[ Post a Response | Working Cane Corso Italiano Forum ]
Posted by Cory on 3/14/2008, 8:42 pm, in reply to "Re: Breeding"
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First of all, when I was referring to horses, I was not referring to quarter horses. QH's are used for a very specific purpose, and actually many are bred with appaloosa's and paints. The horses I am referring to are high performance sport horses. Typically for eventing, jumping, and even dressage. By infusing larger warmbloods such as hanoverians, trakehners, and oldenburgs with lighter horses like a thoroughbred, they get wonderful horses, that are now (in eventing and jumping) even surpassing those that are warmbloods alone. Many of the mares in the Oldenburg registry approved mare books are in fact are thoroughbreds. So yes, this does happen. These horses aren't $5000 QH that we see around here. Many of them sell from anywhere between 30,000- 200,000. And yes, they are from 'big name' stables. They will absolutely 'benefit' the breed as you say.
You are trying to put words in my mouth. Of course breeding two breeds with high incidences of hip dysplasia will not reduce the risk of having a dysplastic dog. I absolutely agree with hip and elbow testing, it makes me very sad to think of all of these corsos out there having these problems, especially at such a young age. (I have an honours biology degree by the way, and am doing my masters thesis on this topic, which is why I brought it up here- I am hoping to dispel some notions!) Anyways, if you were to breed a german shepherd (which have a high incidence of dysplasia) with say an azores fila (I actually can't find any incidences of hip problems with these dogs, and breeders say this is isn't a problem within the dogs), this is through random sampling, you would ABSOLUTELY decrease the incidence of hip dysplasia among the dogs. And crossing these over time would lead to even less incidences of HD. HD has a genetic component, but if we breed 2 dogs with certified hips, you may still get an HD dog, so your argument doesn't hold up, sorry. Of course a mix could get HD. It is just less likely when bred to a dog with lower incidences, and you don't need to do hip and elbow testing to determine this. This comes through the idea that if two different breeds of dogs mate, they will have likely met haphazardly. They are less likely to carry the same detrimental alleles than a purebred. When you get a small population, these incidences would go up, even with a mixed breed.
SO I have to laugh a bit here, as you say go look at the OFA. So, on the OFA website it states the hip dysplasia rates for certain breeds up until 2007. Cane Corsos are #10 on the list. 40.1% of dogs tested were dysplastic, and only 6.6% received excellent scores. Great danes on the other hand, sit at 11.2% Excellent hips, and only 12% were dysplastic. Surely using simple common sense you can determine that breeding a dane and a corso (say neither had been tested) will dramatically decrease the risk of HD in the puppies.
So you are saying "it doesn't change the facts", and I am not sure what facts you have presented other than giving your personal experience (sorry doesn't mean much)saying that you have seen mixed dogs with EPI,and HD and whatever. I believe I have discussed HD, and will now move on to EPI. Typically detrimental alleles are recessive right. That is why some are carriers and never show signs of the disease. So if Epilepsy is 'e', and Non Epilepsy is "E" Then if you breed two epileptic dogs you will get epilepsy in all puppies as both would be "ee", (you get one allele from each of the parents) (FYI- both must be ee to have epilepsy).
So now we take a carrier, it will be "Ee", if we breed it to another carrier "Ee", then if we have 4 puppies (to keep it simple) one will be epileptic 'ee', one will have no epilepsy 'EE', and the other 2 will be carriers 'Ee'. Now if we breed dogs that do not have the disease or carry it, they are EE, we will have %100 epi free puppies. If we breed a dog that has epilepsy to a dog that doesn't, then all will be carriers. Ok, so I think I have explained this part enough. Danes have a very very low incidence of epilepsy, they are more susceptible to other sorts of illnesses (that a corso is not), I will not talk about these as it doesn't really pertain to the question. Because this disease is not found often in danes (certainly not as often as with the corsos), if you were to breed the two together, you would markedly decrease the risk. There are also many other reasons why a dog might have a seizure, and many are misdiagnosed with EPI, and never have another attack (if you are interested I can give you a list of other reasons that may cause a dog to seize)
Ok, so I think I will stop there with the science portion. And my point was earlier, I am not trying to better the breed. It would not be a dog that was passed off as a corso or something. If you wanted to infuse some new blood, it would have to be done over time, using a dog with perhaps 1/8 of something else. I love corsos, I really do, and you know I don't blame you for loving them too. What I wanted was to generate a discussion about the health of dogs, this really is a good way to illustrate it. I do have a corso, and I seriously do wish I could breed her to a dane, I already have one picked out that I love, (I would take the dane in a second if he would sell him to me!), I do not think that this is something I would do simply because I don't have the time to devote to raising puppies right now. If I see one come up for sale, perhaps I would get another.
I ask that you please do not compare me to an unethical breeder. I understand that you are making a point that most mutts don't have a pedigree and health history, but what if they did? You breed two registered dogs, and you would know their background. You test both parents for any disorders they may have, and then make a decision to breed. How is that bad breeding? Anyways, again, you need to think about this as 'what is most healthy for the dogs', not 'I want my dog to look a certain way, and therefore I will risk genetic problems to get it, or keep it that way'.
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