There’s a lot of blame to go around concerning why Dalmatians are a train wreck of a breed and the favorite targets of such scorn are Disney and Backyard Breeders. Neither of these are responsible for the problems facing Dalmatians, being a Dalmatian is the one and only factor to blame. By this I mean that the major issues facing the breed {predisposition toward deafness, urinary stone disease, and temperament problems} are all intrinsic, universal, and inextricable from the breed.
The pervasive issue with urinary stones can be solved by changing very little of what we understand a Dalmatian to be (just one gene out of 19,300 need change), but the pureblood brigade is resisting the only fix for this universal problem (every dog in the breed has two copies of the bad gene), as it would require violating their fundamentalist and inane orthodoxy of breed purity. The other two issues can not be solved without robbing Dalmatians of their signature looks: their spotted coat.
Deafness in Dalmatians isn’t caused by over-breeding, popularity swings, or backyard breeders. It’s caused by the predominance of white in the Dalmatian coat caused by the extreme piebald allele (sw). ALL Dalmatians are susceptible to acquiring coat-related deafness and the more extreme the whiteness, the greater chance of deafness; i.e. dogs with blue irises or missing tapetal pigmentation are more likely to be deaf. And the rates of deafness are not as favorable as you’ve probably read. In 2003, Strain recorded 7.5% bilateral deafness and 18% unilateral deafness. In 2004, he documented 8% bilateral deafness and 22% unilateral deafness in Dalmatians using BAER testing, making for 25-30% deafness incidence in the breed. Dubbed the “Dalmatian Dilemma” by Dr. Cattanach, you can’t remove deafness without breeding against the breed standard which mandates the extreme piebald coat and favors a rather limited expression of black. A strong predisposition for deafness is thus a sine qua non disorder in Dalmatians.
Urinary tract problems are not caused by over-breeding, popularity swings, or backyard breeders. In fact they are caused by under-breeding and founder effects. The gene pool of Dalmatians is so small that the gene which causes uric acidosis / hyperuricosuria / high uric acid (HUA) /urate stone disease / bladder and kidney stones / urinary obstruction is SATURATED and homozygous in every dog in the breed. Their urine is filled with sharp crystalline sludge which can cause pain, irritation, infections, blockages, and death. There is not a single multi-Championship Best In Show lovingly bred and sold for a mint Dalmatian dogs that is free of the disease gene. Not one. They all have it and they will all pass it on. Even though this disease is not intrinsic to the breed standard nor to any other traits of the breed that need to be preserved, it remains another dilemma because there are no healthy pedigreed Dalmatians who carry a safe gene. Thus, the only way to rid the disease and the gene from the breed is to bring in new blood in the form of an out-cross and there are still pedigree purists who will hold the breed hostage to a fundamentalist and unwavering interpretation of purity. There’s no practical barrier to solving this problem, there are Low-Uric-Acid (LUA) 99.99% Dalmatians ready to breed to, and as of July 2011 the political barrier to registry with the AKC has been torn down.
Dalmatian rage isn’t caused by over-breeding either. White-skin related shyness and anxiety and thus aggression and biting is known and documented over many species such as chickens, Holstein cows, horses, and several dog breeds. Despite their black spots, Dalmatians are a profoundly white skinned breed (extreme piebald) and unlike “white” Golden Retrievers, it is a true white where there are no surviving melanocytes in their white pigmented skin.
Nervousness is also common in animals with large areas of depigmented hair and skin. For example, dairymen report that mostly white Holstein cows are more nervous and difficult to handle for milking compared to more pigmented cows. Also, I recently observed some extremely abnormal behavior in a highly depigmented Paint stallion at a horse show.
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While blue eyes and large areas of depigmentation on most of the body might signal neurological defects, it seems that smaller amounts of depigmentation are linked to calm temperaments and large amounts of meat and milk in cattle. For example, high-producing Holstein dairy cows are partially depigmented with black and white patches. Herefords are a high-producing beef breed that are reddish-brown with a white face and belly. These animals also have mostly calm temperaments.
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A certain amount of piebaldism tends to make an animal quieter, but too much might make it nervous. There are many good horses with white socks and a blaze, but every horseman in the last century noticed a relationship between piebaldism and the value of a horse. The old saying goes:One white foot, buy him.
Two white feet, try him.
Three white feet, be on the sly.
Four white feet, pass him by.
Temple Grandin discusses the albino/melanin issue in depth in her book Animals in Translation, using white Dobermans and Dalmatians as examples:
Pure white animals (and people) have more neurological problems than dark-skinned or dark-furred animals, because melanin, the chemical that gives skin its color, is also found in the midbrain, where it may have a protective effect. You see all kinds of problems in white animals. Dalmatians with the highest ratio of white fur to black are getting close to true albinism. They’re more likely to be deaf than other dogs, and they are often airheads you can’t train. Black-and-white paint horses have problems, too. It’s not unusual for a paint horse to be plain crazy, especially if he has blue eyes.
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The color of the animal’s skin is more important than the color of its fur. If its skin is dark, that’s good. The inside of a dog’s mouth should be mostly black, with some white.
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I am definitely against human doing things like deliberately breeding albino Doberman pinschers because they look so pretty. These animals are not normal, and they suffer. People who own albino Dobermans report that their dogs have poor vision, intolerance to sunlight, skin lesions, and problems with temperament, usually aggression. In one survey 11 percent of owners said their dogs had bitten people. That’s an enormously high number considering how rare dog bites are in comparison to the number of dogs living with humans.
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Nature doesn’t evolve a Dalmatian. The Dalmatian has been artificially bred to be mostly white, and is starting to be closer to albinos than to normally pigmented animals. It’s not an albino, but it’s getting there.
The wonderful fancy dog breeders are not breeding for more black on their dogs, in fact they most often breed for less. The temperament issues persist and blanket the breed because the breed is defined by their mostly white coat and it’s a sine qua non feature. It has nothing to do with the dogs being bred in a puppy mill or a mansion. There is no breeder who can tell you they are “breeding for temperament” who can overcome this effect and still be breeding a Dalmatian with a spotted coat. Shyness, erratic behavior, and biting are NOT caused by “backyard breeders” who don’t care about temperament, they are caused by ALL Dalmatian breeders who care more about the unique coat than they do temperament.
Being a Dalmatian is what is wrong with Dalmatians. No amount of finger pointing at popularity bubbles, Walt Disney, backyard breeders or any other cause can change this. To be a Dalmatian is to be prone to deafness and to be predisposed to suffer from mental disorders caused by insufficient melanin. Not every Dalmatian will be deaf, some 70% are not, but that’s just the luck of the draw and 30% deafness is a disgrace! Obviously the same can be said of Urate stone disease and Melanin deficient temperament problems: not all Dalmatians will present with clinical symptoms but they all have the genes for it. To be a pedigreed Dalmatian means that you will likely piss shards until you die, unless you’re one of the lucky few Dalmatians to come from breeders who have put aside fundamentalist interpretations of “breed” and taken advantage of the LUA Dalmatian program or fate spares you from your genetics.
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Some KCs in Europe allow black patches on the ears, whereas the US standard does not. Rates of deafness are lower in ear patched dogs (sorry, can’t find the reference, but also makes sense) and reportedly in those countries that allow patches. Something I hope the US breed club would start to consider, though not a full solution.
The Cattanach paper talks about “patches” although it’s in the same section as his discussion on the eyes, so I’m not sure if he means a patch over both the eye and ear, just ear, etc. Also, we know that although correlated, expression on the surface doesn’t guarantee melanocyte presence in the ear.
I would like to see a scientific paper your claim that cattle and horses with more pigment are calmer. Since melanocytes migrate from the neural crest in the neonatal stage, having one, two , three or four white hooves just means that the pigment cells did not get that far—a common occurrence in many domestic animals. That does not mean that there is not a lot of pigment on the rest of the body.
Second: the extreme white spotting gene and albinism are two different things: albinism, afaik, does NOT cause deafness.
I breed Parson Russell terriers, and they have the s^w gene. Although there id definitely a connection between lack of pigment, particularly body spots, and sensorineural deafness, I have found none in temperament—at all. I was breed warden for eight years and during that time we had every litter BAER tested and made a templates of the markings, so I know what I am talking about, at least in my breed.
Dalmatians do not have to be born with colour on their ears to reduce the incidence of deafness……body spots will do the same thing.
Yes I know they have found no true verifiable links in horses either, in fact I recently had 2 max Sabinos with the overo gene here & have to say their pink skin & blue eyes where a pain in he butt sun wise they where just as any other horse here temperament wise. I know 2 horses hardly makes a point at all but I have also know some incredibly quiet gypsy cobs that were mostly white & a paint stallion you could have set a bomb off under.
I would like to see a scientific paper as well. With all due respect, this all sounds like hearsay and an attempt to demonize a breed. Based off of the photos provided with each of the posts concerning dals, it really does appear that you are trying more to frighten people.
I would more readily back this up if it were mainly concerning health concerns and the morality of continuing to breed a dog that is prone to such illnesses.
So yes, I am aware of the possibilities of health defects and behavioral issues. I feel they should be bred carefully/sparingly.
I personally love the Dalmatian personality(or rather the personality of my own, every other dal I’ve met, and descriptions from other Dalmatian owners). Obviously, this does not mean that every Dalmatian is a good dog, simply the ones I have known/known of. I am just trying to say that Dalmatians certainly can be very different from what was described.
My Dalmatian is the sweetest, calmest, and most intelligent dog I’ve ever owned.
She’s never bitten anyone, doesn’t bark, never bared her teeth to anyone, and is very friendly with everyone she meets-including other dogs, and she adores and is very respectful of cats in particular. Her parents had very similar temperaments.
I feel like many of the supposed behavioral issues have more to do with owners not understanding the breed(or dogs in general) and their needs.
Don’t get a high energy dog if you aren’t a high energy person. Walk your dog, train your dog, socialize your dog, consistently, from puppyhood.
Don’t spoil your dog or treat it like a human baby/child- especially a dog prone to be clingy and sensitive like a Dalmatian.
Regardless of whether or not the dog is lazy like mine, provide them with plenty of daily mental and physical stimulation.
As far as health goes, do buy from a reputable breeder and inquire about the health of the parents. Males are more likely to develop stones, and all puppies should have their hearing tested before being adopted. Dalmatians must adhere to a very specific(and admittedly expensive) diet: food low in purines and a constant supply of distilled water, otherwise you’re just asking for trouble.
No table scraps, over-feeding(give them set meal times), or feeding cheap food and treats or wet foods with gravy.
If you can afford it financially, emotionally, and physically, then go ahead, unless you feel it’s immoral to adopt an animal that has susceptibility to stones and deafness in their genes.
I’m very glad to have read your post. I adopted what looks like a Dalmatian mix (pitout or bulldog maybe). He does not bark, he is extremely hard of hearing(only a hard clap he will respond), very calm, wonderful with my 2 year old & 8 year old, shows protective behavior, doesn’t chew anything, he’s smart in learning signs, and so far is the sweetest dog I’ve owned. I learned that I need to research more about what diet he needs and to be aware that he could get stones. I also pay close attention and don’t let him in a room.Adobe with my 2 year old, not just because of what people say about temperament, but because he’s a dog. I do not trust any dog 100% because they ate unpredictable. I also felt the article was to scare people away from Dalmatians and was very discriminatory of the breed.
Agree 100% with Anon’s post, I really would like to see the research behind this article. My family has had two Dal’s when I was growing up and I got 1 a few months ago. He is hyper-intelligent, is 5 months old now and knows almost 20 commands. He has not pooped inside in over 2 months. And since he is well socialized (has playdates and has met hundreds of dogs already) he plays and wags his tail with every dog and person he meets. To get to this point my SO and I have worked tirelessly for months with him. Several hours of attention, and play and training a day since we got him at 8 weeks old. IF you front load your effort and really put the time into your puppy ANY puppy can and will be an incredibly well behaved good boy on the other side.
My biggest issue with the article is the images being used in the tags and the clickbait are of Dalmatians “smiling” they are one of the only dog breeds that do it, and they can do it on cue. This is not a snarl and its not a bad thing, infact they usually do it to please the owner, or when they are giddy.
My last Dal, Daz would do it every time we said “Shhhmily!!” and for us who knew him it was the cutest thing, and for those who didnt, they took a step back becuase in most other cases if a dog showed that much teeth it was a good idea to exit stage left. I have videos of it, big loopy tail wags with the teeth shown is a happy dog not an angry or warning dog.
All Dal’s need an incredible amount of excercise. This little guy at 3 months was already doing more than a mile of walking a day with us after work. Now he’s up to 2.5 miles of walks a day and hes only 5 months. If you don’t have the time or energy to be out walking/jogging/hiking etc.. every day your gonna have a bad time.
Do your research on the breed you want that fits your lifestyle rather than impulse adopting / buying the cutest guy/gal you see. And as far as I am concerned all dogs start out as potential good boys, and its up to us the owners and trainers to guide them.
What a terrible article. Although many points about health are true, it is nothing like this person states. Maybe I am biased because I own a Dalmatian, but proper breeding is very important. Stating that you cannot fault back yard breeders is a completely false statement. Backyard breeders do no health testing, temperaments do not matter, and baer tests are typically not done. A responsible breeder will ensure both parents have gone through all appropriate health tests, ensure they are up to breed standards and all puppies will be baer tested. Responsible breeders will not breed dogs that are deaf or have unilateral hearing. Although deaf puppies can still be born as well as dogs with unilateral hearing, it reduces the risk. A well bred, well trained Dalmatian can be a wonderful dog. Also isn’t deafness common in most white dogs? Does that mean all white dogs should be labelled as a train wreck? NO, not at all. Dalmatians are active, intelligent dogs. Just like any dog they can become a “train wreck” with improper training and socialization, along with backyard breeding. Do some proper research, talk to some responsible breeders. You need to educate yourself on the breed more.
We’ve had a female Dal for almost 12 years before finding out she had cancer and we had to put her down. She was the best temperament, loyal, and security dog we’ve ever owned. Never snipped at anyone and got along with other dogs for the most part. She didn’t lose her her hearing but did have a coat problem, but that was expected. The breed isn’t bad, it’s the people who give the breed a bad name. We’re getting another one when I retire from the navy in three years.
why not just add like 10 percent labador. Then youll still get like 90 percent of the dalmation and solve all the genetic problems and life goes on.
screw the spots or whatever, whatever it comes out to be thats what u get.
some people will want to carry on the 90 percent breed and like you wont have all those
problems.
At least now the back cross is available to those breeders who can get over their purity issues for the sake of the dogs. Same as the Aboriginal Basenjis and the Country of Origin Salukis…IF people can get over their prejudices.
I’m the Dal breeders are just as worried about changing the amount of basal Dal DNA in their dogs as the Salukis breeders are about basal DNA in COO Salukis.
Jess recently posted..The Afghan Hound as Symbol of Conspicuous Consumption
The dog in the top photo is exhibiting a “smarl,” which is a submissive grin that so many Dalmatians give off.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYVrEEvWm1I
It’s not just a Dalmatian trait because my cousin’s JRT does it and one of our golden retrievers did it too. Both dogs would be counted as ubersubmissive.
retrieverman recently posted..I can’t have one of these dogs
My uncle calls it the “Honey Badger.”
retrieverman recently posted..I can’t have one of these dogs
Lots of dogs submissive grin, but of course being too submissive is a sign of a fearful dog and fear can lead to bites.
Christopher, I am going to say it like it is; you are a jackass.
Oh Bravo, you’ve refuted everything I’ve said with an insult. Oh wait, no, you’ve just confirmed everything I said because that’s all you can say. This is what happens when idiots lose arguments, they resort to name calling and denial. Congratulations.
Your words do not rate more than a brief insult. You, OTOH, are worth less. (pun intended) If you had a degree as a result of your “interest genetics”, or if interest “honed” at Stanford means that you studied there, you would be writing in scientific journals. Instead, you are blogging and asking for donations. Still, I guess the “white gene” theory explains your personality disorder.
And what little brown school house did you flunk out of in the 4th grade?
I should have probably also mentioned, not everyone buys a dal for appearance.
While I think they’re generally cute dogs, I find other breeds equally as aesthetically appealing.
Personally, I wanted a Dalmatian due to the description of their personality and them being active dogs.
I heard that they were friendly, loyal, sensitive, good with cats from multiple people, quiter, active, and very intelligent.
I got exactly what I wanted, high physical energy aside(which I don’t necessarily mind doing without).
If I could find a personality clone of my dog, and it looked something like a Rex cat (something I don’t find appealing to look at), I would snatch it up in a heartbeat.
I’m sure most Dalmatian owners would say the same, that they wouldn’t mind change of appearance for healthier dogs with the same personality traits.
Looks like you struck a nerve.
👍
I have only had three Dalmatians, other than the three litters we sold before the liver spotted female had some problems. Yes, I was a backyard breeder (not a puppy mill). The biggest problem I had was a little stubbornness. The female was a little more aggressive, but the male was a beauty in the eyes of many, even though he had larger black spots than most seen at shows. Several people who bought puppies wanted to buy the male. All of that to say that I am certainly no expert on Dalmations, but my theory is that a deaf dog would also tend to be more likely to bite and be a little more aggressive. They cannot hear calming words and they are more likely to be startled when they may not have seen or heard someone approach.
Wrong, we raised trained and hunted with Dalmatians when I grew up and the deaf pups that were placed and trained by u along with the owners training were some of the best hunters and sweetest dogs. They are always attentive to your locations and even knew when someone was at the door. They feel vibrations from ppl approaching and in most cases more easily trained then their hearing counterparts. They have been unfairly put down by breeders and others that are ignorant of a dogs ability to adapt. That said we did have one that had a bad temper as a pup and was put down but she had other problems as well. A runt that was saved from day one with bottle and never even grew to normal size. After 6 weeks of working with her we decided she was not a suitable pet for anyone and did the right thing. In 25 years we had only one like this and only two to ever get stones and they were 14 yrs without any urinary problems. I have seen just as many very dark marked deaf dogs than lightly marked (actually more so it would be best if those with no true knowledge of the breed other then a book pulled their heads out of you know where and actually talked with responsible breeders that test dogs before breeding and know what they are doing. The Dalmatian is one of the best most versatile breeds out there and do not need other health problems brought into the breed to”improve” it.
Well, the albino rage theory explains a lot about Jack Russell Terriers, which are asshole dogs.
Hallelujah, somebody finally said it.
I have a JRT that is mostly white(except some on head) and she is the most gentle dog I have seen. But yes quite a few small dogs are ankle biters. My mother in law had a vicious yorkie
I raised and showed Yorkies for over 20 years and I bred for good temperaments as well as sound structure and health. I had some good, solid little dogs, so I think that it’s what you breed for that counts. If you have a bad gene pool to work from, however, that would make breeding dogs who are sound in mind and body very difficult and that’s sad to think about.
It seems that people breed for type more than temperament, or health. I’ve always been sad to see that.
People either love animals and treat them as living creatures, or don’t love them and treat them as things to tailor-make for whatever fashion they like.
This comment made me get up from my chair I was laughing so hard 🙂
I’ve always felt this way about the JRT I’ve known as well.
Christopher: “Oh Bravo, you’ve refuted everything I’ve said with an insult. Oh wait, no, you’ve just confirmed everything I said because that’s all you can say. This is what happens when idiots lose arguments, they resort to name calling and denial. Congratulations.”
J.A. Smith: “Your words do not rate more than a brief insult. You, OTOH, are worth less. (pun intended) If you had a degree as a result of your “interest genetics”, or if interest “honed” at Stanford means that you studied there, you would be writing in scientific journals. Instead, you are blogging and asking for donations. Still, I guess the “white gene” theory explains your personality disorder.”
Christopher: “And what little brown school house did you flunk out of in the 4th grade?”
Nice job proving your own point Christopher. I guess you lost that one, didn’t you?
He responded to an argument with a mere insult. I responded to an insult with a question. I didn’t lose anything, nor have you pointed out anything interesting. Do try harder.
My kelpie gives that when he wants to get on the floor with you and wave his feet in the air, going down front first, butt in air.
I always find it endearing.
Given how eagerly he approaches with playful paws, snorts and high spirits, I somehow doubt he feels he’s in serious fear for his life. When he’s in fear, he simply high-tails it outta there! Loyal in one way, cowardly in another. I doubt he’d protect me from a dang thing! LOL!
Wrong, Urban. If you see him beating feet outa there, he’d be telling you there was something to run from and that may be all the protection you need from him. LOL!
My boxer would tell me if something was wrong if we were out late on her “walk” out front. She’d alert on something and be very still, then would turn her head and look intently at me, then turn back and sniff the air. If her hackles went up, I’d tell her to let’s go back in and told her she was a good girl. The last time she did that, the next day, when I had her out back, she went to her spot where she would “go” and started sniffing the low place in the fence from top to bottom, then she started tracking and we went all the way out front, following a strong trail, which she lost in the street.
After we went back into the house that night before, I went and turned on the backyard flood lights and saw a man in the yard to the back of us and he went diagonally across that yard and I couldn’t see him anymore because of the workshop in the way.
Having the dog pick up his trail like that tells me he went over the fence and out to the front of my house right where the dog started sniffing the air and alerting. She didn’t bark, or try to run away, but I “heard” her loud and clear. The man would have come out of our back yard right where we were standing. I’ll miss that dog forever.
Retrieverman, your note is a voice of reason in this wasteland of willful ignorance. This “blogger” is not worthy of anyone’s time.
J.A.
It’s called a Dalmatian “Smile”. It Is NOT agression. They do it when they want to be funny, cute or show off. Not necessarily submissive. Not all Dals do it. As a long time Dal owner, I enjoy it when they smile.
I have an old breeding book and it lists a trait called, smiling and non-smiling. Says it’s a recessive trait. It’s the same as dogs who have bird sense or don’t have bird sense, etc.
I had Yorkies who smiled and those who didn’t. I couldn’t tell there were any complications from this trait and the dogs had great temperaments and no tendency to bite, or be fearful, in fact they were very calm and easy to train and seemed to want to be “good” and follow the rules. They didn’t tend to fight with anyone and would play games with puppies and each other very well. That’s not much of a terrier temperament, but I appreciated it very much. It made those dogs a dream to work with. They would still go after critters with gusto, which is what they were supposed to do, but didn’t fight with each other about it. My one little Daisy didn’t like the other dogs fighting with each other and would bark at them and scold them when they were fighting, or being too noisy. If she thought they were being rude to me, she would tell them about it. She was my proper little English lady. Once, when she got into the feeding crate out of order, I looked at her and told her, “Daisy, It’s not your turn,” she lowered her head, grinned as if embarrassed and got back out of the crate. Each of the dogs knew the order they were supposed to eat in, but Daisy was the one who would let me know if someone else got into the crates out of order. I’ll miss her forever and she was a delightful, precious little Yorkie. Her mom was a good dog, as well. It’s as though they felt good when they were doing what they should be doing.
Is it possible that the smiling and non-smiling in Dals is not linked to anything bad?
On second thought, I think it is snarling.
retrieverman recently posted..I can’t have one of these dogs
Passive fear, active fear…. Either are problematic.
NO, It’s NOT snarling !
I have a fear aggressive Mini Aussie – he smiles and he snarls and there is a distinct difference between the two. What is pictured above is a snarl. There is no other way to describe it.
Cindy
Actually no it is not. If you research the breed they will “snarl” with excitement. It is called a Dalmatian “smile”. Doesn’t mean they don’t also snarl when angry or upset, but if you look it up it is a common breed trait. Dalmatian is not the same as a Mini Aussie. frustrated that people comment when they know nothing about the breed.
Wow…maybe before trashing Dalmatians you should do some REAL research. Dalmatians DO NOT have a temperment issue.Just how many Dalmatians have you been around? How many dogs have you been around in general? And what the heck is “Dalmatian Rage”? Temperment issues stem from breeding from parents with bad temperments and/or lack of socialization/proper training, NO MATTER THE BREED.
Dalmatians are no harder to train than most other breeds. Most people can’t even train an Lab or Golden (the “easiest” breeds), so of course they can’t figure out how to train a Dalmatian. They wouldn’t know what to do with a Border Collie, Basset Hound or Airedale Terrier either. That doesn’t make those breeds “bad”.
Dalmatians have VERY few health issues compared to many other breeds, and the LUA/Backcross Dalmatians you refer to are NOT an instant fix to the urate stone “issue” (BTW, these LUA/ BACKCROSS dogs are registered and shown in AKC and other registires, so no one is holding the breed “hostage”). Most Damatians never have issues with stones. Oh, and Dalmatians are not the only breed to get urate stones…
As far as deafness, it’s not really fair to compare Dalmatians to other breeds. As many as 85 other dog breeds should be tested for congenital deafness, but NO other breed has addressed this issue similarly. Dalmatian breeders very often test and submit the results for the WHOLE litter and have been doing so for years. What other breeds are doing that? How fair is it to compare when there is missing information for other breeds? It’s not uncommon for whole litters of Dalmatians to be born with full hearing, or for generations of good hearing.
I’m sure this won’t change YOUR opinion, but maybe others who read your blog will do more research before condemning an entire breed and the people who love Dalmatians.
You are a pathetic apologist.
So you deny that there’s any biological component to temperament then? Funny, but why do Border Collies show “eye” when no one teaches them how to? Why do we recognize pigment related behavioral issues in several species and others admit to it in dogs, but you think Dalmatians are special flowers that are immune to a documented and understood disorder where we KNOW the causal mechanism (deficient melanin in the brain)?
I’ve written over a dozen posts on pigment related disorders in Collies, Great Danes, Australian Shepherds, Shelties, etc., where pronounced temperament issues are clearly associated with too little pigment. Why would Dalmatians buck this trend? They don’t.
Yeah, great, blame the stupid public who just wanted a NICE dog and got an asshole dog. It’s THEIR fault, they’re just so stupid and don’t know how to train a genetically predisposed temperamental wreck to overcome their innate fear, deafness, and pain from urinating crystal shards. It’s totally their fault, they just don’t know how GOOD they’ve got it.
What are you talking about? 100% of Dalmatians are fully predisposed to urate stone disease, upwards of 30% are deaf, and all of them are severe piebald with the concomitant temperament issues. That’s not comparatively healthy to ANYTHING!
Please name for me the extensive list of other breeds that have 100% saturation of a disease gene? Go on.
No extensive list, but, uhh, Lundehunds?
“…documented and understood disorder where we KNOW the causal mechanism (deficient melanin in the brain)”
Could you please provide citations for this? I did a quick search and found several sites that stated that there appears to be no direct relationship between skin pigmentation and neuromelanin.
If you’d like me to do your research for you, there’s a donation link right over there on the side of the blog. You didn’t even have the courtesy to use a real name or real e-mail, nor did you share the “links” you found so no, I’m not going to do your homework for you.
Be a chum and ADD to the conversation instead of making demands.
I find what you’ve said interesting, and I’m willing to consider it.
However.
Your response to SuperSheppie is patently wrong. It’s YOUR article, YOU are making these assertions, back it up and provide sources if you want to be taken seriously.
No Joel, I’m not your paid tutor. I linked TWICE to relevant information that you’re welcome to read and source on your own time. This is not original research, this is linking people to information they likely haven’t seen before. I don’t run around BAER testing Dalmatians nor do I disect their mid-brains. I linked to MUCH more ample sources. Have fun with them.
Christopher: Your statements show your ignorance. Almost everything you write is false and vituperous.
Until reading this about less pigment causing behavioral issues in dogs I started to recall my raising Parakeets years ago. I used to wonder why every single one of the pure white colored(albino with red eyes) and the pure yellow ones(lutino with red eyes) were ALWAYS ABSOLUTELY INSANE AND CRAZY. All of the other colors acted like normal Parakeets were supposed to behave. It was very obvious to me that there was somehow a connection between these particular colors and the poor temperament that they possessed. in Parakeets those two colors would represent the least amount of pigment possible.
This statement makes no sense because there are plenty of aboriginal dog populations who live in areas so isolated, they rarely see anyone other than their own master. Yet those dogs which live on the trap-line and other places are not human-aggressive.
The blank state theory is bullcrap.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
I have known several very fear aggressive Dalmatians. I think acknowledging there is a problem would better serve your breed.
Great response. Clearly the author was bullied at school and quite literally has not got a clue. For the record, one of the few breeds with which I have experienced temperament issues are Border Collies. Obviously not something synonymous with that particular breed but with moronic owners like this I’ll jump to my own inbred conclusions!
I’ve always been opposed to albino dobes, or GSDs, etc. For that matter, blue dobes piss me off as well. I haven’t found many w/o alopecia or just some sort of major rash!
There are a handful of blue and fawn kelpies being bred as well. Facebookers ooh and aah at them and it’s been said that the incidence of skin issues in these dogs is low; much lower than in dobes, etc. A few owners testified to me that they own such dogs and find no skin issues. If true, I’d like to know what the difference is, but it would take an awful lot to convince me that these dilutes are a good idea.
Hercules and Lily need you. They are on this list. Do you have a big heart, home and possibly pocketbook for these special needs dogs brought to you by thoughtless breeders? Thank goodness there are rescues to compensate for such selfishness!
Malignant Melanoma in a dog! Egad! I have enough fun buying sunscreen for my OWN pinkish white German/Irish fragile skin, much less this crap!
http://www.dru.org/availabledetail.htm
Italian Greyhounds also have dilutes (red fawn, blue fawn, blue, there is some belief that seal is also a dilute) but color dilution alopecia, while it does happen, is much rarer than in Dobermans (according to what I read, upwards of 50% of dilute Dobermans have CDA, but far fewer IGs do–something like 7% was the estimate.) Weimaraners, as a breed, are all dilutes and do not have CDA.
Our male IG is registered as a red fawn, but looking over the color dilution genetics and considering that he has very dark eyes and a black nose, it appears to me that he’s not a true dilute but simply a light red (and I did worry about CDA when he was younger and had stud tail.)
Deaf dogs sleep soundly and are easy to surprise. Uni’s don’t know where sounds come from due to the absence of the doppler effect. These dogs tend to over react and bite first and the uni’s panic and are hit by cars or have other accidents more often.
Larger spots are better but what do conformation breeders breed for? Yep, lots of small spots. I have Australian Cattle Dogs (Dalmatian and Bull Terrier in the mix) and although we have black and red to offset some of the issues, we see a lot of deaf dogs with predictable behavioral problems. Because there is no known mode of inheritance many of the big show people continue to breed unilateral deaf dogs (afterall, THEIR genotype is SO valuable) and so some of them produce ratios approaching 1 out of 3 ears deaf. I have been lucky and produced only one deaf pup out of 8 litters. I BAER tested all adults and get. I found him a good home but I don’t count that as lucky for him. I haven’t bred in over ten years now.
The Australian Stumpy Tailed Cattle Dogs are even worse off, with idiots breeding stumpy to stumpy & wondering why they only have a couple of surviving pups if at all. The temperament issues are huge also.
I’ve known several Dals, 2 of them breed champions. There was only one I considered a “good” dog, meaning a nice pet that I would like to own. The others were all flaky, nervous, or downright dangerous. I had a friend who had 2. The male was the dangerous one I mentioned. I was sitting in the car with my Boston, and this male came in thru the car window and grabbed my dog by the face, pulling him out the window. I went right out the window with him, because I was holding onto him to try to lessen any ripping/tearing. Crazy dogs.
I’ve always heard that 10% of the breed is deaf. But this is the number stated by the Dalmatian Club of America, which also recommends that deaf puppies be euthanized – it’s right in their code of ethics. They recommend against trying to find a home for deaf dogs, and recommend that anyone who owns a deaf dog ought to kill it and start over with one that can hear.
http://www.thedca.org/deaf1.html
They may only be referring to bi-lateral deafness.
No, they are just liars.
Have you ever heard the phrase, “People who live in glass houses” ? ….ALL BREEDS HAVE ISSUES. No breed is for everyone. It is good that there are so many breeds, in order that people can choose which is best for them. How many Dals have you owned? As a long time owner of Dals and Very active in the Dal community, I can say that Dals have wonderful personalities. I have multiple Dals that are certifed with TDI and know of Many more that are doing a wide variety of service jobs in many communities. Please stay with your own breed of choice. We don’t need negative people like you in the Dal world.
How does “ALL BREEDS HAVE ISSUES” change anything? Is this some competition?
Not all breeds have 100% saturation for a frivolous coat color that is inextricably linked to deafness. Not all breeds are 100% homozygous for uric acid disease.
So why does it matter if you can find imperfections when Dalmatians are not only flawed, they are intentionally flawed. Sine-qua-non flawed. Flawed so much that the breeders don’t wont to even change it if they had had to give up the color. Sad Sad Sad.
You are singling out Dalmatians. Your blog gives the impression that a breed with health issues is an abnormal thing. What you say about deafness is true (though the percentage is closer to 25% and that includes dogs that are both unilaterally and bilaterally deaf). All reputable Dal breeders have the parents and puppies BAER tested, but you are right, we will never be able to breed out deafness due to their pigmentation.
“Not all breeds are 100% homozygous for uric acid disease” This statement is no longer true. Did you forget about LUA Dals?
I can find examples of medical issues in virtually all “breeds” of animals. I own horses, pigs, and have owned more than a dozen other domestic and wild animals over time. There are poor representative of every breed and species. I currently own three LUA Dals who have been tested for almost everything a Dalmatian can acquire. We bred our pair and had nine puppies. None of which were #1 Deaf, #2 Dangerously aggressive, #3 Have Poor eyesight, #4 Have Excessively heavy pigmentation(although three have Patches). #5 Have Thyroid issues (They need to be tested again at two) Two were tested as HUAs and will not be bred, ever! The gentlest Dalmatian I know is my male who is also very confident and not at all timid. He expects everyone to be his friend and is surprised but not fearful when they fail his expectations. Among other idiotic old saws stated by Christopher, I owned that horse with four white stockings and he was my trail horse for 16 years. This statement had to do with how hard the hooves are and how difficult it is to clean those white legs. No statement about breed is universal. Even that about uric acid in Dals is not valid anymore. We shipped puppies from the Mexican border to Canada and have LUAs in Europe and South America. Eventually to have one with a uric acid problem will be a choice not a requirement.
I figured that the 10% were the ones who escaped being humanely euthanized.
Or it might be from an old study – before BAER testing was widespread. Deaf dogs can compensate really well, especially if they’re unilateral.
Or a statistic that only took into account the number of BAER tested deaf puppies, then comparing that number to the total Dal population. For instance, say out of 500 puppies that are BAER tested, 100 of them are deaf. 20%. But, if the total number of puppies born is 1000, you could choose to interpret the data as 100 out of 1000, instead of 100 out of 500. Call it creative economics.
That’s hideous. Anyone who owns a deaf dog, such as myself, only need to be aware to approach them carefully, so as not to startle them. My deaf Dalmatian mix hasn’t shown any signs of aggression or temperament issues. To put him to sleep would be just as terrible as putting any of my other dogs to sleep. The shelter he can’came from did not realize he was deaf nor the rescue that got him from the shelter. He is highly intelligent and has learned hand signs. He also gets along well with other dogs and cats. He loves children, doesn’t bark, he is calm, quiet, and does not chew up toys or destroy anything. Best dog I’ve ever rescue and I’ve had wonderful rescue dogs. Oh, May I add he.was on the euthanasia list. Bad bad decision that whould have been.
Sadly I rather like Dogo Argentino’s but they suffer from the same problems because of the pure white coat. Their working dogs even,so can’t blame dog shows on them.
I`ve always thought white Dobermans where taboo to breed,that’s why I’ve never seen one and they seem to be rare. The only breed books or magazines that mention them seem to forbid breeding them.
I thought normally White German Shepherds had dark pigmentation and brown eyes,so where about as healthy as regular ones. As well as some are more of a cream coloration.
Never was really a fan of blue or blue merle dogs.
I wonder why it hasn’t been seen in felines then,sense they can lack pigmentation and can have blue or different colored eyes. From my experience I haven’t seen any difference,and some of the most confident and friendliest cats I’ve had or known where mostly white.
White cats are often deaf, particularly if they have blue eyes (blue = lack of pigment). But cats aren’t expected to listen to and follow commands, and they probably compensate for it even better than a dog.
I was talking about temperament wise. I still expect cats to come when called,and because cats are already more sensitive to noises then dogs I would know if they where deaf. Also Mostly white cats seem to be safe from deafness,even if they have blue eyes. Mostly white dogs do not get the same deal.
There are two white genes in cats, one called “dominant white” that masks all other colors and is associated with blue eys and deafness; the second is the “white spotting” gene that can cause anything from a few white hairs to a completely white cat but is not linked with deafness.
http://www.messybeast.com/whitecat.htm
Will be very interesting to see the research regarding white patterns in cows and horses that show temperament issues.
I’ve found research for cattle that suggests that better milk production, better conception and less horn fly pests are found in animals with 50% or more white. The benefits have been applied to animals that would suffer from absorbing excessive solar radiation in geographic areas where this is a concern. The research that Temple Grandin references for cattle deals solely with Holsteins and dealt with the colour of their heads. Colour-headed cattle were less flighty.
I’ve not found anything specifically indicated for temperament issues for horses with paint colour markings. There is a coat colouration pattern (white headed or high white facial markings) that leads to deafness; but there appears to be no problem with riding deaf horses (they tend to be less spooky overall), and highly trainable.
The Appaloosa coat colour pattern Lp; is associated with congenital stationary night blindness. There is much similarity between the way Dalmatians and Appies are bred.
Are there any white-coated dog breeds that don’t suffer from issues?
Here’s the thing: I don’t think the evidence that animals with white pigment
For one thing, Grandin does not have professional expertise with domestic dogs. Period. Her background is in livestock and ungulates, and she is also a pure ethologist and behaviorist, not a neurologist or a geneticist. She has never to my knowledge advanced any proposed mechanism for the idea that lack of pigment directly contributes to temperamental instability or even good data demonstrating that, all else being equal, unpigmented animals are less docile or stable than their fully pigmented counterparts. That passage is purely her personal experience and anecdotes from other people and cites no actual scientific evidence at all.
I’m usually a great fan of your work, but in this case I think your conclusion rests on very poor data and anecdotal hearsay. (I also think Dalmatians should be bred with more pigment and allow large patches on the head to work with the deafness issue, which is very pronounced in the breed–I have absolutely no quarrel with that or any other part of the post. But I think the pigment = temperamental stability conclusion is not based in solid evidence.)
Where did you get the idea that this one little blog post was supposed to represent the entirety of evidence linking pigmentation to behavior?
Your statement was cut off, but I’m aware of what you said here, which I imagine fills in for what got cut off in your comment here.
See, the thing is, this is a blog. If you want me to source every statement, drop some money in my pocket, else take things for what I bother to dish out for free. I quoted Grandin because she was talking SPECIFICALLY about Dalmatians in relation to her much longer and decidedly WELL researched views on pigmentation and behavior. I left TWO links, feel free to follow them and do your homework yourself. This blog post isn’t titled “an exhaustive review of 100 years of neurology, biology, behaviorism, and dogs concerning pigmentation, the brain, and behavior.” I linked in DALMATIANS with the already well established body of work dealing with pigmentation and fear, etc. You’re welcome to go read up on it yourself. The IMPORTANT part, in my view, was showing that someone else who is neutral to Dalmatians and who has written on the subject of pigmentation and behavior decided to use them as an example.
I don’t care what you think about Grandin or her “expertise” but her position is heavily documented. Here’s just one section from one of her essays with numerous citations.
The actual study names are listed in the link. Feel free to go read them. And then you can catch up on the 15 years of new research since that was written.
You’d be right if you said “Christopher didn’t do all my work for me and didn’t feed me every bit of data on the planet while making a commentary about Dalmatians.” But instead you over-reached and said that Grandin isn’t documenting her position and that there’s no evidence, blah blah blah. It’s one blog post, get over yourself.
More from you:
Actually I didn’t cite the folk belief, Grandin did, and I included it because it finished off the thoughts she had written about prior to it. It would read funny if I cut it out. Nowhere do I suggest that some old rhyme is absolute proof of anything.
And while yes, there are horse people who are rightfully suspicious of white hooves that are not as sturdy as black hooves, I don’t think your interpretation is necessarily correct. If one is concerned with good feet on a horse, you don’t want ANY fragile hooves. One is enough to seal the deal against a horse like that, so the rhyme is of little value if it’s supposed to steer people away from sturdy hooves.
I’ll note that an alternate version of the same rhyme makes the temperament/brain conclusion much more apparent:
Why would white head pigmentation preclude an animal’s soundness in their feet? Why add that bit?
Usually horses who have a lot of chrome will carry it in their feet and heads at the same time.
In all my years around horses, I’ve never seen a horse with 3 + white legs not have some white on their face (and usually more than horses without white on legs) and vice versa, never seen a horse with a lot of white on their face not have at least some white legs, often more in comparison.
And it kind of completes the line of rhyme.
The pink skin also sets them up for cancer. But I haven’t really seen any temperment issues to be honest — I suppose it could come from blindness or something like that, but it would need to be studied (some Appaloosas have issues with progressive blindness, but it doesn’t necessarily affect their personality necessarily). Then again, these are horses, not dogs, problems usually get culled a lot harder, and well they aren’t dogs.
Suffice to say, outside of the Paint and Cream horse color registries (and with Paints, the tobiano gene expresses rather dominantly — so you can get a fair amount of white without homozygosity; overo is recessive and they cannot be homozygous without risking lethal white), most horsepeople will breed a horse with a lot of white to something with not so much, so they sort of correct it out (excessive white is sort of not fashionable in certain horse circles).
And for the record, here are the references Grandin uses in her essay. Your claim that it’s poorly referenced is just asinine.
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What a beautiful doggie smile in the accompanying photo! I’ve had Dalmatians all my life, never a urinary issue, never a temperament problem or deafness. I guess i’ve been lucky…there is certainly something to be said for knowing the breed in enabling proper care.
It’s not a smile, it’s a fear grin, and it’s a dangerous and disgusting form of anthropomorphism that so many Dalmatian owners are so want to recharacterize this sign of anxiety as something cute!
You are quite mistaken and have not researched the facts on scientific, DCA, AKC, or any other well respected Web site. Have you even talked to anyone knowledgeable of the breed or read a scholarly article? I couldn’t believe you were making such broadly ignorant statements. How dare you publish this garbage of unverified and ignorant ideas? On the other hand, perhaps it’s a blessing if it keeps people like you from acquiring a Dalmatian.
BTW Dalmatians are not white. The white is a mask over the base color of black, liver (brown) or lemon (orange/tan).
Owner of 6 lifetime Dalmatians, 4 foster-rescues, and trainer of 8 dogs and 19 pups – all Dalmatians, in the past 27 yrs
Oh, so they are NOT white? Yet they all possess the extreme pie bald gene… Which makes dogs… mostly white.
OK…
Let us know when you’re done redefining the genetic lexicon, please.
You’ve made some interesting comments. I have had the pleasure of sharing my life with three dalmatians and all three have trained and competed in various venues including obedience, agility, and now my youngest is a conformation champion as well as doing performance. None of my dals have been related…three very different pedigrees. All three have been extremely healthy..my oldest passed away at age 15, my boy is now going to be 12 and my youngest is only three. All three have bilateral hearing, allergy free, and I have yet to deal with any urinary issues. As far as the connection between more spots and better temperament…I can just say that my oldest dal had the least amount of spots (she was VERY white) and she was not only the calmest of the three but the bravest at approaching new situations, My youngest is by far the one with the “happiest” temperament..she never meets a stranger and gets along great with dogs and people of all ages.I have been around numerous dalmatians and I have never noticed any connection between spotting and temperament. I can’t see where an open marked dalmatian would be more nervous compared to his or her heavier spotted sibling.
7 in 10 Dalmatian owners can say “my dogs can hear.” That means nothing to the 3 who have defective dogs. If you think that 30% deafness is acceptable, then that really says something about how shallow you are that you should get to enjoy some color pattern you like while letting others pay the price for it.
You don’t think your Dalmatians are related and they have very different pedigrees, but that’s not actually positive evidence that they are not all fruit from the same tree with very shallow roots. Do you really think that the unique Dalmatian coat mutation sprung forth in thousands of dogs at once so that the harsh selection for it that must have occurred to create the “breed” didn’t result in a very shallow gene pool?
Sorry, but in a very real sense all of your dogs go back to just one dog, and that the breed is defined around such a singular gene it is going to suffer because of that. And it already is. It’s not a coincidence that a breed so shallowly defined would have a disease gene 100% saturated so soon after the breed was formed. Drift normally takes a very very long time, but not when you have artificial selection and start with a very small pool of founders.
Why don’t you take a photo of your 3 dog’s urine in a nice clear container and post it for us. We’ll assess how healthy they are.
Wow, I’ll eagerly look forward to your posting about the problems with Border Collies, because like EVERY purebred dog there are health and temperament issues. I grew up in a family that showed both Great Danes and Briards at separate times. Both breeds are challenging for different reasons, but I grew up understanding how to handle all types of dogs both in the show ring, out and about and in the home. The much maligned Dalmatian is certainly not perfect, but my own is not deaf, unless she chooses to ignore my commands, has had no urinary issues, and is not only a Canine Good Citizen certificate holder, but also a therapy dog at a local children’s hospital. Posts like yours continue to frustrate me, as it’s why I’m asked every time a person meets my dog; “Is she hyper?” “Aren’t Dalmatians deaf?” “I’ve heard that Dalmatians aren’t good with children, or have bad temperaments.” Rather than bash a breed, it’s all about education, hands on, not just “research”. Oh, by the way, a “wonderful” Border Collie attacked my Dalmatian without provocation when she was a year old. 12 stitches and 3 years later, my girl gives any BC she sees a wide berth. Can you blame her?
I don’t abide passive aggressive bullshit from idiots. You write a shitty blog about your Dalmatian and you’ve never mentioned deafness, uric acidosis, or being bat shit crazy even once. You must be in severe denial about how shitty your dog’s breeding is.
Nor in the 35 minutes it took you to read the whole 1 page of this blog you looked at did you bother to click on any other of many many posts which deal with health, genetics, and problems with all sorts of breeds, ESPECIALLY Border Collies.
So don’t say things that you have no intention of upholding.
For the rest of you, I’m sure you’ll be horrified with what passes as ethical in Great Dane breeder circles like our friend Leah and her family support and participate in:
http://www.border-wars.com/category/dogs/great-danes
Hint: A lot more health, sensory, and neurological torture of dogs by people breeding for pretty colors.
I have a Swedish Vallhund and a West Siberian Laika. They have two very different temperament. The former recalls every bad thing which happened to him. The latter forgets all the bad incidents.
The fact that your Dalmatian gives Border Collies a wide berth means she has very bad nerves. Whether or not she is a puppy doesn’t justify the fact the dog has horrible nerves. A dog with good nerves would not be traumatized.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
Anecdotes don’t mean much, but I think it’s funny how many Dalmatian apologists are here talking smack about Border Collies as if this blog is a hagiography to all things Border Collie.
I’ll note that most people are unperceptive and ignorant and have no idea why dogs do what they do and most are so oblivious they don’t realize most of what happens between dogs BEFORE they start fighting. I would not be surprised if the Dalmatian here was fearful and provoked an attack (as any behaviorist can attest that dogs that are anxious often provoke other dogs into aggression).
Anxiety begets anxiety and this leads to fear and aggression.
You can’t educate someone who isn’t willing to listen. ANY breed can show the traits the Dals do and while I think this whole article is unfair, I know the guy who wrote it won’t listen. With that said, I would trust my two Dalmatians with children and anyone else 100%, before my Aussies. I had Siberians once too, and I wouldn’t trust them with little kids either.
With all this being said, I would happily invite this man to my house and after meeting my bi-lateral Dalmatians (BAER tested), I would love to hear him label them with any of the stereotypes he listed.
The problem with todays society is stereotyping and this man just took it off people and onto animals.
The truth is, ANY breed could have temperament issues.
And while Dals suffer from stones and deafness, they have far less hereditary health issues than other breeds. A trip to the OFA website can prove that to anyone willing to look. Look up the requirements to get a CHIC number.
The Dalmatian:
http://www.caninehealthinfo.org/brdreqs.html?breed=DM
The Border Collie:
http://www.caninehealthinfo.org/brdreqs.html?breed=BCO
The full Breed list
http://www.offa.org/breedtests.html?btnSearch=Tests+by+Breed
You’re one of those insufferable idiots who thinks that the NUMBER of “diseases” on some list is more important than the incidence and severity of all diseases within a breed.
Tell me, which breed is more healthy between these two:
Breed A:
1% suffer from allergies
1% suffer from deafness
1% suffer from epiliepsy
Breed B:
45% suffer from deafness
You can’t seem to make up your mind, can you? First it’s 30% are deaf… then it’s 45%. Try 10-12% for the win.
You speak in sweeping generalizations. Obviously, you have a deep seated dislike for Dalmatians and want others to feel the same or validate your irrational hatred.
You have very poor reasoning skills, don’t you? In my comment to which you are replying, “Breed A” and “Breed B” a hypothetical. That’s why they are called A and B and not Poodle and Dachshund or something else. There are no real dog breeds “A” and “B,” it’s just an example to illustrate a point.
Dalmatians, as I documented above, which you need to re-read, clearly, have been shown via scientific study to have a 25-30% level of deafness:
References:
http://www.lsu.edu/deafness/Cargill2004.pdf
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14623147
If you have credible documentation for your figure, please provide it.
http://www.embracepetinsurance.com/dog-breeds/dalmatian
http://www.embracepetinsurance.com/health/leukodystrophy
Copper Hepatopathy in the Dalmatian:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12465762
Caudal Cervical Spondylomyelopathy in a Dalmatian:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23644293
CHIC means nothing. The breed club defines what is required for CHIC.
Look at what is required for Yorkies..
Eye Examination by a boarded ACVO Ophthalmologist- Prior to the onset of breeding, recommend evaluations at 1, 3, and 6 Years of Age.
Results registered with OFA – OR
Results registered with CERF
Patellar Luxation
OFA Evaluation
Just TWO tests, and look at what’s optional…
Legg-Calve-Perthes (Optional)
OFA Evaluation
Autoimmune thyroiditis (Optional)
OFA evaluation from an approved laboratory – Recommend testing at ages 1, 3, and 6 Years of Age.
Cornell DNA Bank (Optional)
Participation in the Cornell DNA Bank (Blood Sample Required)
DNA Repository (Optional)
Participation in the OFA/Chic DNA Repository (Blood Sample Required)
Hip Dysplasia (Optional)
OFA Evaluation
Notice what’s not mentioned at ALL?
Toy breeds are notorious for liver shunt, so why did the breed club not require or even recommend BAT for the breed?
Also, may I recommend that YOU look up the requirements for a CHIC number…
Let me quote you from the CHIC site…
“The CHIC number itself does not imply normal test results, only that all the required breed specific tests were performed and the results made publicly available.”
In other words, a dog can FAIL every single test, and STILL get a CHIC number. Considering how lazy some people can be, unscrupulous breeders can say my dogs are CHICed and a number of people won’t even bother to look the dog up and see what the results were, assuming that is a mark of quality, much like people have assumed for decades that AKC registration was also a mark of quality.
Hi there,
Of course, have your opinion, but opinion doesn’t amount to fact! As a Dalmatian owner who has also worked as a dog walker for many years, i’ve never met an aggressive Dal, they’ve all been wonderful characters -with a great sense of humour. How many Dalmatians have you worked with? It’s strange that you’d pick on Dals for negative colour traits, as opposed to, I don’t know… a West Highland White?! I am totally not against the introduction of new blood to counteract some of the problems Dals (like all breeds) face. The most important thing is health and temperament, not purity of genes. 🙂
My girl is the most loving and gentle dog I’ve ever owned, is wonderful with children and the elderly, has no genetic health problems whatsoever.
To be honest, I’ve had more trouble with Border Collies in my career than I have Dalmatians (I’ve scars on my back from a rather nasty unprovoked attack I suffered as a child) but I’m not about to run a hate campaign towards them, each and every dog, whatever it’s breed, can have downfalls. Anyone worried about Dals should talk to me, i’d be happy to put to sleep (no pun intended) any unpleasant opinion on the breed! It is ignorance that leads to these opinions, and education/experience regarding the breed can work wonders!
All purebreeds can suffer issues, are you saying border collies have no problems at all?? All the border collies i’ve worked with are WAAAAYY more highly strung than any Dalmatians I know (I grew up on a farm and around many sheep farmers who owned them as working dogs/pets) a lot seem to suffer very neurotic tendencies, I find them to be very obsessive over possessions and untrustworthy around children/other dogs (no matter how much exercise they get) They also, like all pure breeds, suffer from genetic predispositions to certain problems, Hip dysplasia, Collie eye anomaly (CEA), and epilepsy are the most recognised problems. All of the middle aged/older borders I know suffer terrible hip problems (even allowing for old age) we should try and breed this out of them! 😛
I am interested to know why you’ve singled out Dalmatians as “train wrecks” as opposed to any other breed? Maybe you just had a bad experience??
The picture you’ve sighted at the top of the post is of a Dalmatian smiling. (look it up on youtube) They do this when they’re happy or trying to get out of trouble for trying to steal food or sneak on the bed (in my girl’s case!) Both dogs in the picture are not exhibiting an aggressive stance, the ears back in that way (curved, not flat against the head) is another way a dog shows submission. As a dog person you should be able to read this body language easily.
Kindest Regards,
Cx
This is an argument, I have my opinion and it’s backed up by facts. Try harder.
Since you’ve spent over an hour and fifteen minutes on this blog and you’ve failed to read any other post besides this ONE Dalmatian post, who the hell do you think you are to assess who I am and how often I’ve talked about color traits and the problems associated with them in dog breeds. Dalmatians are HARDLY the first, only, or most regular subject of my discussion of the topic. They are simply the most current. Why don’t YOU spend a few minutes reading the HUNDREDS of posts on this blog before you make an uninformed assessment of what I write about.
This should get you started on my discussions of pigmentation, health problems, and ethics:
http://www.border-wars.com/tag/pigmentation
I’ll get around to talking about West Highland Whites too, but I doubt you’ll stick around long enough. If you’d like an article on Westies sooner, there’s a paypal link right there on the side of the blog. Drop me $100 and I’ll put out a West Higland White post, post haste! If you’re not going to pay than you can wait for the free education like everyone else.
Bullshit! You don’t believe this. If you did, you wouldn’t breed or own extreme piebald dogs like the Dalmatian. 30% Deafness and 100% predisposition to urate stone disease is NOT HEALTHY. And there is NO way that you can claim you’re putting health above trivial aesthetics if you keep breeding dogs that go deaf so often. No justification. You can say it all you want, but that just makes you a committed liar.
Oh, here we have the pinnacle of your logical debate skills? You’re insulted that I spoke some truth about Dalmatians and now you think that I’ll shut up if you insult Border Collies? You are pathetic.
The first part is an uninteresting tautology that means nothing. Every living thing can die. Is that profound? NO. The issue, as dog breeders, is are we really improving dogs? Are we minimizing disease? Are we placing health and temperament above shallow aesthetics? In the case of the Dalmatian, the answer is NO. You are not improving dogs, you are building a breed around a defect, simply because it’s novel. You are enshrining rates of deafness higher than any other breed, and you are pretending that temperament PROBLEMS are really signs of happy dogs being happy and smiling and loving and just at ease and peaceful and wonderful and fluffy wuffy!
PLEASE.
On the second part, why don’t you read more than one post here. I have CATEGORIES and TAGS for every single post to help you figure out where I talk about Border Collies and Health and Genetics. Learn something before you lecture me on Border Collies. It’s so irrelevant to this post that you invoking it makes you a troll.
Where do I discuss the photo at all? But since you bring it up, the dog is certainly NOT smiling as we humans would interpret it (correctly), although there is a theory that human smiling did evolve from the same anxiety response that dogs and apes show. Why don’t YOU look it up. It’s not pretty. It’s a sign of anxiety which Dalmatians are rather notorious for having. And anxiety is not really a positive trait to have in a dog at all, it leads to all sorts of negative and destructive behaviors, even biting.
Firstly, you’re really not being a very nice person, the world doesn’t need any more unpleasant people. Personal attacks based on no knowledge of me as a person. Nice. Real nice. I wonder if you’d be quite such belligerent bully in person, I expect you like to hide behind the relative anonymity of the internet? Calling me a “committed liar” is slander, so please don’t do that. I’d call it a discussion that you’ve managed to turn into an argument on your part, which is a shame because I just wanted to join in. I will read further your posts, but I’m at work right now and my time is taken up with that, and focusing on this post. 🙂
I respect your opinion, but yea, my opinion is also based on fact, which leads me to surmise one of us might be wrong in some instances. (and it’s not me -haha) Please also note how I can voice opinion without being nasty, I in no way want to attack you personally, I just wanted to join the discussion.
I do not breed dogs, I own one, and have worked with them all my life. I was agreeing with you that something needs to be done to widen the gene pool -but you still persisted in arguing with me! My dog has absolutely nothing wrong with her and you can in no way say otherwise as you’ve never met her! I’m not trying to get you to ‘shut up’ by mentioning border collies, more trying to get you to identify with the fact that singling out one breed over all others (in this post) is very short-sighted. Please don’t call me pathetic, nowhere have I made attempts to personally insult or upset you, kindly give me the same respect.
Equally I could say (using stems from your logic) that border breeders are continuously breeding dogs with an incredibly high herding/working instinct and placing them into homes where all they do all day is obsess over balls and are so wired they’re climbing up the walls, snappy and unpredictable. How is that placing temperament over any other breed trait? (in my experience, there are sure to be exceptions, maybe your dogs are lovely and I could rekindle my liking for collies??) I wasn’t attacking Borders and I’m not insulted that you gave opinion on Dals (although it seems that really all you seem to want to is insult me for some reason?) and again, I agree that we should cross them a little to rid them of problems (I believe this with all breeds) If your point is that pure breeds need to have their gene pool widened then that should be an opinion across all breeds. (labs get arthritis, pugs can’t breathe properly, GSD’s have terrible problems with hip dysplasia because their backs are at such an extreme angle)
Also, I am blonde with blue eyes and pale skin, does this make me an aggressive person? Judging by my ability to give civil and non-threatening opinions, and your seeming total lack of ability to remain civil when talking to an absolute stranger, i’d be more inclined to say that you are albino! 😉
My dog, and all other dals i’ve met, have been confident, happy and loving animals. The Collies i’ve met have not been. When I was bitten (badly) there was no warning, no provocation whatsoever. I grew up on a farm and know how to behave around and read animals. This is fact because I witnessed it. You can’t confine aggressive tendencies/behavioural issues to coat colour, but the links you site are interesting and I’d like to read more on coat colour and predispositions. I had a grey horse with with hooves and he was a dream! I also had a bay with 4 black legs and she was a bit of a nightmare at times! -weird.
The most nervous dogs I know of are probably Yorkshire terriers and greyhound/whippet types, and both exhibit their nerves in different ways. (there are always exceptions, although you seem to like to tar every dal with the same brush so i’m mimicking this tendency of yours with regards to other breeds)
You are just plain wrong about the ‘smile’ of a dal, and that picture IS showing a classic passive stance. I am not anthropomorphising when I call it a smile, it’s just what it’s known as. Other dogs do it to, just to a lesser extent. If anything it’s the opposite of aggressiveness. When did I sight a temperament problem and try to make out it wasn’t??? There is nothing at all anxious about my dog, you can do anything with her, take her on trains, buses, central London, and she’d never even consider biting anyone.
Are you saying when I’m happy and I smile i’m not happy?? Strange.
I guess In some circumstances creatures may instigate a smile if they feel uncomfortable about a situation, in an attempt to alleviate it; one could therefore surmise that smiling, in either sense of the word, it not an aggressive stance to take, as it would be seen as making attempts to avoid bad situations.
My dog is not aggressive, she is not nervous, she isn’t destructive, and you cannot say otherwise. You’ve not addressed the fact that I was bitten by a collie, i’m just interested to know what you think of this??
As a female she’s less likely to suffer with crystals and all I have to do is make sure she gets lots of water and low purine food. I’ve owned/grown up with so many dogs, and as much as I loved them all, my dal is the best natured by far. Fact. The next dog I will get, may be a dal cross of some sort (this isn’t because I’ve suffered any consequence of living with my dal, but I, like you, would like to see lenience with regards to a little gene pool widening, in ALL breeds)
Also, Dals don’t “go deaf” they can be born deaf, although I do not think this is right (something should be done to stop this) it’s not necessarily a problem if the owner of said deaf creature knows what they’re doing. Being born deaf means that they just acquire different ways of learning, they’re none the wiser! -it’s not like they could hear and have gone deaf and get confused/distressed about it.
I will probably read more of your posts, because I’m sure I’ll find them interesting, but how could I spend “a few minutes” reading “HUNDREDS” of posts?? 😛
Please if you reply, refrain from making any personal attacks on me as a person. I just want to join in on a discussion as I am bored at work. I’m really a nice person if you get to know me, and do not deserve to be spoken to the way you’ve spoken to me. No one does to be fair. I’d not speak to you that way.
ps- Genuine thanks for giving me something to do today, I’m glad this discussion was brought to my attention. 🙂
Listen Catherine, I don’t care if you don’t think I’m a nice person, but I expect people to make intelligent and informed comments that are rational. You do not rise to that level. You are a catty and biased Dalmatian breeder apologist and you rely on shitty tactics like bashing Border Collies on a post that has nothing to do with Border Collies. Do you think that makes you clever? Do you think there’s some relevant comparison here? There’s not.
Border Collies are not build around a defective and shallow coat color allele. Dalmatians are. There’s really no way that you can reconcile that.
Dalmatians are an artificial breed that is designed around a unique expression of coat patterning and that patterning is inextricably linked to both deafness and all the other problems that come with albinism including mental disorders.
It’s not ME who has made that assessment. Dalmatians are widely considered stupid and flighty and hard to train and prone to fear and anxiety and biting BECAUSE THEY EARNED THAT reputation. And they didn’t earn that reputation from people who HATE the breed and are biased against it, they earned that reputation from all of the people who actually experienced owning one and didn’t like it!
Gosh honey, you’re really dense aren’t you? My full name is printed at the bottom of every single post. This blog is hosted on my personal breeder website. If you took more than 10 seconds to look around you could find my address and phone number.
And yes, I’m every bit as much of an in your face, won’t take your shit, asshole in person, a skill honed over years of highly successful public speaking and debate at the state and national level in both high school and college. I’d happily say everything I type to your face.
Actually, since this is written, it would be Libel not Slander. But you know what the defense against that is? The Truth! And it is the truth. You can not claim and be honest, that you breed for health above all and breed a Dalmatian dog. There is just no reconciling that with the truth, thus you are a committed liar.
The Dalmatian coat is 100% responsible for the 30% rate of deafness in the breed. Being deaf is contrary to being healthy. The Dalmatian coat is a trait that need not be preserved save for your vanity. SO, to put the coat above the breed’s health, thus dooming them to 30% deafness, is clearly NOT to put health above vanity.
So I expect your lawsuit for Libel because I stand by affirming that you are a committed liar if you make the claim that you both breed Dalmatians with the extreme piebald coat and claim to also, concomitant to breeding Dalmatians, put health above all else.
Again, more statements which are lies. You don’t respect my opinion if you counter it with ad hominem attacks, which is exactly what your trash talking of Border Collies is. You bring in Border Collies to a discussion of Dalmatians because you think it’s somehow cosmically justified to attack not what I wrote about Dalmatians, but instead attack Border Collies. That’s being nasty and it’s a rather tired logical fallacy.
Unless she’s a LUA Dalmatian, she has two copies of the disease gene for uric acidosis. That’s clearly something wrong with her. If she has the Dalmatian coloring, she has a propensity to both be deaf and to pass along deafness to her offspring. That is clearly something wrong with her. Her coat color also predisposes her to temperament problems that are well noted in the breed and which have a biological basis. Again, that’s something wrong with her.
You might think she’s a perfect little peach, but your opinion of your own dog, as entirely unrealistic as it is, doesn’t vindicate the breed in the slightest. I love all of my Border Collies but I’d never ever be so naive to say there’s nothing wrong with them. No dog is perfect.
Nor does that observation make all dogs equal in their imperfection either. There’s a world of difference ethically between trying to do right by our dogs and trying to remove disease wisely and judiciously and the complete opposite which is what is going on in Dalmatians, which is to enshrine disease as a breed feature and then decide that there’s no way to remove it AND keep the pretty coat color, so we just live with it.
I don’t believe it’s ethical to breed the Dalmatian coat color pattern, so that implicates the entire breed and every breeder.
The only thing short sighted here is that you opened your mouth before you even bothered to look around. This isn’t the first post on this blog, this is closer to the 430th post. You made the entirely uninformed comment that I’m not writing about Border Collies or other breeds enough. That’s just because you didn’t bother to look around and find any one of DOZENS of other posts which discuss these issues for many other breeds.
So no, I don’t owe you anything, let alone to be civil, when you act so presumptuously and ignorantly on my blog. I pay the bills here, it’s my platform and I don’t appreciate apologists with a chip on their shoulder to say ignorant things because they don’t have the courtesy to acquaint themselves with my writings before making blanket statements about them which are inaccurate.
I didn’t come to your porch and insult your dog. My thoughts are published HERE on my space. YOU are the guest.
Not going to derail this post about Dalmatian issues to discuss Border Collie issues. Any further comments by you that involve Border Collies on this post will not be published. If you want to talk Border Collie issues, select and read any one of the many posts I have written on Border Collie issues. Or better yet, post your thoughts on your own blog.
There is no sine-qua-non aesthetic feature of Border Collies that has 30% deafness and 100% predisposition to kidney/bladder stones associated with it, nor anything similar. Nor are Border Collies bred with temperament problems occurring secondary to useless but novel coat feature. If you don’t like Border Collie temperaments, fine, but if they are problematic, they are so because others have chosen those temperaments on purpose and justify them with their utility to those needs.
I don’t see any justification for shitty Dalmatian temperaments secondary to coat color fetishes being justified by Dalmatian breeders.
So your poor attempt to deflect the conversation off on to Border Collies is a failure and is not welcome on this thread.
If you want to branch this out to other breeds, then you must select one that is actually relevant and topical, like any of the breeds I wrote about in my Sine Qua Non Dog Disorders post. Or any of the other breeds I’ve written about who suffer from pigment related disorders.
You’re missing a rather blatant distinction. I am not taring every Dalmatian as Deaf. 30% are. But 100% of them have the genes to make deafness a reality. The only difference is luck and gene penetrance and where the patterning happens to fall. I’m not taring every Dalmatian has having bladder stones. Rather 100% have the genetic predisposition to. Again, luck and incomplete penetrance are the only things saving every Dal from dying of this.
EVERY DALMATIAN gets tarred because EVERY Dalmatian is genetically susceptible to this based on the fact that EVERY Dalmatian has the coat color and EVERY Dalmatian is homozygous for the disease allele. This isn’t me being mean to poor little Dalmatians. This is just a FACT.
You were, however, saying that they’re all aggressive and stupid and flighty.
No, they’re all prone to it due to all of them having the same coat color which is linked with behavioral problems PLUS the general consensus that the breed has temperament issues.
Answer this: Do you think it is ethical to have the Dalmatian coat color if it means that 30% of the dogs will be deaf in one or both ears?
Do you think that is ethical?
I also said, on many occasions, that I am not condoning deafness in Dals and that I do believe a programme should be put in place to alleviate this issue. I’ve on many occasions AGREED with you!!
Unsure as to how you can take the ethical high ground with such a distinct inability to treat fellow human beings with respect and consideration.
A program to alleviate the issue would mean having a non-piebald coat color option in the breed. I don’t see anyone doing that!
I don’t owe you any respect when you don’t take the time to inform yourself about the 400+ posts I’ve already written and you say demeaning and uninformed things about them. Your ignorance is not an excuse to act like an idiot.
How can I be saying “demeaning and uninformed things” about the 400+ posts I’ve not read??
Reading your replies to everyone on this page confirms the fact that you’re unable to treat ANYONE with respect. It’s not just me. You are just a bully from what I can make of it. All you can think of to do is throw insults at me, that’s hardly an upstanding counter-argument is it??
If we’re talking about being uninformed, how many Dalmatians have you actually met and worked with??
Christopher, actually her statement is not true. There are, in fact, Dalmatians BAER tested at 8 weeks of age that later are found to be deaf. I would point some of these apologists to Dr. Strains work.
All this talk of deaf dogs being calm is nauseating. I defy any of those making this claim to walk around with ear plugs in one or both ears and not be constantly scanning for hazards that seem to appear out of nowhere or appear suddenly because they can’t tell from what direction it is coming. Denial is not just a river in Egypt.
No. In humans not all smiles represent being happy. People have NERVOUS smiles too.
“People smile when they’re happy. People smile for all sorts of reasons, only one of which is to signal happiness. Ekman describes many kinds of smiles, from the “felt” or true smile to the fear smile, the contempt smile, the dampened smile, the miserable smile, and a number of others.”
“Many biologists think the smile originated as a sign of fear. Primalogist Signe Preuschoft traces the smile back over 30 million years of evolution to a “fear grin” stemming from monkeys and apes who often used barely clenched teeth to portray to predators that they were harmless. The smile may have evolved differently among species and especially among humans.”
Basically, calling a submissive fear “smile” of a dog a SMILE!!! is anthropomorphism and is totally misrepresenting what emotions the dog is conveying. They are not HAPPY. They are submissive. They could be fearful. And being submissive and fearful can lead to bites when people don’t read the signals and mistake it for being happy. This is how children get bitten by not respecting a dog’s actual signals and body language (adults too).
You’ve again edited and selected certain phrases or fragments within passages, I also said:
“I guess In some circumstances creatures may instigate a smile if they feel uncomfortable about a situation, in an attempt to alleviate it; one could therefore surmise that smiling, in either sense of the word, is not an aggressive stance to take, as it would be seen as making attempts to avoid bad situations.” I do it myself, I’d rather leave something on amicable terms than have a fight about it. I’m beginning to think the opposite is true of you. You’re more Dalmatian (by your definition) than any Dalmatian i’ve met!
She also “smiles” when I come home. Does that mean she is scared of me???? -No, she is pleased to see me!
She’s not smiling because she’s happy. She’s submissive grinning because she wants to re-establish that she is, in fact, submissive to you. This is anxiety, not joy.
I don’t care about your dog in specific, I’m speaking to BREED dispositions and BREED expression of disease and BREED temperament. This is a collective exercise and individual anecdotes are not particularly relevant. Especially made by people who are biased and often too close to their own animals to make fair assessments. Mothers of killers rarely testify that their children were anything other than angels!
Haha, she’s not an angel at all. She’s a calculating food thief, has sensitive skin (something which is probably a Dal thing, yes) and is very strong-willed. I know a collection of owners who could say similar things that I’ve said, would that count as a better ‘argument’ to you? I’m not being biased, I’ve been totally objective. I’m sure there are more complicated Dals out there, it’s just i’ve not met one yet!
Then take a moment and read this.
http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html
Then print out this photo for easy reference:
http://danielmiessler.com/wp-content/uploaded_content/2008/11/argument-pyramid.jpg
If your statement doesn’t hit the top three zones, don’t bother making it.
That’s funny, one many occasions you’ve not managed to hit the top three zones when counteracting my points!
You have failed to reach the zones at all. And it’s in your court to do so as I made a post which is an argument and your comments are sub-standard. You’re not even making counter arguments in your comments, so your failure to make a counter argument precludes the need to respond to anything you say with a more formal argument. Pointing out that all you’re talking about is anecdotes and opinions is not going to involve data, Catherine, because you haven’t provided any. You’re down on the level of opinion sharing. BORING.
YOU decided this was an argument. I was merely joining in on a discussion. I don’t want to argue, you do, so why would I perform a counter-argument?
There really is something fundamentally wrong with a person that strives to cause conflict at any given opportunity. I don’t need to read any more of your 400+ posts to surmise that there’s certainly some sort of personality defect going on with you, and that there’s no reasoning with you. It’s sad if anything.
Firstly, you’re really not being a very nice person, the world doesn’t need any more unpleasant people. Personal attacks based on no knowledge of me as a person. Nice. Real nice. I wonder if you’d be quite such belligerent bully in person, I expect you like to hide behind the relative anonymity of the internet? Calling me a “committed liar” is slander, so please don’t do that. I’d call it a discussion that you’ve managed to turn into an argument on your part, which is a shame because I just wanted to join in. I will read further your posts, but I’m at work right now and my time is taken up with that, and focusing on this post. 🙂
I respect your opinion, but yea, my opinion is also based on fact, which leads me to surmise one of us might be wrong in some instances. (and it’s not me -haha) Please also note how I can voice opinion without being nasty, I in no way want to attack you personally, I just wanted to join the discussion.
I do not breed dogs, I own one, and have worked with them all my life. I was agreeing with you that something needs to be done to widen the gene pool -but you still persisted in arguing with me! My dog has absolutely nothing wrong with her and you can in no way say otherwise as you’ve never met her! I’m not trying to get you to ‘shut up’ by mentioning border collies, more trying to get you to identify with the fact that singling out one breed over all others (in this post) is very short-sighted. Please don’t call me pathetic, nowhere have I made attempts to personally insult or upset you, kindly give me the same respect.
Equally I could say (using stems from your logic) that border breeders are continuously breeding dogs with an incredibly high herding/working instinct and placing them into homes where all they do all day is obsess over balls and are so wired they’re climbing up the walls, snappy and unpredictable. How is that placing temperament over any other breed trait? (in my experience, there are sure to be exceptions, maybe your dogs are lovely and I could rekindle my liking for collies??) I wasn’t attacking Borders and I’m not insulted that you gave opinion on Dals (although it seems that really all you seem to want to is insult me for some reason?) and again, I agree that we should cross them a little to rid them of problems (I believe this with all breeds) If your point is that pure breeds need to have their gene pool widened then that should be an opinion across all breeds. (labs get arthritis, pugs can’t breathe properly, GSD’s have terrible problems with hip dysplasia because their backs are at such an extreme angle)
Also, I am blonde with blue eyes and pale skin, does this make me an aggressive person? Judging by my ability to give civil and non-threatening opinions, and your seeming total lack of ability to remain civil when talking to an absolute stranger, i’d be more inclined to say that you are albino! 😉
My dog, and all other dals i’ve met, have been confident, happy and loving animals. The Collies i’ve met have not been. When I was bitten (badly) there was no warning, no provocation whatsoever. I grew up on a farm and know how to behave around and read animals. This is fact because I witnessed it. You can’t confine aggressive tendencies/behavioural issues to coat colour, but the links you site are interesting and I’d like to read more on coat colour and predispositions. I had a grey horse with with white hooves and he was a dream! I also had a bay with 4 black legs and she was a bit of a nightmare at times! -weird.
The most nervous dogs I know of are probably Yorkshire terriers and greyhound/whippet types, and both exhibit their nerves in different ways. (there are always exceptions, although you seem to like to tar every dal with the same brush so i’m mimicking this tendency of yours with regards to other breeds)
You are just plain wrong about the ‘smile’ of a dal, and that picture IS showing a classic passive stance. I am not anthropomorphising when I call it a smile, it’s just what it’s known as. Other dogs do it to, just to a lesser extent. If anything it’s the opposite of aggressiveness. When did I sight a temperament problem and try to make out it wasn’t??? There is nothing at all anxious about my dog, you can do anything with her, take her on trains, buses, central London, and she’d never even consider biting anyone.
Are you saying when I’m happy and I smile i’m not happy?? Strange.
I guess In some circumstances creatures may instigate a smile if they feel uncomfortable about a situation, in an attempt to alleviate it; one could therefore surmise that smiling, in either sense of the word, it not an aggressive stance to take, as it would be seen as making attempts to avoid bad situations.
My dog is not aggressive, she is not nervous, she isn’t destructive, and you cannot say otherwise. You’ve not addressed the fact that I was bitten by a collie, i’m just interested to know what you think of this??
As a female she’s less likely to suffer with crystals and all I have to do is make sure she gets lots of water and low purine food. I’ve owned/grown up with so many dogs, and as much as I loved them all, my dal is the best natured by far. Fact. The next dog I will get, may be a dal cross of some sort (this isn’t because I’ve suffered any consequence of living with my dal, but I, like you, would like to see lenience with regards to a little gene pool widening, in ALL breeds)
Also, Dals don’t “go deaf” they can be born deaf, although I do not think this is right (something should be done to stop this) it’s not necessarily a problem if the owner of said deaf creature knows what they’re doing. Being born deaf means that they just acquire different ways of learning, they’re none the wiser! -it’s not like they could hear and have gone deaf and get confused/distressed about it.
I will probably read more of your posts, because I’m sure I’ll find them interesting, but how could I spend “a few minutes” reading “HUNDREDS” of posts?? 😛
Please if you reply, refrain from making any personal attacks on me as a person. I just want to join in on a discussion as I am bored at work. I’m really a nice person if you get to know me, and do not deserve to be spoken to the way you’ve spoken to me. No one does to be fair. I’d not speak to you that way.
ps- Genuine thanks for giving me something to do today, I’m glad this discussion was brought to my attention. 🙂
Genetic melanocytes are multi task with amino acids, enemzes that are building blocks of proteins in the body. Genetic melanocytes multi task amino acids enemzes the building blocks of proteins in the body.
Piebald is a deletion gene. So what does it delete?
Melanocytes, responsible for pigment synthesis in the skin, and enteric ganglia which is basically the insulation around the nerves. .
Why is a Dalmatian a Train Wreck? I have been around a number of Dalmatians. Growing up even those who worked in the firehouses. Well, tempered family dog I do not think so. http://www.genetics.org/content/157/2/803.full.pdf
Color seems to be a magnet for prejudice. It’s refreshing to see white being trashed instead of dark. I’ll bet most of us commenting on this blog have light skin color and blond-to-brown hair, and if we are deaf, it is only through our prejudices, not due to physical disability.
If I follow the logic of the coloration statements in the above discussion, a little white is good but too much is bad . . . .meaning the folks who bred the white chest patch out of the St. Johns dog to get the Labrador Retriever were doing harm. But the solid color (KK) Labbie is notorious for being responsive to humans. Should Labbie breeders shift to going for Bolo pads (look it up if you don’t understand) and white chests?
I have met a couple Dallies with mental problems and I can see why people come to dislike the breed. If I go to an unbiased source, eg., the Finnish KC’s database, and look at cause of death statistics, I find that the border collie is far from problem free, either. On average, Dallies live a bit longer than BC’s and are more likely to die from old age. BC’s statistics are brought down by high incidence of fatal cancer (19.8% for BC’s as opposed to 10.4% for Dallies) and relatively high rates of accidental death (8.5% for BC, 5% for Dallies). Behavioural problems do come through in the stats: a Dal is almost four times more likely to be euthanised for behavioural problems than a BC (4% vs 1%), but only about 1% (2.8 vs 1.8%) more likely to die from urinary problems . . .
Point being, breed bashing is common, and highly subjective. Choose any breed, there’s something to bash. In a way, Dallies are fortunate. Some of their problems arise from simple and easily identified–hence easily corrected (at least in theory)–genetic problems. Big killers, such as cancer and tendency to be accident prone, are much harder to correct. It is lamentable that breed fanciers are not willing to work on correcting known and fixable problems. But that’s a problem with humans, not with Dals.
(source http://jalostus.kennelliitto.fi/frmTerveystilastot.aspx?R=153&Lang=en, with normalization of data done by me).
Why are you invoking Border Collies? This is a post on Dalmatians.
Stick to breeding your Border Collies . They are as mad as a box of frogs, I had 1 once, never again. The Dal breeders are doing their best and we only have the breed because we love them . I haven’t had any with stones in over 40 years of ownership
Troll.
I don’t care if you love the dogs, that doesn’t mean you’re doing right by them. I think you’re sick if you claim to love a dog but think that a 3 in 10 chance of making it deaf because you like just one coat variation is justifiable.
I think you’re cruel to maintain breed purity (a dubious concept at best) by allowing 100% saturation of uric stone disease alleles to plague your breed. It’s no consolation that any of you have managed to not have a case in your dogs, that’s nothing you can take credit for, that’s simply relying on the incomplete penetrance of the disease to the allele. That’s about a stupid as saying that you played Russian Roulette but didn’t die. The gun is still loaded and the only way to win is to either NOT PLAY or unload the gun.
You’ve chosen to leave the gun loaded and then brag about your luck. That doesn’t make you a good breeder, it makes you an apologist idiot who actually doesn’t care about your dog’s welfare as much as you care about their coat color. Plain and simple. You breed Dalmatians, you’re not ethical.
This story is only the view of the writer based on selected information they have read. Most, if not all, research done on deafness in animals start off with saying “we are unclear to the causes” or “we don’t have enough research information” but…..
As for Dalmatian’s deafness as compared to other breeds. The facts are, the Dalmatian has been studied more than any other breed, thus their rates of deafness are probably far more accurate than other breeds. I’ll refer to a study done at Louisiana State University School of Veterinary Medicine. They supply a table of the list of dogs that have been tested and the number tested. Now on this report the Dalmatian’s tested numbered 5638, whereas the next breed tested on the list, Bulldogs, numbered 681!!! Now, when they get to the same level in testing over decades of all breeds, then and only then can one compare deafness in Dalmatians against the other 85 breeds who also have deafness. (http://www.lsu.edu/deafness/incidenc.htm)
LSU states in the article: The prevalence of congenital deafness in different breeds is “seldom known” because of the “limited number of studies”. Again, “seldom known” because of “limited studies”. So what you have supplied is a group of “theories” and a theory is never fact. There are a number of theories but none have gotten to the root cause. (http://www.lsu.edu/deafness/genetics.htm) And with any breed, a breeder has to be responsible and not breed a deaf animal. Should they chose to sell a deaf breed then they should be responsible enough to get them fix before they do so.
For every story of a problem dog there seems to be a story of one that was successfully raised. This includes all breeds and Dalmatians are no different. And I for one hate articles of this type because its nothing more then stereotyping all into one.
A good writer should always be able to take constructive criticism and listen to other points of views, which I actually see little of this here.
Writer shows aggressive behavior in their bloodline. Maybe caused by those white skin pigments.
First, let me say that I have owned Dalmatians for 39 years. They have been all rescues for the last 19 years and 10 of those years have been heavily involved with a huge network of of Dalmatian lovers and rescuers. I can say, without a doubt, that I know a few things about Dalmatians.
I have seen heavily spotted, almost all black Dalmatians be deaf and lightly spotted, double blue eyed ones have hearing. I knew a breeder that had one, ONE, deaf puppy in 35 years of breeding. She lamented that she was not as careful researching the background of the particular line she bred with that time and she vowed that she would never make that mistake in the future. Maybe excessively careful breeding does make a difference as far as deafness is concerned. Who really knows?
Urinary stones and crystals are a problem and, yes, it could be resolved by breeding with a pointer, but the powers in charge of Dalmatian standards will not back down. In all of the Dalmatians I have had over the years (up to six at a time) I have had only one who was born deaf, but many stone formers. Purines are the enemy and it can be controlled by diet. But what breed is free of all problems? It is desire for purebred dogs of ANY kind that perpetuates the problems of that particular breed. And don’t kid yourself, all breeds have problems unique to their birthright.
You think the “smarl” is disgusting? WTF? How many Dalmatians have you shared your life with before becoming so judgmental? Wolves show a submissive “smile” by pulling their lips back, closed, in submission. I have a Dal now that does that, but only because she was beat within an inch of her life by her former owner. The Dalmatians that I have had that smarl may be showing submission, but the rest of their body is relaxed, not tense with fear. They have learned the reaction they get from humans is positive and it diffuses the situation. Dals are incredibly smart and unlike, say, your border collies who endlessly herds all day, they like to think independently. To me, that shows greater intelligence.
I am the first person to say that a Dal is not for everyone, not even most. But to blatantly trash a breed you don’t even know is ridiculous. To even hint that they are mentally and physically a “train wreck” is ludicrous. That’s like saying the Westboro Baptist Church represents Christianity. I can’t even imagine my life without a Dalmatian in it and know many more that feel the same.
Well we don’t know everything, no one said we do. And genetics is not a 100% guarantee of destiny. Nor is what color you see on the surface guaranteed to be what color actually made it inside the ear structure where it counts for deafness or inside the eye where it counts for iris stability (seems to be more of a problem with double merles but it’s the same family of disorders… lack of pigment weakens structures, they fail, be it the iris or the hairs in the ear).
We do know that dogs do GO deaf. That the melanin can have a use in metal storage and transport and that when this breaks you might get an imbalance of metal in the tissues feeding the hair in the ear causing them to die.
I’m not sure how the breeder in question could guarantee the hearing status of all of her puppies over decades. Many of the tests have not been around that long or cheap or easy to access. Puppies, which spend a good portion of their time at the breeders sensory impaired NORMALLY are not easy to distinguish as deaf. Heck, many owners of mature dogs are amazed to learn that their dog has partial deafness.
But the take-away point is that Dalmatians have the highest rates of deafness of any breed and some breeds that are “known” for deafness issues have maybe 3%. Dalmatians have 10x that!
NOT something to brag about. And it won’t go away until the coat color goes away. And I don’t see that happening from people who LOVE the breed. If you love it so much, introduce another coat color.
I know that all of the fancy equipment now wasn’t available the entire time this woman was breeding Dals. I cannot say what was available. I’ll bet you could even bang a pot while standing behind a pup. Dogs hate loud unexpected noises and I’d bet the rent that the deaf ones would be the only ones that didn’t jump, assuming that they weren’t all piled on each other. I tried something like that (loud clapping) to see how much two of mine could hear. They both became almost completely deaf while I had them, not through genetics, but because they both suffered neglect before being rescued. Prolonged ear infections and heamotomas that were never attended to caused their ear canals to shut with scar tissue.
I’d guess with large litters like Dals have that non-hearing puppies could easily hide their deficit by taking their cues from the other puppies. The food bowl goes down, hearing puppies run for it, deaf puppies follow closely behind. I think it would take a very concerted effort to isolate the puppies to test them and heck, there’s a reason they do more objective tests which actually measure stimulus instead of being like “hey dog, can you HEAR ME NOW!”
Of course puppies take their cues from their litter mates and their mother. One would have to separate a pup and see how they respond to as loud noise. It most certainly could be done.
I don’t breed them, so I am not the one to preach to about changing the coat color. I only help rescue them.
It’s not that difficult for observant people. It helps to have puppies spread out a bit, but sound sleepers that don’t have a startle response to loud noises should be suspected of deafness. Nothing replaces the certainty of a BAER test, although breeders should delay it as long as possible as the degeneration and hair cell death usually occur two to four weeks after birth, but not always.
I think people who misinterpret the smile to mean that the dog is HAPPY! is disgusting. It’s a form of severe submissive behavior and that is NOT a safe thing in any breed.
Dear Christopher,
I would love to invite you to meet my always smiling Dalmatian girl who is the most stubborn and sturdy dog you could come across. As you will be aware, stubborn and sturdy does not go hand in hand with submissive behavior. Like Border Collies Dalmatians are not for everyone since they are intelligent and active. Also if you do your research properly, then you will find out that the Dalmatians base color is not white!
Furthermore have Dalmatian breeders been among the first who started to BAER test their breeding stock and made the issue a very public one. They also extended their efforts in working on any issues within the breed to introduce the Dalmatian back cross (LUA) dogs into their breeding scheme and are actively seeking to better the breed even further.
In certain countries in Europe where breeders are only allowed from breeding to bilaterally hearing stock the actual bilateral deafness rate has dropped to less than 1% so again it is possible to breed against this genetic predisposition and therefore you theory is great but no the full story.
The reputation of the Dalmatian in the US is not always great but in Europe they are well known for their suitability as family pets particularly when children are present in the household. They also have jobs and work in search and rescue. In Australia some Dalmatian families are used as hearing for the deaf dogs how would all this be possible if the breed was as submissive as you described it?
Maybe your opinion cannot be influenced but I am glad that you express yourself in such an extreme manner that intelligent people will be able to read these comments and walk away without being influenced by your comments.
Have a nice day,
Stephanie from Europe who has been judging Dalmatians in multiple countries
The predominantly white Dalmatians do not produce melanin at all in their white patches. They are not a “Cream” breed. There are no working melanocytes in their white. That’s what causes the deafness, that’s what causes the lack of melanin.
Oh clap clap clap, you BAER test but then you do NOTHING about deaf puppies, save killing them (according to one of you Dal breeders on this thread).
Testing is not important, having dogs that can actually hear is important and other breeds that are worried about deafness barely comes within 1/10th the rate of deafness as Dalmatians or less. And that hasn’t gotten any better.
If Dalmatian breeders wanted dogs that can hear, they’d give up the color. They haven’t. Not even the LUA Dals have made any improvement on deafness. That’s pathetic. ANYTHING but giving up the color.
That’s putting shallow aesthetics above health and it’s true for EVERY SINGLE DALMATIAN on the planet.
Let’s perform a little test. I’ll query google from the US and you from Europe. I’ll type “Why are Dalmatians ” and let google fill in the most common searches.
For the USA:
Why are Dalmatians … DEAF, MEAN, AGGRESSIVE, FIRE DOGS
What does it say in Europe?
OK I did the Google test. Both in the UK and in Germany the sentence was filled with
“Why are Dalmatians……….. deaf. Particular in Germany you will also find pet buyers complain about skin issues this did not come up on Google but since I am very established in the scene I am aware of what is being said and what comes up on Discussion boards. You will find very, very few complaints about bad temperament.
The only web searches that come up with aggressive and co are .com (usually US) domains instead of .de or .co.uk.
Now I only did you a favor by entering this into Google and since I was curious about the outcome BUT I am not in the habit of lying to others or myself and have chosen the Dalmatian as my breed for their specific temperament. I have worked with horses and their owners as a freelance rider and instructor for many years and I need a dog that could keep up with my active outdoor life-style as well as me not having to live in fear when I took my dogs to the local indoor school where there are many strangers, children and dogs.
The following 17 years of Dalmatian ownership have not disappointed me and they even followed my lifestyle change that now turned them into just house and Garden pets and they adapted in a style that few active/working dogs could.
Now……. of course as a breeder there is always a challenge to keep temperaments balanced and I do not want to create the opposite exaggeration from your point point of view.
Matters can always be improved and if they do not get improved it still requires passion and knowledge to keep any dog breed balanced. I have only lived in the US for one year and have come across many pet owners that tell me that Dalmatians are crazy. I have only had direct contact with four US breeders and ALL their dogs and I saw the same relaxed, clowns that I got to know in Europe so you tell me if this is a location issue or if it is the bad work of some?
Trust me if the Dalmatian was the way you described it, I would have changed the breed a long time ago.
No further replies to this? I did forget to ask you when you will start breeding Border Collies that are solid in color since they also suffer from blue eyes (linked to deafness and the absence of pigment) and since they also often come deaf.
Baer hearing testing DOES lead to acurate statistics as well as providing breeders with information on each and every litter so they can make wiser choices in the future to consistanly work on improving the breed.
You mention in another comment that 38 years should have been enough to fix the HUA problem. This statement alone shows how much you really know about genetics and breeding. Are you serious when you state that you want a breed to be related to ONE dog within that time period?
Do me a favor and concentrate on your own breed it appears that you have a lot more homework to do. Start off by working on the submissive posture the BC displays and if you are not seeing it in US BC then please travel to BC country and go out in the countryside where every farmer owns one that then attacks all by-passers to the farm since they have been bred for a long time to be ankle nippers (their job on those farms).
Now again to the Dalmatians coat color. They do not have a white coat base color they are either black or liver. Another gene is then responsible to cover up the color and even more genes are involved to punch holes in the white layer to let out the spots that are taken from the colored base color of the Dalmatian. If you also look at Dalmatians properly then you will find that they have pigmented eyes, lips, noses, paw pads and only IF a white window falls in the inner year will the hearing be impaired which is the same in many other breeds and rather predominant in your chosen breed.
Now this is my final answer. You had the opportunity to exchange information with some very experienced breeders here. Something that I always value particularly when exchanging information with knowledgeable breeders from other breeds. You do not have an interest in broadening your horizons but something in life made you rather bitter and therefore you do not spoil us with new knowledge but use the information that you have in an incredibly negative manner.
Good luck to you and the BC’s that you breed, I hope your life will soon be a happier one and keep my fingers crossed that your BC’s do not have to live with the mistakes that you clearly display on this site.
First off, you need to stop applying European standards to the blog. He is not attacking FCI Dalmatians at all. The statistics he cite for Dalmatians are the ones for North America.
Maybe in your homeland, you don’t have an Animal Right movement where people are actively trying to ban pet-ownership. In Canada and United States we do. Much of what Christopher writes for his blog is not an assault on the European fancys. It is an assault on the American fanciers.
Why?
Much of the practices dog-breeders carry out have been in direct opposition to animal-welfare which fuels the engine for radical organizations such as PeTA.
As a hobby-breeder, Christopher is more impacted by what other breeders do with their dogs than he is impacted by some farm-bred Border Collie no one gives a shit about. The bleeding-heart greenies don’t give a shit about what some hick does with his sheep-dog. They rather cry over pugs which can’t breathe and aggressive Dals.
If the show-fanciers can’t fix themselves, then no one can breed dogs– including Christopher. Blogging about what Joe Dirt does won’t accomplish anything.
Instead of trying to defend the Dalmatians as a European, maybe you should try castrating the Americans by showing what Europeans are doing better than the Americans?
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
Dear Dave,
the whole movement started in Europe and “Pedigree dogs exposed” was first published in Britain, not the US.
I am one of the breeders that share the views of the makers of the program and applaud anybody who can dust some cobwebs of some old breeders attitude or the KC’s around the Word.
It is also my view that breeders need to move forward and understand the term “fit for function” much better than they do today. I however do not see Christopher intention on improving knowledge and moving matters forward, instead he is attacking a breed that is among the healthiest in the world of dog breeding. How is THAT helpful to the cause? How is that going to bribe breeders and KC’s (where the movement should really start) into working together to stop future problems?
The American and Canadian Kennel Clubs started falling apart in 1990 when Mark Derr wrote “The Politics of Dogs” for the Atlantic Monthly. Since then, the North American kennel clubs have responded poorly to reforms. Instead, they participate in denial and data cover-ups.
The European kennel clubs, on the other hand, took the issue by the horns and wrangled. You see the Kennel Club of United Kingdom introducing extensive reforms. Not only that the FCI changed a few rules over the years. So as the result, Europeans have a very strong animal welfare movement.
However, here we have whackjobs who advocate whales and primates should have the right to votes by granting them personhood. The Animal Right also equate pet-ownership to slavery and meat-consumption to genocides. Organizations similar to PeTA or ALF [Animal Liberation Front] have much more powerful voice than organizations which try to improve animals’ quality of life.
Along that line, “Pedigree Dogs Exposed” is a byproduct of the animal-welfare movement, not the animal-right movement. Totally different political climate.
Christopher’s blog is one of the few which focuses on animal-welfare, rather than advocating for complete ban.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
If I recall correctly, Europe underwent a few reforms in the 1990s based on the movement in the 1970s and 1980s– the biggest one being the European Convention for the Protection of Pet Animals, which has the potential to hold dog-breeders responsible for their actions.
We don’t have animal-welfare legislation even remotely close to these in North America. Instead, our reforms are bordering on complete bans on breeding.
It is crucial dog-blogs like Christopher’s to exist to act as a whistle-blower so we can push sensible animal-welfare model; a compromise which the majority would agree with instead of Ingrid Newkirk and Wayne Pacelle at the helm transforming their radical ideologies into reality.
If the American Dalmatian breeders truly want to preserve their rights to breed, just as Christopher is fighting for his right to breed Border Collies, they should be working toward lowering the statistics just as the Europeans have already done.
In the long run, everyone wins because of whistle-blowers.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
Are FCI Dalmatians free of HUA? No. Do they all have the same Piebald, Ticking, and Flecking genes? Yes. FCI Dalmatians are thus genetically just as susceptible to all the issues I raised here.
As for their reputation and popularity in FCI countries, that might be something interesting to look at.
Of course, by genetic design, the lack of melanin will lead to increase in incidences of disorders.
However breeders should be asking themselves: “would Christopher even be blogging about the issue if the concerns about Dalmatians wasn’t a wide-spread concern in the media?” One simply cannot erase years of bad exposure of being labelled “dangerous” or “aggressive” in the news without cracking down.
If breeders were active in harm-reduction, then they wouldn’t have to be paranoid the media is out to get them.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
Don’t put words in my mouth. Your interpretation of my statement is inane.
(1) No one has SOLVED the HUA problem in Dalmatians. The vast majority of them are still homozygous for the disease allele.
(2) The AKC/Dalmatian breed club did NOTHING for 38 years to allow the one single outcross to be registered.
(3) The breed club actively fought the inclusion of LUA Dals.
(4) Nowhere do I advocate that only one single out-cross is the wise solution.
(5) I would advocate several different out-crosses being done and worked into the breed on different lines.
(6) I would also advocate the formation of an appendix registry where outcrossing could be done routinely and recorded.
And as an aside, not that I’d advocate this, in fact I’ve advocated harshly against it, it is actually quite possible for every dog in a breed to be related to 1 dog over a period of 38 years. In ISDS Border Collies, Wiston Cap was present in all dogs registered after 1995ish and he was born in 1963. So 30ish years.
http://www.palado.demon.nl/bcdb/article2/wsn2.htm
OMFG, what drugs are you on? There’s no such thing as a “base” color nor a “mask” nor “cover up” nor “spots ON white” these are just mental model terms people use to describe the coat colors and patterns they see. At a biological level, there are just hairs. And those hairs have different amounts of two color producing chemicals pheomelanin and eumelanin. ALL dog colors come from differing amounts of those two chemicals in the hairs.
Some “cream” colored breeds still produce both of those in the hair, just at very small levels. But “white” hairs are devoid of melanin.
The effect of the white is to kill the melanocytes in the skin and thus there is no melanin in the hair. This is the only effect that matters. Notions of “base color” are irrelevant.
No, Dalmatians are not albinos. But functionally the white patches are exactly the same. This is no great mystery. I do not have a faulty understanding of the phenotype nor am I misrepresenting it.
And yes, Border Collies do have alleles that create white and several of those alleles are also associated with deafness. Merle, Piebald, and possibly even Irish spotting, although more robust testing with DNA needs to be done to decipher which alleles lead to what rates of deafness. The deafness in BCs is 1/10th to 1/30th what it is in Dalmatians. And Border Collies aren’t required to have any specific color pattern. So really, I don’t know what you’re trying to do comparing Border Collies to Dalmatians. Oh, that’s right, you’re losing the argument so you’re trying to be petty. Yawn.
On the same drugs as George M. Strain, PhD
Comparative Biomedical Sciences
School of Veterinary Medicine
Louisiana State University
Baton Rouge, LA 70803
(225) 578-9758
(225) 578-9895 (fax)
strain@lsu.edu
Please feel free to read this article in particular the part on Genetics of deafness: http://www.lsu.edu/deafness/VetClinNA.htm
There is no need to be petty because I am loosing an argument. I do not feel that I am losing at all. The reason that my latest posts came out more petty than the first is the fact that Christopher has been rather petty himself. Now forgive me, I am not perfect and may respond in a similar manner as I have been addressed.
You say that you did not claim that all Dalmatians have a bad temperament no instead you claim that nobody has a chance to breed a level temperament into the Dalmatian breed since it’s genetic predisposition does not even allow for that matter. So where is the difference between the two statements? You also filter and hear what you can use to your advantage but you are not hearing what I am saying at all.
I stated before that I have judged Dalmatians in multiple countries and spend much time among them, their breeders and owners and I have yet to come across one that is going to nip me. How does that fit in with the multiple occasions that you point out to us that it does not matter if we happen to own some well bred once that have a nice disposition?
You write about the submissive behaviors and body language of the Dalmatian and I ask you how you feel about the very submissive body language of the border collie. I also asked you about deafness in BC’s and which Club you knew that made hearing testing mandatory in your breed but you chose not to answer this instead you demand statistics from myself and my breed.
Sorry this is a simple catch 22 conversation and I feel that it achieves nothing for animal welfare but more for Christopher’s personal argument.
To Dave…….. I have mentioned it before, I am not one of those breeders that are paranoid about the press, the opposite is the fact and since we live in the country of the free, I guess I am also allowed to be of the opinion that Christopher has a rather strange way of wanting to achieve his mission.
The mission I can share but it is the chosen path that I reject.
I’ve read Strain. Linked to him twice in this article. Mentioned him. Don’t see how anything he says helps your argument or in any way refutes mine.
You obviously have not read Strain thoroughly otherwise you would have known that the Dalmatians base color is NOT white. Instead you performed your usual trick and only picked from the article what you found useful fuel for your arguments sake.
If this is how you conduct your research (sloppy) then you failed your mission again before you started it.
WTF are you still blabbing about? Do you SERIOUSLY want me to believe that DALMATIANS ARE NOT WHITE?!?!?!
You are amazingly dense. Dalmatians are predominantly white. This is all that matters. There are not black hairs hiding under those white ones. There’s no secret layer of NON-Whiteness.
Dalmatians are white. White causes deafness. Dalmatians are profoundly deaf. More than almost any other breed, if not the most deaf breed. And the only breeds that come close or perhaps surpass them are other WHITE dogs. In that strain summary, he shows 48 tested Catahoula Leopard Dogs with 68.8% total deafness. Without a discussion on how and why those dogs were chosen (they might have been tested because they were deaf, might not be a random sample since it’s so small), we can assume that they might not have the same level of deafness breed wide as Dalmatians. Or they might be worse if the sample was representative. And again, we have profoundly white dogs. Merle, Double Merle, Piebalds, etc.
More putting coat color above health.
Genetic PREDISPOSITION is not phenotypic destiny. I don’t say otherwise. I NEVER said every single Dalmatian is deaf. I never said that every single Dalmatian has urate stone disease. And I never said every single Dalmatian is screwed in the head.
They all just have the genetic predisposition. And this is true. Extreme piebald causes deafness. Extreme piebald causes mental issues. ALL Dalmatians are extreme piebald. All HUA Dals are also homozygous for the gene that causes urate stone disease.
This is all true.
Okay, that’s true, it isn’t “happy”. Happy is tail wagging, relaxed body and that “wha wha” sound that Dr. Michael Fox, a veterinarian and animal psychologist, and others have speculated to be a forerunner of laughter.
I agree that it is a submissive behavior. However, every smiler I had, used it to their advantage. Yes, anyone could argue that they couldn’t be smart enough to be that coy, but I say the floor is open for debate. If an offender does something bad, all I would have to say is, “Who did that?!”, and the smiler would grin like mad and furiously wag their tail, almost to say (key word: almost), “Aren’t I cute? You don’t want to be mad at me!”. In other words, I think they have learned to use what they’ve got to get out of being in trouble.
My dogs know that I am the leader and it is natural for a canine to show submission to the leader of the pack. I have never had a problem with aggression with any of my smilers. Ever.
Has it been clear sailing with Dallies from day one? Of course not. The Dals that have been abused the absolute worst are the ones that find their way to my house. No animal or human could have come through what they did without scars. These Dalmatians were shot, whipped, beaten with baseball bats, starved and neglected, yet 99 percent of them left their pasts behind and were trustful and loving. No rage. That is a testament to their good personalities. Only one that I have has been a problem, mostly with other dogs. She is completely and utterly obedient with me, but I will never trust her with other dogs and I am extremely cautious with people and always err on the side of caution. Her abuser went to jail for the atrocities she suffered. If you know anything about animal abuse, that doesn’t happen enough. So one dog out of all that I have taken care of isn’t bad odds. And, by the way, she is the one who grins like the wolves (it looks like a dolphin), but never, ever gives a smarl.
So I am no longer on drugs? Well, that is that out of the way then.
IF you really wanted to work on welfare of canine’s why would you pick one breed that is relatively healthy (even in comparison to humans, never mind other dogs) instead of working on breeders, their Clubs and KC’s?
Why pick one breed and try and make it look far worse than it is?
Sorry I do not find your cause believable at all. Since you appear to be in this game to upset instead of trying to mentor and explaining yourself.
Stil in this whole discussion you are making a point of dragging one breed through the dirt. I guess Dalmatian breeders make that quite easy for you since we tend to be pretty open minded and PUBLISH our breeds shortcomings. So MAYBE if you could come up with some realistic and knowledgeable suggestions for us instead of slandering individuals you would actually make a difference and not just create opposition.
Maybe if you started breeding solid black BC’s you would earn the right to demand that we breed solid colored Dalmatians but to attack US and not start with yourself and your chosen breed just undermines your point before you even started.
I believe the pointer back cross was approved a few years ago.
Mona Karel recently posted..Let’s Try to be a Little More Healthy
I stand corrected. Yes, the LUA or low urine acid dogs that were crossed with a pointer have been approved to be AKC registered. I don’t keep up with that stuff anymore since I only take rescued Dallies. I have had some come this way that I suspected were well bred, that had been plucked, starving, off the street. All of those “papers” didn’t do them any good when they are dumped like yesterday’s trash.
“those papers” have nothing to do with moronic owners who won’t take responsibility for their dogs. I corrected your misstatement, in part because allowing in the back cross dogs over traditionalists objections was a forward step for AKC.
Mona Karel recently posted..Let’s Try to be a Little More Healthy
A huge step for The Dalmatian Club of America! They were the ones that wouldn’t give in!
Not just for the AKC. Since their recognition LUA Dalmatians can now be found in Finland, Germany, Spain, France, Brasil and the UK.
The WAFDAL (World Association of Dalmatian Clubs) is also beginning to show a bigger interest and breed Seminars to explain LUA are being held in many more countries right as we speak.
Ohh YAY AKC registered Dalmointer mutts yippee. AKC has definitely proven it is no longer about the PURE-Bred dog. BTW, lot of good those AKC papers will do them if nobody but their own selves will use them. If I had Dals, I for one would scratch my dogs from every show one of the Dalmointers was entered in, I would not buy from any of the Dalmointer breeders or anyone associated with them, I would not give them or anyone associated with them stud service, or take stud service from them or anyone associated with them, I also would not sell to them or anyone associated with them as I would not want my lines used to make Dalmointers.
Well thanks for your honesty, hopefully you’d also do this out in the open and advertise it on your breeder page so everyone else who doesn’t care about artifice and fake history the way you do can clearly identify your bias and avoid buying what you’re selling. There’s little market for dogs that can’t piss without pain save for dogmatic-fancy-as-religion types like you. And really, it’s been shown again and again that such corruption can’t sustain a breed because there just aren’t enough of you to keep a breed pool healthy.
Most real people don’t give one crap about what you’re selling. They see that they can have a ooooh-pretty-color Dalmatian without early-death and pissing blood and who would say “omfg I can’t stand this puppy, it has a pointer 20 generations ago!”
Are we seeing and reading internet TROLLING?
Thank you Paddyannie for your introduction to the meaning of a Troll on the internet.
” Internet ‘trolling’ is the anti-social act of causing of interpersonal conflict and shock-value controversy online. Named for the wicked troll creatures of children’s tales, trolling is purposely sowing hatred, bigotry, racism, misogyny, or just simple bickering between others. Trolls themselves are emotionally-immature users who thrive in any environment where they are allowed to make public comments, like blog sites, news sites, discussion forums, and game chat.”
I even experienced see and read DVM troll. They really become intimidated with their lack of knowledge of genetics and new scientific findings.
More on Trolling and the Truths of Internet Trolls. Thanks again Paddyannie. Kudos Why love this Blog can actually learn most of the time from individuals not the same old excuses, denials and ignorance.
http://netforbeginners.about.com/od/netiquetteonlineculture/f/What-Is-Trolling.htm
•The Sad Truths of Internet Trolls: (more)…
Bad ownership or breeders who will not be responsible for the offspring bred for the duration of the offspring’s life are also not a breed specific subject and have nothing to do with the overall accusations against the breed in this topic.
Exactly, it has nothing to do with this post. So why are you all talking about “irresponsible owners” as if some irresponsible owner is to blame for the deafness, the urate disease, and the temperament problems.
Because irresponsible owners would only be throwing gas on the fire, meaning that if Dalmatians have such a bad temperament, how come someone can torture them and starve them, yet after being rescued, they are loving and (gasp!) calm? Shouldn’t that make them even worse, by your way of reasoning??? If someone took a baseball bat to your head every day, wouldn’t that amplify that horrible disposition you claim they ALL have?
I don’t claim they all have a horrible disposition. That’s the some-all fallacy. Not making it. I said very clearly, they all have the genetic disposition toward temperament issues, blindness, and uric acidosis. Which they do. There’s always penetrance, variables we aren’t accounting for, random chance, evolution, other genes involved, environment involved. This isn’t some stochastic deterministic system. Never claimed it was.
ALL Dalmatians have the genes for uric acidosis but not every Dalmatian will get clinical level symptoms. This isn’t a credit to breeders it’s a credit to non-determinism and chaos.
Uric acidosis should have been solved by now. 38 years is to long to wait on blood purity nonsense. And I will not hold my breath that Dalmatian breeders will EVER consider giving up the spots.
🙂 You are very good at repeating yourself. Let’s move on: I am not sure which Dalmatians you have come across but I keep repeating – I do not know many (and some exist in every breed) that have temperament issues.
Yes Dalmatians suffer from deafness, in the US more than in other countries where numbers are consistently dropping – as I mentioned above less than 1% are actually fully deaf.
Top this with the fact that deafness does not hurt and the fact that many European breeders make sure that their fully deaf puppies are actually homed and not put to sleep then deafness looks much better than HD or one of the many other painful diseases that other breeds battle. All this said it certainly does not hurt to carry on the good work of working on even better statistics.
Again you are right, Dalmatians have a high uric acid problem, I also agree that some of the arguments against introducing the LUA’s where ridiculous but some where also valid and after careful evaluation by geneticists and other professionals the advise is to introduce the LUA gene SLOWLY so it is no surprise that only a short time after their international recognition there are no more than 40 breeders.
It is also obvious that LUA breeders do not JUST breed LUA’s or where do you want the healthy (other than HUA) Dalmatians to come from that are going to be mated to the LUA’s? How would you avoid a genetic bottleneck if any other practice was chosen?
In the US the Dalmatian has an average live expectancy span of 12 years, in my home country in Europe the breed average life span is even at 13.5 years and the British Kennel Club performed some research that stated that on average Dalmatians live one year longer than any other breed evaluated in this study. Do they still look so unhealthy to you?
Trust me I can be very critical when it comes to Dalmatian breeding and dog breeding in general. You are merely seeing the defensive side of me since your “findings” are incredibly exaggerated and applied as it suits you personally.
Sometimes it is great if somebody kicks up a stink and stirs matters up a little so one does not become to comfortable and the dust on some old habits is lifted. Now it appears that you have caused a stir here…….. so you could stick to actual facts now instead of repeating the same old theories.
Rather, I’m good at staying on point.
Please provide a reference for this.
The bigger issue is that it took almost 40 years (38 by my count), and a ground breaking documentary which featured the Dalmatian problem to allow this. That’s unacceptable.
And no, it’s not a problem that I bring up just to pick on Dalmatians. This is a universal problem across the entire fancy and beyond in dogs and that’s why I bring it up. It should be routine for anyone to bring in new blood to their breeds for whatever reason they want with appendix registries. 2-3 generations in an appendix and all dogs that meet the basic standards of breeds (be it performance or conformation) should be allowed in 100% and fully registered and considered pure bred. It should not take dozens of years and dozens of generations and a documentary and public outcry to allow in ONE ALLELE to your breed. And this goes for every breed in the KC, the AKC, etc.
We could avoid a genetic bottleneck regarding LUA if we allowed OTHER breeders to use OTHER breeds to bring in non HUA genes. It’s actually NOT a good idea to have just one injection of new DNA (although really, since the club has waited so long to let in the LUA gene that’s really the only thing they are letting in).
It would be genetically superior if there were more outcrosses than just the one being done. Why create what is essentially a type of popular sire effect with the LUAs?
Did I say they don’t live long? I’d be interested in seeing this report as well, have a link?
I don’t see what’s exaggerated at all. ALL Dalmatians have the white coat. ALL dalmatians save the LUAs have two copies of a bad gene for uric acidosis. The deafness figures come straight from the studies that are linked.
Lifespan has too many variables. An online source will tell you 12. My Dals from my overly careful breeder lived to around 15: I had one make it to 17. My rescued ones have suffered years of neglect, and while I don’t know their exact ages, I’d say they lived to be around 13.
Now, Christopher, I have to ask if you have ever owned a special needs dog? I mean blind, deaf, seizures, etc.?
Averages don’t really tell people much since it the sum of the ages combined divided by the number of individuals.
For every dog which lives to be over 12, there is a dog which dies prematurely before 12.
So for your dog to live to be 17, several dogs must died before reaching 12-years old for the statistics to be demostrated an average mean of 12.
Breeders like to pretend their dogs live “longer than average”, but they don’t think critically how other individuals bring the averages down.
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Their ages at passing were 14.5, 15.5, 15.5, 17, and 13. That averages to 15.1. the 13 year would have lived longer had he not had a strange, freak event happen to him.
Of course. It is entirely possible for a population to have high infant mortality rate and have an average age over 10; providing the survivors are long-lived.
12-years is not a bad average anyway. Most breeds fall within that average.
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It only took 38 years! They should be praised for all that foresight. I mean heck, the first cell phone in 1973 weighted 2 pounds and worked in all of one location on the globe. Dungeons and Dragons was CUTTING EDGE in 1973. Richard Nixon was President. Soylent Green was in theatres.
And what, today there aren’t even 40 breeders in the USA offering the dogs and when I click through several of the supposed LUA Dal breeder pages I don’t see any actual LUA Dals being bred. Hrm. Not exactly cutting edge, not very encouraging that it took so long to allow the dogs in, and many of the arguments made against the LUA Dals were wicked and ignorant.
Only after decades of objection and some rather slanderous statements from the breed wardens:
http://smg.photobucket.com/user/Pietoro/media/webjunk2/CHF_07_DalStones.jpg.html
Interesting postulations. Curious that since doing Dalmatian Rescue in New Mexico since 1997 and having nearly 600 Dallies live in my home, on my couchand lap, for at least three months for each dog, that I have had exactly NO bad temperaments. Maybe you are refering to those crazy New York Raging Damatians. Oh wait, no, I grew up with Dalmatians in New York and hung out with lots of other kid’s Dalmatians and , guess what? No bad temperaments. Wow, I must be really, really lucky. And I am sure you must have met MANY Dalmatians with Rage Syndrom. What? Haven’t met any Dalmatians with Rage Syndrom? What a surprise. That is because there is no such thing in the Dalmatian lines.
Then you show a picture of a Dalmatian smiling (and my two forever Dals and my three foster Dals ALL smile) and allow the reading public to think it is snarling, Really classy move, Christopher.
I’m curious how you feel about the Dalmatian rescue people who were protesting 101 Dalmatians then telling people basically how shitty the breed’s temperament is and how they’re not for everyone because they aren’t particularly nice dogs.
And I’m curious how the breed got its reputation for biting children if they didn’t, actually, perform poorly in homes with children.
I had my dogs before I had my kids. I never put them, as babies, near the dogs when I wasn’t hovering nearby. When the kids came, they were not allowed to stick fingers in dog noses and pull ears. They had to be respectful; I just drummed it into theirs heads. Don’t go near a strange dog without permission, etc.
Fast forward to today, when kids are climbing on restaurant tables and screaming through stores. I can’t help but wonder if that attitude of, “Oh my kid never does anything bad” has something to do with it. My kids, nor I ,when I was young, would have been allowed to act like that. If one of my kids had hurt the dog and gotten nipped, I would have blamed the kid. Now, we hear all about how the dog nipped the kid “out of the blue”, neglecting the fact that the kid was sticking a marble up the dog’s nose and the dog just had had enough.
The idea of a “Nanny” dog is toxic nonsense. It’s tragic that Staffie people keep that myth going. No dog is a nanny. No dog understands the complexity of that task and NO human should turn over their parenting responsibility to a dog.
I never said anything about a nanny dog. I am just saying that if a child causes physical pain to a dog–any dog—then who is to blame when the dog finally nips the kid? That is any dog’s way of saying “back off”.
Don’t be so defensive. I wasn’t accusing you of promoting nanny dogs.
Individuals who rescued Dalmatians were not and did not state that the breed was shitty or that they were not nice dogs and I challenge you to put any rescue site up that states just exactly what you just stated.
The rescue people were protesting 101 Dalmatians because they felt the film resulted in a number of un-reputably breeders coming out of the woodwork to capitalize on the profits of this film. It resulted in many individuals running out and purchasing the breed because the puppies were cute and without doing any research. Individuals who failed to read and understand the history of this breed and what purpose they had, which was to run with a coach and horses and were also used to guard the coach and the horses, ended up with a pet that needed to be taken care of. Dalmatians have an very intelligent nature and extremely high energy level which require both physical and mental stimulation. Thus people who were not willing to put in the time to exercise and stimulate the breed ended up having problems. EVERY rescue place will state if you are willing to put in the time, these are WONDERFUL dogs. But with any animal you see this to be the case. I believe shelters are filled with rabbits shortly after Easter since parents think it is cute to buy a rabbit for a child on Easter, that is until they have to take care of it. Oh but they are cute!
I frankly haven’t seen any breaking news on any Dalmatian biting/mauling children, but on the other hand there are stories weekly on pitbull like dogs. There is a study on this and you might want to read that study which states increased popularity is sometimes followed by increases in bite reports.
Between 1990 and 1995 Rottweilers were popular and during the 1990’s to early 2000’s they moved to the top of the list of “biting breeds”. But in this same study it states other fad breeds such as “Dalmatians” and Irish setters “did not” seem to make similar appearances. Suggest you read this article along with their references. Dalmatians do not appear on any of these reports as being aggressive and/or reported as being a “biting breed”.
https://www.avma.org/KB/Resources/Backgrounders/Pages/The-Role-of-Breed-in-Dog-Bite-Risk-and-Prevention.aspx
Every breed at one point has bitten a child, hell I was bitten in the ear by a friggin Dachsund when I was a child! If a child corners a dog in any circumstance that dog is going to snap at them and that is the major reason behind dog bites. Dalmatians love playing with children because like them, children are high energy. But the dog is a large dog, not a small one and with any larger dog you have to be watchful and with any dog you shouldn’t leave them around small children unattended. I don’t care what the dog breed is. That’s responsible parenting.
Christopher
Posted June 3, 2013 at 7:17 PM
After Movies, Unwanted Dalmatians
By MIREYA NAVARRO
Published: September 14, 1997
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.
==========================================================
Did you read the last three words? This quote or the article did not state as you, that “shelters” stated “how shitty the breed’s temperament is and how they’re not for everyone because they aren’t particularly nice dogs.” On the contrary it stated “owners” who turned over the dogs to the shelters. Read it! The shelters stated what I did, the people who took the dogs were not willing to spend the time to train, give them the exercise they need and take care of them. The owners didn’t think past how cute they were vs actually getting history on the breed. A breed that needs exercise and mental stimulation.
They also addressed bad breeders. “Overbreeding is suspected in genetic defects in Dalmatians like deafness and urinary tract problems.”
Again, you will be hard press to find ANY shelter or rescue place that states this breed your comments quoted above.
Try again, find a “Shelter” that you stated says this. Good luck, because like I stated before you will not find one.
Hehehehe, is this really a hard concept? Who are the former owners complaining to? The shelters/rescues they dump their crappy Dalmatians at. And what are the shelter and rescue people doing going to the movie theatres to hand out pamphplets warning people to NOT get Dalmatians? They are certainly NOT telling them “they’re WONDERFUL DOGS, so nice and well bred that they are just easy peasy to take care of.” The only reason to tell people to NOT get a dog is because you know full well that they aren’t good dogs and that the nice, kind, fun, and good with kids breed they’ll see on the screen is not what people are actually going to find with a real Dalmatian.
They’re warning off future owners so they don’t get more people dumping their Dalmatians saying the same things the last people said: the dogs are fearful, they bite, they aren’t good with kids.
I mean, can you imagine a Golden Retriever breeder running out and telling movie goers that they should NOT have a Golden Retriever? That sounds ridiculous, because it is. Goldens are wonderful pets and great with children. It doesn’t take a highly sophisticated family to own a Golden. They’re nice dogs. And that’s why they’re immensely popular. And even after their various popularity bubbles, they didn’t crash into oblivion, they still maintain high levels of ownership.
Heck, they’re so popular that even the show breeders who are creating shitty Goldens with too-light coats that have reputations to bite (pattern sound familiar?) aren’t populous enough to dominate the breed. But Dalmatians don’t have that luxury, the white coats are predominant throughout. It’s not small show fad sub-population, it’s the entire breed.
And I’m glad you brought up the “overbreeding” argument. I have an entire post on that. Stay tuned.
You’re getting off track of your own statement. You stated that “shelters” were saying this was a nasty breed, not “breeders”. And I said you were hard press to find any shelter that stated this. And you haven’t seemed to be able to back that statement up. You posted what owners were telling shelters.
I would suspect if a movie was made called 101 Golden Retrievers following a popular childrens book etc, the same events would have occured. Again, it goes back to owners not wanting to spend the time to train an animal. Most people who bring a dog into a shelter will state, regardless of the breed, that they can’t handle them. In fact the number one reason people bring their dog to the shelter is they get a dog without realizing how much training is involved. Dogs do not come trained I don’t care what breed they are, golden retriever or dalmatian.
And you were given a link to a study done on dog bites and it states very clearly that reports of Dalmatians biting during this time period were just not there.
Since you brought up Golden Retrievers. Which by the way are worse than Dalmatian on biting….
Dog attack deaths and maimings, U.S. & Canada September 1982 to January 31, 2012
http://images.bimedia.net/documents/Dog+attack+stats+with+breed+2012.pdf
Breed: Dalmatian
Attacks doing bodily harm: 3
Child Victims: 3
Adult Victims: 0
Deaths Maimings: 0
Breed: Golden Retriever
Attacks doing bodily harm: 10
Child Victims: 8
Adult Victims: 2
Deaths Maimings: 2
Look down the list, heck Poodles are worse than Dals! You might be very surprised at some of the breeds listed who are far worse than any Dal.
I will close the argument by saying, if one is going to blog about any breed and bad mouth its behavior, they first should spend time with that breed. And evidently based on your comments you have not spent a minute with a dalmatian. If you would have before writing your article, what you stated about their behavior would have been left out. I would say the same with those that wrote the blogs on Golden Retrievers or any other breed. Because in the end how a breed, any breed acts is based solely on the individual owner of that breed and whether or not they are responsible owners who care for the breeds individual needs. Again Dogs, ALL Dogs, do not come trained.
You need to look at attack rates on a per population basis. It’s not surprising that a highly popular breed has higher number of attacks than a relatively rare breed. You stats show golden retrievers to have about 3.5 time the no. of attacks as dalmatians. I’m pretty sure goldens outnumber dals by way more than 3.5x in the general population.
In 2000, the AKC registered 66,300 Golden Retrievers. Same year Dalmatians had 3,084. A ~20x ratio. But Dalmatians dropped off to a fraction of that in only a few years:
2000 3084
2001 2139
2002 1453
2003 1112
2004 1012
2005 1041
2006 820
Goldens have fallen in the AKC too, but the ratio hasn’t gotten better for Dalmatians. In 2008, the AKC registered 34,485 Goldens and 983 Dalmatians. A 35x ratio.
>I would suspect if a movie was made called 101 Golden Retrievers following a popular childrens book etc, the same events would have occured…
Yes, there hasn’t been one popular movie aimed at children starring adorable Golden Retrievers lately. There have been five “Air Bud” movies, six “Buddies” spinoffs (with another due this fall), and at least twenty movies in the last twenty years.
The newer version of Homeward Bound was released twice in 1993 and 1996. Not to mention other movies like Fluke (1995) and Air Bud with countless of releases and spinoffs. And TV shows like Full House, The Drew Carey Show and Pushing Up Daisies and many others.
That’s not even counting the lesser-known movies such as A Christmas Wedding Tail or A Golden Christmas (released twice), The Retrievers, Napoleon, The Trial of Old Drum and so on.
Also there is that Pixar hit success as well, Up.
The 101 Dalmatians TV spin-offs were never really popular to begin with. And their claim to fame outside the movie theatre is what? Lou-Dog owned by Bradley Nowell from the band Sublime?
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Delivered:
http://www.border-wars.com/2013/06/dont-blame-bybs-for-dalmatians-either.html
The people outside the theater weren’t calling the breed “shitty”, they were there to be informative, truthful, and honest about the very real problems intrinsic to Dalmatians.
It’s not a case of good breeders vs bad breeders, although both articles try to shift at least some of the blame onto puppy mills, pet shops, and dog owners.
“They should never be a family’s first dog, or even a second. The dog is not a good pet for most family situations.”
http://articles.philly.com/1996-11-20/news/25648812_1_coach-dogs-janet-budzynski-dalmatian-breeders
http://articles.mcall.com/1996-11-25/features/3117026_1_julie-lux-club-s-rescue-perdy/2
You haven’t got a clue what you are talking about Christopher. Try reading about Dalmatian temperament in the many online guides to owning different breeds or better still try owning one before you criticise. My Dalmatian avoided conflict at all costs and was a wonderful loving, caring and sensitive dog. He also smiled by baring his teeth, but the tail never stopped wagging. Most Dalmatian owner don’t care for the 101 film, so stop referring to it the whole time if you want people to take you seriously.
Lyn, are you really claiming that you have never had one bad temperament even though you have fostered “nearly 600” Dals? People need to stop saying things like that. There is no way you had that many and never experienced any issues. I have German Shepherds and am involved in rescue. I have had dogs with bad temperaments, HD, blind, deaf etc. If I posted I had never had a problem I would be lying. I am a 4th generation dog person and actively show my dogs. I HATE reading blogs like this… Not because I think Christopher is wrong, but because I am terribly afraid he is right. Every breed has problems but what exactly are breeders doing??
I think it depends on the breed and the breeder. A lot of us are scrambling to hold the line, breeding the healthiest dogs we can, retaining breed function, and placing our puppies with the best homes possible. All the while fighting off legislators and AR people, plus the propaganda spewed by the “all breeders are evil” crowd. Many of whom, sadly, do breed rescue.
Mona Karel recently posted..Let’s Try to be a Little More Healthy
Ohh but there is a way she could get through 600 Dalmatians without ever meeting a bad tempered one; “rose tinted glasses”. That or she plain don’t know how to read subtle signs in their body language.
“RELATIVE anonymity”
-Face it we’re not going to meet are we? -I’ve already seen your facebook page etc. Please don’t call me dense or speak in such a condescending tone. I’ve not made any irrational statements (kindly point them out) and if anything you’re being irrational for reacting in such an offensive and frankly infantile manner.
You’ve failed to respond to any of my sentences AGREEING with many of your sentiments. I have also been an owner of Spaniels, Labs, lurchers, and terriers, so how you can think it just to label me a “Dalmatian breeder apologist”? Especially when I am AGREEING with you that something needs to be done to increase the gene pool (of all breeds)
I’ve not been “bashing Border Collies” I’m sure there are some lovely ones, I simply spoke of experiences. I even said maybe you can say something to rekindle my love for them? -as I am keen to point out that I don’t think they’re all the same despite my aforementioned experiences. In the same vain, being such a proficient debater, you should be prepared to analyse and critique other people without relying on sensationalist statements that are based on no fact. You’ve concentrated on the same points over and over and have failed to address many of the points i’ve made, much like a politician might avoid addressing issues they can’t explain. I didn’t once mention Border Collie coat colour, and why would I?? Why would you bring that up? Now you’re drawing comparisons from Collies when, as you keep on stating, this post is not about Border Collies. Is it a different rule for you because you are the God of all opinion?
Also, I’ve never met anyone with any rational intelligence who claims to HATE a breed, you should be hating breeders if anything, the dogs don’t choose to be bred.
If someone approaches me with the opinion that Dalmatians are aggressive and difficult to train, they soon change opinion after spending just a few minutes with my dog, she’s very calm, bright, obedient and gentle. We’re currently considering going under assessment for registering as a PAT dog to visit hospitals and homes for the elderly. She’s wonderful with young children and the elderly, she’s got a massively calming temperament.
And what have I said that you determine to be a lie please??? -I’d like you to quote as I’ve been very careful with what I’ve said.
Kindly elaborate on what you consider to be an “artificial breed” ?? -are they a figment of my imagination? -surely, if you’re referring to them being selectively bred for specific traits, all pure breds are artificial?? All dogs are artificial because we’ve selected and chosen and bred them for certain traits, that is why they vary so much. Dalmatians are no more artificial than any other breed of dog.
“being deaf is contrary to being healthy” -I am in no way condoning the fact that some dals are born deaf, as i’ve said, it’s wrong and there should be programmes in place to eradicate this…but would you tell a deaf person that they are unhealthy? Are you really saying that deaf people are not healthy?? – because that’s ridiculous. Most of your comments are just spiteful, reactive and sensationalist. You should become a tabloid journalist!
Wow, you’re a dick lol. What a charming personality you have.
Here is one of my Dals, as you can see easily trained to a high level of obedience and passes his Temperament Test by The American Temperament Teat Society. My Dal has the appropriate temperament for his breed, social and outgoing to friendly strangers, and protective and aggressive to threats.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yUvpcY8FcEw
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uT4-zQt2Teo
Wow, so you can bite me, lol. And no, as Prince Charming I will not be touching your nasty feet and allowing you to try on the glass slipper.
At least I don’t have to purchase wide soled shoes, your fat prick
But they’re so sexy in wide. Length is nice, but the girth is really were it’s at. 12W, look out.
It has been shown in the past the American Temperament Test has no scientific foundation behind it and there is no measure of hereditary traits been drawn from it. Why is regarded as being worthless? Because a dog can be trained to pass the temperament test.
The only temperament test which has been proven by a genetics research institute (Genetica) is the one developed by the SBK:
URL: http://www.brukshundklubben.se/hundar/mentalbeskrivning-mh/mental-status-per-hundras/
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How many years experience do you have actually have breeding dogs?
Why must you constantly ask for better arguments and proof but then keep using the same exact wording time after time?
And the CHIC list you are complaining about? Those are proven genetic disease in dogs and to get the number your dog has to be clear of all those diseases. Do you do the required testing of your dogs before you breed them? Do you know the MDR1 statuses on your dogs?
Please…I would rather know at 7 weeks a Dal is deaf and euthanize it than place a breed with known eye disease problems or epilepsy or HD that costs the family huge amounts of emotional and financial hardship before having to be put down. Its called being a responsible person. And I am NOT a Dal breeder. I simply own two.
The reality is there are problems in all breeds.
The other reality is you are a cyber bully who feels the needs to use name calling to get your point across. And that just makes your arguements come across as untrue based on your tone. Perhaps you should act like the man you claim you are and not the child that is portrayed in your posts.
Since when did CHIC become an authority on dog health? The Dalmatian CHIC doesn’t even demand, nor suggest that you have your dog tested for LUA! How pathetic is that? Very pathetic.
That’s boldly meaningless. Why does it matter that there are problems in all breeds. That in no way exonerates Dalmatians and their breeders one bit! They are still a breed built around a genetic disease. They are still a breed that has 100% saturation of disease genes for their coat and for their uric acid (save the handful of LUA Dals). NOT impressive.
Since you like numbers and statistics so much:
Passing rate of ATTS temperament test:
Dalmatian: 82.7%
Border Collie: 81.5%
American Temperament Test have been proven to be unscientific and unreliable.
The MH-test (Mentalbeskrivning Hund) have been shown by Genetica, a Swedish research facility, to be hereditary.
Unfortunately, the Svenska Brukshundklubben doesn’t have a readily downloadable breed-profile to show the true temperament of the breed.
URL: http://www.brukshundklubben.se/hundar/mentalbeskrivning-mh/mental-status-per-hundras/
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Obviously you’ve never owned a Dalmatian & therefore, I don’t understand how you can make these ridiculous assumptions ! I’ve seen some pretty skittish border collies, does that mean they’re nervous, temperamental, not good around children ? I think not !!!
Do if I paid someone to give me a Dalmatian, suddenly they would magically be different dogs. Magically they would not have 30% deafness rates due to their coloration? They would magically not have HUA genes saturated in the pedigreed dogs any more? They would suddenly be popular again and the top searches for “Why are Dalmatians _” would no longer be DEAF, MEAN, and AGGRESSIVE?
How would my owning one change any of the material facts?
Some more numbers for mr. Smarty math man:
Border Collies affected with hip dysplasia: 12.6%
Border collies that are carriers for Collie Eye Anomaly: 25%
Do you hate Dals because one bit you or something? I hope so because you deserve it. Do you know that Dalmatians are a guarding breed? They are supposed to have appropriate aggression. It’s poor breeding that creates week nerved guarding breeds, not the color you dolt.
Well aware of those numbers. Did a post about it.
http://www.border-wars.com/2010/10/through-anomalous-eyes.html
And 100% homozygous for both the Coat Color deafness and 100% homozygous for HUA is many times the expression of disease tan having a 2.5% homozygous for CEA and 25% carrier.
If we take 100 representative Border Collies we’d have 30 disease alleles and 170 healthy alleles.
In Dalmatians, we’d have 200 disease alleles for HUA and 0 healthy alleles. 200 disease alleles for coat related deafness and neurological weirdness and 0 healthy alleles.
Not a very compelling comparison if you think that criticizing Border Collies makes Dals look better or if that’s even important. It’s sort of sick that so many of you think of disease as a competition with other breeds instead of something to minimize in your own breed regardless of how poorly other breeds are doing.
Heck, if we want the OMFG what have they done with their breeds, I think the Pekes, Bulldogs, and Pugs take the cake. But again, it’s not very hard nor praise worthy to have a breed that isn’t as pathetic as those are.
Im not trying to make any breed look better, I like border collies, first dog was a BC mix. I just think you are a complete fucking moron with your theories on Dalmatian temperaments.
I am an owner of a well bread dalmatian with a stable temperment. In the past few years I have have the chance to meet many very stable friendly dalmatians. One avenue you should pursue is the absolute need to breed only those dogs who exibit correct stable temperments (an essetial mission for all breeders- no matter how physically correct and beautiful, if the temperment is not there… spay and neuter) and the need to socialize and train from a very young age. The dal of old was expected to guard the carrige they accompanied. A fishbowl existance is not suitable for a dal. They must get out and see and experience all. I think your piece was short sighted. Did you make any effort to speek with dalmatian beeders who have a track record of producing dogs with healthy temperments? Did you attend any shows or events to see the stable dal in action? Genes do matter… but so do many other things. Look at GSDs and other breeds who have a guarding function in their heritage. You should have tried harder to get the whole story.
But Pam, you can’t blame the dogs for poor temperaments when they literally have a mental disorder caused by funky brain chemistry. It’s not enough to find nice Dalmatians. The coloring is a poison and it has an effect that clearly interrupts an over-rides all the many other elements and genes that influence behavior. Nor can you just breed away from it. The temperament issue is inextricably linked with the lack of melanin. Can’t have one without the other.
It is such a shame that you are so persistent on the fact that Dalmatians have not even got a chance to have an excellent temperament as some of the very valid points you are making just get drowned in this ignorance.
Like in any other breed there are good once (both breeders and dogs) and bad once and all the variations in between.
For Dalmatians I can say that the far greater majority have an excellent temperament, which cannot be said about every breed out there.
In 12 litters that I have bred in 13 years there wasn’t a single aggressive dog about and I know many breeders that have similar out comings.
Those that did have temperament issues where clearly related to the breeders attitude, that did not make temperament a large priority. So how does this fit in with your statements that the Dalmatian as a breed does not have a chance?
How can you be so confident about being right on this particular topic without having accurate breed knowledge and first hand experience.
I’m persistent on the facts. That a flood of people from the Dalmatian Lovers!!! Facebook group can’t abide to deal with the facts and want to distort what I’ve written doesn’t change anything. If there is a flood, it’s a flood of denial from the Dalmatian apologists.
Let me walk you through an example.
FACT: White coloring is correlated and causal to deafness in dogs.
FACT: Dalmatians have an abundance of white coloring.
FACT: Dalmatians have a high rate of Deafness.
PROPOSAL: Dalmatian deafness is caused by their coat color.
APOLOGIST: My Dalmatian is not deaf!!!
Do you see how the apologist’s statement is in no way a refutation of the series of factual and logical conclusions?
I didn’t say all Dalmatians are deaf. 30% are deaf. I didn’t say all Dalmatians have horrible temperaments. Nor did I say that all Dalmatians have clinical level uric acidosis. But ALL of them (save the LUAs) have the genetics to be deaf, the genetics to be unsound in temperament, and have uric acidosis. ALL OF THEM have the genetic predisposition to be that way. So the statement “My Dalmatian is wonderful and can hear and doesn’t piss rocks” is not a refutation of anything I’ve said.
Look I am totally on your side when it comes to the argument that we as breeders have a lot of room for improvement but I still think that you are going about it in totally wrong manner.
Instead of bringing your point across and making it clear you exaggerate and rip one of the better breeds apart. Of course this will only achieve defensive behavior from the people who love the breed and work hard to make it better. What do you expect?
You asked for a link to the Data, well if it was that simple I would have included it in the first part. Back home they publish a yearly studbook that lists all results of all “faults” that are visible at the age of eight weeks. All four of the Clubs back home publish these yearly books but it would mean that I would have to find all of the books and do the calculations overall for myself in which case you would not believe the figures that I previously stated.
One of the Clubs publishes their stud book online, free for everybody to see and since I have access to the other Clubs books I can assure you that the statistics are all the same. Less than 1 % are bilaterally deaf in some years even only 0.2 %.
Here are the links. Even tough it is all in a language that I presume you cannot read you will understand the terms of Bilateral hoerend (bilaterally hearig) or Bilaterally taub (deaf) or Unilateral:
http://www.dalmatineronline.de/downloads/dvd-zuchtbuch-2012.pdf
http://www.dalmatineronline.de/downloads/dvd-zuchtbuch-2011.pdf
http://www.dalmatineronline.de/downloads/dvd-zuchtbuch-2010.pdf
http://www.dalmatineronline.de/downloads/dvd-zb-2009.pdf
http://www.dalmatineronline.de/downloads/dvd-zuchtbuch-2008.pdf
blue eyes = blaue Augen
Patch – Platte or Monokel if the patch is located around the eye.
The British Clubs unfortunately lost the person who used to collect data from all testing centers on a yearly basis but again bilateral deafness has never been higher than 4 % the same is reported from the Norwegian Club and that is with the occasional use of unilateral hearing Dalmatians for breeding but never blue eyed once.
Prof. Dr. Distl from the University of Hanover will also be able to provide you with statistics since he has performed a lot of research into the topic of deafness in Dalmatians and communicated with many Universities around the globe.
So I am aware of the overall statistics which is my job as a breeder but I am not willing to spend my day putting the statistics all into one place for you unless you stop ripping the breed and its breeders apart and start working on the actual topic that appears to be bothering you.
Clicked on the 2012 book and that reports 8.9% deafness, not 1%. And I’m not sure why you think a stud book report compares to a scientific study. (1) Breeders lie. (2) Breeders don’t report everything. (3) Breeders kill deaf puppies.
So why on earth would we believe self reporting by breeders to a breed club to document a true incidence of deafness in the breed?
Sorry Christopher no chance of lying in Germany. Breeders receive a visit by a Club warden days after the puppies have been born and then it is mandatory that all puppies are chipped and hearing tested by a Vet which is nominated by the Club. Another visit is then performed by the breed warden before the puppies are homed where all visible and testable results are recorded in the Stud book.
Sorry all I see here is somebody who will do EVERYTHING to achieve his mission but it scares me if that person has such ignorant views and will make statements that they know nothing about.
If you calculate all unilateral HEARING puppies you will get a higher percentage than one, I have never said anything else. In most years you will find tough that even the unilateral hearing puppies are no higher than 4 – 6 %. Having unilateral hearing puppies is not great but I can assure you that they go through live in no pain and just fine.
The fact remains that your breed is still not tested at ALL and I do not want to know how many unilateral hearing once are among breeding schemes so please do what every RESPONSIBLE breeder does and concentrate on leading with a great example, show everybody how much better you can do and mentor as many young and upcoming breeders that you can get hold off rather than ripping a breed apart that you know very little about.
No chance of lying? Please. That’s fresh. The all knowing, all seeing Breed WARDENS of DOOOOOOM!
Isn’t Germany the country that did or still does cull puppies in large litters just because they think it’s better for the dam to not have to raise so many puppies? Doesn’t seem to me that they have any problems culling puppies. I also don’t buy that newborns are tested, sorry. Why BAER test puppies before their ears even open and why test them when we know from several studies that white coat related deafness does not necessarily present with deaf puppies at birth, but they go deaf over weeks.
LMFAO, you want to exclude unilaterally deaf puppies? WHAT A COP OUT. I’m using and always have used Strains TOTAL DEAFNESS numbers. In fact, I listed BOTH unilateral and bilateral deafness from BOTH of his studies. You think you win points because you want to only talk about bilateral deafness from some German breed survey? Please, that’s the desperate act of an apologist who wants to keep her spotted Dals and pretend that it’s perfectly healthy.
Table 2 at the Strain link YOU provided (which is a summation of the 2 studies I linked to):
Breed: Dalmatians
Dogs Tested: 5009
Bilaterally Hearing: 70.2% (3510)
Unilaterally Deaf: 22% (1100)
Bilaterally Deaf: 8.0% (399)
Total Deaf: 30.0%
Let’s say it again, TOTAL DEAF: 30.0%
I have no idea where you get your information from. Certainly not my text. I shall explain it to you in smaller portions.
It is ILLEGAL to put any healthy puppy to sleep you are referring to the culling of puppies in GSD only that used to be a terrible practise aprox. 10 years ago and this was in GSD only.
The breed warden will visit the litter a few days after they are born so they are fully aware how many puppies of which color and sex are alive at that point.
The soonest possible date to have a Dalmatian puppy tested by a fully qualified Veterinarian is six weeks and one day. They are also microchipped BEFORE the testing takes place.
You have taken my post and performed what you performed all over the place……….. you have read something into it that was not there and you have added some ancient information that is long out of date since it suited you.
As stated before, I am usually the person who reminds breeders that we need to take better care of our breeds and dog breeding in general and I am usually the person that criticizes the importance of dogs show results and the dusty habits of the KC’s and Clubs alike.
There is however no reasoning with you and it just makes me want to argue the Dalmatians case. I thank you for this opportunity.
I also never stated that HUA or deafness are not a problem,
Well, I’m not sure why the German system is being talked about since I don’t think they are a significant producer of Dalmatians nor do I think they export their supposedly improved dogs much, but you can correct me if I’m wrong. If you have pedigreed Dals that have a fraction of the deafness compared to the thousands of dogs Strain tested, by all means you’d think foreign breeders (US, UK) in bigger Dal markets would want to know and use those dogs.
Does the German system have an appendix registry? Can you bring in LUA Dals? Can you bring in anything you want after X generations of back crossing? How does that work?
How about patches? Strain suggests that patches improve deafness rates. Does the German KC punish dogs with patches?
ALL European statistics are an improvement on the Strain Statistics. The UK does not have a higher incidence then 17 % deaf of which no more than 4 % bilaterally deaf and those are pretty much the same figures all around Europe.
Nobody in Europe breeds from blue eyed Dalmatians and very, very few will occasionally use a unilaterally hearing one.
Germany was the first country that made hearing testing and bilaterally hearing parents mandatory. Then it became mandatory to have every single puppy born tested to gain more accurate Statistics and the figures that I have provided ARE accurate.
Since you are applying sarcasm to your post again I’d like to point out that I do not believe that EVERYTHING in the German system is an improvement but then it depends what you compare it too.
German Dalmatians do get exported to other European countries all the time just like we import many European dogs but very few US dogs since it is difficult to perform accurate research (and see the dogs and their families) across such a distance.
I am also certain that today’s statistics on hearing in the US are an improvement to the old Strain statistics but I have no accurate figures.
Yes Germany has an appendix registry, like many other FCI KC’s have. If you own a dog that looks like it’s breed it can be shown to a judge after an appointment is made and so far I have not seen a single one that was turned down.
Like I also mentioned before there are LUA litters in many European countries by now, including 4 in Germany, thanks to the hard work that some of the US breeders have put in over the many years. Using an LUA dog at stud in Europe is not a problem since they are now AKC registered and the FCi as well as the UK KC has an agreement with the AKC to support each others registries.
The UK KC registered an LUA Dalmatian before the AKC or any other FCI country did tough.
Why are we talking about Europe? Well no single breed lives from one country alone and the world is shrinking constantly.
I obviously brought my own European dogs to the States and since my arrival I have imported two more whilst two of mine bred in the US and sired by a US LUA went back to Europe.
Well, then we’re running out of things to disagree on.
If Germany has dropped deafness rates using their scheme it’s a fair representation of true breeding results, then wonderful I’m not sure 8% is acceptable to most breeders but I think that by judging their actions 1-3% deafness is acceptable to maintain a valued coat color. And if the German numbers continue to improve perhaps you’ll find a means to make extreme piebald no more causative for deafness than lesser piebald and the other white factoring genes.
And if the German system already has an appendix registry and you are allowed to enter dogs based upon a fair criteria then that is infinitely superior to the close systems we suffer from over here. Not going to complain if you’ve already progressed to a more enlightened model.
Should the US Dalmatian club and AKC raise their bar to the level the Germans have, then they would have something to respond to my criticism of instead of pointless logical fallacies and personal attacks against me. I await the day when they do so. Until then, they get the scorn.
And before you complain about BCs again, I’ve been saying … nay, demanding … the same enlightened appendix system and routine out-crossing for MY breed for years now.
He means the one used for cats or livestock– one can cross in any breed or any individual they want, and after 3 or 4 generations, it is considered as pure.
Dog registries are more restrictive than this.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
Hi Dave,
there is nothing that would exclude the registration of an outcross that looks like a pure bred dog so there isn’t a need for an additional registry. You could take your ideas of your ideal outcross, breed it for a few generations until you had one that “looked right” and then re-register it.
This said, I think in some ways the European KC’s are a little bit more up to date on THIS specific issue BUT hardly anybody will use a “registration” dog in their breeding program.
So the possibility exists but only about 2 % of breeders utilize this opportunity.
As mentioned before the UK KC did register one LUA before they where recognized by the AKC with the restriction that none of the offspring in the first three generations could be exported but all the offspring would be eligible for registration.
While I would love to wag my finger about the low usage of the “registration” dogs… this does need to change. AT LEAST THERE IS THE FREEDOM TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THIS. We do not have this here.
I would not mind if I were the only one who valued the outcross I would do, I would rather be able to do it and let it win or fail on its own merits and the merits of the dogs it produced. Let the market decide instead of some stupid notion of breed purity.
2% of new blood per generation MIGHT be enough to sustain breeds over much longer periods than we are finding now. I do not believe that experts in population genetics demand much more than this low but non-zero level of influx of new alleles to combat the natural loss of alleles from other breeding effects.
2% is VASTLY superior to 0%. And while there is the extant problem in Dalmatians that only one variant of piebald is allowed (must be extreme, no piebald is not allowed), there are dozens of breeds that have health issues which can be solved at no expense to their conformation standards. Like the LUA situation.
So good for the appendix registry. Can’t wait until the AKC and the ABCA (the two main BC registries in the USA) have that option. The closest thing is for the ABCA you can register on merit, but they’ve made the process quite difficult with unanimous voting and no show dogs in the pedigree and testing of the dog and their parents and blah blah blah … and of course they only let in one or two dogs out of 30,000 per year anyway. Not really a robust system.
Well if that is the real issue here (creating an open minded KC) then why not try and get breeders on your bandwagon as nothing achieves more than unity!
Why not gather all the positive work that has been performed by numerous KC’s around the world and use the collided Data to move matters forward to the KC’s?
Instead you pick one breed (and I remain, they are pretty healthy and stable in comparison to some others) and it’s followers and spend all day arguing with a handful of individuals?
It seems to me that it is a lot of effort spend for very little reward.
I’m ripping your breed apart because it deserves it. I’m showing just how callous and idiotic you apologists are and the lengths you are willing to go to convince yourselves that history, tradition, ego, phony breed histories, and uniqueness will go toward robbing people of their ethical cores to do what is right by their dogs instead of treating their dogs like objects.
You Dalmatian breeders make wonderful examples of what NOT to do.
And the individual does not always have to meet the breed standard either. In a livestock registry, it is possible to cross in a Scottish Highlands Cattle into an Angus gene-pool.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
Yes the same goes for horse breeding and the difference is the fact that both horses and cattle have a purpose beside looking right, This however is not a Dalmatian related topic but one that is widely spread in the canine world!
It is also the first time in the whole discussion that I feel that we are coming close to the REAL issue here!
Again, you’re arguing a different point. I’ve already explained that nowhere did I say that every Dalmatian should be put down lest they savage the face off of a human being or kill a child or re-enact Kujo on an unsuspecting public.
Your protest is much the same as the protest made by pit bull people. In response to legitimate public concern that the breed has a history and reputation for temperament issues, they rush to tell everyone that their individual dog is a saint and they’ve never seen this or that problem, etc. etc. etc.
That doesn’t answer the charge. And worse, I’ve heard the exact same lines of bullcrap from people in my own breed who produce dogs I would not want to see within 20 yards of a child. People who have bred dogs that bit children which were the offspring of dogs that I’ve seen with my own eyes to have horrible temperaments.
I see plenty of pit bull friendly bloggers who describe the lengths they have to go to in keeping their dogs in check, the “crate and rotate” regime. Well, if you don’t have children and you monitor your dogs extensively and they are never even near children then it’s really NOT impressive if you say “my dog has never bitten a child!”
It fits! Breeder attitude is important. Dalmatian breeders, all of them, have the attitude that coat color is more important than deafness. And this is easy to say because we know the excess white causes deafness and all Dalmatians are bred with this color. Done deal. No other way around it. The only counter-evidence to this claim would be (1) if there were Dalmatian breeders who wanted to preserve whatever else it means to be a Dalmatian but would accept more common coat colors in the breed and introduce those colors through outcrossing. Or (2) if some breakthrough could happen to allow Dalmatians to keep their coat color and not have deafness (or have deafness on a much much smaller level of incidence).
Finally, found some data which can refutes or support people’s positions which can be broken down for analysis. At this point there is over 145 coments and there are lots of stupid knee-jerks comments which resorts to name-calling and ad hominem or tone cricitisms without discussions through counter-arguments and or refutations. So, I doubt anyone would see this comment due to the lengthly barrage of defenders who are incapable of discussing.
People should be quite leery of the results from the American Temperament Test since dogs can be trained to pass it. It is no more than a complimentary piece of paper like the Canine Good Citizen program which doesn’t guarantee the dog is mentally stable– just a good trainer.
The Swedish Mental Description Test (Mentalbeskrivning Hund), or MH-test for short, on the other hand, is considered to be more reliable for several reasons: it’s based on the protocols developed by the military and police; the test is taken when the dog is 12-months old and no more than two years old; since 1997, there is about over 8000 results readily accessible. Also, the dog doesn’t fail or pass the test since it is simply a tool to measure the attributes of the temperament on a scale from 0 to 5. Not only that, the Swedish research institute, Genetica, has demonstrated those trait values are hereditary.
While the Dalmatians don’t have a breed profile published on the official website of the Svenska Brukshundsklubben, the data can still be access from a database: http://kennet.skk.se/avelsdata/
The database requires an account and Internet Explorer with cookies enabled and pop-up blocker turned off to access it though. Unlike the Finnish Kennel Club’s KoiraNet program, the Swedes seems to be incompetent in designing a user-friendly platform. So, this will require a bit of hand-holding to access the results. So, bear with me.
Steps
1) Click on “Registrera” [Trans. “Register”]
2) The following pop-up form will appear:
Signatur = user ID
Lösenord = password (minimum 6 characters)
Verifera lösenord = verify password
Förnamn = First name
Efternamn = Last name
E-post = E-mail
3) Hit “Skicka” [Trans. “Send”]
4) Once e-mail is retrieved, use the information to log onto the database. The fields “Signatur” is for user ID, and “Lösenord” is for password.
5) Once logged in, there should be a green menu on the left-hand side with the links: “Hundar”, “Provparning”, “Raser”, “Inställningar”, “FAQ”, “Hjälp”, “Logga ut”. Click on “Raser” [trans. “Breeds”], then click on “Sök/Välj Ras” [trans. “Find/Choose Breed”].
6) There should be a pop-up screen with “VÄLJ RAS” as header in a green box with white text. Below it, there should be a drop-down menu. Scroll to “Dalmatiner” [trans. “Dalmatian”], then click “OK”.
7) A page should refreshing itself with “Rasinfo” as the header. On the left-hand menu, click “MH”. Once the page displays “MH-översikt” [trans. “MH-Overall”] as the header. Beside “Typ” [Trans. “Type”], select “Medelvärde” [trans. “Mathematical Mean”] in the drop-down. Adjust the variable in the fields beside “Födelseår” [trans. “Birth Year”] to 1990 and 2013. Then click on “Visa” [trans. “Show”]
8) There should be a new chart available which is immensive. To adjust the information, there should be a few buttons beside “Visa för” [trans. “Show For”]: “12-18 månader” [trans. “12-18 months”], “12-24 månader” [trans. “12-24 months”] and “Samtliga” [trans. “All”]. Select “Samtliga” for all the data available. Click “Visa” again to regenerate the data.
There will be two different calculated values below the MH-diagram. “Egenskapsvärden” [trans. “Trait Value”] is weighted value of all the traits. “Faktiska värden” is the actual values or result from each individual section.
“st” is short-hand for “stycket” [trans. “Individual”]. In the case of Dalmatians, there are about 401 individuals.
One can do the same thing with any breeds. One can go through the dataset by yearly basis to see changes in the temperament results as well.
For those who do not want to go through the hassle of going through the SKK’s database, I took the liberty of producing downloadable PDFs and putting them on my website.
Actual Value: http://www.prickeared.com/?attachment_id=9205
Trait Value: http://www.prickeared.com/?attachment_id=9206
To understand the data-chart, one can refer to a Swedish kennel which specializes in Lapphund:
http://www.lapphund.nu/lihkmhen.htm.
So what are the trait values of all 401 individuals from 1990 to 2013?
Nyfikenhet/Orädsla = curiosity/non-fearfulness (3.4)
Aggressivitet = aggressiveness (2.0)
Socialitet = sociality (3.4)
Jaktintresse = interest to chase [prey-drive] (2.6)
Lekfullhet = playfulness (2.9)
The closer the median is to 5, the stronger the trait is. As we can see, Swedish Dalmatians are fairly average across the board and they exhibits low-aggressiveness.
Mind you, this is not vindictive of any breed since the data-set only looks at Swedish sub-population. We know that Swedes and Finns are very health-conscious compared to their counterparts abroad.
The other problem with the data-set is that the tests are voluntary, which does not randomly sample the dogs. The samples are also only a small fraction of the number of dogs bred and born. However the MH-test is often used as an assessment tool for someone’s breeding program. So if someone want a temperamentally-sound dog, then the puppy-buyer should only contact kennels with dogs that have results published.
So, we cannot assume Christopher’s conclusion false or true without understanding the variations between sub-populations and why the breeding practices in between each country differ.
We know that Americans are less tolerant of patches than Europeans do. We also know deaf dogs tend to be more aggressive as well.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
Hi Dave,
as an experienced breeder and judge of Dalmatians who has lived in multiple European countries and now in the US I can assure you that the majority of Dalmatians have a very friendly disposition.
As regards to Swedish Dalmatians and the mental test you need to know that the majority of breeders do not test theirs since it is not a working breed nor is it a breed that is generally known for aggression, they mainly judge by what the dog is like to live with.
My own foundation bitch is Swedish bred and I have over the years combined british and scandinavian blood lines which appears to be working rather well.
Like I stated before I do not know many US Dalmatians BUT the once that I did come across in my are display a wonderful predisposition that is not only compatible for a family pet but also deals rather well with living in a pack of dogs with many visiting too.
So far I have only bred and raised one litter in the US and I did find that I needed to spend quite some efforts in educating the new families on the fact that commands such as sit, down and stay are merely tricks a dog can learn but that it was of far more importance to actually understand canine behavior so they could stir this in the right direction.
A Dalmatian like most other breeds are not for everyone and if left to their own devices they will become bored, stressed or even territorial toward their garden, that they never leave but ONLY if the owner is clearly not in charge and has allowed this behavior to creep in slowly.
Bred by a responsible breeder who is then prepared to guide their puppy buyers at least through the first two years they are not only a very healthy breed but also a very level headed one.
Bad examples exist across the board but I do not think that Christopher wants to see this part at all instead he misunderstand the color inheritance pattern which explains why he picks our breed instead of his own and he also keeps referring to blindness. Now in 17 very active years of breeding Dalmatians I have known exactly one that turned blind at the age of six due to a severe case of diabetes. That’s all so he can hardly speak of color related blindness.
The list goes on as regards to his misinterpretation of the breed displaying only one factor and that is his own ignorance.
In 13 years (17 years of Dalmatian ownership) I have bred 12 litters ranging from 6 – 12 puppies. One of them was fully deaf, one died due to swallowing a toy, one was killed in a car accident, one died after a stone operation gone wrong and one other also blocked from stones.
The rest of them are still ALL alive and healthy with the oldest once being 13 years of age…….. please tell me how that represents a train wreck of a breed? Yes I have worked HARD on doing my research but I still use the same lines that many breeders do across Europe and if the rest of the breed where so unhealthy then I am sure I would have run out of luck by at least the third generation.
Actually, it was a Finnish breeder who got frustrated with the discussions on this blog. She sympathizes with the Dalmatian defenders, but she was horrified not a single person used statistics to defend the breed.
You have much better luck using data from SKK and FKC than trying to compare Dalmatians to Border Collies. Otherwise the general public think show-fanciers are only trying to hide something.
Oh, and for the record, if you compare the number of dogs tested to the number of dogs born between 1990 to 2013, over 10% of the breed has been tested. 10% in participation is a huge accomplishment for any breed.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
And at the moment, puppy-buyers are inclined to believe news-articles than breeders’ anecdotes. There are no shortage of articles written by American newspapers about the aggression or dangerous status of Dalmatians.
Like all media portrayals, the only antidote to false information is hard statistics.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
Exactly! So far I have only seen people taking it too personal, attacking the author, deflecting the issues and not really refuting the arguments made in the post.
There’s nothing they really can say, Joe, except “We’re sorry, we won’t do it again.” But they WANT to do it again. They won’t give up the coat color and many won’t give up “breed purity” to solve problems.
So I mock them so that the rest of us can learn.
I read it.
And I appreciate all the work that went into producing this – I’ll have a grand time swimming through that data! Thanks!
Christopher sorry if there are some of us who love our breeds, want to see our breeds preserved & not mixed into non-existence.
You seriously think this comment makes sense on a Dalmatian post? As if the LUA Dals are anti-preservation and anti-existence?
I find your ignorant and twisted mind-set troubling, if not plain disgusting. The notion that “purity” which is not purity it’s simply book-keeping, is more important than the health and happiness of the dogs you claim to love, that you’d rather have them bleed and suffer every time they piss, just because you can’t abide a known pointer-in-the-woodpile let alone understand that breed formation itself was a grand mixing of types, you value ignorance over knowledge, suffering over health, and intangible artifice over extant reality. That means you suck.
Hi Dave,
Very interesting – do you by any chance know if it is also possible to access the individual-level data for the MH-test, not just the breed averages?
Thanks,
Conny
Finnish JTO
http://www.findal.net/ROTUINFO/Dalmatiankoiran_jalostuksen_tavoiteohjelma_01012008.pdf
On page 18, the Finnish breed club addresses the prevalence of deafness in the United States:
Deaf dogs (unilateral or bilateral) are not used in breeding which contribute to the lowering of deaf dogs being born. In the United States, it is still socially-acceptable to breed excessive pigmentation with blue eyes. In FCI countries, blue-eyed dogs are not allowed to be bred.
This would explain why Stephaine says only 1% of European dogs are deaf, while Americans report 30%.
According to JTO, only a few deaf puppies are born. The majority of breeders test with BAER before they are 8-weeks old.
Below is a statistical report. “Täysin kuulevia” refers to hearing hearing; “toispuoleisesti kuulevia” refers to unilateral deafness; “täysin kuuroja” refers to bilateral deafness. URL: http://www.findal.net/ROTUINFO/Liite_5_Dalmatiankoirien_kuulotutkimustulokset.pdf
In Sweden:
http://www.hundsport.se/redaktionellt/veterinaren_mapp/diagnos_arftlig_dovhet.html
From 2004 to 2006: 74 hearing dogs, 12 bilateral deafness, 4 unilateral deaf dogs.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
I find it amusing how people are viewing this article as a personal attack and using their anecdotal evidence based on a handful of well-bred dogs they own as evidence to refute the whole thing.
If I went by anecdotal evidence in the same way, I would say dalmatians are a horrible breed. I have met probably almost a dozen dal/dal mixes and all had serious behavior problems. Some were even pretty responsibly owned and still ended up biting someone in the face. And by my anecdotal evidence alone, the few border collies I have met were very nice, albeit high-strung dogs who were well trained.
The article did come across as a bit too rough on the breed, but there is still interesting and relevant subject matter (to more than just dalmatians!) that cannot simply be dismissed by “well, MY dog is not deaf or neurotic!”
Wow – AP Chem and AP Bio. And studied (but apparently didn’t earn a degree) at Stanford. Did you flunk out? Those of us who actually have an education can see so many flaws in the statements here that it defies reality. I don’t really know why I’m bothering to comment other than to say “What a waste of a 1/2 hour”. All this article does is prove Christopher is a raging jerk who has no ability to write effectively and resorts to insults and name calling to defend his inappropriate behavior. He who points fingers the hardest is most guilty of his own accusations.
My degree is in Industrial Engineering and I graduated with Honors (so Stanford thinks I can write pretty well), you clearly can’t read “Stanford Grad” which is right over there on the bottom left of every page on this blog. But I am amused you seem to think that my getting a full academic ride to the best school in the world and dancing off with a Bachelor of Science degree is somehow something to be ashamed of. I’m also amused that you think my extensive AP career is not an asset as well. I got perfect scores on the AP Biology, Chemistry, Calculus BC, Art History, English Language, English Literature, United States History, U.S. Government, and Comparative Government exams. This earned me an Advanced Placement Scholar with Honor award my Junior year and the superlative Advanced Placement National Scholar award my Senior year.
I had a 4.520 GPA, was a National Science Foundation Scholar, was a National Finalist in the American Chemical Society’s competition, was a member of the National Honor Society, Achieved Degree of Merit, Degree of Honor, Degree of Excellence, Degree of Distinction and Degree of Special Distinction with the National Forensic League, I was inducted into the Colorado Junior Academy of Science, I was the President of the Colorado Junior Classical League and runner up for President of the National Junior Classical League.
I won the Stanford University Book Award, I was a BP Amoco Community Scholar, a McNeil Tylenol Scholar, a MENSA Research Foundation Scholar, a BPO Elks Most Valuable Student National Scholar, a USA TODAY All-USA High School Academic Team Honorable Mention, won the President’s Award for Academic Excellence and was in Who’s Who in American High Schools all 4 years.
I twice achieved a Certificate of Distinction on the American High School Mathematics Examination, was a National qualifier twice for the American Invitational Mathematics Exam, and twice won Certificates of Distinction from the American Mathematics Competitions.
I received a scholarship in Engineering from the National Science Foundation, was a U.S. National Chemistry Olympiad top 8 student, and qualifier for the National Chemistry Olympiad National Exam.
I also took first place in Colorado with a perfect score on the University of Northern Colorado Invitational Mathematics Examination. But that’s just a little old State award and I wouldn’t want to tax your already suspect reading skills by listing my sub-National accomplishments.
Is that enough mathy-sciencey-sort-of-qualifications for you?
A degree or GPA means nothing if you have lack of commonsense or reasoning, which I see a lack in both areas based on most of your statements.
Christopher,
You write: “Sorry, but in a very real sense all of your dogs go back to just one dog, and that the breed is defined around such a singular gene it is going to suffer because of that. And it already is. It’s not a coincidence that a breed so shallowly defined would have a disease gene 100% saturated so soon after the breed was formed. Drift normally takes a very very long time, but not when you have artificial selection and start with a very small pool of founders.”
However the Dalmatian breed has actually been around for a very looong time! It is NOT a recent breed. It is one of the earliest known breed of dogs dating back to ancient Egypt and the time of the Pharaohs. So how do you define “a very very long time”? I think multiple centuries qualifies and “drift” certainly can happen in that time frame!
Just as a point of reference for the rest of your readers…..All dog breeds, in a very real sense, go back to one original dog.
LMFAO, they’re EGYPTIAN DOGS!! Because there’s a black and white spotted dog on a tomb wall? LMFAO. There’s a Black dog on a tomb wall, now Border Collies, Black Labs, and Boston Terriers are Egyptian and ancient too!
Actually, the Dalmatian is thought to come from India and was transported to Europe via the gypsies.
Come on Eileen, we know that Gypsies are from Egypt! It says so in their name. Just like Dalmatians. If you give them a name that must be where they are from. TruthPinkySwear!
Oh, yup, right! How silly of me! For all the others reading this that are unaware, read it and weep: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/9719058/European-Roma-descended-from-Indian-untouchables-genetic-study-shows.html
Oh you learn so fast! So, where’s the DNA evidence that shows us that Dalmatians came from Egypt via the Balkans?
Ah, well, it is all speculation. No one knows for sure where Dals are from.
Yeah, no one knows for sure. But we DO know that the purebred BREED that we now call “Dalmatians” comes from the UK. To my knowledge, no one has found “country of origin” dogs that are not actually descendants from UK dogs.
If they are so ancient, where are the aboriginal Dalmatians? Where’s the landrace Dals? The Country of origin Dals? The unwashed and unimproved Dals?
“However the Dalmatian breed has actually been around for a very looong time! It is NOT a recent breed. It is one of the earliest known breed of dogs dating back to ancient Egypt and the time of the Pharaohs. So how do you define “a very very long time”? I think multiple centuries qualifies and “drift” certainly can happen in that time frame!”
No. Retrieverman has written on the origins of the modern Dalmatian. It ain’t Egyptian:
http://retrieverman.net/tag/dalmatian/
I actually own two ‘ancient’ breeds (ancient as defined by having more basal DNA than most other modern breeds) and even I will not admit nor promote the idea that our modern Salukis and Afghans are directly descended in an unbroken line from the dogs painted on the walls of Egpytian tombs.
“Just as a point of reference for the rest of your readers…..All dog breeds, in a very real sense, go back to one original dog.”
Um, no. There were many domestication events associated with the development of the dog, including multiple backcrosses with wolves. This is what the DNA tells us, not pretty stories designed to stroke our egos. The evolution of the dog, and it’s selective breeding up to the advent of the Victorian Toilet Science of the closed ‘purebred’ registry, was NOTHING like the type of hyperselection that goes on to develop an entire breed based on a specific color or pattern.
Such breeding, and indeed, the modern methods of closed registries, line-breeding, small founder populations and selection for minutiae cause loss of gene variants on a massive scale. Even if benign or beneficial mutation were exceptionally common in the dog, such a process would be hard pressed to keep up with the variant loss caused by modern breeding practices.
You are mistaken in your understanding of drift. ‘Genetic drift’ occurs in ANY population, it is simply a change in frequency of alleles. A popular sire, for instance, that leaves many progeny, will cause a good deal of drift in the population, especially in a relatively rare breed with low numbers.
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evosite/evo101/IIIDGeneticdrift.shtml
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Now you just sound even more like a narcissistic child who has been told too many times that he’s really smart compared to others. I think you should be asking for money for psychological counseling. None of the things you listed as accomplishments qualifies you in any way to make statements regarding genetics nor do they give you any special knowledge regarding Dalmatians – or Border Collies for that matter. Says the reader who also has a list of accomplishments of similar math and science awards, who also had full-ride scholarships, who also graduated with high honors AND has a degree from a major university in ANIMAL SCIENCE with a minor in GENETICs, and emphasis on reproductive endocrinology and a DOCTORATE of Veterinary Medicine, and who has 25+ years of experience in clinical practice and 40+ years of Dalmatian experience. Typical Border Collie owner – control freak. You wife probably needs funds to go to an abused women’s shelter…. Get a real life. You are not the smartest person in the room. (gasp- don’t die of shock)
Funny, for all your supposed experience you comment anonymously and can’t find fault with anything I’ve written. I’m not anonymous, all of my accomplishments are real and verifiable. If you can’t back up your credentials, why don’t you leave a comment that is more than insults? After all, you’re the idiot who is making Appeals to Accomplishment instead of actually making sound arguments. Do you like Logical fallacies much?
I could be a hobo who is barely literate, it wouldn’t make what I’ve written any less accurate and your inability to point out a single flaw in the genetics means that you’re probably not much of a Vet at all. I mean heck, how outdated is a minor in Genetics that’s 30 years old? Even if you’re telling the truth. “Major University!” Um, ok.
Heck, if you are both a Veterinarian and a Dalmatian breeder, you’re a pitiful human being for being in a position to KNOW about how screwed up your breed is genetically and doing nothing about it for your entire career. Your legacy is one of enabling and sustaining the unethical and idiotic breeding behaviors that were antiquated in 1900 let alone 2013. If you’re telling the truth, you have no excuse to be so callous and ineffectual.
And the odds of me NOT being the smartest person in the room are infinitesimal. Sorry, it’s not bragging, it’s just the logical consequence of being so many standard deviations above from the mean. I mean really, did MENSA pay for your schooling?
Almost everything you have written here is based on sloppy research and it did not take a degree to work that one out.
You fail at the base, the foundation for any breed, the knowledge of the breeder or guardian of each breed. You do however excel in pointing your finger at others instead of encouraging them to open their views and mentoring them to a better state of mind.
So all of your degrees have failed on one level……….. you fail to be able to teach others but your are fabulous at bringing out the worst in them since you are not capable to lead by good example.
Funny you call it sloppy research when there are no fewer than two dozen published papers linked in the article and the comments. You’ve done a review? You think it’s all shit work? Strain is an asshole? Grandin doesn’t know how to read?
OOOOOH KAY! But yeah, I totally failed to appreciate the people who drink the koolaid and think that deafness is ok, that urate stone disease is just a little problem we can handle by putting our dogs on overly expensive special formula food and bottled water. Don’t fix a problem, make it more expensive and involved to treat! Because we NEEEEEED the coat color. It’s magical.
I am going to sum this all up and put in my 2 cents.
1. LUA Dals should be bred in more. Breeders need to be more careful to lower the incidence of deafness, which, from what I saw from a careful breeder, could be done.
2. The Dalmatian Club of America is a bunch of old farts that are resistant to change. There is a lot of that going on in the world today. The dragging of their feet on the LUA situation is inexcusable. Their insistence of deaf pups being put to sleep is ridiculous. The pups are secretly slipped off to rescue like contraband drugs. They are always neutered or spayed, so what’s the difference?
3. Since you never answered my question as to whether you ever had a special needs dog, Christopher, I’ll take that as a no. You might be surprised how well a dog lives with a handicap. Far better than their human counterparts, I think. To me, their life has value. They have taught me more than a few lessons in strength.
4. Deaf dogs are not all aggressive and a threat to society. I have seen the ones who came through rescue and I have one right now. She is an extremely happy girl. She has bonded with another rescue I have who is close in age, so maybe she relies on him. Her only threat is giving you too many kisses.
5. You can’t expect to bash Dalmatians and not have the people who love them disagree. You aren’t going to change anyone’s mind.
6. Stupid people have a lot to do with dog bites. I go to a rescue picnic every year that has probably 40 or 50 Dalmatians gathered. Would I ever stick my face down near theirs and pet them? Never!
Hello people! They are DOGS, not tiny people. You can’t think that they are going to act like a human. Or Lassie. You have to take the time to learn “dog”.
7. That being said, the Dalmatian has to fit with the right person. Can they be nervous? Yes. Can that nervousness go up exponentially if they are with the wrong person? Absolutely. Are all of them nervous? NO.
They have some traits that I love that would annoy others. They are good watchdogs. The males are more affectionate than the females; they literally worship the ground you walk on. They all follow you everywhere, even the bathroom. They are comedians. The females guard their den (the house) more. Some can be a little aloof when meeting strangers. They would guard me with their life if I were in trouble. They are independent thinkers and can be very stubborn. They are “talkers”. They are masters at getting attention from you.
8. Finally, you come across, to us Daliie lover, as singling out Dalmatians as the detritus of dogdom by virtue of their health issues. What about bulldogs, that can die from too deep of sleep or being too hot, because of their respiratory shortcomings? Great Danes get bloat, Boxers get cancer at alarming rates, dachshunds have weak backs, and beagles often battle epilepsy. And what about ridiculous tail docking and ear cropping to suit some dumb human’s idea of good looks. ALL purebred breeding causes the problems because natural selection would have weeded them out!
Just let me add that my daughter was a vet tech and the nasty biters were all of the little dogs that came in.
No argument there! I think a Jack Russel Terrier (also an extreme piebald dog) that weighted 40 pounds would be the worst possible dog for anyone. Have you ever met a nice one of those? Their only saving grace is being small.
I have met two that were nice, although they were short visits. My daughter rescued one, so I do have first hand experience with one. She’ll lay on her back and expose her tummy to me one minute and then snap at me the next if I try to stop her from assaulting the other dogs. She is also a worse barker than any of my Dallies. Tiny body, pain in the ass personality!
Of course we felt sorry for her when she was rescued. Her former owner kicked her in the head so hard she almost died. They brought her to the vet, making up a story that she fell down the stairs. When they couldn’t pay (of course), they thought that they would take her home and bury her while she was still alive. That’s when the vet receptionist stepped in. Don’t ever chide me about stupid people.
Yes, my breed JRT are NOT a “extreme piebald dog” they standard across the board for all the variations is greater then 51% white. I am pleased to say that not many all white ones are not put up due to a lack of pigments which is a huge fault in many breeders books. Color aside, people love to assume JRT are good dogs for kids and apartments because they are small and after having them for years the only places these dogs are good for is in the country working. They are the best possible dog for anyone who wants a tough watchdog that will keep varmint out of an open barn. And for the record I have met many nice ones of them. And if any of them ever put their teeth on anyone I would seriously reconsider the dog.
And following that train of thought many people who have a dalmatian do not understand these dogs were bred to run along side carriages all day. I have met 2 good Dalmatians after years of being in dogs and those dogs were owned by a gal who rode almost everyday and took overnight packing trips. If all these so called bad dogs were given a chance to actually exercise the way they were bred to do you have to wonder how many would still show the trait for instability.
I stand by my assessment that JRTs are an extreme piebald breed. This isn’t a technical term or a specifically biological one. I am saying that they have an extreme expression of piebald on average.
51% or more is a lot more white than a few spots here and there.
LOL Chris technical or biological Terriorman agrees 51 percent. http://terriermandotcom.blogspot.com/2014/04/why-color-is-good-on-jack-russell_23.html
Lzi the JRT standard calls for the 51% white and this appears to be alot more than just one recessive allele of the sp?
Honestly was surprised to see the standard limiting pigmentation on most JRT which honestly should not have surprised me but it did. Likewise, further limiting the gene pool there are subdiviisons and divisions such as the Parson. I have seen well spotted Dals with more pigmentation. JRT that I have experienced were so high strung and nervous were too much for me.
So far all extreme white dogs that have undergone genetic testing have been shown to be homozygous for the piebald gene (spsp), piebalds .
Since there is genetic testing available to determine if a breed is carrying a single or double dose of piebald one would need to change my opinion as well that JRT are extreme white because it takes more than one dose of in most breeds to produce that much white on the dog.
However, as there is a fairly large difference between those dogs. It could be possible there is something else going on to cause the high white. In breeds with both true irish spotting and piebald the high white may simply be caused by the interaction between homozygous irish spotting and homozygous piebald (e.g. the Collie, Border Collie , Sheltie). We are not speaking of any other dilution genes just the S locus where only two alleles thus far have been discovered and identified with markers.
The postulation of sw for extreme white in other breeds in S locus however, has no evidence yet found.
Who ever heard of anything so insane as a JRT standard. I think its the most ill advised thing in the world that the Australians for example went for a closed stud book and AustralianKC registration of their JRTs.
I’ve met many many nice JRT’s, he says indignantly.
What you mean to say I imagine is have you ever met a nice JRT that isn’t yours.
Yes IMO many especially the longer legged dedicated working types are extreme piebald, many with just a single patch over one eye. There are though some cracker black and tans coming out of Ireland of both type, shorter and or otherwise.
Just a querie I’ve wondered about is the panda bear an extreme piebald?
Anton I am more inclined to believe that the Panda’s white and black markings are attributed to the KIT Gene. You might find these photos of interest. I have read that the skin under the black in a Panda is dark and under the white is pink much like the piebald. However the Panda’s eyes likewise are dark. I see no documentation to my theory. The panda is an anomality of evoltuion it climbs and walks like a bear. It has a digestion system to be a meat eater, but primary diet as you are aware is bamboo much like some sort of cousin the red panda which is of the raccoon family.
Again we are told Panda’s skelton is more cat-like as the raccoon,
Personally if I would take a Border Collie over JRT with a typical Terrior Behavior and Personality with abillties far beyond any terrior breed in my experience?
http://www.reshareworthy.com/33-dogs-with-unique-coats/
I love JRT personalities they are so extremely bright, loveable and athletic.
I’ve never counted but mine must know at least 30 if not more words. If I say get the rope they get the rope, if I say get the mouse they get mice, if I say get the ball they get the ball, if I say its in the fridge they go to the fridge (all in an instant of course), if its in the tree they look up into the tree or climb it more often than not, etc etc.
They know all our names. Eye contact like no other dog I know except maybe the BC. I dont have to even point and off they go they seem to know where everything is at all times. If I do actually point they know instantly where, if its bird in the sky circling overhead…. I can even point with my eyes and they get it. Sharp as can be. And they can entertain themselves endlessly as well as be a real pest for entertainment.
I mean there is all that too.
I also think in fact in many ways the negatives (if you see them as such) are a lot like those of the BC except they will bite.
They will not let anyone in unless we are there to open the gates for example, as our vet discovered to his cost. He was so used to popping through the gate through the garden area through to the yard and getting on with the job at hand. He then phones up to the house if he needs anything and no one else is around. He would simply feed the big dogs a tit bit through the gate and they were like lambs and let him pass no problem. A JRT is entirely different they wouldn’t touch such a bribe, ignore it completely. He now phones explicitly to be escorted in, a small trifle, they do this even though they know him, with anyone they know who is not here daily. They honestly don’t like that vet after they had their first rabies shot. He should stick to cows if you ask me.
They do make an exceptional compact guard dog as a result and are in high demand in some areas of the world where armed crime is rife. They’ve saved lives with their extreme lack of fear.
There is that something I don’t know, spontaneous in much of their behaviour too which I think I honestly like a lot in this size package where it would be a nuisance with anything larger as I know myself after living with a pitbull.
I don’t know much about the showing numbers but they appear a bit subdued for my liking, dopey almost, all a bit wrong. When I hear they are looking for wider muzzles, more bone etc I shudder at the shallowness of it all. Why fiddle when the perfect little dog is looking up into your eyes already.
I seem to remember something about the panda being a piebald, its stuck in my mind for some reason….
Anton you like many terrior folks love the personality of their JRT. Like a wonderful professional handler years ago loved his Westminister Champion Terrior and accepted it would bite him. He truly loved his Terrior and all Terriors
I agree however, that this JRT standard calling for 51% white is as ignorant as most Standards. Maybe they did not have the technology to document the health issues when these standards were originally written for our pure breeds. This certainly is no excuse today and they defend these standards like they are the Holy.
Oh I had a Vet Tech friend who had two Parson Jack Russell and she admitted it was huge mistake to have purchase the second one due to the fighting. Like you have seen the same situation with the Peke when owner has two. Strange is it not? Recent genetic tests have indicated that the Pekingese is one of the most ancient of all dog breeds, and this breed is credited to be influential in the development of other East Asian companion dogs?
I agree the Panda looks so typical piebald. The Panda is born weigh about 3 to 5 ounces and about seven inches long which is smallest mammal in relationship to its mother. Panda milk is much like dog milk and is used in zoos to feed baby Pandas is another important factor.
They are born pink and hairless and like the Dals the spots come in later. We know they are double piebalds. This mammal like born like marsupials such as opossums and kangaroos reflects this unusual mammal has been caught in evolution isolation seems safe to say,
The Chinese are known to have played with selected breeding in fish for examplem long before prior to other civilizations. What makes me believe there is a modifiying factor
Heavens alive no. A JRT that bites its owner or anyone they live with is a train wreck of a bred dog!!!
The first issue to clarify when looking for a pup is character and you expect proof of this when you visit. If the dogs or parent are grumblers, growl when being handled brush picked up by the owner and or family etc those are not the pups for you! Walk away in a hurry.
It’s better to get your pup based on reputation, word of mouth.
JRT’s in general get along with each other even strange JRTs in my experience. In all the years I’ve been riding I’ve never seen a single dog fight between these dogs or aggression to other riders. These dogs are very popular amongst riders and are generally free range to mingle at events as they travel so easily and well. Could be it was simply we all smelt like horse shit so were all more or less part of the happy family.
They can though get aggressive with bigger dogs. Im saying all this from my own personal experience of course and these aren’t blanket statements, when I mean “they” I mean the ones I’ve known.
Besides the Peke the other alarmingly aggressive little dog I know off is the French bulldog.
Thanks Anton for the clarification and with helpful hints to those who might make the mistake of choosing an aggressive dog. Again, I agree with you about the Peke and most of those miniature biting nuisances. However, some people have a knack of raising these ankle biters to be a good social animal. I believe the word is Spoiled.
I believe we all spoil our dogs regardless of Breed, but tolerating being bitten is not one of them. They say much of a dog’s personality lies in its genetics. I am not certain this is correct.
Ha! Im of the opinion it’s impossible to “spoil” a good JRT, that they are “spoil” proof. Yes they can instead be little control freaks and give their owners as much “eye” as a border collie gives a sheep.
I do think though that character can be genetic of course. It is in many breeds. Nothing to do with nurture. As this blog entry for example clearly explains.
Not using these dogs for breeding or upping the melanin or pigment is key of course. When you have aggressive tendencies in larger dogs like mastiffs it becomes life threatening. Mostly these dogs haven’t been spoilt and very few are piebald so there is more at play of course than just extreme piebald.
I dont know how many badly bred JRTs with aggression are related to the extreme pied gene but its possible though, its true the aggressive ones I’ve seen appeared to have normal pigment but still mad.
Sealyhams are as far as I know also extreme pied and some of them have completely unacceptable rage with it, its usually the completely white ones too.
Agree! And not just to that one line of dogs. Other breeders should be doing new outcrosses.
Agree! And that’s why it is important to mock them and make sure that all the other breed clubs that have yet to even allow ONE outcross see just how foolish the Dalmatian club was for waiting for so long and allowing their breed to suffer needlessly. If you want to pat them on the back because they finally relented after 38 years, GOOD. I’ll spit on them for waiting that long. It should not take nearly 40 years to realize that this problem needed solving and opening the stud book was clearly the way to go.
We can’t afford to keep all the rest of the stud books permanently closed for 4 more decades.
It is morally reprehensible to create “special needs” dogs ON PURPOSE based upon shallow breeding decisions like “I want a pretty coat color” or “I will not violate breed purity to fix this issue genetically.”
Sorry, I don’t CARE about the rest of your point. If you want to raise a special needs dog, fine, free country. But as a breeder, I would NEVER ever EVER inflict a special needs dog on someone else. I go to great lengths to not produce them and if one happened as a mistake, I would either keep it or put it down. I would NEVER ever ever add to the entropy of the world by creating dogs that would burden someone else like that. There are plenty of rescues who feel differently, and more power to them, they want to do the hard work by repairing other people’s mistakes, paying for other people’s mistakes, by all means. But I will not foist my mistakes off on others.
And the first step to that is NOT CREATING SHITTY DOGS. Not creating deaf dogs with poor temperaments. No nylon ribbon is worth doing that to someone or some dog.
No one wants to CREATE a special needs dog. All the ones that I had, but one, were blind, deaf and disabled were at the hands of a moron POS who abused them. I have ONE BAER tested pup. Like I said before, the incidence of stones/crystals is far higher that the amount of deafness I ever see. And people get rid of deaf puppies because they ARE harder to train.
I truly believe that obsessively careful breeding in the USA could decrease the incidence of deafness.
So, one must also say, by following your arguement, that dachshunds are shitty and they are bred with backs too long to support their bodies and French bulldogs, with their smooshed nose is shitty because they can’t breathe, etc., ad nauseum. Those are ALL traits that some human thought looked nice, like spots and white coats, that cause a problem with health. It is repeated over and over in so many different breeds and you can’t just single out Dalmatians.
Well I guess that no one wants to Create a special needs dog, but look at all the breeders who do!
All Shar Peis are predisposed to fever disorder because of their skin. To be a Shar Pei is to be prone to disease. All Rhodesian Ridgebacks are predisposed to dermoid sinus. ETC.
All the breeds I list here are predisposed to be diseased in some manner:
http://www.border-wars.com/2011/08/sine-qua-non-dog-disorders.html
So I can’t REALLY agree that people don’t intentionally create diseased dogs. Just look at my most famous post, where first rate respected top show breeders intentionally bred Merle to Merle. And got a blind and deaf dog. And used him for stud!
http://www.border-wars.com/2012/02/westminster-rewards-cruelty.html
So no, I can’t agree with you. These people did this, they knew the risks. That’s intentionally creating special needs dogs. No other way to look at it.
YES.
And I don’t just single out Dalmatians. You only think that because you haven’t read the other 400 posts here.
Okay, the Westminster thing is just plain stupid. No, it’s worse that that. The whole dog show thing is just like the figure skating world that I was involved with once. Winning is everything.
Well, then if purebred dogs are the source of all problems, why do you have purebred dogs?
I love my Border Collies, but I’m not wed to the notion of their purity. My breeding actually brought together two BCs from different registries, the ABCA and the AKC. The puppies are actually registered in the AKC because they allowed me to “outcross” to a non AKC dog. The ABCA does not allow this. So surprise, surprise, the AKC is actually the more progressive and open registry at this time in this regard for this breed!
As they are, their recent history is very diverse within the breed, going back to both Australia/New Zealand, the UK, and different parts of North America. They are also diverse in purpose. The southern bred BCs are more cattle focused, the Canadian and N.E. US bred dogs are sheep focused. I have a branch of farm dogs that quickly go unregistered and there are agility and obedience lines, cattle farming lines, sheep herding/trial lines, and show lines. A grand mix, although still within the same breed. A very low COI.
And in the future I would not rule out a more severe outcross to a different breed entirely. I favor an English Shepherd cross at the moment for all the benefits (undoing a century+ of gene loss) with very little risk and really getting the results I want after just the 1 cross. No need to back-cross several times before I like the look of the dogs or the temperament of the dogs or the smarts of the dogs … because the breeds share a lot of similarities in this respect.
I can imagine outcrossing even more wide in the future as well. I’d love to bring in a sight hound to counter balance the boxy heavy structure that BCs are tending to and of course for the big benefit, the excellent hips!
I’d love to do all this ASAP if only the breed clubs would make it easier to do so within a system that will still track my dogs for posterity via pedigrees and appendix registries, and with the hope that they would be returned to purebred status with full rights in said registry after a few generations.
But that is not the case, so when I do it, I will have to do it on my own and hope that one day the registry will come around.
So breed purity means almost nothing to me. I like the idea of a landrace much better and I vastly prefer the appendix registry system that is regularly used in other animals.
That sounds reasonable.
“I like the idea of a landrace much better and I vastly prefer the appendix registry system that is regularly used in other animals.”
I couldn’t agree more.
I didn’t read all 400 posts, however, it appears that Great Danes, Pit Bulls and Dalmatians are the ones you have a bone to pick with (pun intended). You had better get busy, pal, there are a lot more breeds that sport serious problems. You can start with Bull dogs. I always thought breathing was pretty important. Or chow chows. Every one of those that i have met are run-for-your-life MEAN.
Of the three Dallie pictures attached to the posts, two are “smarls” and only one is a Dalmatian about to attack. Check out the dark spotted one. Look at how relaxed his ears and body are.
Bull dogs are a disgusting mess, a complete tragedy of a breed and they’ve been that way for a LONG time. Luckily, other people have already covered them extensively and I don’t feel the need to prioritize them. Especially as they are such an iconic British breed and there are UK bloggers who are keeping good tabs on just how dysfunctional they are. The “rape racks” posts have already been written by at least 3 prominent dog bloggers that I can think of off the top of my head, and surely many more.
I’ve written most about Collies, BTW, in regards to white-factored disease and unethical breeding.
Future targets for post that are of more interest to me are Chinese Cresteds, Dogo Argentinos, and some others. There are more interesting GENETIC issues that I can cover that other people haven’t yet. Bulldogs also have white factor deafness, but much of their dysfunction is conforamational and not disease-related genetic. I.e. they are dwarfs (did this post), brachycephalic (did this post), and unsound in structure. Others have written about this a lot. There are not particularly genetic (as in gene theory, more advanced allele analysis) involved. So meh, not a priority.
Of course, if you want to hire me to do an essay, by all means. Otherwise I write where the muse takes me.
Yes, I meant to add collies to that list, also.
GSDs have been given a decent treatment as well. So much so that I have 2 drafts of several thousand words each that I’ve kept in reserve as not to over-GSD the blog.
Don’t forget Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retrievers. Done several on them as well.
I’d like to hear more about the Dogo.
4. If Deaf dogs were no worse than fully hearing dogs, then you could not object to me making all my hearing dogs deaf on purpose. Being deaf is not an advantage. It’s a liability and it is reprehensible to inflict that on a dog just because YOU, a vain human, like how it LOOKS more than if it is a fully functional dog. Be a deaf apologist all you want, it makes you look a fool. No one chooses deafness over health.
5. I don’t care if Dalmatian apologists disagree. They need to be publicly shamed for their callousness. Public shaming is a very useful and effective tactic. It DOES work. It is IMPORTANT to show these people that what they do is not moral. That the rest of us don’t agree with making dogs deaf is a bonus. That making them urinate stones is not a fair situation to maintain breed purity. That being shy and overly submissive and nippy and bitey is NOT what we want in dogs.
Vitally important to not consent to this abuse of animals through breeding by not speaking up.
6. Stupid people are no excuse. You should not have to be a professional dog trainer and super genius to have a pet that’s nice. Dalmatians should not be hard to keep as pets, since that’s their ONLY job. There are no more carriages for them to run under. They aren’t useful as “fire engine dogs” their ONLY purpose is to be a pet. They should be GOOD at it, not poor at it. The ARE DOGS. They should not be nasty biting unhealthy deaf things. If you want that, get a naked mole rat or a badger.
7. Didn’t say ALL of them are anything, save PRE-DISPOSED by their genetics to have undesirable features that they don’t NEED to be predisposed to if breeders would just give up the color and the breed purity to prevent 100% saturated urate stone disease from making them poor choices for pets. Some people like dangerous expensive and unhealthy pets. Dalmatians should not be in that category. They should not be exotics, they should not require a license to own. You want to own a Panther? Fine. You want to own an Alligator? Fine. But a Dalmatian? No reason at all they should be a high maintenance, expert-only breed.
8. I’m not singling out Dalmatians. I’ve mentioned at least 50, if not more, breeds on this blog before I said one word about Dalmatians. Heck, they aren’t even in the top 5 breeds I’ve discussed concerning breeders abusing PIGMENT related disorders for shallow reasons. Australian Shepherds, Border Collies, Rough Collies, Shelties, Smooth Collies, Great Danes, etc. Dalmatians are just the next on the list and they won’t be the last. Next up, Dogo Argentinos. And that’s JUST the white related problems.
Click on the HEALTH AND GENETICS link at the top of the screen and read up.
4. I never said that ALL deaf dogs aren’t any different. I am speaking from what I observe in real life. I see deaf dogs of ALL different breads go through the rescue pages and not every dog is without worry. I was actually a little nervous to get a deaf pup, but she has surprised me with her abilities. I am just saying that not every deaf dog is a threat to society. And I’ll repeat: careful breeding could lower the incidences of deaf puppies in Dalmatians.
5. Wow. I can see you’re really making progress with your point with Dalmatian people by berating them. Once again: I don’t breed them, I merely
rescue them.
6. Stupid people are part of the problem. You can’t even imagine the amount of pure stupidity I see with dogs. No, they don’t need a trainer. They need common sense.
7. I didn’t say you said ALL, but your intense wording implies little patience with anything redeeming I could say about the breed. A Dalmatian is not in the same category as a dangerous exotic pet. To say so is laughable. They really aren’t that high maintenance. I am honest with their quirks.
8. I didn’t know that you regularly picked on other breeds. I will check that out. I am sure others have appreciated your crusade.
That’s supposed to be “stupid people” are part of the problem. Haha…wrong time to skip a word!
Fixed. I perform spell check fee of charge. 🙂
Wow, you must not own a dalmatian. I own two, and they are very good with my children, they are well-behaved, a tad on the barky side (which I don’t mind), and can be taken out to socialize with people and other dogs. And the issues you insist are “exclusive” to dals are not part of my dogs. I think you’ve been indoctrinated into some sort of anti-Dalmatian cult, which is a pity, really.
Why you insist upon giving a wonderful breed a bad name is completely baffling to me.
Dalmatians give Dalmatians a bad name. And Dalmatian breeders give Dalmatians a bad name. This isn’t me making shit up, it’s you folks being flagrantly accepting of extremely high deafness rates, suspect temperaments, and chronic lack of urinary health that give Dalmatains a bad name.
Everyone needs to stop feeding this troll. He is arrogant and unwilling to even look at different stats. We all need to be thankful such a person will never own a Dal. Move on. All he wants is to continue his views…with interjections of name calling and insults. Let’s all be adults and move on.
And Id still like to know what health tests he does on his own dogs. Bothing breeding stock and pets. He avoided that question. Because if he doesn’t do any health testing then its a case of the pot calling the kettle black.
LMAO, “health testing” You clearly missed my most recent post where I talk all about the disease testing in Border Collies:
http://www.border-wars.com/2013/05/health-testing-in-dogs-is-limited.html
And tell me, KS, why does the CHIC program for Dalmatians NOT include a health test for Uric Acidosis?
No I read it. What I am asking is about YOUR dogs. The ones YOU own. Have you had them tested? I have Aussies and am very familiar withwhat disease run in them and border collies. I don’t need to read the list again. But again you’ve failed to answer the question. Have you personally tested any of the dogs in your breeding program for the disease that they are known to be afflicted with.
And according to you 100% of dals have the uric acid issue so why bother testing them for something you know they have by default.
Well that’s a defeatist attitude! Would your breed club want to try and find any “pedigree” Dals that are free?! And wouldn’t you also want to require testing to document how the LUA Dals are removing the problem from the breed?
And the issue of my dogs is a poor attempt to derail the conversation. They are free of the few things there are DNA tests for, and that’s not saying much, non of those conditions is particularly popular. There are no DNA tests for more important issues like EIC and Epilepsy and behavioral problems (fear of sounds and lights and what not). The lab looking into the behavioral genetics closed down.
My dogs have participated in every active BC study going and a few all breed studies as well. I’ve sent their blood work off more times than I can remember. I care a great deal about actual improvements to the breed through DNA. So sorry, you’re not going to find dirt on me here.
If all works out, my dogs might be some of the first tested under a new DNA testing regime as well. One that looks at the entire genome (or at least a substantial part of it) instead of testing one allele at a time.
The DCA tested over 200 Dalmatians at their Nationals many years ago and like you rightly pointed out they are all HUA.
The UK tested 68 dogs, selected from a variety of lines and all where homozygous for for HUA. On top of that many breeders tested their dogs privately, all with the same findings so there is very little point to spend more money on finding more homozygous HUA Dalmatians.
Occasionaly someone will presume that their (non backcross) Dal is LUA and these people are advised to take a home Urine test.
LUA litters are all home tested and then the presumed LUA’s are send off for DNA testing so it is CERTAIN that they are LUA. Those bred in the States are then also registered with OFA.
So yes, the breed Clubs DID want to know.
If all works out, my dogs might be some of the first tested under a new DNA testing regime as well. One that looks at the entire genome (or at least a substantial part of it) instead of testing one allele at a time.
So you found a company that will charge you approximately 1000.$ to register approximately 20.000 Genes and then what? How would you evaluate those 20.000 Genes?
A single poly-genetic (and therefore not very reliable (under today’s circumstances) test would cost you aprox. 400 $ and at the end of the day you would not know more than us Idiot’s that only test for one issue at the time but can at least be aware that the findings have a purpose and are accurate.
Please explain how that makes sense.
Well, since I am unaware of the cost and the number of alleles currently tested, let me compare this to humans where I know costs.
A few years ago 23andMe opened service for $600 to test your genome using many thousands of markers. Price quickly dropped every year as the technology got cheaper and now it’s $99. They test for HUNDREDS of disease alleles and hundreds of physical traits. They also do ancestry. for $100.
If we compiled the previous individual tests for each allele the cost would be tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. Some tests are still under patent and are $14k for testing 1 locus for a handful of alleles. Like the recent breast cancer tests. 23andMe owns (I think) 2-4 allele tests here, but they are prevented from telling you your results (even though they are tested for) on the other alleles that are still under copyright by another testing company. They want the $14k for that test.
Well, it makes much more sense to me to have hundreds of tests done and once for a cheap price that makes it WORTH the expense instead of this inanely stupid idea of having to test every dog bred for every breed secific test, NO MATTER THE COST and NO MATTER HOW COMMON THE DISEASE IS! That’s inane. I could as you, is YOUR dog tested for Shar Pei fever disease? Why not? Oh, because you can tell your dogs are not Shar Peis… well do you KNOW KNOW KNOW that they do not have that allele? No. So darn you why are you not spending $2,524 to test that dog for Shar Pei fever?!?!?!
Well, the rational choice is that you only pay for tests where the cost of the test is less than the value of the information. An expensive test for a very rare disease is just not worth the money and I am not so insanely risk averse that I would spend $1,000,000 on every dog to have their alleles tested one by one just to claim “I did all the health testing I could!”
See my point? Tests are more valuable if the disease is more common and/or more serious.
I am not so sure again how thorough your research has been for the statement that you used to fuel your argument.
There are currently 500 Genes in canine’s that are know to cause disease so the other 19.500 are totally irrelevant and not even a professional would be able to to anything with them.
In Dalmatians we are quite lucky that we do not need to evaluate all those 500 Genes since only a few are actually relevant to the breed. If you see the need to evaluate all 500 for your breed it might be time to change?
Also the fact remains that so far only simple recessive inheritance is proven to be accurate in Genetic testing. So YES I would LOVE to have all those Genes tested for my dogs too but I am fully aware that it does not make any sense,
It’s scary how many people want to use their own dog in examples. Most dog owners love their dogs and aren’t going to come out and admit to any problems they may have.
First of all, it’s time for people who claim they love their breeds to open their eyes. There are so many issues in just about every breed. Christopher isn’t saying that every Dal has these problems. Just that they could have or produce the issues. Hiding our heads in the sand especially the show people is just encouraging negative stereotypes and it makes us all seem like we don’t give a shit.
I don’t breed, but I do own show German Shepherds who have won plenty of pretty ribbons. It’s not fun reading what Christopher writes about the GSD’s. Unfortunately, it needs to be said. My current dog is line-bred on 6 different dogs in generation 5-6-7 and even more I am sure if I go back to the 70’s. He doesn’t have problems like dysplasia or DM, but I am sure some of his close relatives do. Maybe “YOUR” Dal is perfect, but take a look at litter-mates, aunts, cousins etc.
Thats what makes a good breeder a good breeder. You know what you have behind your dogs for as many generation as you can. I know of several stud dog owners in the breed who will send an email out to everyone who has bred to said dog if something turns up in his get. It’s all about responsibility.
I’ve had my own set of things I do, for five generations. Not Dalmatians, but a different breed. I am in constant contact with puppy buyers and every single puppy I produced has had it’s eyes examined twice (more if it’s in a breeding program. But pet puppies again at 2), it’s MDR1 tests and in breeding dogs, hips-thyroids-elbows-DNA for Cataracts (yes it’s available in my breed). I’ve have it in the contract that I want the eyes done on pet puppies, and I make sure it’s done. The rest is far too expensive to ask a puppy owner to do. I do however ask if they have health problems. Granted I’ve only had 6 litters in 22 years, I do take care in them.
So, let me ask a 3rd time. What testing do you do on your dogs before you breed them? Seeing you are on certain breeds for genetic issues, I’d like to hear what you do to screen for them in your breeding program.
As far as your plans of bringing in different breeds to better your breed-they won’t be border collies then will they. They will be mutts.
The dogs I currently own are out of health tested parents for the entire pedigree as far back as 1982. What does that mean? I honestly don’t know anymore. I learn a lot on this blog even though I want to ignore the facts and pretend that my quest for pieces of silk is meaningful. The truth hurts and it isn’t pretty….
“As far as your plans of bringing in different breeds to better your breed-they won’t be border collies then will they. They will be mutts.”
Please don’t start this garbagey breedist nonsense. A crossbred dog is just that: a cross of two ‘breeds’ (or types.) Backcrossing to one or the other parent breeds for three generations will produce progeny that is 93.75% ‘pure.’
A mutt or mongrel is simply a dog of mixed ancestry. That is all. I know some mutts and mongrels with pedigrees nearly as long as my registered dogs, purpose bred mixes. Mutt is not the insult you think it is. And a crossbreed is not a mutt. I have crosses and backcrosses and I can trace their ancestry back to the founding Western populations. Even if I chose to put another breed into the mix, I would still know my dogs ancestry. Hardly unknown “mutts” or “mongrels.”
If the dog fancy is going to take itself so seriously, it needs to expand it’s concept of ‘dogs’ a little bit. Before the advent of the Victorian Toilet Science of the closed registry based on blood purity, all dogs would be what you so condescendingly term “mutts,” no matter how long their pedigrees were.
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
Jess, thanks SO MUCH for addressing this elitist nonsense. So few of our purported “purebred” dogs are ‘pure within the line’ I’d go out on a thin limb and say pretty much NONE of the current “purebred” dogs are “pure” past a couple hundred years and I’d question what went on within those 100 years. The Victorians have a lot to answer for, most of it lodged within that ridiculous concept of “God IS an Englishman” and the rest of the world is, well, mutts.
Even my beloved Salukis can’t always lay claim to a “pure within the line” pedigree since (thank you all you might think of as holy) you go back enough generations you find purpose bred dogs, not purity of pedigree bred. YES
Mona Karel recently posted..Let’s Try to be a Little More Healthy
I think if people understood the racism, classism, and conspicuous consumption behind the modern notion of ‘purebred’ they wouldn’t be so quick to throw stones at people who work outside that system. I do find it interesting that this system has persisted when (most of) the rest of society has matured a bit in regards to those issues.
There is a reason that ‘low class’ dogs such as lurchers, longdogs, hogdogs, curs, etc. haven’t been swallowed by the registry system. It is not because these dogs aren’t selectively bred or sufficiently pedigreed (known ancestry.)
I have an entire post percolating on this issue, which has far-ranging effects (it is illegal, for instance, to breed mutts or even crosses in El Paso now) but because of the blog redesign and wretched weather I’ve put it off.
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
I also have a post discussing the class issues inherent in dogs. The high class are abusing dogs by breeding for dysfunction and the lower classes are abusing dogs by breeding for fierce temperaments. The game pit bulls and the show pekes are two ends of the same abusive scale.
Those of us in the middle classes who don’t see genetic freaks as a bade of social status nor ghetto ponies as a sign of social status are left to wonder what the hell everyone else in dogs are doing.
I’ve seen and experienced some terrifying Pekes in my time, they hurl themselves at each other like the best pitbulls.
They can be extremely dog and human aggressive.
I didn’t know there were ghetto ponies in America? In Dublin Ireland there are plenty. They are often seen tied up to graze in empty allotments, usually piebald. Kids mucking about on them in streets after school and weekend even at night. Mounted gangs up for fun.
I’ve always found the whole thing fascinating and somehow romantic. That strong inner-city or urban link to the horse. I imagine they dream of horse at night and it soothes their souls, despite everything wrong going on in their lives the horse is there.
It’s illegal to cross breed dogs in El Paso? What?
It’s under the breeders permit:
http://library.municode.com/HTML/16180/level2/TIT7AN_CH7.14ANSABRSH.html#TIT7AN_CH7.14ANSABRSH_7.14.080BRPE
“A declaration of intent to breed only currently registered purebred animals of the same type and registry which are also eligible for registry with one or more additional registration agencies and that the offspring of any breeding are expected to be eligible for registration with the same registry, and/or to breed animals solely for the intended purpose of being trained and certified as service animals, for search and rescue use, or for official use by law enforcement and governmental agencies;”
So, same breed only, same registry only, and have to be registerable with multiple registries. IOW, no rare breeds recognized by a single registry, no crossbreeding, no rare breeds not recognized in the US, no unregistered dog breeding at all.
Read the whole code, it’s a hoot.
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
A little off subject, but found it interesting…
I am currently reading into a research project that my supervising professor is involved in. It’s aim is to provide a better understanding of the experience of hearing voices in the absence of any external stimuli (termed ‘auditory verbal hallucinations’ in a medical context) I googled “hearing the voice” and the Google suggestions included the following: “of God” “of Jesus” and “of the Holy Spirit”
You being a fellow atheist and all I naturally seemed to link your love of Google suggestions as a tool to provide back-up regarding Dalmatian temperament with the Google suggestion I just stumbled upon. We both reject the belief of existence of deities, yet Google finds this God stuff amongst the top searched terms…You believe Dalmatians to be uneven in temperament, just like some people believe in God. I do understand that there is no evidence of God and that there are statistics I’m sure you’ll uproot regarding temperament of Dals (I’m not adverse to stats, it’s part of what I study) I guess what I’m saying is that one cannot always trust the internet (anyone can write here, and as we’ve seen, it can be both positive and negative/ correct and incorrect in outcome) and using ‘Google recommends’ as a back up source probably isn’t the best ‘proof’ that Dals are evil beings, only that they are considered so by some people (possibly, I might hypothesize, by people lacking the knowledge to make educated decisions on the subject) I’ve had a look at more of your blog and you really do raise some interesting points, I agree with a lot of your sentiments, it’s just a bit of a shame that you find it difficult to work alongside people in the sense that you seem very keen to name call and demean rather than teach -when you talk of educating people. I guess you just lack diplomacy and tact, and working in education myself, this is an important tool if you want your opinions to be held in high regard or for them to sway another person’s opinion. Creating ‘arguments’ -as you like to call them, only puts people’s backs up and makes them more inclined to disbelieve you, if you want your words to be heard AND respected (which they could be) possibly a less offensive tone is in order.
PS, I am from the UK, this may go some way to explaining why the Dalmatians I know are wonderful in temperament, from what I’ve read, we’ve less stringent issues when it comes to crossing? (my main irk with your discussion was regarding temperament, not your issues with lack of modification of coat colour and introduction of widened gene pools. As i’ve reiterated many times and you’ve disregarded, I’m all for ‘backcrossing’ 🙂
I’ve not the time right now to look into this but FYI;
http://www.nuadalseurope.eu/eunuas.html
Anyway, I look forward to your further writings, and hopefully a less temperamental (or white-coated) approach to refute other people’s opinions. 😉
I love your example! Except you’re missing the point. My using google is not to prove that Dalmatians DO have bad temperaments, it’s to prove that most people believe they do and are searching for that. It’s a measure of the zeitgeist. So in that regard it’s exactly like your comparison. Most people believe the appropriate words to follow “hearing the voice” are of GOD or JESUS.
The words they are thinking about most regarding Dalmatians are poor temperament and being fire house dogs.
YES! This is exactly what it does and all it does. Google recommends is not a comprehensive study which documents tens of thousands of litters of Dalmatians from birth til death and makes comprehensive measurements of the temperament. But we have no such study except the one carried out by all those tens of thousands of people who DID have Dalmatians and do and the impressions those dogs made.
I don’t know the numbers on how many Dalmatians were temperamentally suspect, but we know that deafness rates of 30% are enough to give the breed a severe reputation problem due to deafness. What if only 5-10% were bitey? That could be enough to give the entire breed that impression, and a very negative one that is largely unchanged between 2013 and 1997 (and before, but I’ll not search news archives for it, but feel free if you want to see how far that stereotype goes back). And that’s enough to send a breed off rails.
How many fawn cockers with “Cocker rage” did it take to sink that breed’s reputation?
Your presence here shows my strategy is working just fine. You might not like my tone, I don’t care, there are already plenty of people who spend decades in dogs to get a “good reputation” kissing the right asses and buying the right big-wig’s dogs and conforming, and most of them don’t have the balls to institute any change at all. But you’re here arguing with me reading what I have to say.
I’ve never put a ribbon on a Dalmatian, I’ve never owned one. But what I say stings because it’s true. And that’s all I need.
So yeah, play tone police all you like. I’m not going to win any arguments pretending I have some great history in Dalmatians and will eventually LEAD MY PEOPLE OUT OF THE DESERT! like some Dalmatian Moses. But I’ll speak truth to tradition and let the cards fall where they may. Unless you’ve successfully advised someone else to a million views and tens of thousands of facebook shares, then your opinion on tone is really just that. And your actions say otherwise. Your ACTIONS say that my approach works.
So there we are.
Christopher,
You keep harping on the 100% HUA issue in Dalmatians being the cause of all sorts of doom and gloom for the breed. However of the 6 top producing stone forming breeds out there the Dalmatian is the 2nd lowest in formation of stones. They form fewer stones compared to the Miniature schnauzer, Shih tzu, Bichon frise and Lhasa apso. They form slightly more than the Yorkshire terrier. So what do you wish to blame for these higher incidents of stone formation in these other breeds?
That said, Dalmatians in fact have one of the lowest levels of Calcium Oxalate, Struvite and Calcium Phosphate stones in ALL breeds! It is a FACT that bladder stone formation is one of the most common problems affecting all breeds of dogs and cats in the world today. Breeding Low uric acid Dalmatians may only prove to substitute one type of stone formation for another type. It is probably NOT the great panacea people are being led to believe.
Another FACT for those looking for real information is Sturvite and Urate Stones can be medically treated and managed with diet and medication. On the other hand Calcium Oxalate Stones can only be treated surgically.
For those looking for more info check out: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC548608/table/t1-pg225/ and
http://www.lbah.com/word/bladder-stones/
I harp on the 100% HUA issue because it just doesn’t get any worse than 100% saturation for a worthless and destructive disease allele that has no positive trade off. This is a situation with one CLEAR solution to breeders: OUTCROSS OUTCROSS OUTCROSS. And yet it took nearly 4 decades for the solution to even BEGIN to be accepted in the breed community. That is pathetic.
I don’t do this to just bag on Dalmatians. This is an indictment of the entire breeding world that would be so stuffy and inert that they would rather their dogs suffer for 4 decades than consider doing the right thing. Do you think they deserve an award because they finally relented? Well, clap clap clap. Good for Dalmatians. Now let’s make sure it doesn’t take 40 more years for the rest of the breeds to realize that you should NOT have to end up with 100% saturation of disease + 40 years before you do anything about it.
That’s the point.
There are undoubtedly breeds out there that have saturated shit in their gene pools that HAVE NOT yet out crossed. And the more I uncover them the more I’ll write about them. I bag on Dalmatians (and tons of other breeds) because it should not take this long. This is not ethical it’s a comedy. You can’t claim to improve breeds if you let them stew in their genetic waste of your creation and refuse to fix it for decades!
The real train wreck here seems to be Christopher.
The author can’t respond to comments without lashing out at almost everyone and his posts are filled with rage. His anti-Dalmatian rants aren’t backed up with facts.
Making rash, generalizing statements about anything demonstrates a lack of intellect, I suggest people take his blog posts with a grain of salt.
Christopher is no expert. He’s a dog owner from Colorado with too much time on his hands.
Amazing you can’t list one error. Just insults. Pathetic.
Christopher:
Fourth time here. What genetic testing do you do on your dogs before they are bred?
Why are you still harping on this. I already described all of the DNA tests for Border Collies.
http://www.border-wars.com/2013/05/health-testing-in-dogs-is-limited.html
Add to that PennHIP for hips and you have the disease testing I do. Oh, and CERF, but that’s sort of worthless because my local vet is also a specialist so it’s entirely redundant.
As for other health screening, I have contacted every living person in all my breeding stock’s pedigrees and compiled my own db of several thousand ancestors. A near exhaustive pedigree back to the founders save a few dead ends caused by registries going under and no living people who have papers that I’ve been able to find.
There are no DNA tests for the most prevalent issues in the breed like EIC, epilepsy, cancers, osteo-c-d, cryptorchidism, CCL tears, etc. So health testing is limited, not particularly on point yet in my breed. CEA is the only really on point DNA test.
But of course this has nothing to do with Dalmatians or this post. So get relevant.
I’m harping on it because you haven’t answered the question. I know what tests are available. I’m not stupid. I’ve asked your four times if you test YOUR DOGS. I’m not asking what tests are available, I’m asking if you have personally tested your individual dogs for the list of possible diseases before they are bred.
Seriously? I’m gonna be polite and ask you to read his response again, this time very carefully because he already answered your off topic question. Now, move on and stop acting like a troll.
My point Christopher was that in actuality High Uric Acid may actually be a benefit to the Dalmatian and not the curse you seem to give it. Since stone formation is a very common malady in almost all dog breeds and mutts it isn’t going to go away in any way shape or form. Unlike most breeds that form Calcium Oxalate Stones, Dalmatians form uric acid stones. Uric acid stones are treatable with medication and diet and occasionally will require surgery while Calcium Oxalate stones are not treatable any way but surgery. Do you see the difference? Right now a veterinarian seeing a Dalmatian come through the door with a blockage has a 99% chance of being right in prescribing Alopurinol to that dog and reversing the stone formation without even doing any testing. That is not true in any other breed! With the advent of the LUA Dalmatians we will see more surgery being done for other types of stones along with cases that get a lot worse because a Vet wrongly prescribes Alopurinol for a Dal with Calcium Oxalate Stones thinking they are Uric Acid. Meanwhile we will see more money spent on testing and surgeries. It should be a boon to the veterinarian community! Funny but I don’t see this as being an improvement or better for the breed especially when studies put the current inicidence of actual stone formation in Dalmatians at being only 2 to 3% even though they all have the gene.
The biggest thing that every single dog owner can do to prevent stone formation, Dalmatian or any other breed, is to make sure their animal is properly hydrated and allowed plenty of chances to go out and eliminate.
Oh that’s rich, it’s a BENEFIT, not a disease. Welcome to the callous and reprehensible sine-qua-non-disease club then.
I don’t even know if I have the words for how disgusted I am at your twisted and defeatist view of a perfectly preventable disease. You’d plague an entire breed with one form of urate stones simply because you feel that there’s some other disease out there that’s worse? Please, cut off your face so you don’t get acne and flay your fingers so you don’t get a hang nail. Burn out your eyes with hot metal rods or poke them out with sharpened sticks so that you won’t get a cataract.
Pathetic. HEALTH is always superior to disease and having 100% saturation for urate stones is not superior to 0% saturation for urate stones and some risk for calcium oxalate stones.
It is just pathetic on so many levels that you’d call disease a benefit simply because your dogma prevents you from seeing the clear and ethical solution. It’s disgusting. You know you’re impotent to bring health to your dogs as long as you hold on to breed purity so you concoct an undefendable line of bullshit that you’re actually HELPING your dogs.
No one who is not a disease apologist and breeding defeatist would agree with you because no one has gone out and intentionally inflicted urate stones on their dogs just because those stones are “manageable.” What a horrible person you are. Just the worst of the worst.
Back when I was first investigating breeds, Dalmatians were on the list of dogs I wanted to own. One thing I remember reading (probably in a very old library book) was that deafness was a benefit: they made good firehouse dogs because the bells/sirens didn’t spook them.
You’d be hard pressed to find a breeder today who would describe deafness as a benefit, but at one time someone tried to make that point.
You really need to read the statement before commenting. I do believe that SF says it benefits the Dals because there is a medication that can treat it and diet can help it where as the other stones don’t have those luxuries. They have to be operated on. If I, as a dog owner, had the option I would rather not operate.
Having a disease is not a luxury. I think you need to rub some brain cells together harder before you continue to give these inbreeding idiots who peddle in deaf and sick dogs more of your money.
It really doesn’t matter here if the medication available is a “luxury.” A more accurate word, at best, would be that it’s “fortunate” that there is at least an easier treatment for uric acid stones.
People WANT luxuries! Who goes around wishing they will have to put their dog on stone medication someday????
Any way you slice it, it’s just a lesser-of-two-evils argument. Both are still evil. Even my mother, who knows nothing of science, raised me saying “Don’t set your standards by comparing yourself to worse [ people, ideals, etc]. Compare yourself to what’s BETTER and shoot for it.”
Wise woman. I’ve been lucky to have her.
As an owner, if I had the option, I would have dogs that never got sick with anything, lived to be sixteen, and then died quietly in their sleep.
The problem you don’t seem to be understanding, is that there is no choice involved with having a Dalmatian. They are almost all homozygous for genes which cause disease. The fact that not all of them develop stones is irrelevant; they all have the potential, and medication or not, this is not a benign disease that has NO effect on quality of life.
Stop throwing up red herrings.
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
I have no idea who you are SF but your comments leave me speechless and they disgust me.
Sadly, an AKC Dalmatian Breeder of Merit.
You might think that an AKC Breeder of Merit would stand behind their words by commenting under their real name.
I guess ‘merit’ means different things to different people.
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
I call BS, I don’t think any Dalmatian breeder would be so dumb to say those things in public. I think you’re making it up that they’re a breeder of merit.
SF is Scott Facey of FyrLyte Dalmatians, an AKC Breeder of Merit.
http://fyrlyte.home.comcast.net/~fyrlyte/
“Scott & Carol Facey’s little corner of the world. Scott is a retired firefighter and Carol was a former professional groomer. Our hobby is breeding and showing DALMATIANS!
We have been showing and breeding our favorite breed since 1981. We are both members of The Dalmatian Club of Southern New England and Holyoke Kennel Club. Carol is a past Recording Secretary and board member of DCSNE. Scott is a past President, Vice President, Treasurer and Board member of the DCSNE for 19 years. Scott is also a past board member of HKC. Scott is also a member of The Dalmatian Club of America and served on the DCA hearing study committee including 4 years as the committee director.”
It’s amusing they have a photo and link to IFAW.org “A Better World for Animals and People” but apparently not BETTER animals for that better world.
Dog breeders have made exceptionally stupid comments on this blog. They always forget the pet owners are listening.
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
LOL! You need to stick that on your comments policy page.
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
Now you know why Animal Right movement has more power over the public in North America than the Animal-Welfare movement– because of people like this.
At least Europeans are sensible bunch.
Dave recently posted..From Which He Flushed
I’m speechless. That’s just so…twisted.
Do you have evidence that LUA dals are more likely to form calcium oxalate stones than HUA dals or is it just pure speculation?
Not sure where you get your information from but my knowledge as a vet student is…the most common stone formation is struvite…which is easily remedied through medical management.
And you disgust me.
Wow! Wowee wow WOW!
Haven’t you ever heard that two wrongs don’t make a right?
So, it’s either Calcium oxalate stones or uric acid stones? Uh, how about NO stones? Isn’t that a viable third option????
How many years did it take for you to get brainwashed into the idea that perpetuating risk for disease is okay just because there are worse diseases out there? I find these situations mutually exclusive. Other dogs having risk of one has really NOTHING to do with the dalmatian situation. The latter is entirely, voluntarily supported by the very status quo of dal breeding.
No different than voluntarily breeding bulldogs and pugs for their extreme brachycephalic faces and the problems that come with it, just because some people find the look appealing.
In short, you are asking a dog to suffer or risk suffering a real health issue for the sake of something completely superficial; a “look.”
There are NO dals being bred for anything else.
The AKC is so big on a look defining what a breed is, and pretty much nothing else
Any working or cultural histories are purely an add-on; something to talk about, but for TODAY’S purposes, all the AKC folks that have followed the registry mantra
seem to be about the look MAKING the breed what it is. Nothing else.
Vomitous!
Dodo,
There is no proof as of yet becuase there are so few LUA Dalmatians out there…..But look at it very simply: Calcium Oxalate Stones can not form in a high acidic state which is what Dalmatians currently have. This is why in the study I quoted it showed only 2 cases of Calcuim Oxalte stones occuring in Dalamatians while the other breeds studied had literally hundreds of cases! Also Sturvite stones are less likely to form in a highly acidic enviroment which explains why there are only 5 cases noted in the study compared to hundreds and thousands for the other breeds studied.
As to those who question my sincerity to the breed the bottom line is I would rather have to deal with a medically manageable stone than one that could only be treated with surgery.
You are not going to get rid of stones in dogs and your not going to reduce the incidence unless and until you feed them a proper diet, give plenty of hydration and allow them ample chances to eliminate. I have had Dalmatians for 35 years and in that time I have had 1 case of stones in my Dals. It isn’t a case of a true disease as much as it is a case of poor management of the animal in question.
Want to see a similar case in humans? Think about lung cancer. Very rare if you don’t smoke but every human is susceptible to getting it.
The idea that you’d trade hundreds of times the incidence of one type of COMMON stone to remove the already scarce incidence of another is a horrible wager. Again, it’s akin to cutting off the face to avoid acne. Nor have you established that you’re even getting anything in this wager. That the rate of these other stones are LESS and that OVERALL Dalmatians are somehow healthier.
Why? Because they’re not. And it’s rather pathetic that you’ve just internalized having to feed your dogs a special (and in many cases astronomically expensive) diet just to hope to slightly offset the genetic burden you’ve allowed to be placed on them, again for NO CLEAR BENEFIT.
But you ARE going to reduce the incidence. This is well documented and clear. Why do you think scientists were even looking at Dalmatians in the first place? Because they are hundreds of times more likely to form stones than any other breed.
And NO, every human is not EQUALLY likely to get lung cancer. You can not claim that 1 in 10,000 is the same as 1 in a billion chance. To do so is idiocy. Plus, lung cancer isn’t even a good analogy. The vast majority of cases (9+ in 10) are thought to be due to BEHAVIOR and not genetic predisposition.
But even then, we CAN look at the genetic predisposition:
I, for example, know that my risk for lung cancer based upon this locus is 20% less than average. Some people are average, and some people have a many-fold higher risk based on just this locus.
You have made my point succintley Christopher.
“And NO, every human is not EQUALLY likely to get lung cancer. You can not claim that 1 in 10,000 is the same as 1 in a billion chance. To do so is idiocy. Plus, lung cancer isn’t even a good analogy. The vast majority of cases (9+ in 10) are thought to be due to BEHAVIOR and not genetic predisposition.”
Neither are Dalmatians equally likely to get Stones. It is also very dependent on enviroment as to why one does and most don’t. What makes you think I am feeding an expensive diet? For the first 15 years in the breed I fed Ken-L-Bisket (10 to 15 dollars for a 50 lb bag) with an occasional egg mixed in and never had a problem. Still kind of bummed that they stopped making it! Currently I feed a readily available average commercial brand that is being used by an awful lot of dog owners everywhere.
You are right that it is not the same gene that causes HUA in Dalmatians and Humans but none the less Humans are 100% genetically predisposed to HUA. It is just another gene causing it in humans. Surprisingly the results are about the same with 2 to 3% of the human population actually getting gout or urate stones. Again the question arises as to why one does while the majority don’t and the answer is “It is enviromental or behavior” as the case may be!
There are a lot of other reasons why I don’t accept that the inclusion of the LUA Dals in to the pedigrees is a wise move. As you are so fond of saying it is stupid to put all your eggs in one basket. This is exactly what has been done by taking two mediocre dogs from two seperate breeds and breeding them togeather one time 40 years ago. All the decendents are from that one single pairing! Besides risking a higher incidence of other types of stones the Dal community has also opened the door for an increase in Hip Dysplasia and a few other diseases that the Pointer has and the Dal doesn’t. The rate of Dysplasia in Pointers for example is almost double what is seen in Dalmatians currently. No records for these types of issues were collected in the first 35 years of this so called “project”. The only thing that was recorded was the LUA or HUA status of each dog produced.
Now for the best part……If the Dal community were to universally accept the LUA dogs and breed only to them from this point forward we could see 75% of the breed being LUA within about a century! Yet you would still be facing your very own dilema decribed at the beginning of this debacle….All those dogs would be the product of a single breeding going back less than 100 years. In my mind that simply does not make for a healthy, more broad based, pedigree.
I just don’t think the possible advantages outweigh the possible detriments at this point and I believe we will all see the proof in another couple of decades by which time it will be to late to reverse them.
I have seen the same stupidity time and again….We had prominent breeders sing the praises of certain dogs who were then used extensively throughout the breed and 10 years later heard the same breeders decry the lousy toplines, flat feet, straight shoulders, etc. being produced that typified the same dogs they were singing about earlier. It happens in all breeds so I’m not going to single out the Dal on this point. What I will say is that what happened with the DCA and the backcross dogs with the back door politics that AKC used to install them in the stud book has opened a pandoras box that will allow any crackpot on a mission to circumvent the parent club and the majority of each and every parent club to do what they feel is right for their breed.
Your points about humans have no weight (plus they’re just wrong) since Dalmatians are not humans. They’re dogs. Are you seriously trying to say that it’s moral to inflict Dalmatians with hyperuricemia because humans get gout? What sort of inane argument is that? By that horribly twisted non-logic we can have no morality in dog breeding because any breeder can say it’s moral to breed blind dogs because flatworms are ok, and they’re blind. We can breed deaf dogs with abandon because snakes don’t have external ears. We can kill any puppy we want because fish eat their spawn. We don’t need dogs to have spines because invertebrates don’t have them.
Hyperuricemia is a disease. All Dalmatians have this disease. ALL OF THEM. The mutation is fixed in the population. Stone formation is secondary to the disease, and I see no studies that corroborate your claim that only 2-3% of Dalmatians form stones. The studies I read don’t report on the prevalence of stone formation at all, save to note that 55-80% of ALL stones diagnosed in ALL dogs come from Dalmatians (Hesse and Neiger 2009).
That blows your “trade off” theory out of the water as well. If Dalmatians are alone responsible for more stones than ALL OTHER BREEDS COMBINED, then there’s no way that their disease is a benefit in regards to stones. No possible way.
You’re dense if you failed to read the actual human Gout studies which show that NO, it’s NOT in fact “equally predisposed” at all. All humans excrete Uric Acid, but certainly not all humans have Hyperuricosuria. ALL Dalmatians have Hyperuricosuria. But again, this is of little concern to Dalmatians because we know exactly how to fix the problem in Dalmatians (we do in humans as well, humans with genes which increase the rate can be tested and not breed with other humans that have shitty genes). Except there’s no way to solve the problem within the breed. ALL Dalmatians are diseased genetically. ALL OF THEM. They are ALL affected.
This isn’t like some breeds that have a high concentration for a shitty gene. Dalmatians are at 100%. There’s no getting worse than they already are in relation to that gene. It’s the worst possible scenario.
Wow, you’re even worse, if that was possible. You don’t even understand basic genetics. The LUA Dals now don’t even have that much Pointer DNA. Perhaps the first 2-3 generations had the possibility of dominant diseases, but the LUA Dals really weren’t inbred on themselves, no? So recessive diseases can’t be a problem unless the genes are also in Dalmatians. Even then, the selection has not been FOR those alleles so genetic drift will most likely drive them to extinction in the breed. Also the amount of Pointer DNA now is insignificant. It has taken so many generations for these dogs to be allowed in, there’s not really much else coming in besides the good LUA gene. If there’s a disease gene on another chromosome it’s pretty much guaranteed not to be in the population and the only chance a gene has of sneaking in along with the LUA gene is by being very close to it on the same chromosome. Even then, the odds of there being a disease gene is very low and even lower that it will ever be homozygous and weighed against the fully saturated HUA, the moral choice is clear. It’s not even close.
I’m amused you think the two original dogs were “mediocre” too. What’s that based on and why is it even important? You also make it seem like all LUA Dals are like highly inbred on that one pairing. No, they all share that one common ancestor, but there’s nothing problematic about that in dog breeds. It’s not as if they are inbred at all on that ancestor, let alone highly. I can point to pretty much any breed and find a dog that is a common ancestor of all the dogs in that breed. Genetic damage is done when that one dog was bred far and wide in its day, becoming a popular sire. In the case of the Pointer, there was only 1 mating. His/her other genes will never be far and wide in the breed. It’s really down to just the LUA gene. So that problem is entirely avoided.
And where have I ever said anything about putting all your eggs in one basket? That doesn’t even make sense in this case, nor do I recall ever using that cliche?
LMAO. Your understanding of population genetics is inane. If we take your suggestion that every Dal be bred to a LUA Dal, then the very next generation would all be LUA as one copy of the gene is enough. So there would be no waiting a century for anything. There could be no more HUA puppies born ever.
And your point about “single breeding less than 100 years” you’re really confusing the case of very small breeds where ALL of their DNA is coming from a very very few number of founders. That’s not the case with LUAs at all, nor could it be. Bringing in the LUAs actually brings in another founder dog and it invariably increases the genetic diversity of the breed. Sorry, but there’s no way that it decreases the diversity in the breed at all. There are so many options of LUAs to breed to now, the rush to breed to them isn’t much of a constricting force at all. It’s certainly not the case that there is only 1 LUA that all dogs must be bred to now. In fact, there are so many LUAs now to breed to that they are not necessarily similar in all their other DNA either.
So there’s no dilemma at all. In fact, you’re staunchly against bringing in any new blood to your breed, so you trying to get huffy about “a healthy, more braod based, pedigree” is a sick joke. You don’t have any ground to stand on where that’s concerned.
You don’t think much at all. Nor is your opinion about “possible detriments” compelling. For the public and everyone not wed to a bullshit breed purity ideal, the moral choice is rather clear. Decrease the chance of deadly urates stones by HUNDREDS of times by allowing .01% foreign blood into a breed that has no other purpose save being a pet.
The benefits clearly outweigh whatever made up risks you have in your head.
And thank dog for that! I don’t care if you want to continue to produce shitty sick dogs that are inbred, but there should be freedom for people who aren’t callous, aren’t immoral, and aren’t utterly stupid to do what is actually right for the dogs.
“Your understanding of population genetics is inane. If we take your suggestion that every Dal be bred to a LUA Dal, then the very next generation would all be LUA as one copy of the gene is enough. So there would be no waiting a century for anything. There could be no more HUA puppies born ever.”
Not quite true there Christopher me boy! There are currently about 10 true LUA dogs out there in the world. (Those that carry two copies for the low uric acid gene) Others are LUA but still carry a copy of the recessive HUA gene. Examples: Low x Low bred to a normal High x High Dalmatian will produce 100% Low x High progeny. Every single puppy while being LUA phenotypcially will still have a copy of the HUA gene and be able to produce it if bred to another one that is pure HUA or LUA x HUA. If the current LUA population is used today to only try and breed pure LUA dogs it will take about 100 years to get anywhere close to pure Low Uric Acid in the Dalmatian breed. Most of the breedings taking place currently are using Low x High bred to High x High to increase so called diversity in the population. The resulting litters are averaging 50% High x High, 50% Low x High. When they do breed a Low x High to a Low x High the resulting litters are 25% Low x Low, 50% Low x High and 25% High x High. To keep the diversity in the breed pool those High x High and Low x High can not be eliminated or the population will have it’s inbreeding coefficent go through the roof! In the meantime how do you keep those dogs carrying the affected gene in the gene pool when you have people like you trying to convince the entire world that they are no good and diseased? No body is going to want them because of idiots like you trashing the breed! So we either keep them around and in about 100 years we will get close to being able to eliminate HUA from the breed or we lose them and quickly convert the population to LUA and narrow the gene pool exponentially with all the resulting problems that will come with that scenario.
And just to be clear here: Every single LUA dog out there will have come from just one mating done 40 years ago. The very thing you were saying created this mess in the first place! Here is your own statement just to refresh your memory: “Sorry, but in a very real sense all of your dogs go back to just one dog, and that the breed is defined around such a singular gene it is going to suffer because of that. And it already is. It’s not a coincidence that a breed so shallowly defined would have a disease gene 100% saturated so soon after the breed was formed.”
Just to be clear: There were quite a few people in DCA who thought the LUA experiment had a lot of promise including myself. The problem was and still is that single outcross breeding. If more outcrosses had been done initially with the resulting increase in diversity and there had been careful testing and data recorded showing all the pluses and minuses I think the entire DCA membership would have happily endorsed the project and we probably would now be close to eliminating that problem in our breed. Instead we had a small group say it was their way or the highway and so we have been stuck for 40 years and never shall the two groups meet. As far as AKC is concerned this has nothing to do with the health or welfare of the breed. For them it has everything to do with increasing litter registrations and their bottom line. 🙁
Why not just do some more crosses? Why rely on one cross done 40 years ago? And allow other patterns in, too—like Irish shawl. Might help with the deafness. Spots are just decoration—not essential to health or any kind of working ability.
They could easily do more outcrosses. The breed clubs control the definition of ‘purebred’ for their breed and the Dal club could easily vote to open their studbooks to more outcrosses, producing a program that records all that good data that asshole Dal breeder says isn’t there. They won’t, though, because all the stupid science denialist contention that has been smeared all over the original project for forty years now has poisoned the well and removed any incentive to restart the project.
If LUA advocates are smart they will propose working with UKC and restart their outcross program. AKC will not last forever, not with their finances and their reputation in the toilet. Looking far ahead is the way to go.
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
There are hundreds of thousands of HUA DOGS in the USA right now who are good candidates to outcross to. I don’t see why anyone need use only the established LUA line of 99.9% Dalmatians when in a few generations they could make their own LUA Dalmatians. We’ve seen just how quickly you can return a breed to type even with a drastic outcross (Boxer x Corgi).
And why is your measure of success the 100% removal of the HUA gene ASAP? It’s vastly superior to introduce a healthy gene and work the HUA gene into obscurity over time using careful selection. I don’t know where you’re getting your “100 years” figure, but I don’t see how that helps you. If it takes 100 years that’s all the more reason to have started breed-wide out-crosses 40 years ago. But I see that you’d rather drag your feet and do nothing. Or stand in the way of others who want to do better.
Being a mere carrier is enough to alleviate the vast majority of the actual problems from HUA. Why not make that your goal first and foremost instead of spreading purebred elitist nonsense and slander against outcrossing?
As a Dalmatian breeder I do feel that I have to add my comments to this particular thread as well and add that I distance myself strongly from Scott’s views.
I also hasten to add that his views are not representing the majority of Dalmatian breeders neither here in the US nor in Europe.
Let’s not forget (and yes I know it took too long) that over 50 % of the DCA membership voted FOR the registration of the LUA’s. So there is a light at the end of the tunnel.
There are many ways of how the shortcomings of our breed can be fixed or at least improved vastly. As regards to deafness I published the figures from some European countries and really all it takes is to breed from bilateral hearing dogs only and breed away from blue eyes (the later being even more important as non-published * studies have shown multiple times.
The current LUA’s are coming on stronger and stronger by the year so no matter how many people are still out there believing that the pointer can spoil the Dalmatians hips (ah well, some do not learn) they will make their way.
In one way it is sad that it takes so long for people to come around in other ways it is the healthier way to introduce a good gene into the world-wide population,
Like with everything in the dog world I find that those who cannot see confirmation, movement and over-all soundness for themselves rely on Judges opinions and show successes. NOW that is a point that is not breed related as it spreads across all show dogs and if this point could be altered we would not see half as many issues as we are seeing across the board today.
The issues begin with the training of Show Judges (I am one myself). Where confirmation and movement is only taught in a show related way. What I mean is that professionally handled dogs with HUGE (but not necessarily correct or healthy) movement that are taught to stand with a lot of tension (here again lays a temperament issue since breeders select for an overly alert temperament) do all the winning.
THIS issue alone stands for many beginners who learn to be successful from a totally wrong angle.
I myself started off my working life (and grew up) with competition horses where nobody gave a damn if they where true to breed type or if they all had the same height or color, nobody cared if breeds where mixed and the sole aim was to breed an athletic animal that would take years to train for high level competitions (Olympics) AND most importantly needed to be SOUND at the end of those many years of training as otherwise a whole lot of money would have been wasted on breeding and training such horse.
These horses are all beautiful, since they are healthy and sound both in body and in mind. After all you would not like to put your live in danger with over a ton of dangerous animal.
Ever since I started in dogs I have mentored many on true soundness and what it meant. Since I was a newbie to the dog world not too many listened. I also had to move across a variety of countries so always had to re-establish myself BUT by now, after only 13 years of hard work it is paying off.
There are a string of breeders that I worked in cooperation with and there are generations of dogs out there that have excellent hips, temperament, an incredibly low incidence of deafness, bitches that give birth easily (I could list more) and the LUA gene has been introduced to my lines too.
These dogs (across many countries in Europe and the US) have won in the last two months alone:
1 x BIS Veteran
1 x Veteran of the Year
1 x BIS
7 x BOB
5 x Group placings
The placing that brought the biggest smile to my face happened today when my little LUA boy who is from my first US litter and who was exported to a friend of mine in Germany won his age group against all HUA puppies at the German Club show, showing off the fact that if you through a strong line against them you do not even need to suffer any type loss in the first generation of your own personal LUA breeding program.
The reason so many of these dogs are successful is the fact that I never bred to achieve a single BIS winner but that I tried to make my dogs as sound and healthy for their own and their owners sake as possible!
Too many breeders out there (of all breeds) are too scared to make sacrifices for a generation or two, too scared that they will loose their type, that they will never see the huge rewards that they could gain if only they thought a little bit outside the box for just a little while. It is amazing what you can learn by being brave.
So I dearly hope that you guys who read this block out there do not believe that the majority of Dalmatian breeders out there share Scott’s views and no I do not think that Europeans are so much more sensible than US breeders since I have found a great bunch of breeders here that think along the same line as I do. It is just unfortunate that some do not move on but they will soon find themselves……. well “left behind”.
Oh Stephanie,
It only took 7 votes and an end run around the club to finally get an illegal vote to pass. By DCA and AKC rules there needed to be a clear 2/3 majority to allow the dogs in but both looked the other way because they didn’t want the publicity. It wasn’t about doing the right thing as much as it was doing the expedient thing.
You say I don’t speak for the majority but I woulkd beg to differ with you with the vote being nearly an even split the last time and a number of people just giving in the shut the bobble heads up!
I’m quite happy with my line. I’ve had 1 dog out of 200 over 35 years that has blocked. I have had one deaf and 6 unis out of those same dogs which equates to a deafness rate of just 3.5% total and an actual total deafness rate of just .5% All my dogs tat have been bred have been health tested and since it’s inception have had their CHIC numbers. Average lifespan has been between 12 and 15 years for most of these dogs. Many of them have their Championship, some in multiple countries, have excelled and earned multiple titles in agility and obedience. Why would I mess with results like that?
If on the other hand your breeding junk maybe it is time to look at what is behind your lines and possibly start over. It doesn’t mean you have to change the breed! Nuff said and I’m done with this bunch.
I still don’t think you understand the point. There’s a world of difference between INCLUDING one mating done 40 years ago and being LIMITED to one mating done 40 years ago. The difference is whether the genes are ADDED to a larger gene pool (which is the case in bringing LUA Dals INTO the larger gene pool) versus the genes being excluded into a gene pool in and of themselves. This would only be the case if at some point before the LUAs were widely bred down to other Dals if we declared only LUA dogs as “Dalmatians” and closed the gene pool around them.
That is an exclusionary idea and I don’t see ANYONE suggesting that, so the problem is removed.
This is world’s different than the observation that, say, when looking at domestic hamsters ALL of them come from one mating between a mother and her son in 1930.
The observation I made about Dalmatians is that there are no Dalmatians with variations in their coat on the extreme piebald, this means that the entirety of the gene pool in England, to which ALL world-wide Dalmatians are from, was selected strictly by one gene, and we have no reason to believe that the coat gene was slowly worked through a diverse series of dogs and that they brought in a lot of variation otherwise and took decades to allow the extreme piebald to saturate. NO, rather it’s likely that only extreme piebald dogs were used and thus a small gene pool was created from the start.
So the only way we recreate this idiocy is if we suddenly declare the entire LUA population as the ONLY Dalmatians and all other Dalmatians can not be bred into the LUAs and they must be discarded. And again, no one is suggesting that.
So you point fails once again.
I think you’re full of shit. Why must someone else do all the work for you? Why don’t you start out crossing your own dogs right now and do all the testing you want? Why didn’t you do this 10 years ago? 20 years ago? 30 years ago?
Your statement here looks like “it’s not perfect, therefore I reject it outright and refuse any solution that is not perfect.” Really? Why not do BETTER. You breeders love saying that you’re “improving” the breed. Well, why don’t you claim to be perfecting the breed? Why is your standard improvement but you don’t do something that is a clear improvement.
And you’re full of shit with the “my way or the highway” … the group wanted the right to register their outcrosses as Dalmatians. They NEVER said the rest of you breed purists had to sully your precious lines with their dogs. That’s not authoritarian, YOUR position is authoritarian. YOU are the side that is saying “YOU CAN’T DO THAT.”
“I think you’re full of shit. Why must someone else do all the work for you? Why don’t you start out crossing your own dogs right now and do all the testing you want? Why didn’t you do this 10 years ago? 20 years ago? 30 years ago?”
Testicular fortitude is sorely lacking in the dog fancy. Which is quite hilarious if you think about it, because the *dogs* must have *two* balls to be shown…
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
“And you’re full of shit with the “my way or the highway” … the group wanted the right to register their outcrosses as Dalmatians. They NEVER said the rest of you breed purists had to sully your precious lines with their dogs. That’s not authoritarian, YOUR position is authoritarian. YOU are the side that is saying “YOU CAN’T DO THAT.”
Just want to comment on this as someone who owns a breed (Salukis) which not only accepts [unregistered] COO dogs for registration, but also has a lot of contention here in the US about some of those dogs and their ‘purity’:
If you are a dog breeder with even half a brain, you can read a pedigree and you can research the dogs within it. What dog breeders are saying when they start in about purity, whether it is LUA Dals or Iranian Salukis with funky colors, is that they are too damned stupid to read a pedigree and avoid those lines.
They might want to think about how that sounds to the pet owners of the universe. Because public perception is very, very important, and really, if dog breeders are too bloody stupid to read a simple pedigree, what else are they too stupid to do?
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
***If you are a dog breeder with even half a brain, you can read a pedigree and you can research the dogs within it. What dog breeders are saying when they start in about purity, whether it is LUA Dals or Iranian Salukis with funky colors, is that they are too damned stupid to read a pedigree and avoid those lines.***
PRECISELY what we said for years when working for recognition of the non registered import Salukis. No one HAD TO breed to them, we just wanted that option available. It was a long, hard battle, in some ways it continues. I can certainly read the pedigree of a dog that interests me, and put it to one side due to the dogs behind the dog I’m looking at. I only have forty years with this breed I do not pretend to consider myself an expert. The advantage I’ve had is an open minded viewpoint, possibly from years in working with horses.
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You also have the advantage of good old fashioned common sense.
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
“The problem was and still is that single outcross breeding. If more outcrosses had been done initially with the resulting increase in diversity and there had been careful testing and data recorded showing all the pluses and minuses I think the entire DCA membership would have happily endorsed the project and we probably would now be close to eliminating that problem in our breed. Instead we had a small group say it was their way or the highway and so we have been stuck for 40 years and never shall the two groups meet.”
This is absolute bullshit and you know it. The DCA BOD approved the registration of Stocklore Stipples and another LUA Dal which was never bred from, and enough club members had a pissy little shit fit that the registration was rescinded and it too nearly forty years of idiocy before enough members realized that refusing registration to the outcross descendants was massive PR blunder. That rescinded registration did not happen years and years after the initial approval, based on good information about advantages and disadvantages. It was a kneejerk purist reaction.
If the DCA membershit hadn’t been so fucking stupid and religiously motivated more outcrosses could have been done forty years ago to develop more than one line of LUA Dals. Because of your own stupidity any incentive to do so was flushed down the toilet.
You are a fucking moron and so are all the people who fought against these dogs for so long. There are literally dozens of open or appendix registries for other animals besides dogs and such registration was extremely common during the post WWII years when so much breeding stock was lost. It does NOT result in disaster. I own TWO breeds with OPEN registries where COO stock is regularly incorporated, and the concept of ‘bringing in new diseases’ is bogus compared to ‘gene loss and concentration of deleterious recessives’ that is part and parcel of a closed registry.
Germany has an almost constant stream of COO Salukis coming in and guess what? No new diseases running rampant. And these are dogs where there are no tests of any kind that have predictive power. Outcrossing to known lines tested for relevant diseases has less risk of producing ‘disease’ than staying within your closed system where all dogs are homozygous for disease causing genes.
Unfortunately the absolute reeking stupidity of many of the members of the Dal club has poisoned the outcross well, NOT Christopher. Nothing Christopher writes could do more to make Dal purists look like monsters than their own writings on the outcross Dals, which are laughable from a genetics standpoint. Even a cursory perusal of the literature on the backcross Dals pounds that fact home:
http://www.luadalmatians.com/publications.html
Your own comments here prove my point. I can guarantee you that there are literally dozens of appalled pet owners sitting in front of their computers, reading your words and feeling disgusted. I am a dog breeder, my breeds are absolutely ancient compared to yours, and I am disgusted. People like you with your bogus rationalizations and absolute resistance to change make me ashamed to call myself a dog breeder.
Keep digging that hole. If anyone needs a really good example of the kind of thinking that is really, really bad for dogs, registries and breeders, they only have to link to your comments in this thread.
Jess recently posted..Tazi, a Journey with the Afghan Hounds
By the way everyone there are only two other animals on the planet that are HUA. They are apes and humans. In humans the result is more often gout than stones but both can occur. Every human is affected with this gene. Guess that means we better stop breeding all of you too!
Wow, now you’re trying to misrepresent science and evolution. First, high uric acid is NOT limited to Dalmatians, Humans, and Apes.
Cats form ammonium acid urate stones: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2857427/
Rats can suffer from hyperuricemia and hyperuricosuria: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17644
Birds can get hyperuricemia: http://veterinarycalendar.dvm360.com/avhc/Exotic-animal+medicine/Renal-disease-in-birds-Proceedings/ArticleStandard/Article/detail/557962
Need I go on?
Now, besides Dalmatians NONE of these animals, humans included, are 100% saturated, FIXED, fully homozygous for the gene which increases susceptibility to hyperuricemia hundreds of times!
So no, EVERY human is not “affected with this gene.” It is only Dalmatians that are universally predisposed by their genetics due to lack of any other allele present at SLC2A9. And there’s no reason for them to stay this way save people like you who think that “breed” is somehow a magical term and that outcrossing at all is a crime against nature.
What IS true is that Apes (including humans) have evolved to no longer form allantoin as the end product of purine catabolism. We produce uric acid as our waste product in urine. But this is not the same mechanism which causes hyperuricemia in Dalmatians. It’s a much more recent mutation in Dalmatians which distinguishes them from wildtype canids. It’s a much older mutation in humans (and not the same one).
Anyone interested is welcome to read the actual study which talks about this:
http://www.plosgenetics.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pgen.1000246
Note this: “The cause of high uric acid levels in humans and great apes is not the same as in the Dalmatian dog.”
Beyond the Ape-wide change in allantoin production, all humans are NOT the same at the SLC2A9 locus.
Marker rs1014290
Vitart V et al. (2008) . “SLC2A9 is a newly identified urate transporter influencing serum urate concentration, urate excretion and gout.” Nat Genet 40(4):437-42.
This study compared 689 gout patients and 10,330 healthy controls from Scotland, Germany and Croatia. The authors found that, compared to those with the AG genotype, subjects with the AA genotype had 1.4 times the odds of gout, while subjects with the GG genotype had 0.7 times the odds of gout.
So right there we have humans displaying all possible combinations of base pairs which show marked differences in Gout.
If Humans were like Dalmatians, as you say, there would be no genetic diversity found at that locus. And we have diversity at other places on the SLC2A9 gene as well:
Marker rs6449213
This study compared 689 gout patients with 10,330 healthy controls from Scotland, Germany and Croatia. The authors found that each C at rs6449213 lowered subjects’ odds of gout by about 1.3 times.
Vitart V et al. (2008) . “SLC2A9 is a newly identified urate transporter influencing serum urate concentration, urate excretion and gout.” Nat Genet 40(4):437-42.
Marker rs737267
This study compared 689 gout patients with 10,330 healthy controls from Scotland, Germany and Croatia. The authors found that subjects with the GG genotype had 1.3 times the odds of gout compared to those with the GT genotype, while subjects with the TT genotype had 0.75 times the odds of gout.
Vitart V et al. (2008) . “SLC2A9 is a newly identified urate transporter influencing serum urate concentration, urate excretion and gout.” Nat Genet 40(4):437-42.
We even have documentation of Gout susceptibility related to an entirely different gene.
Marker rs2231142
In this study, researchers compared 854 individuals with gout to 20,872 individuals without the disease, all of European descent from the United States and the Netherlands. They found that each copy of a T at rs2231142 in the ABCG2 gene was associated with 1.74 times the odds of gout.
Dehghan A et al. (2008) . “Association of three genetic loci with uric acid concentration and risk of gout: a genome-wide association study.” Lancet 372(9654):1953-61.
Now to your final point, that we should “stop breeding humans,” I have an evolved view of genetic disease. I believe we should breed away from it slowly and methodically and maintain genetic diversity. Routine and widespread outcrosses. Appendix registries. Smart, patient application of sound population-genetic principles.
That is vastly superior to “breed purity above all, no introducing other dogs into our lines ever ever and we’ll wait 40 years to even consider letting someone else breed mongrels into our pure dogs!”
If only his parents knew before they mated 😉 Is arrogance inherited? Does he attack humans because of the color of their skin too? Sounds a lot like Hitler. Scott….you can’t teach people who aren’t willing to learn. This guy is a prime example and lets just be thankful he’s in a different breed. Which, in my opinion, is just as crazy as he is. Perfect fit!!
Ah yes, the good old “Let’s call him HITLER!” attack (so cliche it has its own name). Because yeah, I’m the one who is torturing animals through their breeding. Oh wait that’s you and the breeders you buy your defective dogs from. Defective for no other reason than RACIAL PURITY and an obsession with whiteness. Hrm. Who sounds like Hitler now?
Thank you so much for giving me the exact response I had hoped for. Made me smile ear to ear!
And, far the record, anyone who breeds a purebred dog is breeding for racial purity, including yourself and your border collies. So good try on turning the tables.
Turning the tables? Heh. The spotlight is on Dalmatians and your Hitler comments don’t change anything about that given that the breeding scheme you support fits that label incredibly well.
And no, anyone who breeds a purebred dog is not torturing their animals with malgenics all in the name of racial purity. The ABCA, the largest Border Collie registry has no purity requirement. They don’t even have a conformation requirement. You can cross breed and demonstrate through ability that your dog meets the only standard they care about: behavioral ability to move stock with eye, and they will register your dog and it becomes a purebred. Their definition of purebred is very different than yours.
My own breeding brought together BCs from very different registries and backgrounds. In fact, my bitch goes back to undocumented farm stock only a few generations back. Her daughter was bred to an unregistered ranch dog and all of their offspring work, and are thus Border Collies. Any one of them can be brought back into the registry at any time. There’s no great fear that they are 1 generation away from being mongrels or 15 generations. Bringing these dogs back in doesn’t require the entire community to cast their vote and changing the rules, there’s an established process and it’s not prohibited. I’d even argue that it could be more open and be more beneficial, but it’s decidedly better than the unthinking and closed stud books that are extant in other neighborhoods in the fancy.
In fact, I’d love to expand my breeding program and bring in more collie landrace dogs such as English Shepherds, just for the sake of genetic diversity, not racial purity. I’d venture that a program to bring in some sight hounds to bolster the hips would be an excellent endeavor as well. So yeah, my dogs come from mongrels and are bred to mongrels, and in the future I’ll make them even more mongrel. And soon after that they’ll be back in a registry and “pure” again. And the sky will not fall and the seas shall not drain.
Hi there, very interesting website you have
Good points in your dalmation articles, the outcrossing sounds like a good idea, wish breeds they could use? maybe german or english pointers? do the mainly white ones suffer from deafness also?
I remember reading something about some breeders wanting to us english cockers to outcross clumber spaniels to help reduce some issues but I haven’t heard back on what happened
Anyways, the diversity sounds very nice as long as the breeders do a good research the dogs who are going to use, to prevent getting new severe problems into the breed
You see, I’m located in central america and in the country were I live there are a lot of mixing in many breeds done by BYB and millers
When I was a kid I remember that every small furry dog who had a brown coat was called “pekingese”, the grey or black ones “terry”, the white ones are called “fresh spaddles” (poodles) and they could come from the same mother
Some years later I saw in a magazine how poodles should look, and then I read and looked for info on their behaviour and more
The poodles from here have being washed out so mush that they look like shih tzus but wit white curly hair , they lost the most importang things water dog breeds should have like the waterproof oil in the coat, as well the skin between the fingers (like the duck feet) the muzzle is flat like the pekingese so this prevent them to retrieve easily a prey or an objet and besides that the fur sheds a lot
Worse of all they have SEVERE dog aggression problems, and will snap at people, people have told me that “they poodle won’t let them get near to be touched or groomed” or “that they will attack any visitators 🙁
That’s why I imported my toy poodle from another country, he is very sweet and haven’t had any aggression, like I said before the poodles from here looks so different that people ask me every time I take him to a walk wish breed he is, many of them didn’t believed me he’s a poodle because they say the muzzle is too long, so now I tell them he’s a caniche that’s the other name of the breed
So in conclusion, the outcrossing can be good for a breed as long as is controlled and reseached well
What a shame. Valid points can be quickly lost when a writing is presented in what starts off with an apparent bias (dalmatian snarl picture). Reminds me of the overly sensational television news headline images.
Mixing in good arguments and data is thoroughly drowned out by hyper-sensitive counter attacks to any differences in fact or opinion.
A pissing contest is what this ultimately seems to come down to. For an apparently well educated person the author loses a ton of credibility with the acidic tones and generally nasty demeanor. Whats up with the anger? I realize just about everyone is maddeningly more stupid but isn’t knowing this enough?
Based on much of the above maybe the argument should be to do away with all dog breeders? Well, maybe not all, as the most even discussion I saw came from a (gasp) Dalmatian breeder!
So, “I want you to tell people they’re full of crap, but be so nice about it, they can save face and not actually consider that they’re wrong. And when they show up with weak-sauce non-arguments and get insulting, you should be even more nice to them and just let them have their fantasy.”
This blog isn’t about opinion sharing. I don’t need to be nice and stroke the egos of people who are ignorant, immoral, and adamant about staying that way. My arguments and data are solid and only other well constructed arguments are going to find faults if and where they exist. So if people are unable to bring an actual argument that combines both data and reasoning to the table, I don’t really care if they feel insulted or don’t like my presentation. People who wrap their messages in sweetness and light are usually selling you bullshit, and enough idiots will gobble it down because it tastes good, but that’s not happening here. The arguments hold out if you like the presentation or not.
I’ll point you to my comment policy where you’re stuck on the piss-yellow level bitching about tone without discussing the substance of the argument. If you believe that credibility is linked to tone and not to substance, that’s your problem.
http://www.border-wars.com/comment-policy
Chris, you are arguing with people who breed dogs with a 100% affliction rate, when there has been a cure for 38 YEARS. What type of comments did you expect?
Great discussion … one thing to correct you on – Some breeders are now breeding LUA pups all over the globe. These pups are now accepted by the UK KC which lovers of the breed haver fought for for many years. Your opinion on a dals pre disposition to anxiety is not backed up by fact… it is backed up by opinions that are backed up by opinions.. All dogs can have behavioural problems, most of which stem from their upbringing.
Deafness in dals is a real issue that I completely agree with you on but severe heart conditions in great danes, and breathing issues in dogs such as bull dogs and Mastiffs show that most breeds have issues… doesn’t mean we should let a specific breed die out ……
Hi Kathy Bittorf,
I do not believe in ageless vampires, or the living undead. Please explain how you grew up where there were WORKING Dals in fire stations.
May indeed read about a Dal that was a police dog in Norway.
http://chandhally.co.uk/html/versatile_breed.html
http://www.k9web.com/dog-faqs/breeds/dalmatians.html#activities
http://www.wassaicfirerescue.com/thedalmatian.htm
I grew up in Maryland in the late 40’s and 50’s. These were bred to be Coach Dogs at one time. Fire stations often had them as working dogs. The dogs were known to miss a possible trapped Fireman …long before human co-workers setting off the alarm to get him help. They guarded the Fire Engines with great vigor. This was a working dog not a pet.
Years later going into local All Breed kennel club functions got to know a breeder of Dals. Good thing her husband was a Plastic Surgeon because her dogs left their scars on children’s faces. Children can surprise a deaf dog. She did ultimately go into another breed.
May: I would suggest before you go back to your current Vampire stories get some known history on the breed.
http://www.local1259iaff.org/dalmatians.html
http://www.windsorfire.com/fire-buffs-traditions-dalmations
Hi Kathy,
I never heard of WORKING dals. I’ve heard that they trotted along with wagons, but that isn’t work, neither is being a mascot. Most breed histories are more story than history. Even in breed books, I’ve never read of them searching buildings for downed firemen. The original search and rescue dogs?
Think that maybe dals still have the instincts to be natural SAR dogs?
Sorry, maybe you are right, but it is a new idea to me, and I’m suspicious of newly discovered histories. Forgive my questioning nature?
Quite possibly May, you have never lived in rural areas where Fireman are Volunteers primary? Maybe you were never exposed to Fireman, and now woman who do volunteer work at fires with their Dals.
Dalmatians were purely Working Dogs until recent times. They were Protection and pet like to horses, and a one master dog. If you ever were in the Firehouse when the Alarm went off…the Dal would be the first to jump in the truck.
It would be my guess that SAR dog abilities do lie in the Dalmatians if they could still hear without being in pain from kidney crystals.
Have you never seen a Fireman’s Parade? Check out the photo in this link.
http://m.livescience.com/33293-dalmatians-official-firehouse-dogs.html
You have likely never seen a Fireman’s Parade with a Dal sitting proudly in modern fire engine truck?
I assure you this is not some of the fractured fairy tales in my opinion +++++++
May it actually does not surprise me in consideration of the manner of your questions. Because many like yourself likely did not realize this is a breed not suitable for every dog lover and adding kidney stones, and deafness can be dangerous situation. Remember a 1956 novel written by Dodie Smith; an English Writer, One Hundred and One Dalmatians, in 1961 Walt Disney .Film became possibly for an entire generation of cartoon, talking Dals your generations fantasy stories of the breed.
Today, Dalmatians are still known to get along well with horses, and have become nearly synonymous with the Anheuser-Busch brand, often pictured in the company’s beer wagon or featured in television commercials with the Clydesdale horses. According to Anheuser-Busch’s Web site, Dalmatians were historically used by brewers to guard the wagon while the driver was making deliveries.
http://www.schunikka.co.uk/welfarechallenges.php
http://www.ebay.com/itm/BUDWEISER-DALMATIAN-CHARACTER-STEIN-GERMANY-CS324-NIB-Anheuser-Busch-Figural-/291000373542
So are these Budweiser dal’s LUA?
May in early studies white in canines scientific findings found only just two patterns that created white on a canine. “MITF and White Spotting in Dogs: Population Study”
http://jhered.oxfordjournals.org/content/100/suppl_1/S66.full
The white Dal did not come from the S locus..
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17485734
As you can see the Dalmatians now have breeding strategy remedy.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/11/081107071818.htm
Understanding the difference one needs to understand the E extension gene and why these health issues plague the current gene pool diversity of the breed.
Basically in simplest terms combinations of dilution genes it would likely appear just as double dilutes creates deafness regardless be it Great Dane, Collie, or Dalmatians.
http://www.horsetesting.com/Canine/ELocus.htm
Dalmatians belongs to a group of Canines that develops its white/cream coat from a gene combination in early genetic studies called Bb Ee and Beyond.
Understanding beyond Mendalian Genetics is quite difficult for many breeders in terms of cleaning up this “Train Wreck” as Chris has so brilliantly reported here.
Two different genes it has been discovered can act together to modify and create multiple phenotypes.
http://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/some-genes-are-transmitted-to-offspring-in-6524945
http://www.genomia.cz/en/homepage/page/dalmatin/
http://hattrickdalmatians.com/Colors.html
Hope this helps you to recognize that Chris is not on a witch hunt.
If the “witch” or “curse” is what we know to really be an “inherited genetic disease” , then I am all for not breeding more of it.
I guess, if this were “Talk like it is 200 years ago week”, a person might say that a person who helps a witch (a person who casts harmful spells/curses), is (like a black cat) a “witch’s consort”. So a breeder who breeds dogs with an inherited disease (a spell or curse), would (in old fashioned terms) be a “witch’s consort”.
But, we have all known for a century that inherited diseases are not curses, and nobody causes them, they are errors in the DNA. These are remedied by not breeding animals which have a harmful dominant gene, and not breeding in a manner which will double up on harmful recessive genes.
I believe the question is how did the LUAs come about? It seems from personal studies in the late 1970s a geneticist, Dr. Robert Schaible with extensive scientific expertise and a love of the Dalmatian Breed, decided to attempt a remedy to fixed” the genetic defect in Dals. He bred one Pointer (male) to one Dalmatian (female) only one time. He got some odd looking spotted dogs in the first generation. He persisted in many subsequent matings and always used Dalmatians and only Dalmatians afterward. This single Pointer gave the “normal” gene for uric acid metabolism that the Dalmatians needed but was never used again. After more than 14 generations and well over 10,000 Dalmatians in a pedigree, the present day dogs – LUA Dalmatians – look like and act like Dalmatians! In fact, by pedigree analysis, they are 99.998% Dalmatian.
In 2007, Dr. Danika Bannasch at the University of California (Davis) with a grant funded by the National Institutes of Health and others, identified the actual gene that the Dalmatian is missing. It is a transporter gene that all other dogs have, except those who form urate stones. Dr. Bannasch also developed a genetic test so we can determine if a puppy has one copy of this gene (heterozygous – has low uric acid, but can produce both low and high uric acid puppies) or two copies of this gene (homozygous – has low uric acid and all puppies produced will also have low uric acid).
It is stated there are less than 100 LUA Dalmatians in existence today, compared to the thousands of regular Dalmatians in the US, and tens of thousands worldwide. While the LUAs provide real hope for curing the problem of urinary obstruction due to urate stones that afflicts so many male Dalmatians. It seems speculated to take many years before these dogs – the LUAs – are fully incorporated into Dalmatian breeding programs across the US and around the world.
In the meanwhile, there will continue to be many fine Dalmatians bred who will have the fixed genetic defect in uric acid metabolism. Fortunately, many dedicated breeders and owners have developed methods to manage the high urinary uric acid so as to minimize stone formation and urinary blockage.
As Dalmatian breeders, we consider it an ethical – and moral – obligation to make every reasonable attempt to improve the health of our beloved Breed. We are proud to be incorporating the LUA Dalmatians into our own Proctor Dalmatians breeding program.
For additional information about LUA Dalmatian, please go to:
http://www.luadalmatians.com
According to luadalmatians.com, the original outcross was an AKC male Pointer named CH Shandown’s Rapid Transit.
The Dalmatian bitch is said to be named Lady Godiva.
Being naked, the original Lady Godiva might have chose to gallop through town rather than go at the walk. A rapid transit. Despite their fast names, it has taken from 1973 until now for Dr. Schiable’s healthy LUA Dalmatian to be accepted. Why did it take so long? This time lag discourages others in different breeds from looking for a cure.
The cure was ignored for nearly 40 years!
May I have been asking the same question regarding CEA in Collies. It took the same amount of decades for the marker to reveal Overseas Collie breeders they had no true normal eyed collies.
They had only carriers of CEA in a mild form at best labeled in the 70’s by a few US Collie breeders as “Go Normal” and the cooperating professionals such as Dr. Daniel Wolf. Now the proactive Collie breeders in several countries and United States attempt to reach across the Oceans to one another. This is not only for normal eyed non carriers but to increase the Genetic Diversity. Just wish there were more pro active pure bred breeders.
Yes, and note some just think it can be dealt with through Diet in Dals?
Sometimes what appears to be an error (to those on the outside looking in), is really the goal of the breeder. Over and over you must look for the motive, and not be quick to assume that you have found the answer. Often the true answer can’t ever be found by oneself because a key piece of knowledge remains hidden.
Why are so many collies blind? A person might assume that this is an error, and assume that breeders never selected FOR this trait.
Actually, May it is not that many collies are blind, but have limited sight or will go blind for varies eye diseases just like a great number of today’s Pure Breeds. CEA for example which is actually named after the Breed of Collie due to early research. I still remember a breeder upset when her Corgi was diagnosed with this eye disease. She was upset coming out of the Eye Clinic. This is a Corgi and a pure breed how could it have an eye disease known to Collies? (CEA) is a congenital, inherited, bilateral eye disease of dogs, which affects the retina, choroid, and sclera. It can be a mild disease or cause blindness. CEA is caused by a simple autosomal recessive gene defect. There is no treatment. Assuming would be unwise, but the road was a difficult one without modern technology. It took intestinal fortitude and all the similar words of character moxie, backbone, strength of conviction and lots of courage to go against the grain so to speak. Few have this focus of purpose with the odds against them.
People who want collies to have normal vision should not have to fight the tide of breeders who want to show and breed blind collies or vision impaired collies. IMO, something is seriously wrong with a system, or club, which promotes breeding impaired dogs and neutering unimpaired dogs.
May I do not disagree that Breed Clubs with traditional breeding practices of winning popular sires has created a social system condition within in these Breed groups. It t causes people to think that they have great or unlimited power or importance. it has created groups of followers not Leaders and Thinkers.
http://www.instituteofcaninebiology.org/7/post/2013/12/the-pox-of-popular-sires.html
Yes Kathy, people surrounded by the culture of dogs shows and kennel clubs seem to be conforming to standards not questioning them, more like a flock of sheep who are being herded than individual people thinking through the problems.
Clubs should have some responsibility for the problems they cause, especially when they are warned about the harm they are causing year after year.
What happened to the vision in show collies’ eyes? You might think any club, and every collie breeder would make sight a priority in their breeding, and quickly work to correct this sad problem. But that didn’t happen. Why?
I did assume that it was to get a longer fuller show coat. Dogs are said to know if it is fall or spring by the amount of light coming through their eyes. I have heard of show collie breeders keeping their dogs in cold dark basements to make the coat thick and long. So I thought that maybe people bred blind collies because with less light coming through the eyes, they thought the coat would grow more.
But I went with someone to the home of a collie breeder who lived, like many dog breeders, out in a rural area. Her dogs ran loose, which must have been a great work saver for her, the dogs could go poop in the woods where she wouldn’t have to clean it, and they exercised themselves.
But herding dogs have one terrible trait – they like to herd. When they have nothing to herd, they find something to herd, neighbors’ horses, cows, bikes, children walking to school, or cars. CARS, collies are bad about making chasing cars their life’s work.
This one breeder with the free roaming collies, had some well behaved collies, and some troublesome collies who chased cars and roamed around trying to get work herding. She wanted to sell the troublesome collies.
Problem was the well behaved collies were well behaved because they were blind. Couldn’t see it, so wouldn’t chase it. She knew that she would be breeding for blindness. She was very self-defensive about it. What could she do? She could not continue to keep the troublesome regular collies. She couldn’t afford kennels. And she hated the idea of switching to a non-herding breed…….she loved collies.
Just another example of why one shouldn’t breed dogs to retain working instincts if they are selling puppies as pets. If you don’t have sheep (or livestock) you don’t need a dog with strong herding instincts. He won’t be happy with your home and lifestyle, and you can’t give him what he needs. Pet people don’t really want a dog that is bent on chasing cars and herding everything.
Breed dogs who will be happy in the types of homes/ environments in which you sell them into.
I can not tell you why anyone in any breed wants to create blind deaf, crippled , can’t breath have seizures or any health issue. I furthermore, can not understand why they do not take the responsibility and keep dumping them on the pet owners, and novice breeders. There obviously was more wrong then some of these collies being blind. Many good herding collies are quite loved and enjoyed in pet homes.
Correctly bred they adapt well to varies situations. A blind dog be it Collie, Great Dane, or even the many cross breeds that are coming up blind just can not adjust to homes and new environments.
Extreme coat is actually not in the Standard. The Standard calls for a well fitted coat just as the eye is to medium almond in shape …not a three corner eye. I have found many people today know nothing about Lassie. So should not be a surprise that people do not know a Dal was a working dog.
The small breeds seem to suit a larger majority of Pet Owners. Some of us rather have a real dog who is at least capable of “barking than wagging its tail” with enough intelligence to know the Invader is robbing their house, car. or trying to kidnap their child. Breeding for temperament and intelligence keeping our working, and herding breeds functional and acceptable in today’s society is not for a novice or sloppy uneducated breeder. Knowing one’s breed is vital. I simply do not comprehend how a breeder can breed numerous breeds well.
May all this seems to fall on the word, paradigm. A theory or a group of ideas about how something should be done, made, or thought … A theory of knowledge
a philosophical and theoretical framework of a scientific school or discipline within which theories, laws, and generalizations and the experiments performed in support of them are formulated; broadly : a philosophical or theoretical framework of any kind. Paradigmatically
It would seem Medicine has been reaching back more deeply into the patterns that govern and influence illness, as we have long known the importance and significant power of predetermined genetic state.
Due to this DNA has received much attention and it is here that we are now looking for the “causes” for many diseases and the ability to change their natural history.
In our human development which still is governed by ” old paradigm thinking”, and contains many of the pitfalls inherent in establishment of dog breeding practices. The arrogance that we have in believing we can make such assumptions without changes to new scientific fact discovery excluding natural order is unconscionable
The Old paradigm thinking which is based on only … A theory of knowledge
Paradigm: the tree on which we hang our bits of knowledge.
Paradigm: The Grand Assumption which we all assume is behind our facts.
Exactly, but with new scientific fact we no longer have to rely on a rotten tree.
Many dog breeders don’t care how rotten the tree is or how much the dogs suffer. So long as they win at dog shows and the public still buys theirs puppies, they fear change.
What happen to the Vision? What a paronomasia in a deep sense making your question cover so much Show Dog Fancy history and social standards in this venue. It is much like the ” Brackett’s Formula for Failure”, but Chris covers these topics with a great deal of study and outstanding research. Go into his Archives: “The 8 Signs of Groupthink.”
Number seven is one of my favorite noted of what might be termed a narcissistic mind in my opinion and experience. Another in the archives might give you insight is “Academic Fraud in The Toller Research” . Might I also suggest you read “Inbreeding is Screwing Yourself:”
The need to get full discussion of your questions would require someone to have a Collie Blog site. I regret can not imagine how currently this is possible. Note number seven in Chris’s archives. You ask good intelligent questions. They do not deserve vehement answers. This is Chris’s site for Border Collies but he recognizes and fully comprehends current conclusion of all the scientific discoveries seeking answers for his own chosen breed in my opinion:
“Intensive breeding by humans for over the last 500 years is responsible for dramatic differences in appearance in modern VARIES SPECIES OF CANINES not the genetic origin”. Humans have produced varies breeds by specifically selecting different traits, but they are all the SAME species.
Canines today come in many phenotypes, but scientist are more than hypothesizing they evolved from just a few wolves tamed by humans living in the area of China less than 15,000 years ago Because Canine Genome project is complete with 38 pairs of autosomes as well as the X and Y chromosomes.
The organization of the American Society of Veterinary Ophthalmology (ASVO) began in the spring of 1957. The site was Miami Beach, FL, where a group of veterinarians interested in Ophthalmology met to discuss the prospects of organizing a Society during the annual meeting of the American Animal Hospital Association.
Eye checks , or Canine Ophthalmologist did not commence until late 60’s in collies., A renowned breeder, leader, and AKC Judge, Steve Fields of Parader took the reins with his own observations and findings in his own Collies. Do you know that the first Health Foundation for Pure Breeds was the Collie funded by its Membership with monies left in Trust Funds? Yes, before the AKC Health Foundation!.
The Collie was the first breed to commence not only findings for CEA but studies of PRA with Cornell in the United States . If not the oldest Breed Club in the AKC it might be ranked second to the Collie Club of St. Louis? So what happen to this type of Pure Canine Breeder in just a few decades? Is it true that it is stated that any establishment made by man that gets more than 100 years old is doomed to fall?
What is the oldest Breed? Basenji closest related breed to the wolf. It would seem the Siberian Husky, Alaskan Malamute, Shiba Inu and Akita come next in the evolution from wolf to domestic dogs. . What is the most genetically diverse breed? Poodle
Did you know currently discovered 155 regions on the canine genome that are determined to be influenced by human selective breeding?
Are they afraid of change? Could the real reason for the failure to address this new knowledge be lost of individual power and respect? Look at the Books of Champions for one example.
Might they be frozen in fear of the impact on the “Legends of the Breeds’ Champions and Breeders” and current ones?
There are many Honored Awards and books of early contributors that now will be under question and reexamination as new knowledge sweeps the Canine Show Dog Fancy Breed Clubs worldwide. Others might find themselves seemingly trapped in this Informational time line?
The parallels between the decades of historical changes in Dog Fanciers seemingly are not breed specific . Dalmatians health issues and Collies reveals a time frame in the 70’s when the goals radically changed. Some say, the generations that followed wanted everything handed to them on a silver platter” I noted that Novices’ rhetorical questions were not answered but with vehement replies such as “Don’t Throw the Baby out with the Bath water”. It seems to be a right of passage, with questions being answered with questions? “How litters have you whelped? “How many champions have you made?” Worse yet, “You have to earn your spurs so to speak before one could question or change the status quo..” Everyone has to take their lumps.” Why? The Pure Breed Canine is taking bigger lumps in my opinion than I or other Fanciers have had to endure. .
Apparently, members interest and goals have changed over the decades. They became more Social Clubs in my opinion, and viewpoint.. The Standard of the Breed became more flexible it would seem in the eyes of some Judges. Their choices seemed to be based on current Fad and Fashion of current winner, or what was behind the lead instead of in front of it. Judging too often stopped at the base of the ears.
Hi Kathy,
The truth is being heard, even here in America. Last night I watched a cartoon called “Family Guy”. In the cartoon, one of the children went to the North Pole to see Santa Claus. Santa was so unhappy he wanted to die because life was frustrating him.
Santa said that one of the big problem was inbreeding. He had moved to the North Pole with one family of elves, so now all the elves were inbred. It was difficult for Santa Claus to teach the inbred elves.
Santa also complained of not being able to keep pace with technology. He said that they did make wooden trains, but now children want ipads.
I though: this is like dog breeding. Many dog breeds have become inbred, and people want to buy different types of dogs from what our grandparents had.
May it just takes cartoons, and jokes it would seem to reach people. It is all so silly because all dogs are descended of a wolf-like ancestor that had genetic diversity. This diversity allowed people to breed dogs as different in size as Chihuahua and the Great Dane. Look at the diverse traits as color, temperament, exercise needs diverse as well among the breeds. Again Chris has covered “The Circle of Evolution published in Nature (2010) on the Canine which like a cartoon depicts the evolution of dogs and varies breeds developed. Now what these folks need to grasp which is more than interesting are the breed groupings that science reveals common haplotype (DNA sequences groups share. The pure breed canine is stated to have over 500 genetic diseases. They occur in dogs at a much higher rate which depletes the gene pool for non carriers because:
The immune system is governed by the Major Histocompatability Complex (MHC). This group of genes is referred to as a “complex” because they are all positioned close together on one chromosome. This positioning actually guarantees that the genes will be inherited as a unit called a haplotype. The haplotype will be passed to offspring without the usual shuffling that occurs as genes are distributed into sperm or eggs.
Every individual possesses two MHC haplotypes, one inherited from each sire and dam. It explains why we see all this complexity with the MHC. It is Nature’s answer to the problem of infectious disease. The immune system must be prepared to tackle many different infectious agents. Check out The 3 types of Genetic Inheritance in the Archives.
Okay… I see a lot of posts about Dalmatians but have yet to see anyone talk about the pigment. I love Temple Grandin, but I find her statements about pigment to be a bit iffy. It’s all hearsay and very little of it is verifiable.
I’ll first get this out of the way: I do know Dalmatians as well as several other breeds like Labrador Retrievers are coming up more with aggression, but I don’t believe this has anything to do with pigment, it’s just selecting for looks (who’s a show winner, not as in who has the least amount of color, although I know they do this too) and less for temperament. I do know for a fact however that piebaldism does affect hearing and there is cold hard science to prove this, the other bit is just an assumption. Saying that albinism (or something similar to it) makes an animal violent/aggressive does not hold any weight, then albino humans would be too. Sure when color is in the process of being developed, it comes from the brain, but it is more likely to affect the eyes and eyeballs than the temperament of the afflicted.
Now as for everything else Grandin said:
I have heard of squinting in albino dobes but never skin lesions or aggressive/unstable temperaments. I don’t think squinting is a reason not to breed albino dobes, it’s not like they go temporarily blind when taking a walk in the park from the sunlight or are more likely to get cataracts because they happen to have blue eyes (an incredibly common myth). Blue eyed people (such as myself) even squint from the light, may have migraine sensitivities (which I do), and a myriad of other things, but this is just life and it’s not like I’m disabled from it.
Bad things happening from breeding two blue eyed huskies together? I have never heard of this and have a hard time believing it. Blue eyes in huskies are recessive and have nothing to do with pigment, it isn’t like the merle gene, and I have an even harder time believing it affects their health or temperament in a negative way. What is far more likely to happen is a breeder inbreeding two blue eyed huskies together, gets some nasty results, blames it on the blue eyes to cover their rear. This is why anecdotal information isn’t that great.
White flighty hens, flightyness being linked to color? No. No no no. She needs to get some Welsummers, they aren’t white at all and I’d say those are even flightier than white leghorns, and leghorns are nasty mean little buggers but so are the Japanese fighting chickens. It’s just the chicken…
Albino animals in the wild do not survive long “due to all their problems”, it isn’t “their problems” if it was then we would never see them, they would have failure to thrive and probably would only exist for a few days if it caused such a severe problem as to facilitate death. No, what the real reason behind low survival rate is they stand out, they don’t blend in, their natural camouflage is gone, therefore the predators have the first part of their job done for them. This is why domestication is nice, the animal can stick out like a sore thumb but still survive because we need them to, we require it. I have a theory that broken patterns such as piebaldism and merle are the direct result of domestication, I have yet to prove it, but to me it makes sense. I guess one instance of this partially being proven would be the Russian Fur Fox Farm Experiment. These animals would not exist without humans, indeed.
Anyway that ends my long post.
I mentioned to my mother after reading this post that Dalmatians are becoming more and more aggressive (by the sounds of it anyway) and she said when my brother was 3 years old (meaning this took place in 1989) he was bit in the face by her friend’s Dalmatian while at daycare. She was horrified and said she’d make sure it didn’t happen again but my mother was understanding and said he probably did something to deserve it (you know kids). That was the first and only time my brother has been bitten by a dog, according to my mother.
She herself was bitten by a Saint Bernard and Doberman, of which the Doberman did the most damage, turned her entire arm a myriad of colors and she still has a long scar from where it grabbed her and tore her open. The dog just came into the store and attacked her, after doing so the owner, who was outside of the store, called it, threw a piece of meat into the back of his truck, and drove off with the dog. I make it sound like someone executing a “hit” but she made it sound more like the guy was there to pick something up real quick and was letting his dog run around loose and for whatever reason it decided to come after her. The owner either didn’t care that his dog just attacked someone or was unaware of it.
I’ve only been bitten in the face once by a 6 month old wolfdog and I was acting passive aggressively (was on my back across from him and was laughing at him which probably looked like snarling and growling to him). Made the inside of my nose bleed but didn’t get more than that thankfully (on account of him being 6 months old). He never did it again afterwords and was submissive towards me but I also learned to never get below a wolfdog’s level, and learned that the hard way.
“I have heard of squinting in albino dobes but never skin lesions or aggressive/unstable temperaments. I don’t think squinting is a reason not to breed albino dobes, it’s not like they go temporarily blind when taking a walk in the park from the sunlight or are more likely to get cataracts because they happen to have blue eyes (an incredibly common myth). Blue eyed people (such as myself) even squint from the light, may have migraine sensitivities (which I do), and a myriad of other things, but this is just life and it’s not like I’m disabled from it.”
I’m afraid the Doberman Pinscher Club of America does not agree with you regarding squinting not being a reason to breed albino dobes.
“Why does the DPCA reject the Albino?
We know that these dogs are photophobic, (sensitive to sun light). They have vision problems resulting from abnormal development of the retina.”
As taken from their website.
http://dpca.org/albino/albino_about.htm
I read the first few sentences and the entire article lost all reputability to me. I don’t believe breed clubs in general, they’re all “drinking the kool aid” but I thought I would still give it a look, and I’m not surprised that they aren’t any different.
“In November 1976, a mutation occurred with the whelping of a cream colored Doberman.”
I highly doubt this was a mutation, more a gene finally expressing itself after not having done so for a number of generations (as it never met a second copy).
“She was bred to a dominant black male, producing 14 black and tan pups. A male and female were kept and all ran loose. Her son sired her next litter, which contained 2 Albino males. He was also bred to his sister and her litter contained 2 Albino bitches. Later, these Albinos were bred together producing all Albinos.
These dogs have been highly inbred and have multiplied at an enormous rate, and unfortunately they are being bred into our top show lines.”
Suggesting that all albino dobes are inbred and that all originated from one source. Genetics don’t work that way.
“This prevented the Albino’s from being shown in the conformation ring, but unfortunately does not stop the continued breeding of these mutant Dobermans. The AKC had refused DPCA’s request to cancel any registration of Albino Dobermans.”
Mutant dobermans = not neutral, derogatory wording.
“The results after a five-year study conducted by the DPCA and its consultants, concluded these mutants were correctly termed, “albino or tyrosine positive, partial albino or tyrosine negative which suffer from hypo-melanocytic disease. It is important to note here that partial albinos are still albinos.
Albinism is a deleterious mutation which affects the whole body.”
Tyronaise is not albinism, though it has parts of albinism in it, it is the seal points you see in siamese cats and rats, it is a dilution gene which responds to the temperatures in the environment, but it is not albinism in the least. Albinism does not exist in dogs. http://homepage.usask.ca/~schmutz/white.html
“We know that these dogs are photophobic, (sensitive to sun light). They have vision problems resulting from abnormal development of the retina.”
Squinting and being sensitive to the light does not equal vision problems in my opinion, it’s just light sensitivity, it isn’t cataracts.
I like that they’re even using the Z list, the same thing that the American Cocker Spaniel club is using to keep merles out of the bloodlines, and it uses the same shoddy science to keep merles out of their ranks. It’s all ridiculous nonsense.
I’m not always crazy about what these breed clubs post either, but the reference was intended strictly to bring attention to the abnormal development of the retina. And even the normal blue eyes of humans, non-albino humans, are not without risk. Blue-eyed folks have more vulnerability to some forms of damage than brown-eyed humans. Not as bad as in humans with true abinism of course, but any lack of melanin does increase risk for problems.
Which is why my pale white skin, though not due to albinism, is at greater risk of various skin cancers including malignant melanoma ( which my Germanic, pinkish white father got in his 60s from early-life sun exposure).
The term of abinism being “tyrosine positive” was confusing, to be sure.Lack of tyrosine causes the issue. “Tyrosine positive” sounds like one HAS tyrosine.
A doberman that has a mutation is NOT a “mutant doberman?” The idea that this is derogatory is down to perception and sensitivity to semantics. I’m sure the dobermans don’t mind.
“I highly doubt this was a mutation, more a gene finally expressing itself after not having done so for a number of generations (as it never met a second copy).”
All mutations are gene expressions.
“Suggesting that all albino dobes are inbred and that all originated from one source. Genetics don’t work that way.”
Could you elaborate please?
BTW, dobermans as a rule are inbred. Tons of linebreeding goes on, as with all breeds. All breeds as we know them today are a result of strict genetic isolation/limitation. In one form or another, they are inbred. Just how inbred they are is a matter of checking their COI.
You still seem to be missing my point: they squint at the sunlight. They don’t go blind, they don’t develop skin cancer, they have the same risk of developing and being born with genetic defects as any other doberman would. Squinting at the sunlight is not life threatening and it does not impact their lives immensely. Any dogs with blue eyes from merles to huskies even squint at the sunlight, we might as well get rid of them too with that pattern of thought (which, some have already done, from miniature pinschers to bearded colies).
“All mutations are gene expressions.”
Then I don’t see why they treat mutants in a negative manner.
“Could you elaborate please?”
Inbreeding is not required to express a hidden/recessive gene, you only need two copies, any unrelated dog will do. It’s easier to express it through inbreeding, but it’s not required.
No, I completely get your point. I feel you are not getting mine.
Oh great. It’s one of those, right?
🙂
On the whole, the issue here is melanin, or rather, the absence of it. Be it ablinisim in dogs or people, or just the blue eyes attributed to people or other animals without true ablinism, ulimately, the lack of melanin means less protection against UV radiation from the sun.
The less melanin, the less protection. Albinism results in most protections being removed! And yes this certainly DOES put the risk of skin cancers and eye damage up higher in these individuals than in those with higher or normal melanin concentrations/production.
Which is why this particular mutation is being treated in a negative manner. It is nothing personal against the dog. OTOH, these statements are being made out of the concern for the well being of dogs.
What would be wrong with getting rid of merle patterns or blue eyes in huskies? They are purely aesthetic characters. They offer no advantage to either health, working ability or disposition.
And I brought up my inbreeding statement because you said “Suggesting that all albino dobes are inbred and that all originated from one source. Genetics don’t work that way.”
It was a faulty statement because you pretty much said I was wrong to suggest all albino dobes are inbred. They are! All dobermans are inbred to some extent, therefore all albino dobermans most certainly are.
I agree totally but when dealing even with a semi expression of albino one should consider the following scientific facts. We realize that low thyroid function can affect temperament as well.
In more than 25 different dog breeds, a mutation found in a gene called Microphthalmia Associated Transcription Factor-(MITF) is associated with a piebald spotting.(White Factoring) at the S Locus likewise a dominant mutation merle gene at the MITF
What does the merle gene and White factoring have in common …they are mutations at the MITF. Can these mutations be detrimental to the health of the breed and its temperament in my opinion. …Absolutely
Now let us contemplate the following: The MITF gene was first discovered and identified in Variegated Indian corn.
Like the merle gene it is produced by transposon elements in this corn. A number of viruses, that are responsible for diseases such as AIDs, feline leukemia genetically function as transposons. Hereditary diseases such as hemophilla A and B and a predisposition to colon polps, cancer and muscular dystrophy all relate to the inheritance by means of transposon. It is interesting to note that Genetic engineers have used on occasions transposons to introduce specific genes into an organism. (GMO corn, wheat, soy ?)
Now when animals dilutions are caused by such systems now documented why with selective breeding that is inbreeding primary would you not find the same results as in humans?
Kathy, you seemed to reply directly to me. My segue posts sidetracked onto the issue of melanism and the eye. Chris brought up the temperament issue. You may want to pose your Q to him.
Though as long as the question is here, I am wondering if you could rephrase. I’m clear on everything you wrote previously to your actual question “Now when animals dilutions are caused by such systems now documented why with selective breeding that is inbreeding primary would you not find the same results as in humans?”
To me this phrasing suggests you are asking about human inbreeding.
No not questioning human inbreeding. I simply do not understand how dog breeders do not see the parallel of health and mental issues in our dogs in selective breeding programs.
Chick I found your mention of the lack of pigmentation to the eye quite pertinent to the discussion. Impaired function of the auditory and ophthalmologic systems in dilution systems is well documented Microphthamia blindless and merle ocular dysgensis
Likewise, health encumbrances associated with lack of pigmentation are skin allergies, skin cancer and sunburn, demodicosis (immune-mediated hair follicle mange), follicular dysplasia (coat which is dull and breaks), reduced fertility and sterility, and photo-induced epilepsy just the tip of the ice-berg IMO.
Kathy, “Ah, I see” to the first reply and “thank you for pointing those health issues out” to the second.
It still isn’t life threatening or bad in my opinion, reduction in pigmentation is part of evolution and even domestication, piebaldism does not exist in the wild but it does in domestic animals, it even popped up in the russian fur fox farm experiment and foxes with blue eyes also appeared, what do you think this means?
More colors instead of less is important as well, in my opinion. Sussex spaniels only come in one AKC recognized and accepted color, I’m sure their health reflects this. American Cocker Spaniels used to come in multiple shades of red before the color was standardized to one particular shade and hue. Dachshunds come in 15 different colors and have 6 different markings. That’s a lot of variety and diversity.
In my experience with the American Cocker Spaniel breed, the first cockers with tolerable temperaments that I met were two merles (they weren’t perfect, mind you, but tolerable, the male was a toy guarder and the female ruled the roost, but I’ve been bitten by other cockers, seen one with rage, cherry eyes left and right, etc.), they also didn’t pop cherry eyes. After that I met a brown with a good temperament, I don’t know what his health history was though. The merle aussies I’ve met also seemed calmer compared to non-merle or regular piebald aussies. I’ve read some articles in which merles are described as having less “vigor”. For me, I love this feature. I hate hyper yappy dogs. I can see why some people might like dogs like that, but I don’t.
“It still isn’t life threatening or bad in my opinion, reduction in pigmentation is part of evolution and even domestication, piebaldism does not exist in the wild but it does in domestic animals, it even popped up in the russian fur fox farm experiment and foxes with blue eyes also appeared, what do you think this means?”
The issue specifically was albinism when it came to the doberman. As has been stated, it comes with an increased risk of melanoma and that IS most certainly life threatening. In fact, if not caught early enough, it’s one of the most ruthless and insidious cancers going!
What does the Russian fur fox experiment mean? That humans intervened and their selection for traits that have nothing to do with natural selection between animals living in the wild, resulted in piebalds that would probably stick out like a sore thumb to a predator. The consensus for years has been that foxes with such markings would be more of a target for predation.
The fact that people CAN create something/bring out a trait does not mean it’s a good thing. The dog world is full of examples of what this means.
I do agree with not limiting the gene pool by making certain colors “incorrect” PROVIDED that the color or pattern in question does not have issues of its own. It might be acceptable in the cases of some questionable colors if there were one parent with a dominant gene that would result in all pups having a healthy color/pattern and if this could be tracked, but that would be more important for a breed where the unhealthy color or pattern has become far too common.
Dobermans not not such a breed.
From the bio of Lily, ablino doberman at Doberman Rescue Unlimited:
“Unfortunately, the biopsies came back that Lily has malignant melanoma. Treatment options weren’t great and our veterinarian couldn’t say how things will progress or how long we can expect Lily to live..”
http://www.dru.org/availabledetail.htm
You note Labs are coming up with more aggression. So too are Golden Retrievers. Notice a pattern in those two? Both of them have been decidedly selected as of late for a more white appearance. Goldens used to be RED like a red setter. The “beautiful bean footage” dog. Now they’re well past blonde into platinum.
Labs as well are being bred lighter and lighter. So your observations speak to the issue at hand, not against it.
As for “iffy” well, all science is iffy. A series of hypotheses that increasingly fit the problem better and better until our own human limitations prevent a more accurate interpretation, which we then run with for a while.
The science is not closed here, it’s not settled, in fact there’s clearly more ignorance than there are answers. But it’s a very interesting hypothesis and despite the problem that we’re not likely to get human funded research into pigment vs. temperament for political reasons in humans, what little scholarship we do have for animals is open for debate and I think Grandin’s point is a solid place to start.
Actually the labs that I have seen behave aggressively or shly have been black, and I was attributing this to the breeding for box heads now, much like Chihuahua’s are bred for apple heads and suffer seizures due to this.
I wouldn’t say all science is iffy, I’ve never felt iffy about Sheila Schmutz’s work, as she really digs deep and gives straight answers by way of genetic testing and whatnot, not stories. Using stories to support a theory is just sad.
Oh and when I was working with American Cocker Spaniels, the meanest and most obnoxious were always the blacks, blacks and buffs are well known for their temperament and health issues. The black especially are loaded with cherry eyes. The most pleasant and healthiest I’ve seen have been the reds and chocolates, particularly the chocolates, which are unpopular colors, whereas buffs and blacks have been bred to hell and back and are seen as the more “reputable” colors of the breed (if you’re a reputable breeder or win tons of shows, you have buffs, blacks, or both).
Sarah lack of pigmentation in the wild generally spells death. The White Artic Fox losses its white coat when the snow melts. You can be sure the information of health issues on lack of pigmentation is more extensive than previous posted. Ask a good eye doctor about the increase sensitivity of blue eyes,. You might find this link a real awakening.
http://dpca.org/BreedEd/index.php/articles/44-history/381-albinism-science
Love my ALL Smiles Dal <3
I read the post and am responding to it, not to all the comments.
Chris you might of stepped into the poo. Bad idea to mention color without mentioning that fur color in dogs isn’t the same genes as skin color in people.
White people are what would be called “cream” in some dog breeds. A cream colored dog can have white colored patches. White and cream are different genes.
White (really “cream”) people usually don’t have white hair, their hair has some color to it until they get old. Albino people, even albino Africans, have white colored hair.
A black Labrador Retriever has white skin – he is more like a white person with black hair. Most dogs have white skin, or maybe it would be cream if the dog was shaved bald and we could see it.
Cream color tans a little bit with gradual increase of sunshine. White skin is like albino, it does’t tan, it burns, peels, and flakes after expose to even mild sunlight.
There are very few dogs that don’t have white skin. Some of the hairless dog breeds, and a few Swiss hound breeds.
Instead of using the general term “white” use the more exact term “albino” or “albino spotting”. Otherwise you step in the poo.
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Hey, i found this blog a while back now and recently decided to read into it more, very interesting!, I have always been interested in human and animal genetics!. I can understand why the dalmatian owners react in the overprotective way that they do because the bottom line is they love their dogs, but it is a shallow approach to not except that their certainly is a very serious problem with the breed. I own a 4 year old, black spotted dalmatian male. I brought him at ten weeks old from a kennel club accredited breeder and as far as conformation is concerned he is a stunning example of the breed!. I brought him up around cats and made every effort to socialise him with as many other dogs as possible from as early an age as possible. He was a charming puppy but as he grew i noticed he displayed rather cocky and dominant behaviour towards other dogs, and when he played in the park he would often elicit a negative reaction from calmer more submissive dogs. When snapped at he would often beat a hasty retreat. As he approached a year old he began to become more pushy and dominant approaching other dogs very proudly and with tail held high i began to notice hackles being raised, when off the lead he would bomb up to other dogs stopping just short of mowing them and often their owner down and made a lot of growling but if the other dog was submissive then generally they would begin to play albeit roughly!. I became aware as he grew that he would no longer back down to the challenge of other male dogs and would happily confront fearlessly, At nine months old i had him castrated hoping it may settle his temperament but things only continued to get worse!. by two years of age his dog aggression had become fully fledged and he was no longer able to free run off the lead, i had to resort to long lead walks and cycling with him on a long lead to meet the exercise requirements. Now at the age of four i have a fully mature male who physically is very fit! he is incredibly strong!, i grew up with staffordshire bull terriers and believe me my dalmatian is physically stronger than any staffy i have dealt with period!. He is dont get me wrong a wonderful companion, and i love him to pieces!, he is well liked by many people in my neighbourhood!, and he usually is very friendly with people, BUT! i would never trust him to be left alone with strangers and especially children, he is ok with kids and many of my friends children play with him but i am always in the vicinity supervising, i am his owner and i do not put up with his bad behaviour but he will still push his luck, he will often growl if my feet brush against him while he is sleeping at the foot of the sofa, and i have to remind him of the status quo. His attitude towards most other dogs is diabolical!, as i stated i have to exercise him in a confined fenced in area were he cannot get to other dogs, or i exercise him on a long line, 98% of the time when out unless very late at night or early in the morning he has to wear a basket muzzle because, if another dog suddenly approaches there is a 50% chance he will lay into them!. I can tell from a distance usually if he is going to react to another dog because if we see a dog approaching his entire body language will alter, he will become stiff and rigid, his ears cock forwards tail erect and whipping erratically, eyes totally fixated and glazed, he will sometimes begin stalking similar to a collie that is approaching sheep, then when a certain distance away he does not bare his teeth! he just explodes! up onto hind legs, pulling wildly, growling and roaring!, he will pull until he chokes himself!, he has to be literally dragged down the street and he does not forget for some time!, you would think once the other dog is out of sight he would forget but no! he says alert and tense for ages and continues wingeing and trembling with shear anticipation, when he is in an enclosed area if another dog walks past the fence he will charge the fence and snap and bite at the wire!, once the dog has passed he will pace and circle for some time and often paws at the gate and chews at the wire fence trying to escape!, he is truly hell bent on destroying the other dog in question, sometimes just for looking at him in a way he perceives a threat to his high perception of dominance!. Now dont get me wrong there are a small number of dogs he will get along with but these are usually bitches and castrated males who are calm and submissive and do not behave in a challenging manner, most intact males are immediately attacked and any castrated male or even bitch who squares him up is also going to receive the same treatment!, infact even dogs that he knows i would never leave him with unattended and that is because he still can behave funny often raising his hackles and getting slightly confrontational. There is only one other dog is trust him with and that is my other dog who is an 8 year old staffy cross, the pair of them are very close! but even they play rough and the dally even though the younger of the two is the more dominant of the pair, even my old gentleman will not push his luck with him. He really is a very highly strung, skitty and neurotic creature and can be a real embarrassment!!. You can see when you look into his eyes he is not quite right!, there is just something in there that says i have potential! if you catch my drift but i am aware of this and i am a responsible owner who takes every effort to ensure my dog does no harm to anybody else’s dogs. Now health wise, His hearing thankfully is not an issue, as both his parents were baer tested as was the litter and i was supplied with a certificate to prove the he has bilateral hearing in both ears. The uric acid crystals sadly is a problem and he has had a couple of flare up the caused him to have an irritation in the bladder resulting in bleeding, he had to go on antibiotics and when a urine sample of taken for analysis they discovered he had the crystals and he was put on to a prescription diet, thankfully i have had no further flare up’s but of course it is always a concern, he also seems to suffer with allergies and i never found a solid reason as to why but i believe it could be seasonal perhaps due to grass and pollen, he will chew a certain place on his body usually the root of the tail, around the anus and inside the rear legs, often resulting in slight hair loss, soreness and in more serious cases cases staining of the coat from sebum. I have had a ruff ride with my dalmatian!, i gave him a good start as i said socialised him with other dogs but regardless of my efforts he still turned into a highly strung, and often very difficult dog to control,
I don’t know about other animals so much but from personal experience I don’t believe for a minute that the amount of white on a paint horse has anything to affect temperment.
Also the ‘white feet’ saying you referred to is not about temperment- white hoof horn is weaker than blue horn, and that is why the number of socks a horse had would have affected the price people would have been willing to pay. Another old saying: ‘A horse is only as good as his hooves’
Erin: When it comes to horses the piebald gene and existence of the Lethal white stated to be quite common especially in the Paint. The Paint to my understanding is known to be direct decendants of the Quarter Horse known for good temperaments. Of course, there are always exception to the rule. The Myth regarding the color of legs and hooves can be considered with two different poems:
The two poems are:
One white foot, buy him.
Two white feet, try him.
Three white feet, be on the sly.
Four white feet, pass him by.
The other says just the opposite:
One white foot, keep him not a day,
Two white feet, send him far away,
Three white feet, sell him to a friend,
Four white feet, keep him to the end.
However, some horse people do believe that black feet tend to be harder than light feet, or more brittle than light feet. Is this really true? To date, no research that indicates there is any proof either way. If this was true, you would expect to see a noticeable difference in health and lameness of different colored horses. However, Congenital Stationary Night Blindness (CSNB)
It has been understood that a small percentage of Appaloosas are affected by both Equine Recurrent Uveitis and Congenital Stationary Night Blindness (CSNB), a condition making it difficult or even impossible to see in relatively low light. Night blind!
Research has now shown that CSNB is a recessive disorder that is directly linked to the leopard complex in Appaloosa horses. DNA test for the LP mutations can also provide clear information as to CSNB.
Genetic testing of the leopard complex (LP) gene may be beneficial for several reasons. The first reason for testing is to confirm that an animal is a true Appaloosa horse. Another important reason is to identify those animals that are homozygous or LP/LP and could be affected by CSNB.
The Gelderlander is/was a such a breed with four white feet, always strong as an ox though these horses are presently and very unfortunately suffering the same problems as some of the rare older pedigree dog breeds.
The magnificently moving and carried Gelderlander was very common before and up until the 1960’s even 70’s as a large elegant (rather spectacular) carriage horse and along with the Groninger (very similar to the original Oldenburger) a heavier horse suitable for ploughing in heavy soils formed the basis of the Dutch Warmblood. These were typical landrace breeds of the region.
The rather too clever Dutch who apply market principles to everything completely transformed these two breeds with the use of TBs and German warmblood stallions plus a few others like the Celle Francais etc. This transformation was quick and merciless. Its uncommon today to even find four white feet in the Dutch Warmblood.
Today they are also endangered breeds which everyone is regretting as they represented an invaluable genetic resource which is no longer available. I remember even in the early 80’s there were a fairly decent number around of the Gelderlander that weren’t F1 crosses but today its like finding dry land in the Netherlands, almost none existent and far worse for the Groninger.
The last typical and recognisable stallion of the Gelderlander type I saw was a two and a half year old dressage prospect in 85. Unfortunately I had a new black Rubinstein colt import in the same group and I was all eyes for him as a licensing prospect for the Oldenburger or Dutch Warmblood register. But what a tall strapping beauty he was. He always came galloping up to greet me with a spectacular strong pounding true stride then passage in neat circles around me as though he had wings, snorting and looking sideways at me before bolting off to join the herd. He was gelded a year later and sent to America for a handsome sum. Of course had I not been sleep walking he should have stayed in Holland as a stallion and I should have made sure of that. I missed him that’s for sure. When I was posted to Brussels a few years later I tried finding out where and what he was up to but in vain.
These days what’s left don’t even look like Gelderlanders.
Now of course those same market principles that led to the creation of the fine Dutch Warmblood are being conveniently brushed under the carpet and the blame is being squarely aimed at KWPN politics on the fall of the Gelderlander. And there is that too of course.
Indeed they had four very strong white feet. (:
I might add the Gelderlander came from a time when there were no registers as such. A true working animal and landrace and unlike many rare pedigree dogs in closed studs books was a significant genetic resource which has been miss managed and for all intensive purposes lost.
The present light riding more versatile “Gelderlander” is a recreation and nothing like the original, but most sadly of course doesn’t represent the same genetic value. It’s a smoke screen of a breed that never existed, what was being ridden was the carriage horse.
Im sure expressing these things broadly is acting as an incentive or rather direct challenge. It wont be long before there suddenly appears Gelderlanders all over the place and true to form. Create a demand and the Dutch achieve miracles…… (:
Anton I consider the following that has been the resuls of not only piebald, merle to merle breeding but lack of color pattern pigmentation. It is not that our canines pigmentation is different, and NOT COATS OF MANY COLORS, but COATS OF MANY PATTERNS.
Why I question the relationship of neurological issues that certainly can affect the temperament and personality is scientific studies that relate to deletion and dilution factor. Could we not say that dilution in white factor is the deletion of pigmentation? http://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1002759
Can anyone even the show champion breeders find an argument to defend breeding over dilution in canines of any breed? It just makes no common sense what has been said by breders of merle to merle or breeding for extreme white canines that offspring are not carrying recessives diseases due to the deletion factor. Be it neurological, heart, blood , or limb deletions including bone and skin diseases. We do understand that the skin is the largest organ of the mammal’s body? I curious has anyone given this any consideration?
It is not only the neurological disorders being studied but the heart problems that increases can not be denied even if they are being ignored.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3559124/ We were aware that Collies like many breeds due to inbreeding especially, father to daughter/mother to son often produced patent diuctus arteriosus for example. Like in the Dobie one can note has it been the breeding protocol …but we know it is from a deletion?
http://www.texaseurodobermans.com/dobermann-health.html
Most Doberman are not white but have breeders being practicing old protocol or just old inbreeding protocol. Either way, it certainly can be pin pointed to the
Breeding Protocol that sorely needs modernization based not on Breeder experiences but Scientific fact that we have been screwing up listening to old breeding theories not FACTS. Lastly for consideration are the Blood Diseases such as VwD which is a recessive that has been genetically identified as a deletion; Now for your consideration the number breeds with Von Willebrand’s Disease which currently are three types in varies breeds. https://www.vetgen.com/canine-vwd.html
I find it strange that the Collie is not listed as VwD 2 is known in the breed?
http://healthypets.mercola.com/sites/healthypets/archive/2013/03/25/von-willebrand-disease.aspx
What genetic process causes this blood disorder?
Thank you Anton for sharing about this once magnificent horse. I looked it up to find photos etc because have never seen one. Sad but interesting that even horses suffer from the fad and fashion of man kind. Seems we should have learned something from all the mistakes one would believe.
Yes. It was discovered when they were almost wiped out already that the best show jumpers were in fact the F1 crosses themselves, nothing better was to come by keeping on breeding away from the original. Having lost the Gelderlander they lost the edge on producing show jumpers and rely heavily on other stud books to produce any now.
Its so lovely to see how the Irish draught has been taken care off. They know it too, F1 ‘s and three quarter breds are the winners so you need a healthy population of draught.
You obviously haven’t a clue about owning a Dalmatian. They are one of the most wonderful breeds on planet earth. Not only are they good looking, but their temperament matches their looks. I have never come across an aggressive Dalmatian in my life. In fact, they are one of the most loving breeds you can get with more personality than all the other breeds put together. Yes, they do have problems, deafness and kidney stones, but which breed doesn’t. My Dalmatian lived to the ripe old age of 15. I lost him 4 months ago and miss all his special ways. The only breed that I will own again. Train wreck in very inappropriate.
Some of comments here only seem a psychological defense mechanism to bury guilt. Several motivations and causes for denial-ism have been proposed, including religious beliefs and self-interest. I am inclined to go with the self-interest. It surely can not be they love the breed not to correct health conditions that handicap and cause extreme pain.
I find the title using the term “Train Wreck” to be applicable to most pure breed AKC registered breeds. Train Wreck can be applied to most AKC pure breeds and many show breeders and their out of date breeding protocols. Giving consideration to the several defensive angry remarks: I guess it is only human to exhibit anger with uncomfortable truths. It is an empirically verifiable reality that dogs that are deaf , blind, crippled, can not breathe or naturally reproduce in pain with conditions such as kidney stones temperaments reveal poor breeding programs.. It is irrational to deny and reject the basic concepts that are well supported and argue scientific fact. Did anyone every tell these individuals that “Beauty is Skin Deep” Personally think many people have health conditions, or family members with health conditions that require their care. Why would they not want to eliminate painful health conditions such as kidney stones? Why would they not want to eliminate blind, deaf and cripple dogs? You bet it is a Train Wreck!
All I want to say is, how would you feel if someone started attacking your beloved Border Collies with half truths and ignorance? EVERY breed has issues. You, sir, have no clue as to what the temperament of a Dalmatian is really like. I seriously doubt you have a single moment of first hand experience with a real life dalmatian. All you have, in regards to temperament, are your THEORIES!!!!! I won’t argue with you further as I would just be repeating what others have said, but I just wanted to ask you a simple question. How would you feel if someone went around giving Border Collies an ignorant and bad reputation that they did not deserve?
Judging by the articles you’ve written though, I doubt you care. Case and point-using an image of a smiling Dalmatian KNOWING that uneducated people are going to see it and think the dog is being aggressive.
I’very always had and will only ever have Dalmatians! What a crock your article is. Keep your OCD neurotic Border Collies to yourself! And don’t bother to email me.
I purchased a Dalmation at 13 years old from what was supposed to be a reputable Illinois breeder. My “sweet” girl was a Disney Dream come true 🙂
Very quickly we realized some red flags that began to wave more vigorously and even multiply as time passed. These behavioral problems became less cute and more frightening every day. The snarling and dominance over the house began. Very shortly after, the snapping and lunging at family members began. Her protection over me was ferocious and unwarranted.
I was devastated and begged my family to see what we could do to find the problem and get a viable solution to save my baby. We saw animal therapists, specialty trainers, a dog psycho analyst and a neurologist. At the end, the only diagnosis was she is a product of inbreeding and as a result experiences random and unforeseeable episodes of viciousness and cannot be trained. She is a danger to anyone who comes in contact.
I again pleaded for her and at 15 had very little pull but managed to get a hold placed on any rash action. Then the inevitable happened and she went for my mothers throat. No training command, no screaming or crying was stopping what I was watching take place. Thankfully my father grabbed the dog and pulled her off of my mom with minimal injury but the sweet dog I knew was gone and her fate was sealed. We had to take her in and explain the situation and the vet demanded she be put to rest since they felt it would only get worse. A very painful, sad and emotional decision but what other choice do you have.
During her 3 short years she bit 7 people, tried to bite others and jumped out of a moving car(at 40 mph) she was fine?!?!. We were very fortunate that this happened in the late 80’s early 90’s and people don’t react the way they do today. Because we certainly would have been sued to say the least.
My point here is, we did everything within our means to train/rehabilitate/heal this furry family member and nothing worked. Out of all of the “experts” that we saw, NO ONE explained what was happening or made it seem so clear the way the writer of this blog has. I firmly believe, NOW, my dog was deaf and I am sure other things such as severe anxiety and health related rage caused by pain played a huge role in her behavior. She often had bladder and kidney infections that were treated but never had a causal diagnosis! We were never told these were common problem in Dal’s.
Reading this has been bittersweet. There is real sadness in my heart, feeling like I could have possibly saved her if I only knew this, then. However I am also relieved because now there is some closure.
I would simply like to say thank you for sharing!!!
Now Cathy agree there is a genetic component to the propensity to develop OCDs, and certain breeds do have a predisposition for certain compulsive behaviors.
Most canine behaviorists do agree that the primary cause of compulsive behavior is stress. An article in Science Daily quoting Andrew Luescher quoted in a January 7, 2010, saying, “You could probably make every dog have compulsive disorder if you provide enough threats or conflict.” Now when the stress of pain due to kidney stones….?
I know this is late, but I was looking for information on diets for dalmatians and I couldn’t resist commenting on this blog. First of all, dalmatians are not the only mammals that produce uric acid, humans do too! Secondly, dark pigmentation, not the lack of, has been tied to animal aggression! Here is a peer-reviewed article: http://www.ferris.edu/isar/bios/rushton/rushton-last-article.pdf. And just as a matter of pointing out, the article from Colorado State University, doesn’t list any of its sources either. Just because it comes from a University doesn’t mean it is free from mistakes, or that it doesn’t need to list its sources.
Dalmatians, like a lot of breeds, need to be carefully selected for temperment issues. And when someone says that temperment issues are not tied to the skin color, it does not mean temperment is are not genetic. Of course they are, which is why one has to find good breeders and know the temperment of the Dals parents. Dachshunds are similar. Sometimes they can be just damn mean but the last 3 I had were sweet, and well socialized. You have to train your dogs, but that doesn’t gurantee a good dog, and neither does good genes. This holds true for many ‘good’ breeds.
Wow Shaun! Holy shit! I’m admittedly not even going past the first page of that article unless you can point me to the parts where a considerable number of African Americans and Europeans with reasonable access to an education and good role models, are equally likely to commit violent crime and end up in jail.
And don’t even begin to compare the nature vs nurture debate with dogs as being comparable.
Human morals and ethics are uniquely human. At age 7 people reach the age of reason. Dogs never reason like we do because they don’t have our cognitive abilities.
You can compare the two to a limited extent. But there are many factors affecting human behavior because of the way we think which I do not think even begin to be relevant to dogs. Eg; It makes no sense to punish a dog for stealing, or vandalism, etc, the way we punish humans.
But of course I’m sure you can see where these suggestions for African Americans can go.
Talk about racism.
People were not purpose bred the way dogs are either. And if anything we have more mixing of the populations than ever before. Dog breeds are experiencing the culmination of isolated gene pools; the opposite situation.
BTW, black labradors, flat coated retrievers, black and tan coonhounds, etc. Ah yes, among the most aggressive dogs ever. 😛
You do know that the picture you have is how most dalmatians greet their owner don’t you? Not aggression.
What’s the matter Chris? Did someone with a Dalmatian piss you off as a kid, so you feel the need to trash talk a kind of dog that alot of other people really love, just so you can pretend to have a bigger dick????
I have Dalmatians I have two of them they are in perfect condition…. ABSOLUTELY NOTHING WRONG WITH THEM….LOVING BEAUTIFUL SMART LOYAL…CAN SEE AND HEAR…
What are you talking about? This is so wrong and non of it is true. Stop writing stupid exts about Dalmatians. Every breed is going to show rage if you don’t work with them. Most of kids today have rage problems because of bad parenting. Have you ever seen a Dalmatian?
I’m glad to see an expert address the issue of Dalmatian tempers. This is indeed a bizarre breed with crazy mood swings.
Have you ever owned a Dalmatian? I have lived with several over nearly 30 years. Like any breed, not all are sweet. But mine were sweet dogs with a wonderful sense of canine humor.
My family and I were lucky. My Dal lived to be 16, not an ounce of aggression, didn’t lose his hearing until he was 13. Sweet guy. My dad and sister each had one. Both were nervous and barked a bit, but no aggression.
You lay claim to Dalmatians having temperament problems, yet you own 4 of the one breed that is rebound for its bad temperaments! Also one of the highest numbers of puppies sold by backstreet breeders – a huge contribution to the aggressive trait they posses!
lay claim = to announce ownership of something
claim = assert the truth of something
rebound = to bounce back
renown = having fame
backstreet = a minor street away from a main road or something done in secret and/or illegally. Also an insipid boy band.
backyard = a plot of land behind a house typically surrounded by a fence.
posses = not a word.
Dalmatians have a well deserved reputation for negative traits no one actually enjoys or wants in the breed. Unproductive liability traits. And yet they persist because being inbred on color is more important, so temperament and health are sacrificed for appearance.
As for your poor attempt at deflection to Border Collies, not sure what point you’re even trying to make.
Border Collies aren’t known at all for aggression nor for poor temperaments. Not to say they’re immune. And I don’t see any indication that they are one of the “highest numbers of puppies sold by [backyard breeders]” or how this supposedly contributes to the “aggressive trait” they possess.
Border Collies are an extreme breed, they are highly intelligent, biddable, and modified prey-drive turned up high. In my experience BCs are more likely to be aloof or shy than aggressive. And all of this is wanted for the extreme performance they are asked to do.
Of course this doesn’t make them an ideal buy it and forget it pet. But no one us under the misnomer that they’re anything else.
The temperament problems in Dalmatians don’t serve any purpose to anyone. They’re a bug, not a feature.
You are a cunt. To generalise all dogs like this is harmful. Go fuck yourself.
LMAO. Yeah, dogs, bred by man in to breeds. The ultimate in attempted uniformity and generalization.
It’s idiotic you’d fail to recognize this. Dogs are not bred to be diverse individuals, they’re bred to a platonic ideal that pushes conformity.
Or maybe you missed the memo.
You do realize that the Dal on the left in the photo may well have been “smiling.” Many Dalmatians “smile ” by pulling back their lips. They are not snarling,, the generallyvdo it when begging for a treat, when caught being naughty as a method of appeasement, etc. I have had several Dals over the years and only one had temperament issues. He was overly protective on his home ground, but not when somewhere else. Also, the stone issue can be minimized by proper feeding and hydration.
You do realize I wrote an entire article on dogs not “smiling,” or do you intend to lecture me like an idiot who thinks that you can call something that’s not at all the equivalent of a smile in humans and pretend it means your dog is happy and grinning?
http://www.border-wars.com/2013/07/dogs-dont-smile.html
I read your article and have a few small comments to make. The first is in regards to the photograph at the beginning of this blog which shows two Dals bearing their teeth in a submissive smile behavior. There is no aggression being portrayed, yet I’m sure an uninformed individual can mistake this submission for aggression.
Now, as a long time show breeder who keeps a small number of dogs, I can accept many points in your article. I do not, however, accept the presentation. Dalmatians are extreme piebald dogs with a modified tick pattern that we recognize as spots. We breed for color inside the ear canal (the lack of which causes deafness to white dogs), as well as color on the nose leather and eye rims. This “trim” is important as it is the difference between albinism issues and healthy expression of the coat pattern. Many Dal puppies are born with patches, a less extreme version of the piebald gene. But, we, as breeders, are aware of this issue and are working to educate other breeders and enthusiasts so we might keep our beloved dogs and make them healthier.
To date, we have no way to check the color within the neural tube and subsequent structures, but we are testing temperament in puppies and doing our best to breed outgoing, loving companion and working animals rather than those who seem to truly be missing something essential in their temperament. We can recognize dogs who have these problems, and the standard talks of darker pigment being desired and temperament issues (usually stated as shyness) to be avoided. This does not cover the neurolgical deficits you discussed which may affect more than brain chemistry/temperament. We, the DCA, are working to study issues in our breed with hope to finding a cure to the problem.
As you stated, changing just one gene will change the uric acid/urate stone formation problem in the breed. We can manage the genetic disease through hydration techniques which will keep the dogs bladders flushed. Males are affected more than females which taught us early neuter also needs to be avoided as part of the management of the dogs. And, as the ultimate solution, the healthy gene was copied into the breed. This gene may take 50 or 100 years to infiltrate every dog, and testing would need to be implimented at some point to avoid replication of the faulty gene. Unfortunately, the LUA dogs are not yet perfect examples of breed ype and structure, but many are increasing the frequency of the gene without making our shallow gene pool dry up completely.
Please understand this is a long process as we cannot yet splice the desired copy of a gene directly into the genome of an individual, we must use the tried and true method which includes a lot of time in the recipe. Personally, I would recommend another splice line, from a different family, so we can duplicate the effort and, perhaps, reduce the time it will take to get the gene completely changed over. Having been born with a genetic disorder where a gene does not work right, I may have special interest in this area.
If we can truly get the LUA gene to be universal and rid the breed of the HUA gene and associated disorder, and can test for neural tube melanin/eumelanin deficiencies, we may make inroads into the problems of breeding an extreme piebald dog. But, make no mistake, Dalmatians are not the only breed to have extreem piebalds in their genome (I’m not sure if we are the only breed to support this color over other expressions of the piebald gene). I do know that I love the breed. I adore my spotted clowns and, if I must support their bodies as they hit 13, 14, and higher because their nerves have greater problems than other breeds (and I’m not convinced they are any different in this area from non-piebalds), then I will support my dogs. After all, I have a connective tissue disorder and they support me through pinched nerves, subluxations, and dislocations.
We did not start the fire (design the breed), but we have fallen in love with it and work to improve it with the knowledge accumulated by breeding dogs!
I find this article somewhat confusing because there are lots of other dog breeds that focus on producing the colour white and the dogs are fine. I have a Coton de Tulear (she is all white except for champaign colouring on her ears) and her skin is very pink. She is so calm and laid back as is common for the breed.
Why are Coton’s okay, why are Bickon’s okay? I’ve also met half a dozen American Pit Bulls that were easily 90% white with a few little black spots who had wonderful personalities.
I also worked on a dairy farm as a teenager and Brown Swiss cows could be just as likely to be crazy as a holstein.
There has to be something a little more going on with your article then what you are really saying because it’s not applied to other dog breeds.
First off, your article is filled with biased information and that makes it hard to view as viable. Your article consists of bashing and anger, towards a breed that has been treated as status symbols instead of living creatures. I grew up on a farm with horses with four white feet and blue eyes and they didn’t exhibit any traits of neural behavior issues what’s so ever, melanin is a complex polymer structure that provides pigment to the skin, eyes, etc. Nueromelanin is found in the brain, IF that is missing than you will have behavioral issues. I have had many dogs growing up, our first that I can say I had the ability to choose were two border collie litter mates they are great dogs, mind you they have their genetics too and can be prone to deafness, I understand that it is an occurrence in white dogs, but ours were mainly black and the one with this problem again was black with just a small line of white on his face. Honestly it boils down to the genetics and the dog itself, we just lost our sheep dog mix, she was the best, she was mainly white and had blue eyes, but she was gentle had the perfect temperament and was the smartest dog I have ever had the honor of owning, but she developed a malignant tumor in the lining of her urethra: she was a mix of old English sheepdog and border collie, again it boiled down to her genetics, she was one years old. We just recently adopted a Dalmatian, and she’s very sweet, she came from a home where she had been mistreated, she is very timid around men, and starts shivering if they come too close, but with recent socializing she has been going up to people and letting them pet her and sits calmly. Mind you she is only 5-6 months old. She has been just as easy to train as my Border Collies (which will always be my favorite breed because they have a special place in my heart, but all dogs have their qualities) She is quick to respond and is extremely smart. ANY breed can be fearful or aggressive. That’s like saying a pitbull is just made mean, no I don’t believe that because look at their history, pitbulls were nanny dogs before they were bred to be fighting dogs, Dalmatians were used for a plethora of things. In fact their history is all over which is why they have a hard time placing their origin, they are an old breed. To say that Dalmatian are just Bad is completely ignorant. These dogs are really fantastic, and to be honest yes, Disney started a fad breed, the reason why there is so many problems with certain breeds is because people breed them for profit and it does cause problems, Look at puppy Mills. Poor breeding causes poor results, it causes health issue for the mother and the litter and it does effect them mentally and behaviorally. Pardon my rant for a moment but the whole reason why Disney gets blamed and backyard breeders are shamed boils down to the fact that they used them as a symbol, people breed them because they know people want a pretty spotted dog, Disney used them because they knew it would sell, the mass public that says they’ve always wanted a Dalmatian leads back to “101 Dalmatians” which if you want to get technical it was a book written by Dodie Smith back before Disney turned it into a production. Like many things though the book was subjected to creative liberties after Disney took over. Also a reason why Dalmatians get so anxious too is because they HAVE to have exercise, and if you have breeders that are keeping them penned or put on a line in the backyard it causes them a lot of fustration as would it a Collie. Both are made to run and be active. I will end this with, if you’re trying to make Dalmatians seem like demons than that’s your own warped opinion, I agree people should think twice before adopting, rescuing or buying a Dal. If their looks is the only reason you are considering them as a pet than you are vain people and I think it shows why this breed gets a bad wrap. If you’re looking for a dog that is playful, Loyal, active, Intelligent, and adaptable, but don’t want a dog that can be stubborn, sheds night and day, needs a lot of attention, and has to have a low purine diet to avoid having urinary stones. Not for you. But they are not monsters, like many other breeds they have their unique qualities and problems, but they are NOT just terrible genetic problems as put in this article.
We have 3 Dalmatians liver and white.Popcorn is the girl her husband is Leroy Brown and we kept one of their pups 2015 we named him Ocker because he has spots on the shape of the southern cross like the Australian flag and Ocker is a nick name for an Aussie.He is totally deaf, he is a bit naughty but not often, we have taught him sign language and they all smile wouldnt change a thing . POPCORN is highly strung with storms so put a storm jacket on her reduces about 60% of her anxiousity. Leroy is so layed back .
I couldn’t agree more with your article. Thank you for illuminating the truth.
You sound like you just hate Dalmatians. From one journalist to another I hope you remember that you should leave bias out of the articles you write.
My Dalmatian is the sweetest family dog one can ever dream to have. She cuddles with us at night and is a sweetheart to the ones she knows and loves. I advise you not to talk badly about animals that many people own and keep as dear friends, you should be ashamed of yourself picking on a poor breed to just make money to satisfy yourself.
My dog is a mutt. She is maybe 1/3 dalmatian. She has some weird “stranger danger” issues but otherwise is a great protector and friend for my baby and the family. I realize this is directed at purebred dalmatians, I just want to say my part dalmatian is white as can be and awesone.
I own a 3 year old dalmatian. The most beautiful, well behaved, calm and friendly dog you’ll ever know. Best trained and behaved dog around the entire neighborhood hands down. Every day we meet fully pigmented stupid missbehaved aggressive unhealthy dogs. He is 100% healthy and hears my whistle from a mile away and comes flying to me. I have also ridden horses all my life and to say that a less pigmented horse has worse personality than a pigmented one is the dumbest shit i ever heard. In fact, black horses (as well as dogs) have a reputation for being more difficult. Pretty much every dog breed has been over bred in some way and may have some kind of health problem. You even talk about the pigmentation in humans?? You are taking this way to far.
I can’t believe I wasted my time reading this trash.
Actually one of the most disgusting articles I have ever read. Who ever you are you should feel ashamed.
I have a purebred Dalmatian and she is the smartest puppy and has the most beautiful nature about her. She loves her family so much and she loves meeting new people and puppies.
She was toilet trained at 7 weeks in 3 days. She can sit,shake, high five, stand, hug, kiss, sit pretty and learned almost all of these by the time she was 10 weeks old.
She has never harassed us when we eat and she new to sit when waiting for her meals without ever being told.
She loves playing and going for walks. But she also loves to get up on the bed for a big cuddle and nap with myself and my partner.
She’s also not deaf and she is not aggressive at all.
I feel like you have something against the breed which is a shame because if you have time and energy to train and exercise your Dalmatian you’ll have a beautiful gentle little family member who adores you.
And for the health issues. Yes the can be deaf and they can have uti problems but every dog has its own health issues. You need to be aware of what your dogs are and care for them the right way.
Every dog is going to act the way the OWNER treats and trains it.
If you have no time to look after any dog the right way do not invest. They are life long commitments. Don’t blame the breed of dog.
FYI
The photo of the Dalmatian showing it’s teeth is the classic Dalmatian smile.
Just in case you’re trying to make them look aggressive for you charming article.
F*ck you!
Interesting. The urinary problem is a given. Owners must supply a low purine diet, and lots of clean water. Deafness is likewise a significant problem. I am not qualified to express an opinion as to how, why, or what one could do about. I am afraid I find your argument on temperament not born out by the experience of long ownership. Indeed it is the Dalmatians temperament that attracts people to the breed. They are challenging dogs to own well. They are not normally stupid. They are not normally aggressive, or dangerous. What they are is a breed that needs a huge amount of exercise, and because they are intelligent, a lot of stimulation. They hate to be left, and even if inactive, will nonetheless want to be with you. But they are not immediately subservient. So if your training them, there has to be something in it for them, or they simply become bored, and will, do something else. They are not natural stick collectors, for instance. The third time, its boring, ‘Go get your own stick, you threw it away’. Its this individuality, while not being a rebel, that I find their defining quality. I have rescued a number of poorly treated Dalmatians, They are not irredeemable. Given time, trust, and love, they become extraordinarily loyal. Dogs beaten with sticks, to play with sticks (normally destroying them in the process – intelligent you see. Get rid of the thing that used to hurt me). Shoes eaten from the inside out, as to start with the crime is invisible. Smart. For temperament, I think the bigger problem is the dog looks more attractive than the demands it requires of the owner to have, and own well. To many do not get the home, and care, that they need. A Dalmatian, with the Dally cockyness bred out, would be of little interest to me. Its like a Ferrari with a diesel engine. None of which really contradicts the basic facts of your research. But I do wonder if you have been unfortunate with your acquaintance with the breed. And yes, training your dog to show the guilt complex is not fair. Dallys naturally smile, but normally only to those they will take orders from, and like. It is an over stated submission response, but its not in that form, a snarl. Dallys can be guard dogs, and I can tell you. You will know the difference if the dog means it.
I was interested on a LUA dalmatian, but the prices were insanely steep. I got mine from Amish folk who breed on an as needed basis because the dog is popular for its endurance and comfort around horses. My rescue just didn’t have the genes to keep up with my 10 to 15 mile runs or my long day hikes that would push 30 miles. I needed a high energy, hardy, endurance animal that could outhike me. I highly suspected bilateral deafness despite him being quite spotty which was later confirmed by the vet but he knows ASL and it doesn’t slow him down. His amazing temperament makes up for it. Hyper friendly with all people and other playful dogs. The jury is still out if he will have HUA complications but none so far. But I agree with your article. Just wish LUA wasn’t so difficult to get a hold of. But I love my baby so much.
I have owned and loved several Dalmatians since 1992. Not one was aggressive. Not one was deaf. Two of the males has issues with bladder stones (males have a bone in the penis which blocks more easily), but diet and allopurinol prevented future issues. All but two have been rescues. If I ever buy a puppy in the future—unlikely due to my age—I would buy a LUA puppy. And I don’t understand why you are picking on Dals? Why not Cocker Sosnieks (Cocker Rage?) and other breeds with generic health issues like displaysia? It seems to me you are making a generalized statement that because some Dals have a lot of white they must be aggressive based on Cows!
Utter rubbish.
Author needs to own one, then comment. Just wasted 10mins of my life scrolling through this tripe!!
Actually the author uses a photo where these dogs are smiling and expressing happiness (mine does it as well when I arrive home, it is very funny). And despite this picture he writes about aggression and other defects of this breed. He lost his credibility in the first 10 seconds. This article is written by frustration and sounds like it’s based on speculation of some gossip/incomplete or a wrongly picked bad experience. Please don’t write rubbish based on your fantasy. This breed I tell you is the most interesting, most intelligent breed ever. But they are stubborn that is the basis of their incredible endurance. The only negative I can tell you about my dalmatians is the infinite energy that they have. It is very exhausting to keep them busy.
Dalmatians are a train wreck mainly due to deafness, shyness and mostly due to the quality of having aggressive nature. But here are some tips which can help you know how to stop a dog from jumping, read more!
I do not think that the author is “demonizing” Dalmatians, as some have claimed. It may not be the individual dog itself but the concept of Dalmatians that is morally repugnant to him. I’m not sure why a valid post received so much backlash. I personally love Dalmatians, but similarly to the pug, the breed primarily exists for its aesthetic “appeal.”
Perhaps the only point I’d disagree with is that backyard breeders are not to be blamed for an unruly dog with an aggressive temperament. It is always advisable to find a reputable breeder as good breeding can negate the genetic predisposition these dogs have to be neurotic. In ways that mimic the diathesis-stress model for humans, this genetic vulnerability Dalmatians have can be dormant, which would explain why many Dalmatian owners on this page have friendly dogs. That being said, even the best breeders will sometimes yield aggressive dogs, due to nature/genetics.
Interesting read, cheers!