might have been the policy in the past to keep your mouth shut and accept that these things are just part of the game, but I don’t believe that’s a winning strategy for dogs, for breeders, or for simple ethical behavior. To not speak out is tacit approval, and when the ship goes down, all of us will be hurt, guilty or not.”
Thank you, Christopher. I just left a mailing list I was really enjoying because of a certain member who insisted that ‘we shouldn’t judge’ and that ‘HSUS and Peta just want to take our dogs away.’ My assertion that we *need* to be aware of what is acceptable to the pet owning public fell on deaf ears; evidently I just hate all show breeders.
Jess recently posted..Envy Winning Her Second Major
One of the comments on a thread that linked to the recent Westminster post was “he just hates Collies.”
Yeah, I actually do hate what they’ve become, as if we should just approve of and love anything that gets walked into a show ring. And yeah, my deep seated hatred of Collies is so immense that it must have poisoned me against creating blind and deaf dogs.
What gets me is that cross-breeding is automatically suspect from an ethical point of view, as is breeding ‘just pets,’ but show breeders get a pass on practices that would get a byb lynched.
I looked and could not find a picture of Oreo’s face. Suspicious?
Jess recently posted..Envy Winning Her Second Major
I’ve got pretty good googlefu and came up with these two shots of Oreo’s face. Not reassuring. His right eye, especially, looks nearly closed in all shots.
and
http://www.lacewoodshelties.com/polaris.htm
I looked a bunch of sheltie pics and it seems like there are some strains that are going for the ‘small eye’ eye look.
I ran across these posts on twitter a while back, they are interesting as examples of how merle can affect the eyes in a not so obvious way:
http://equinetapestry.com/2012/02/15/identifying-double-merles/
http://equinetapestry.com/2012/02/19/merles-and-unrelated-eye-defects/
Freaky.
Jess recently posted..Envy Winning Her Second Major
Looked at first link. Cool lesson in merle. So why am I letting it bother me that the Equine Tapestry author refers to the dogs “we sculpt”.
I suppose someone could tell me I’m getting bogged down with semantics perhaps, but that moderator commented somewhere down under her piece, that the lethal gene is not lethal, just “damaging.”
Gee. Nice.
The blog author works at a model company. They literally sculpt animals.
Raegan recently posted..Adam’s Task II: Preface
When you are choosing two dogs to breed, based on how you *think* the puppies might turn out, you are sculpting. You must have missed my reply to you on Scottie’s blog about this very issue:
http://retrieverman.wordpress.com/2012/04/26/english-bulldogs-have-been-screwed-for-a-long-time/#comment-32554
“Oh, please. I am not a ‘show person’, but I will definitely tell you if one has any kind of goal at all in breeding you are definitely sculpting living flesh, combining genes. I set a goal for a breeding, an idea in my head, and I look at the bitch and pick a sire that will allow me to achieve that goal. You must have an eye for it, there are skills to be learned along the way, sure, but you must have the innate eye to see what a dog has and what it can contribute. I know people who have been in dogs a long time and don’t have an eye; mostly, they get lucky.
Art is subjective. The goal for a litter of show puppies and the goal for a cross-breeding may be entirely different but a good breeder is still having an image in their head and doing the breeding in order to see that image become reality.”
And you should be fair and include the whole quote from that blog:
“I would also add that homozygous merle is not truly lethal. Damaging, yes, but not lethal. That distinction is important since horses have a truly lethal gene which shares a name with the slang term (“lethal white”) for homozygous merle. It is also a distinction many who rescue homozygous merles want to emphasize, since the dogs are viable and can be homed.”
Who is being nice now?
But, in this case, she’s talking about actually sculpting animals. Out of clay. To make sculptures.
Raegan recently posted..Adam’s Task II: Preface
Raegan, now I have to laugh at myself.
Jess, yes I do recall your reply from the other post. Thank you.I apologize for the redundancy. I was just expressing a general frustration. Guess I shouldn’t have put it in question form. 🙂
I have a huge appreciation for poetic license and how malleable the English language is. It’s just that when it comes to dog breeding, every breeder I have met who uses these sorts of terms with glee seems to have an inordinate focus on the superficial.
As to including the whole quote, you are right. Now that was a case where someone felt the need to explain the term “lethal” was not quite literal, with respect to the life of the dog in question, theoretically. To my mind it is lethal for a trait such as normal sight or hearing.
And now I recall yes, the strict def for lethal gene is causing the death of the organism carrying it, if able to be expressed. Great. I need more coffee.
I have personally seen this dog and my daughter has given him a bath. He’s NOT blind.
Thank you for posting this. A discussion about double dilute merles came up on a rough collie FB discussion and I remembered this and the other post.
Wow, we are leading parallel lives!
Have you been told that someone ‘just can’t be friends with you’ because you ‘hate everyone who shows?’ Even though you just explained that you co-bred a litter with a show breeder and should have your first home bred champion sometime this year? 🙂
I find it really interesting that some people can’t divorce criticism of the institution from criticism of the individual. Or maybe there are just a lot of people who have poor reading comprehension.
Jess recently posted..Envy Winning Her Second Major
Showies can be like that. I’ve been kicked off the breeders forum on Dogzonline.com.au after being a regular contributor for six years. I’ve sent two emails to the site manager, one to the breeders forum manager, and a post on the forum that deals with Help/Forum Management/Suggestions have yielded no information about why. Could it have something to do with posting questions about double merle and NBT breeding and questioning the top pick at Westminster?
So that means I won’t be getting any new traffic from that forum.
Some of these people are control freaks.
Others bizarrely paranoid.
Others have taken some pills or so kind of potion that destroys their common sense and good judgment.
Retrieverman recently posted..Miley and Rhodie play with the raccoon
It’s part of the group think mentality. Those at the top are pragmatic and know much of it is a sham and a power grab, but the peons must be indoctrinated and true believers. That’s why they are so often much more fanatical in protection of the doctrine.
I’m convinced they call it dog-ma for a reason.
BTW, the chap who asked for the peer reviewed articles didn’t read them.
And he then proceeded to badger me.
Wrong move.
Retrieverman recently posted..Miley and Rhodie play with the raccoon
What would someone who reads that bloviator-blog know about badgers?
No badgers in Virginia or Maryland. I can tell you that.
No setts either. You have to have badgers to have setts.
Retrieverman recently posted..Miley and Rhodie play with the raccoon
He’s the bloated bloviator.
Retrieverman recently posted..Miley and Rhodie play with the raccoon
Maybe that’s why he castrated himself: his chest and gut size is too large to fit down those holes to go after the dogs he accidentally brains with his post hole digger.
He’s very fixated on being small and thin, so maybe he has body dysmorphic disorder in addition to his borderline personality disorder.
Chris is this not like being on the top of a pile of S…? Maybe like starting a war on who has rights to Bird Poop island?
Who wants to have Giardia or Coccida plus.
I first learned the meaning of “Troll” as I was slowly in the process of being kicked off of a breed forum. One of the moderators Private-messaged me asking if I knew what a troll was? Having only joined a few chats until then, I was admittedly ignorant of the term. I was quite taken aback when the definition they sent me included a list of things to look for in a troll, which included “a tendency to talk about the constitution and free speech, freedom to express viewpoints.”
Wow!
Can they not see kicking someone off a forum for differeing veiws is just showing they have something to fear from your opinion, that they know something is a miss. Otherwise would they not just say oh poor such n such has no clue………….
I’m sick of the whole deal I have a women having a go on another forum who has never managed to produce a full litter due to in breeding & the bitch eating all her pups yet wants to critize me for my choices. She has to talk to people outside her country as we all know her go & wont deal with her. Goodnes only knows whats she is saying about me, lol….
Sam
Being kicked off a forum or mailing list is the least of it. I have been harassed via e-mail and regularly get hits on my blog searching for my home address. I’ve been libeled in a breed club magazine. Making false reports to animal control is a common intimidation tactic with some people. I know many people who have been harassed in real life for their views.
The fact that there are very few people who will call out this kind of behavior amounts to tacit approval, and the people who insist “that all breeders aren’t like that” or “we shouldn’t judge” or tell the people who DO speak out that “they just hate all show breeders” is indicative of how very sick dog culture can be.
Jess recently posted..Envy Winning Her Second Major
My local ranger is great she has recieved several compliants about my dogs & often from people who have never even meet me or my dogs, lol. She just sends me a text these days letting me know if someones is ringing about me. She is even on my list if I ever have another TM litter.
What gets me is those complaining have their poor dogs penned & crated for the magority of their lives.
My inbox dose get a bashing some days too.
Sam
I’ve been kicked off just about every forum and yahoo group there is. Those places are rarely tolerant of debate and serious questioning, they are mostly special interest groups with a singular agenda and close minded people in charge.
That’s been my experience, too.
If you’re just a touch stroppy, they get very nasty.
I think you and I are pretty close to stroppy on steroids.
Retrieverman recently posted..Miley and Rhodie play with the raccoon
If ya can’t beat’em Chris, don’t join’em. Start your own blog! Glad you did!
I have been kicked off a few forums for indepdenent thinking myself. A ridgeback forum, two yahoo raw feeder chats, etc. When you can’t tolerate some questions, you are basically saying you want to preach to the choir. Who needs that?
Jane Hammett is also a professional handler. She has bred collies as well. This breeding of blind and deaf collies AFAIK has been going on over 20 years. I find it amazing the collie and Sheltie are not extinct.
Too bad Albert Payson Terhune isn’t alive to comment. (I love this APT photo . . .
http://www.sunnybankcollies.us/images/collies/apt_bruce_lad_wolf.jpg)
The double merle problem may just be one of many problems. According to my mother (b. 1923) breeding for low stop, narrow head, and big coat . . . above working performance . . . had left the collie pretty brainless by the 1960s, compared to the dogs she knew from childhood.
I’m curious, Chris, you give inbreeding %’s. How many generations are behind those numbers? If you look at collie history websites, you find much mention of a few famous dogs. If so, it may take a pretty high N on the COI to get an accurate number.
Jen –
I believe those COI% are based on 10 generations. That’s what the website those images came from claims and I actually made up a 5 generation pedigree on one of the dogs before I found that website and the numbers do align (i.e. my COI5 was less than the COI10 by a few percent).
I again am astounded at this. First the collie and now finding about about these shelties is making me so mad. This behavior should get their kennel kicked out of any AKC event. It’s ridiculous.
The original Sheltie was appropriated by Collie people, who transformed it into a miniature Rough Collie via crossing of the two breeds until the original Sheltie type was destroyed. So it’s not surprising that the culture of the two groups is the same.
And yet time and time again, whenever I hear about the sheltie, the origins are described as if this dog is not related to the collie whatsoever. “Although it looks like a collie in miniature…it is not.”
Slight paraphrasing at the end but that is basically what is announced at every dog show. Every Westminster, every year. And also most recently on Dogs 101.
Yes, and it’s a blatant untruth. The fact that undersized Rough Collies were bred into them during the 1920s to create the modern Sheltie is not a secret. before then, they looked like small Border Collies:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v485/Pietoro/Dog%20Breed%20Historical%20Pictures/Shetland%20Sheepdog/1910_ShetlandSheepdog_CHLerwickRex.jpg
That dog is actually not the original Shetland. If you read the accounts, the dog had to be big enough to retrieve grey seals and be able to catch Shetland Sheep. One would need a large dog to be able to catch sheep.
The photograph is probably evidence of a first-generation Rough Collie-Papillon mix.
Dave recently posted..Research Request: History of the Black Norwegians
Do you really see a Border Collie on the small end of the spectrum being able to haul these to the surface? Even Kishu Kens have a hard-time being able to catch a boar in Japan without being thrashed to death since hunters prefer bay dogs. And that is on the surface, we are talking about a dying underwater bear with flippers.
Dave recently posted..Research Request: History of the Black Norwegians
Shit. Would not embed image:
http://www.canada.com/news/1564825.bin?size=620×400
Dave recently posted..Research Request: History of the Black Norwegians
Even if so, the point is that whatever the original ‘Shetland Sheepdog’ was, the current ‘Mini Rough Collie’ type is nowhere near related to it.
The breed history and name was appropriated by people who wanted to make a Mini Rough Collie; they were not interested in preserving whatever type of dog the Shetland Sheepdog really was. It’s a sham for them to claim otherwise.
I think there were two kinds of Shetland sheepdog.
One was very similar to the Lundehund and Icelandic sheepdog. These islands were once part of Norway, and the Shetlanders once spoke a Norse dialect called Norn.
However, when these islands became part of Scotland, they imported collies, and these dogs supplanted the Scandinavian dogs.
The dogs called shelties– well, I just can’t find evidence that there ever were small collies on the Shetlands. Your original shelties in the ring were smaller dogs than they are now, but Shetland sheep don’t flock. The collies actually had to catch them to control them. So how on earth is a tiny little dog going to catch even somewhat smaller Shetland sheep?
I have a post with all my historical data on it.
I think the dogs called Shelties were created by the dog fancy. The name miniature collie isn’t incorrect. All they did was breed rough collies to papillons and toy spitzes, and then breed for a more collie looking dog. That dog you posted looks to me more like a papillon/border collie cross.
Retrieverman recently posted..Pleistocene coyotes were larger than modern ones
Looks like a mini Border collie.
Jess recently posted..Ding, Ding, Minna, Revisited
I have 2 shelties, but I admit I don’t know much about Sheltie history. However, this is a nice site with photos of earliest shelties:
http://www.portmazathe.nl/ped/statichtml/earliest.html
Some go back as far as 1908. it says this about collies:
”Just to make things more complicated: there were several standards. There was a Scottish, a Brittish and an American standard. E.g. Eltham Park Eureka was not considered a Sheltie in America because Teena was a collie.
This resulted in a lot of close breeding (inbreeding if you like). And even more close breeding. Eventually, some breeders felt the gene pool was becoming too tight, so they used collies.”
Eltma Park Eureka had collie Teena as her great-grandmother (appears twice in the pedigree, she even resembles a sheltie).
I have to say that I see my Shelties in these early dogs. There is more hair on Shelties today, but the faces and structure remain the same. My male’s aunt herself looks like a small tricolor border collie, with her floppy ears. Then again, my breeder breeds Shelties for work, not shows. Today work for Shelties means mostly sport of agility, but what is positive about this is that agility people want structure, functional body, nice working temperament and overall health.
There is another site about Shetland islands with photos of old Shetland dogs.
http://shetlopedia.com/A_Gallery_of_Shetland_Dogs
Just various types of dogs you could find on the islands, not necessarily Shelties. It’s a variety of shepherds, spaniel type dogs, spitzes and some dogs that could resemble a sheltie. Quite a lot of these dogs are very small, they could never be used near seals.
Here in Europe merle to merle is forbidden,as well as merle to sable. It’s pretty common that most breeders test for eyes and MDR1 gene (although not required by our clubs). To get a license to breed a dog, you have to have a general breeding exam done – blind dogs would never pass.
My young sheltie is French, but has quite some US dogs in his pedigree. Sable with floppy ears, round eyes of lighter brown color (hell no!), great structure. I notice that Shelties in the ring (at least in Europe) look totaly different – more a spitz type of head with smaller, darker eyes.
Some of my favourite agility Shelties in Europe (all boring tricolors with health checks) have US fathers (imports) and I know that there is a nice number of US breeders who do breed for sound working temperament, health, structure. At least in my personal experience, US shelties were a positive addition.
This is a very good series on merle, thanks.
As to strategy, what works with breeders in Europe just wont work in the USA. Their breeders are like the BioSensor dogs who wont cross the line without permission. Ours are often more like marti gras night in New Orleans – very late in the night, after hours of parting, marti gras night.
You just can’t say “Don’t breed merle to merle” and expect compliance. It might work better to ban merle in dog shows and dog events, unless the merle is spayed neutered. That will turn the status of merle into “pet dog, not show dog” color.
http://belmarkshelties.com/dash.htm
I was interested in a pup from this breeder until I read they bred two merles. Since then I looked at most of the dogs on their site and noticed many have narrower eyes than the shelties I have/had. More show breeder shelties also have a longer narrower nose and less pronounced stop than what I used to see.
Are shelties now being bred to look more like collies? If so, why?
Does anyone on this blog know of a sheltie breeder that shares your outlook on breeding? If so I’d appreciate the information, thanks.
Either that dog is blinking in every picture, or he has really messed up eyes.
Pai, my first thought was perhaps the dog was squinting in the sun but that simply can’t be the case with every double merle dog photo shown in the internet.
http://members.ncats.net/jdselby/vidalia.html
Another double merle sheltie being bred.
Their “What is a double merle?” link:
http://members.ncats.net/jdselby/dmerle.html
“Merle to Merle breedings should only be done by responsible breeders who are willing to stand behind any puppy they produce that may be affected as a result of doing such a breeding!” What does this mean?
Does it mean they keep and raise all “affected” dogs themselves? Or do they tell prospective buyers their puppy will likely have diminished sight and/or hearing? Do they instead choose not to share the information and wait until the buyers figure it out themselves in the hope the buyers will be too attached to the dog to return it?
I actually have the joy of owning of one Luna’s pups. Luna is the blue merle pictured at the beginning of the article: Shadow Hill’s Star Chaser.
My little tri-color is a wonderful little dog–probably the best and smartest dog I’ve ever had (and I’ve had four Shelties). I believe Jane knows exactly what she’s doing. Does not the article state that this type of breeding should only be done by the most experienced of breeders? Exactly. Oreo wouldn’t be ROM unless he was producing champion offspring.
I don’t know anything about the author of the article so I’ll make no comment about him, but I do know that many times (generally speaking) people on a message board offer opinions about things of which they know very little.
Attack me all you want; it matters not to me. But until you have met Jane and you have actually seen her dogs in person, your opinions may be a bit off.
Whether or not Luna produced good pups regardless of her merle status is irrelevant. The crime is the fact a double-merle was bred and was bred from. Why should her father`s life or her father`s sibling`s quality of life be compromised? Luna, in an abstract sense, would still exist even if a double-merle breeding was not performed.
In Germany, Austria and Switzerland, it is considered as torture-breeding to do merle-to-merle breedings. The Nordic Kennel Clubs refuse to register any progeny which come from a merle-to-merle breeding as well.
Actually if the American breed club is true to the country-of-origin which Shetlands come from they would forbid merle-to-merle breedings as well. The individual breed clubs in the UK and European countries have already banned merle-to-merle breedings based on scientific ground. It is rather abnormal the ANKC, AKC and CKC are the last strongholds which still approve of such archaic combinations.
What Jane is doing would warrant her being banned from kennel clubs overseas and she would be charged as criminal for animal cruelty as well in a select few countries. Experience does not triumph over scientific evidences or statistics.
And no, animal rights activists did not back these laws or reforms in Europe.
Dave recently posted..Trouble in the North
Congratulations, you’ve financially supported a callous breeder who places vanity above health and well-being of the dogs they produce. You must be very proud.
My article does not justify this breeding strategy based upon “experience” or “knowledge” in any way because there is no amount of experience and no knowledge that can give the breeder any ability to mitigate the production of deformed puppies when they breed merle to merle. The ONLY bit of experience or knowledge which can mitigate this from happening is to NOT BREED merle to merle, and this breeder obviously failed at that realization MULTIPLE TIMES over many years.
The breeder’s website attempts to justify this by saying that they have experience and are willing to “take the risk.” Since there is NO ability to change the odds of producing these puppies except not breeding merle to merle and there is no cure or treatment for the defective puppies produced, this breeder is not making a moral justification, they are simply informing us that they are callous enough not to care and well read enough to KNOW full well what they are doing. That’s actually pretty messed up, in my view. They can’t claim ignorance, and they still think this is worth the damage they cause. Very callous.
The “it’s ok if you have enough experience” line is also laughable. It’s like saying “if you are thoroughly familiar with the rules of Russian Roulette, your odds of living are better.” Um no, knowledge of the game in no way changes your odds of survival if you still play the game. The only way to win is to NOT PLAY and the only way to prevent defective double merle puppies is to not breed merle to merle.
‘It’s like saying “if you are thoroughly familiar with the rules of Russian Roulette, your odds of living are better.”’
No, it’s more like them claiming that because they know a lot about Russian Roulette, they’re the best qualified person to be pointing the gun at -other people-.
Because the breeder isn’t the one who suffers when the odds fall against the puppies — it’s the puppy who has to carry the consequences (either by being killed by the breeder when they are born or by living the rest of their life impaired).
I think the point those “experienced” breeders are making is not that they can stack the odds but that they have “carefully” considered all the pros and cons, and consider the potential of producing a “desirable dog” worth the risk of producing a crippled dog.
That makes it pretty bad in my view. It means that this is callous disregard for the health and well being of the dogs for a really worthless “benefit.” It’s very shallow and greedy really. You can have merle without creating doubles and frankly you can have a lot of them. You’re willing to kill off 25% of the litter you used to create the double, create a dog that can not be evaluated in the ring (these people do claim that the ring is where such things need to be done) and then you condemn the dog to a very good chance of very significant impairments just to be used as a breeder that throws merles.
How is that worse than a puppy mill? Torturing breeding animals for the sake of their ability to produce rather non-special but popular puppies.
The problem with that kind of thinking is that it clearly goes against the entire principle of ‘ethical’ breeding, which is that ethical breeders do not produce defective pups ON PURPOSE.
I accept that since we are talking about biological organisms and not mechanical objects, I cannot entirely predict ‘health’ in my puppies. There are going be unhealthy ones, there are going to be dogs that get horrible diseases there are no ‘tests’ for, there are going to be dogs that die young. I understand that there are times when you have to pick your poison, as well; being able to weigh risks and prioritize is important.
Merle x merle is not about prioritizing health issues, it is not about deciding acceptable risk (I don’t think a 25% chance of defect is acceptable, and I am damned sure that the majority of pet owners out there don’t think it is, either) it is about accepting that a breeding WILL produce defective pups. This, to me, says something about that breeders priorities, and it isn’t flattering.
Jess recently posted..My Apologies, a Musical Interlude
“I believe Jane knows exactly what she’s doing. Does not the article state that this type of breeding should only be done by the most experienced of breeders?”
Maybe you can answer a question for me. See, I have Afghan hounds, and they are subject to juvenile cataracts. This is caused by a simple recessive. If I were to breed two dogs that are carriers together, each puppy would have 25% chance of being affected. Such pups would go blind.
Now, in a merle x merle breeding, each puppy has a 25% chance of being developmentally screwed up, which includes vision problems up to and including blindness, small or missing eyes, and varying degrees of hearing loss.
Statistically, both breedings have the same chance of producing messed up pups. Here’s my question: the first breeding would clearly be considered unethical, no matter how experienced the breeder is. Why is the second breeding, the merle x merle breeding, acceptable, as long as the breeder is ‘experienced?’
And what, exactly, does ‘experienced’ mean? Because the rankest, nastiest ‘puppy mill’ has exactly the same statistical chance of producing defective pups in a merle x merle breeding as the nicest, most winningest show kennel. So, ‘ceebee’, can you tell me? What’s the *real* difference between those breeders?
And speaking of experience, I’m looking for a breeder ‘experienced’ enough to breed one of male Salukis. He’s got not one, but two relatives that have died of primary dilated cardiomyopathy, his sire and an uncle. He’s a really, really nice dog, though. My gut feeling, since we don’t have the faintest idea what the inheritance of primary DCM in Salukis is, unlike merle x merle, where we have very good stats, is simply to never breed from him. But he’s sooooo nice. Tell me, ‘ceebee,’ do you think a breeder with enough ‘experience’ could ethically breed from a dog that has two first degree relatives dead from DCM?
Y’all come back, now, ‘ceebee.’ Always nice to have new victims.
Jess recently posted..My Apologies, a Musical Interlude
I also own an “Oreo” offspring who is now a 9 yr old gorgeous silvery blue Merle. Not QUITE breed quality although one of his litter mate sisters is pointed. My boy has tiles in Obedience, Rally, Agility and has his CGC Certificate. Certainly a Well rounded boy but most importantly a beloved member of our family. Wouldn’t part with him for anything. I haved been owned by Shelties for over 40 years and have found that no matter the color or background they all have their own little quirks, and how boring it would be if they were all identical. I trust the breeder with whom I deal whole-heatedly, and believe me, she does not breed indiscriminately or for profit. She is a ROM breeder and is only about intelligent well put together quality dogs.
Shame on you for casually condoning abusive breeding practices that lead to unneeded suffering.
Also, may I ask? Why wait until two years after the event to post this? And do you think the title of the thread is a bit misleading since Luna is not a double merle?
Thank you.
You might want to check the antics surrounding the Rough Collies to understand why the sludge was dragged up two years after the fact.
Dave recently posted..Trouble in the North
I posted this as soon as I found out about it via my own research. Is there a statute of limitations on pointing out unethical and stupid breeding practices?
I don’t doubt that many double merles have small eyes (I’ve seen this in double merle Aussies as well), but I have seen some with perfectly normal-sized eyes. One thing that may make the eyes look smaller is the lack of pigment on the eye rims.
I admit when I saw this I was confused. To me it sounds like you want to blame the fact a blue merle sheltie won best of breed because it had a double merle father. I dont like the breeding of them but it is still gonna happen in puppy mills even once they remove it from breeders. Yes Oreo is a double merle and it sucks that his breeders made the choice. However while this is wrong that a double merle was bred on purpose there is nothing we can do about it now. Demanding that the AKC ban all progney coming from said double merles is faulting a good dog for some one else’s mistakes.
Faulting a good dog? No. The dogs don’t care about ribbons. Banning such dogs and their offspring removes the incentive to continue to breed unethically. If there is no structural consequence to cruel breeding behavior, it is tacitly condoned and will happen more.
The sad fact is, unless you kick these people in the ribbons there won’t be any incentive for them to take the issue seriously or change their behavior.
I just lost my girl..i am look for a blue merle with a lot of with white..they are so pretty…will you have any puppy soon Yvonne reighard
Sorry no, I don’t breed Shelties, nor do I recommend merle dogs especially those with excess white. You’re just asking for vision and hearing problems.