Despite the prevalence of claims that Hollywood drives fads in dog breed popularity, there’s little evidence that this is true. In fact, actual data sharply contradicts the unthinking mantra that popular movies make for popular breeds. The converse is the more likely scenario: already popular dogs get featured in moves. Hollywood mostly follows trends, rarely does it set them.
The often repeated conventional wisdom is that Dalmatian puppy popularity spiked following releases of Disney’s 101 Dalmatians: from the original in 1961 through the re-releases in 1969, 1979, 1985, and 1991; and the live action film in 1996 and its sequel in 2000 with a TV show between them.
The registration data just doesn’t support the idea that every time Disney comes out with a Dalmatian movie the breed experiences a popularity boom as we see just as many declines in popularity or stable runs of popularity as we see increases. If Disney is a factor at all, it’s clearly contingent on a other factors coming together that simply aren’t present during most of their releases.
See if you can spot the complete failure in logic in the following account from multi-dog-book author Elaine Waldorf Gewirtz:
From 1951 until about 1960, the Dalmatian ranked around 30th in the United States, as indicated by AKC registrations. When the animated film 101 Dalmatians made its debut in 1961, the public rushed out and bought Dal pups because they seemed so cute and cuddly in the movie. Their ranking continued to climb from 27th place in 1988, to 15th place, then ninth in 1992. The media further catapulted the Dalmatian’s popularity by using its image in numerous television commercials, billboards and print advertisements.
So in the decade before the movie was first released the Dalmatian dog was ranked 30th in the country and after a supposed Dalmatian-puppy-rush the breed was still ranked about 30th nearly 30 years and FOUR trips to the big screen later. So there was no evidence of any significant boost in popularity from the original film.
If the movie is a potent driver of popularity, how come we don’t see any effect at all from the 1960s to the 1980s?
But Dalmatians DID have a popularity boom. Starting in 1983 and lasting until 1993 AKC registrations of Dalmatians had a string of positive yearly growth that quickly passed 10% per year and flirted with 40% growth per anum. But 1983 was 4 years after the last theatrical release and 2 years before the next release of 101 Dalmatians. Is the 4th time the charm?
The dates of the movie releases do not represent profound shifts in Dalmatian popularity; rather, they are congruous with pre-existing trend lines. The most significant rates of increase occur between releases and in the case of the 1985 release the rate of growth accelerates as we move away from the release, peaking BEFORE the 1991 release. It’s a strange trend that grows stronger the further you get away from the supposed initiating event.
The rate of increase actually began to fall after the 1991 release turned sharply negative just two years later.
The 1996 live-action movie was released when the breed was already 3 years into a steep decline in AKC registrations and the two years following the film were the most significant declines. By 1999 the registration numbers were lower than any time in the preceding twenty years. The live-action movie and its sequel in 2000 not only didn’t create a fad they did nothing to stop an aging fad from dying rapidly.
This readily available fact doesn’t stop the bullshit-mill from repeating the story though. Take this 1997 story from the New York Times:
In the movie, the Dalmatians are cute and fun. But at home, they shed, tend to snap and sometimes bite, and often do not particularly like children, former owners complain.
Animal shelters around the country have reported sharp increases in the number of unwanted Dalmatian dogs this year, many of them given to children as gifts last Christmas after the release of Disney’s remake of the movie ”101 Dalmatians.” Although nationwide figures are not available, some shelters say they have seen the number of abandoned dogs more than double and that they fear the problem will only grow worse with the new ”101 Dalmatians” television program on ABC.
A spokeswoman for the American Humane Association, Joyce Briggs, said that the group planned to survey members at its annual meeting next month to find out the extent of the abandoned-Dalmatian problem.
Well isn’t that fantastic? We have lots of CLAIMS of increases but NO ACTUAL DATA! (But we’ll look into it next month and um, not get back to you). I’ve already documented that the “Christmas Puppy” epidemic is a myth.
In South Florida, where animal control officers in Dade and Broward Counties say they have seen up to a 35 percent increase in Dalmatian returns, animal shelters say owners have found the dogs high-strung, willful and aggressive. The dogs also require lots of exercise and in some cases special care because of health problems associated with indiscriminate breeding.
Animal rights advocates say movie and television exposure can increase numbers. In the case of Dalmatians, they say, amateur breeders and so-called puppy mills flooded the market when the 1961 cartoon version was re-released in 1985 and 1991, and after the 1996 movie remake.
If the shelters are so sensitive to Dalmatian numbers, why on earth didn’t they report on the 9-fold increase in dogs you’d expect to see between 1980 and 1995? By the time this article was written, Dalmatian numbers were in a nose dive. And the only Flordia link I’ve found is by a single woman rescue, not “animal control officials,” and you’ll notice that they don’t include the AGE of the dogs that are supposedly flooding in to their shelters. If they did, do you think they’d support the idea that these dogs were juveniles purchased because of the movie 6 months before or were they juveniles and adult dogs that were purchased during the huge boom which occurred outside of a convenient movie release?
Even Wikipedia repeats the fable and provides a source. But when we look at the link it’s to a 2003 Press Release from the Marine Aquarium Council and claims:
(Hollywood, Calif.) Rewind to the summer of 1996: Following the release of the Disney’s blockbuster 101 Dalmatians, families flocked to pet stores to buy Dalmatian puppies. Fast forward to the present: As Disney and Pixar are preparing to release their new animated feature, Finding Nemo, the marine aquarium industry anticipates a similar interest in a new type of pet—tropical fish.
Well, the live action film didn’t even debut until November of 1996, so no one was buying Dalmatian puppies that summer in response to the film. And as we can clearly see no new rush happened in the summer of 1997 (or any year since) either! That’s not legitimate documentation, it’s simply another uninformed and unsubstantiated repeating of the rumor. Rubbish! The rest of the Wikipedia coverage isn’t any better.
101 Dalmatians
The Dalmatian breed experienced a massive surge in popularity as a result of the 1956 novel The Hundred and One Dalmatians written by British author Dodie Smith, and later due to the two Walt Disney films based on the book. The Disney animated classic[31] released in 1961, later spawned a 1996 live-action remake, 101 Dalmatians. In the years following the release of the second movie, the Dalmatian breed suffered greatly at the hands of irresponsible breeders and inexperienced owners. Many well-meaning enthusiasts purchased Dalmatians—often for their children—without educating themselves on the breed and the responsibilities that come with owning such a high-energy dog breed.[32]Dalmatians were abandoned in large numbers by their original owners and left with animal shelters. As a result, Dalmatian rescue organizations sprang up to care for the unwanted dogs and find them new homes. AKC registrations of Dalmatians decreased 90% during the 2000–2010 period.[33]
I’ve already established that no “massive surge in popularity” happened in the 1950s or 1960s or 1970s, so the entire first premise is simply not true for the USA.
I’ve already established that NOTHING happened following the release of the second movie, either and that breed popularity was already plummeting before and continued after its release.
The claim that Dalmatian registrations plummeted 90% between 2000 and 2010 in response to a backlash against the reality of owning a Dalmatian compared to the movie is a lie, too. While the reasons for the drop are conjecture, the statistic itself is absolutely false. The highest yearly registration for Dalmatians came in 1993 with 42,816 and by 1997–the first year we’d see an effect from a late 1996 release–the registration numbers were already down to 22,726 and 9,722 the next year. By 1999 the total was 4652, an 89% drop from the high and this all occurred before the year 2000 when it was supposed to have started. The decline continued but not nearly at the same pace and a new floor was established over the second half of the next decade at around 1,000 dogs registered per year.
If Disney movies had any appreciable effect on Dalmatian popularity, it’s a very curious phenomenon. No measured increased associated with the landmark debut in 1961, no bump from the 1969 re-release either. No particular improvement from the third outing in 1979.
By 1985 we’re already seeing an upward trend and the year following the fourth release isn’t spectacularly abnormal either. The 1991 release is right in the middle of the boom but even then the year before is more impressive than the year after, and if we’re to believe that the bubble has staying power from 1985, we don’t see it happening after 1991 when the tide soon begins to go out on the breed.
The live-action movie, the TV show, and the sequel don’t even move the needle from the precipitous crash even though the proceeding boom means that there must be plenty of breeding dogs available that could be used to expand the numbers to meet demand.
I was a child of the 1980s and after the disastrous Carter presidency and optimism and economic boom under Reagan there was a clear cultural shift toward conspicuous consumption and pampering the children of the baby-boom “me” generation. I remember vividly how quickly and ferociously fads came and went, especially involving items marketed for children (He-Man and G.I. Joe existed as cartoons simply to push plastic action figures in stores). The must-have toy of Christmas 1985 was a Teddy Ruxpin and my mother had to brave the brutality of other desperate mothers descending on Toy-R-Us stores to get me one. As with most other children that year, mine was defective and had to take a “vacation” early in 1986 back to the factory for repair/replacement.
This is the very same time we see the huge increase in Dalmatian breeding and it’s possible that years of pent up lust for Dalmatians driven by over-exposure to the Disney film finally made parents relent and buy the dogs in celebration of good times and a desire to own one that they hadn’t displayed in the previous 20 years. But I think it’s much more likely that the 4th release of the film is simply coincidental and not causal to the fad. If it is causal, we most certainly have to acknowledge that other factors played a much larger part given that the exact same film released 6 years previous and two times before that, had no appreciable effect.
In my next post I’ll examine the concomitant blame for the rise and fall of Dalmatians that likewise doesn’t align well with the evidence.
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I have no firm opinion on “101 Dalmatians” and ‘breed popularity’, but I think using AKC statistics only to support your argument is a bit flawed. Many dogs are bred that aren’t AKC registered. Debatably, these unregistered/’backyard bred’ dogs were the ones that actually swamped the market, and not their AKC registered kin.
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Oh, but the difference is that the people who keep repeating the same claims over and over again don’t publish ANY statistics. So I’ll take what data I can get. This isn’t a question of data vs. data, but data vs. myth. And even incomplete data is superior to myth.
Nothing is worse than repeating myths and claiming that there’s no way to prove it because all the effect must be otherwise invisible.
I agree that using AKC statistics is better than using no statistics which, you’re right, the myth is pretty much based on (i.e. no evidence).
I don’t know if dogs have to be registered with councils or counties or something in the states, but that may be a place to seek data, too. I know that in Australia, according to council statistics, in the top 10 most popular breeds is the Maltese. But, according to ANKC statistics, only 305 dogs in total were bred and registered Australia wide last year. If such a discrepancy could happen in Australia, it could also happen in the USA. This is one really clear example which shows that kennel club registrations don’t necessarily tee up with what pet people own (or believe they own).
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AKC statistics are certainly limited in regards to certain breeds. 10x as many Border Collies are registered with the ABCA as the AKC every year. We also see AKC registrations dropping like a stone but I don’t think anyone is seeing dog ownership dropping.
But that’s not a problem, because if you want to claim that a boom happened, you’ll also have to say that the AKC numbers are immune from that boom. I don’t see how you can in this case. There’s no independent Dalmatian registry of note. There is also the fact that the AKC numbers DID have a huge spike! Well, what caused that? Why did that happen then, but it didn’t happen 4 times before and it didn’t happen after either?
I’d love to get inside the AKC’s data and pick apart just HOW that boom happened. Where did those dogs come from, where did they go. How did they breed so many dogs in so few years, etc. LOTS of questions. But those are the sorts of things they don’t advertise.
Remember too that the AKC is the registry of the Puppy Mill / Pet store industry and if there was a boom in the Dalmatian market, it’s inconceivable that those places would fail to take advantage of it in such a manner that NO appreciable difference would be seen.
Seeing just how big the bubble was, I’d say that it’s not inconceivable that the majority of those numbers might come from the Hunte Corporation whose board might have made a decision to gear up for Dalmatians and produce as many as possible and put as many as possible in stores.
I’m not aware of their inner workings, but you have to guess that the sorts of dogs they have for sale are not organic, but chosen.
If it’s not the work of a planned calculus and it is “organic” and all these thousands of separate breeders decided to get into the breed in that decade and produce a ton of puppies, I’d want a lot more data to support “Disney did it!” because it takes YEARS AND YEARS to respond to demand for livestock, you can’t just produce a ton more next year than you did this year, you have to grow breeding stock numbers and that takes years.
It’s hard to believe that the movie would have enough staying power to keep driving that sort of growth year after year.
Anecdotally (and this is PURE anecdote) I volunteered at a shelter in an Chicago suburb for many years during the time the live-action 101 Dalmatians was popular, and we DID see a spike in Dalmatians arriving at the shelter. We had 20 runs, and for a time 4-5 of those runs were occupied by Dalmatians. Never saw that many Dalmatians in one place before or since.
Also anecdotally (based on information I have seen working with rescue and surfing commercial breeder websites) one of the reasons AKC registrations are declining is that commercial breeders (AKA puppy mills) are less and less likely to use AKC as their registry of choice. This MAY be due to AKC’s response to pressure from various sources. I have “papers” for a couple of the dogs I have fostered that are not AKC (rescue doesn’t pass on papers as a matter of policy), one of which (bought at a pet store) came from a notoriously awful puppy mill, thankfully now closed.
In any issue regarding myths regarding impact of movies and books on pure breed dog breeding there exist truths. The first truth that comes to mind is Lassie. The once over popular breed that more than likely led to unsound breeding practices to gain revenue.
However, there is a new better story that lies behind the Great Dane breeders of today’s dilemma of the Harlequin Dane, Marmaduke a fawn Great Dane movie. The public demand for a fawn pigmented Great Dane rather than a black/white spotted Dane is helping turn the tide for the breed.
I would doubt that Dalmations are one of the breeds that are often bred without AKC (or at the very least UKC) registration. If the breed in question was coonhounds or Border Collies or APBTs, I would be more likely to accept the assertion that “Many dogs are bred that aren’t AKC registered.”
Exactly, none of those breeds are captured well in AKC numbers. Sadly, I don’t see anyone else posting historical numbers to use. And we do see a huge bump within the AKC so it’s not like we can claim they are a tangential registry when they were at some points producing over 40k dogs per year. There’s NO way you’re going to convince me that was necessary to support the fancy dogs that trot around the ring. They seem to be doing ok with 1/40th that many dogs being produced each year.
Does the ABCA publish registration numbers? Border collies had a real flurry of activity in the mid-90’s – the movie “Babe” came out, they were recognized by the AKC, and “The Intelligence of Dogs” rated the breed as #1. There was also sweet Murray on “Mad About You”, and probably others I’m forgetting.
I’m curious if the ABCA numbers spiked during the popularity boom, since they’d already been registering BCs for 10-15 years, and were/are the biggest BC registry.
I remember a friend of mine getting a Dalmatian puppy for his birthday one year. This would have been mid-nineties. I remember thinking “This is a response to 101 Dalmatians and that dog is going to be aggressive and bite someone.” Sure enough, that dog didn’t make it to adulthood. Though in hindsight, I wonder if it wasn’t just lack of socialization and puppy mouthing instead of real aggression.
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I’ll get to why Dalmatians are nasty dogs in the next post. It’s not socialization, it’s related to their coat color.
Ah yes Dals…..some of this is linked to former discussions here.
Dalmatians, coach dogs, work horses by heeling them, which got the fire wagon to the fire faster (which is how they ended up on fire trucks). They also RUN…..a lot! And those spots (on white)? More problems from extreme white piebald and pigment issues. You know, like deafness. So now a kid gets a Dal that needs a ton of exercise and is “spooky” and bites because it is either bilaterally or unilaterally deaf. Another breed train wreck that’s hard to not watch.
Even though it doesn’t tell you the full number AKC registration numbers do paint a picture. Although it’s not very useful with dogs like Pit bulls and Border collies.
Disney isn’t the only one to blame,the movie the Omen was blamed for the surge of popularity in Rottweilers.
Which makes more sense,but there is still many factors to it then just the movie.
The movie was first released in 1976,it had sequels in the late 70’s and 80’s,and a remake in 2006. They where also seen in other horror movies like”Rottweiler:hounds of hell.
AKC registration for Rottweilers is this,I got from the book Fatal Dog Attacks
1965-69: 1,712
1970-74: 3,222
1975-79: 9,961
1980-84: 50,952
1985-89: 181,344
1990-94: 439,561
1995-99: 355,797
In 1976:1406,in 1977:1878 registered(from the book The Literary dog)
So they where 49th most registered dog,and in the early 90’s the second most registered dog.
I`m not sure of more recent numbers,but it seems to have gone down. They are still seen in media,even seen more in movies then Pit bulls,yet Pit bulls are much more popular now days.
Dalmatians are high energy dogs,that need a lot of training and exercising,and also have some health problems. These people I`m sure never did their research and ended up with too much dog on their hands.
Rottweilers,German Shepherds,and Pit bulls are definitely not dogs for the average joe. Yet at some point everyone felt like they had to get one.
NIce crap detection.
I presume the ‘so what’ follow-up is in the works.
In anticipation, may be worth looking at the Finnish ’cause of death’ data to evaluate how much of a mess dallies are in relation to other breeds. See:
http://jalostus.kennelliitto.fi/frmTerveystilastot.aspx?R=153&Lang=en
(choose health statistics, scroll to cause of death. These data are harsh and show surprisingly low life expectancies for most breeds, so make sure to do some comparisons).
Looks like dallies aren’t that extreme. The deaths attributed to euthanasia for behavioural reasons are a little high–but well below the equivalent statistics for the American Staffordshire bull terrier. Their average life expectancy, at 9.5 years, is longer than that for the border collie, at 9.0 years.
I’m not sure how we can get a clear picture with that data. For example, with unilateral and bilateral deafness one would expect a high incidence of behavioral problems (13), but there were 13 non-diagnosed, 16 due to accident, 4 to skin or ear disease which makes me question this data, 2 lost and 63 cause of death not specified.
I can assure you, there were far more than 4 dogs with ear problems in a breed were conservatively, something in the order of 1 out of every 3 ears doesn’t function.
Out of the 316 dogs for which there is data provided in the latest time frame, I would be willing to bet that approximately 3/4 of the above fatalities were related in some way to deafness in one or both ears.
I’d be interested in seeing similar stats comparing registrations after other movies or shows that feature dog breeds, like “Lassie” “Big Red”, and “Rin Tin Tin”. You’ll never convince me that “Beverly HIlls Chihuahua” had anything to do with that breed’s popularity which was already well-established before any movie was done. Did “Ol Yeller” spur a spike in large, yellow mixed breed dog ownership? Guess we’ll never really know, but I’m betting that some folks out there might have drawn that conclusion or perhaps believe that the yellow lab is popular now due to that one since the dog in the movie closely resembled a lab.
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I will be doing more posts on this topic, but getting data that old is difficult. That doesn’t stop people from making the claims about Lassie and Big Red and Tin Tin Tin (the AKC even put out an announcement which claimed these) but those don’t really ring true if you think about it. Those breeds were popular BEFORE those shows.
And somewhere in all the reading I did for this Dalmatian post, the “Beverly Hills Chihuahua” one stuck out as I read someone said nope, didn’t have any effect, which was refreshing given all the unsourced nonsense making great claims otherwise. I’ll try and dig that up again.
When I saw the 1996 movie in the theater, there was a disclaimer before the film started – something to the effect of “Dalmatian puppies are cute, but make lousy pets”. There was also a table out front staffed by rescue people (or breed club members, but probably rescue people) wearing anti-Dal tee shirts and handing out anti-Dal literature. There were also a couple letters to the editor and articles in the paper along the same lines. After all that hoopla, it’s not surprising that registrations dropped the way they did.
And of course there’s no doubt SOME people would be (1) influenced by a film and (2) in a position to buy a dog. But really how common do we think both of those scenarios are? Dogs are not really impulse buys and they are not cheap and the ability of a movie to create a lasting demand for something is suspect.
Collie registrations did spike after “Lassie Come Home”, and stay high through the fifties and sixties thanks to the incredibly popular TV show, but purebred dogs in general became more popular in the postwar years. Lassie just happened to put the collie in the right place (the public eye) at the right time (economic boom and baby boom). Looking at the registration numbers of one breed only gives part of the picture.
The most recent Lassie reboots, in 1994 and 2005, didn’t do much for the breed’s popularity. After the most recent one, though, some rescues reported a sharp rise in inquiries.
I had a dalmatian during my childhood for a short period of time. I acquired him when he was 3 years old through my mothers new boyfriend. He was probably a direct result of the ’91 re-release of 101 Dalmatians as his age, although not confirmed, would have placed his birth date in the early 90’s.
He probably was not registered, but as he was my mothers, boyfriend’s dog, I have no clue.
All I do know, is that he was returned to his breeder 3 times before Rich (mother’s boyfriend) bought him.
He had aggression issues and hated anyone outside the immediate family. My brother (who is 11 years my senior and was in college at the time) has told me about how whenever he visited, he would have to re-introduce himself to my Dal, Haggis to avoid being bitten.
I loved that dog despite all his issues and I truly wish I wasn’t so young at the time. I wish I could have “fixed” him.
I also remember we were the only family in the area to have a Dalmatian until 1997. That school year I remember walking home and seeing a dalmatian puppy.
So although I don’t believe the films had a huge impact on the number of registered Dalmatians being born, I think the BYB’s tended to try and cash in on the film’s success.
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The problem with the “BYB” theory is where do they get all these dogs? And how do they ramp up their breeding to meet demand? It’s really not easy getting into dog breeding and it’s also not easy pushing out more than one litter a year, let alone buying and raising the numbers of mature bitches that it would take to really get into the Dalmatian puppy business.
In doing my Sheep Industry post, I kept reading about how cyclical the industry is because it takes several YEARS to respond to trends in demand. You can’t just produce 20% more sheep next year than this since these aren’t on-demand machines, they are animals and they have to be kept intact and allowed to mature before we can start breeding them.
Also, there’s the fact that the ‘moneygrubber breeders’ would have to dump their previous stock en masse as well. Wouldn’t that result in a big spike of shelter-dumps of their ‘uncool’ purebreds soon after the films? Seems to me that would be the most immediate result if this claim was true, since as you’ve said it’d a while to breed up enough Dalmatians in numbers that would be in any way noticeable in response to the movies.
Someone said Finnish Kennel Club has evidence via KoiraNet registrations jumped after Beethoven was released in 1992.
Statistics on St. Benernards from 1988 to 2012:
http://jalostus.kennelliitto.fi/frmJalostustilastot.aspx?R=61&Lang=en
Can’t seems to find data before 1988 to ensure it wasn’t an established trend before the movie.
2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 2001 2000 1999 1998 1997 1996 1995 1994 1993 1992 1991 1990 1989 1988
Offspring (domestic) 55 115 112 142 96 90 94 121 64 113 51 55 102 151 144 188 212 327 257 423 522 573 543 455 431 356
Imports 5 11 15 19 17 23 11 6 17 13 12 1 2 5 6 4 3 8 1 4 11 6 18 11 10 5
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I’m telling you that this film in no way makes you want to buy a St. Bernard. Half the film is the dog tearing things up!
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Marley & Me got the same claim, and that entire movie is about a Lab that’s hell to live with!
Labs were already number 1 with the AKC when that movie and book came out!
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The fact there seems to be an upward trend from 1988 to 1992 before entering a decline doesn’t really tel us much. We would need a more complete data-set from before 1988 to figure out if there is a sudden spike or a steady climb.
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Yahoo recently had an article on breeds which dropped the most in popularity.
URL: http://shine.yahoo.com/pets/20-dog-breeds-fallen-popularity-over-past-decade-122000047.html
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How I wish there were lists of the most healthy dogs. You know like the ten most healthy breeds today…….its always the ten most popular or the ten most rare or the ten most expensive, even the ten most desirable, or ten that have dropped in popularity never the ten most healthy.
What about an authority on the ten most healthy…..this could help people a lot to choose a dog breed if they were after a breed or type.
even your photos are completely biased. Why do you hate Dalmatians so much? In my experience Dalmatians are nice dogs. You definitely have an ax to grind and it does you a disservice.
It’s a real photo of a real Dalmatian. I don’t much care if you think I’m “biased” because what is that supposed to mean in this context? Am I rationally against breeding deaf dogs? Yes! Am I logically against breeding within a closed gene pool to maintain type at the loss of health, well being, and vitality? Of course. Am I emotionally against breeding dogs that chronically urinate sharp crystalline stones leading to needless pain and suffering? You bet.
Do I fundamentally believe that breeding unsound dogs – unsound in mind and/or body is unethical? Yes. Do I think that producing overly shy and reactive and prone to bite dogs is a moral hazard for both humans and the dogs themselves because both are likely to come to harm? 100%. I don’t bring up these issues just to piss on Dalmatians and feel superior, I bring them up because they NEED to be fixed and they are an example of the chronic and widespread problems in pedigree dog breeding that place blood purity and fashion above sound minds and sound bodies in ALL dog breeds.
So if I’m “biased” it’s in favor of the well being of these dogs. And I see no crime in that.
I would be interested in knowing how often Dalmatians started showing up in ad print just prior to and during their population boom.
And this includes ad print for the kennel clubs.
It makes sense that they would be used for that — they are very eye-catching — and have two factors most dogs don’t have: a friendly, dog next door vibe to their look (just their look mind you; they have that sporty, family dog appearance); and yet due to the coat they can be made to look opulent.
In short, a dog that’s already photogenic + instills within its outward appearance the two cultural big things of the ’80s; that’s a dream combo for advertisement.
For the dog and its erstwhile owners, not so much.
It’s a shame, because they really are pretty dogs — but they have all sorts of problems, and yes, let’s be honest — temperment is one of them (there are some sweet ones out there, but few and far between, and sadly not the healthiest animals I’ve seen).
Carter was a pretty good president. Reagan wrecked the American economy and presided over the crack era.
Carter was a spineless national embarrassment that we’re still apologizing for today.
Ronald Reagan was a visionary whose legacy will far transcend many presidents before him and all of the ones since.
And there it is. I’m sorry but I find it very difficult to grant you any credibility in any area reading what you have said here. Reagan was not “a visionary”, he was, at best, an actor who was a puppet for his advisors and, at worst, a criminal who masterminded Iran-Contra. Carter was not “spineless” as it took a LOT of guts to stand up to the American public and tell them the truth when they didn’t want to hear it. He was able to negotiate peace between Egypt and Israel (which exists even today) plus all the wonderful work he has done with Habitat for Humanity and the United Nations. To steer this back to the topic at hand, I don’t blame Disney exclusively but rather the culture of consumption on demand that allows people who have done no research to walk into a pet store and purchase a puppy solely because their credit is good.
People can walk into a “pet-store” and purchase a puppy even without good credit. The financial collapse of 2008-2015 tells us that. They were buying houses with bad credit never mind cute pet-shop impulse purchases. One of the little national side effects of supposedly free money.
I walked into a pet-shop yesterday with good credit and good intentions trying to buy a product not available anywhere else. Of course I was momentarily side tracked by the puppies stacked in their cage apartments.
There was a Border Collie about three months old throwing itself from one corner of the cage to the other like a seasoned zoo animal displaying stereotypic behaviours. Its head was damaged from bashing into the 1X1meter cage’s water bottle fixed in one corner. I expect no one had impulse purchased it as a wee puppy for the same reason. Next door a pug puppy was out for the count on its back in alarmingly noisy and deep sleep apnoea. Above a JRt was mauling a long haired Dachshund pup whose breed although plucky at the best of times had given up the fight and was crying instead.
I left as soon as possible but these haunting images these shops leave are always with me. And yes fashion and the media dictate a lot what kind of breeds you find in there, definitely.
It used to be here at least assorted mini and somewhat larger Schnauzer puppies.
Our local TVBPearl TV station had a programme about pets and the star “host” was a talking Schnauzer of uncanny brilliance but little perception. There were literally thousands of Schnauzers on the streets in rehoming and in pet-shops. It retired eventually, probably dying from verbal diarrhoea and after awhile there were definitely many many more Schnauzers in rehoming facilities than pet-stores or on the streets. For whatever reason poodles are now it along with Japanese type dogs that look exactly like a red fox.
I don’t think the Cantonese Chinese are more prone to this sort of thing than any other dog buying public but who knows. The Schnauzer was it’s true very fluent in Cantonese?
Oooops politics, Im steering clear of this one, just to say Reagan was considered brainless outside of America, literally the president who had an empty cranium, and it was Nancy with all the presidents men that ruled that country.
Others think Margrete Thatcher and Reagan won the cold war, others think that impossible one without a brain and all and that it was Mikhail Gorbachev that ended the cold war. Thatcher and Reagan merely noisy witnesses to history. They certainly were noisy.
Most outside America like Carter thinking he was/is a pretty clued up man but the oil crises f’up his presidency and there must be some truth in that as the oil crises almost f’up up the world too.
What I think is immaterial (: this is about dogs isn’t it?
I know what I think about Disney but Dalmatians Im not so sure I still have to read the blog entry but Im sure I will emerge enlightened.
Dalmatians in America may not have surged with the movie One Hundred and One’ but I do know that there are thousands literally thousands of JRTs called Milo in shelters across the globe.
From Johannesburg to Bangkok from Mumbai to Amsterdam…problem Milo’s await their “forever home” and luckier thousands still in their “forever homes”, all shapes and sizes.
Now I think its must be safe to assume because of the name that this came about because of the movie “The Mask” with the almost uniformly brilliant and talented Jim Carrey and Max also talented who plays “Milo” the JRT dog.
I don’t have any data to back up my claim just Google “Milo the Jack Russell” and see for yourself how many there are.
Maybe Milo in “The mask” left a greater impression than did the Dalmatians in “A hundred and One Dalmatians” and maybe Dark Horse Entertainment outshone Disney on this one?
Personally I was all eyes for the Borzoi part in the 1996 version 101 Dalmatians “Digger” played by the Borzoi Uncle Zeke none of the Dalmatians or any of the other dogs left much of an impression.
Pity Digger had such a cameo bit part I feel he could have lifted the movie to greater heights had he been given a leading role.
Anyway side tracked there JRTs called Milo weren’t that popular before The Mask where they? Mostly it was the horsey and game keeper types that kept JRTs including my own and hardly any if any were called “Milo”. Though in America Im not sure.
Guys, I have adopted two dalmatians from shelters. One was found on the street with a broken leg and the other was given up by his owner. One is 12 years old the other is two. The 12 year old has had ONE urinary tract infection–he got some antibiotics and was fine after that. He also started losing his hearing last year….but he is something like 80 years old in dog years, so I’d say that’s somewhat normal. He has NEVER had any stones. As for disposition, these dogs are kind and playful, and kind of goofy—I have only seen the older one snarl once or twice (at dogs he was trying to protect me from)—- but they do require regular exercise and attention or they will be destructive. And yes, if you’ve got kids or elderly people around, you need to be cautious—the dalmatian is energetic and it can knock people over unintentionally. Dalmatians are also smart…but they will try to test you. The owner must be firm and patient. They are not for everyone–again these are active dogs and they NEED attention. While I’m sure there are some breeding problems that account for bad behavior….the dogs I have are good, healthy dogs that just needed a little extra TLC.
That’s great, Nik!
I don’t think you’ll see anywhere in my article the claim that every single Dalmatian is going to come down with an infection from stones. And your dogs could very well have stones without getting an infection from them. Most people and animals carry their stones for a long time before one tries to pass and gets stuck causing an infection.
Environment plays a rather large roll in urinary problems as they are not simply a matter of genetics, of which every non-LUA Dalmatian (basically 99%+) has the genes that predispose them to the issue, anything from the food you feed to the pH of the water your dog drinks.
And a genetic predisposition is not destiny. It’s just not something that A BREEDER SHOULD RELY ON in trying to make the dogs better. That’s the point of this article, pointing out that breeding culture has created a situation where breeders put tradition and artificial ideas like closed gene pools above the actual health and interests of their breeds.
That’s undeniable.
It’s not surprising that your dogs have not had issues. You’re welcome to look at incidence rates for Dalmatians and while they are certainly many many times more likely than other breeds who do not have a bad allele at saturation level, it’s not a guarantee.
Nor is there any indication in my article that all Dalmatians are going to be neurotic biting messes that are guaranteed to kill everything and melt into puddles insecurity, or anything of the sort. It’s an analysis of major issues that make this breed statistically different from dogs-on-average and which are not things that are good for the dogs or their owners, and things which CAN BE FIXED.
That’s the point. There are many many people who have wonderful Dalmatians which have wonderful lives. My article is neither evidence against that nor is that evidence against my article.
Just came across this article (with the vicious-looking photo) and the other one that says these dogs are a “train wreck” and felt compelled to share my experience. Obviously my experience with these dogs has been much more positive. And yes, I agree, if there is a way to breed dalmatians, or any other dog for that matter, so they don’t have stones and other health issues down the line, I’m all for it.
I remember the warnings which came out when one of the Dalmatian movies did. It said not to buy a Dalmatian. That might have counter-acted the idea of getting a Dalmatian on impulse.
It might have even gone beyond what was intended, and crashed the breed because people remembered the warning for years afterward, and there are probably people who will always remember the warning to not buy this breed.
But the other side of these numbers are the people who never read the warning, ignored the warning, or have forgotten the warning.
Also, the non-impulsive buyers who need to replace their dog years after the movie. Will they remember both the movie and the warning?
And the people who saw the movie when they were children, the warning probably flew right over their head. Seeing a movie as a child can set emotional outlooks for life.
Advertisers pay for ads because they work. People buy things they see on TV. That can include animals. How many kids wanted an owl or a dragon after watching Harry Potter movies?
Yes I definitely had the urge to want an owl, a snowy owl from the Arctic Tundra.
However a tiny Pearl-spotted Owlet from Africa would’ve been as good if not better for ease of keep and cute factor.
Unfortunately even the smallest amount of research tells us they don’t make very good pets.
Not only do they shit through their mouth at you but what actually comes out the anus is a gush of horrific smelling liquid likened to the smell of public sewerage works stage one and in the same quantity.
They are not social animals so don’t like being petted, in fact petting them can kill them as it removes the waterproof layer from their feathers so if they get wet they catch pneumonia, “bird flu” just want I want in the house. They have razor sharp beaks and claws so are no fun to tangle with.
They are nocturnal which means they sleep all day. Not much fun there either.
Lastly you need a deep freeze full of little frozen fluffy animals to thaw in your kitchen every evening as this is what they need to eat and often as they have raging appetites. Thick as planks too so a finger might do as well as a half frozen hamster will.
Loud, aggressive and wild. You will need to learn falconry to keep one as that’s the only interaction you will have. Flying onto your arm while you encourage it to take small bits of diced small mammals and baby chicks from your gloved hand. Back to thick as a plank, its likely to get lost in training so you need a large avery long enough for falconry training at least 20 meters.
There are cleverer birds of prey for falconry.
They breed easily in captivity, not a plus.
I was put off the idea. I came pretty close when my house keeper arrived with four beautiful perfectly round paper white owl eggs she saved from tree felling exercise in the garden. She has a thing for the gardener.
Luckily they didn’t hatch, not from want of trying but the embryo’s must been a little shaken when the tree came down as they lingered in the incubator developed eyes then went black and died. The house keeper was devastated as she had given them all names in a language I still and will never be able to learn to speak.
Far sooner smile when I hear their cooing in the forest at night and think isn’t that nice.