Posted on 05/14/2018 12:55:08 PM PDT by kanawa
For a purebred dog and, on occasion, even a first-generation hybrid, breed-inference services often just confirm what the dog owner already knows.
Sometimes a pedigree is available, tracing back through multiple generations of purebred ancestors and providing essentially complete information about the pet’s ancestry.
In other cases, an owner’s extensive experience leads to correct intuition that ears that floppy together with a nose that keen must indicate complete or near-complete beagle ancestry.
By contrast, when applied to investigate the ancestry of a mutt, DNA-based inference often yields surprising conclusions.
(Excerpt) Read more at winter2018.iaabcjournal.org ...
RDO Ping
I wonder what would happen if you submitted a ‘Dog DNA’ sample to one of those ‘ancestry’ outfits?..................
Mixed breeds are sooooo much healthier.
Myth.
They are BS on humans, and BS on dogs.
They need to refine it more from what I see, and guarantee they’re not just messing with us. How are we really to know what is going on behind closed doors?
When DNA reports (NatGeo) declare German Shepherds to be basically Molosser types, I know it’s hooey that cannot be trusted.
We were just talking about doing this... I have two dogs I rescued I rescued at different tines in my town. I know they were both born here. Although they are not the same size, they look so alike and it could be they are related. I just think it would be fun to find out.
I used to think DNA testing to identify breed was not possible.
It seems over the last decade or so testing has become more refined.
Hopefully, it will continue to be refined and increasingly accurate.
The authors do end with this cautionary summary...
“As with any new technology, breed inference is an exciting opportunity that introduces some unresolved challenges.
Many dog owners intrigued to learn more about the origins of their pet will surely appreciate having a window into which breeds contributed to the unique genetics of their mutt.
You might even earn the rights to speculate that your dog’s excellent stamina at high altitude comes from her Lhasa Apso grandparent (Li et al., 2014)!
Still, we urge owners to be cautious and remember that a variety of problems can compromise the reliability of inferences,
all the while remaining optimistic that inference will improve as reference data accrue.”
My dog identifies as a cat.
Hopefully useful in a couple of cases:
if you live somewhere with BSL (Breed Specific Laws) that prohibit pit-bulls they can prove you have an American Bulldog (similar appearance, VERY different temperament. and more importantly to possibly give a clue as to if your dog might be genetically predisposed to certain conditions.
“My dog identifies as a cat.”
Don’t let the dog watch or read any more news. It’s confusing the poor thing.
Not really provable-my vet believes that the oldest breeds are healthiest-those that have not been crossbred to change their appearance, size etc-and that are not high on the popularity list-which invites over-breeding-such as what has happened to German Shepherds and other popular large breed dogs. That all produces a higher risk of health problems/defects and a shorter life for the dog. I think she is right-I prefer the larger working/guard breed dogs as companions, and I always purchase a puppy from an AKC recommended kennel-never an adult dog-so that they become part of the pack along with the cats and they are taught to recognize me as the alpha leader from day one, which greatly minimized the chance of attack and bites on family members-I haven’t owned a dog that was not on the “bad dog” list in many years-and I have never had a badly-behaved dog.
I had two German Shepherds-they died at 12 and 13 respectively and both had arthritis. Since they are longer lived, I chose a Chow Chow for my next dog-he died in his sleep at 17, having never had a serious problem-he just slowed down and stopped. I got my Siberian Husky from an AKC sled-and show kennel in WA, near the Canadian border-she stopped in her sleep nearly 2 years ago, having never had a problem at all-she was 4 months shy of 18. Long healthy lives for dogs that weighed 85 and 80 lbs respectively-both of those breeds are centuries old, and have not been tinkered with by breeders much-neither breed is terribly popular or in demand enough to have been overbred...
The only canine DNA projects that are worthwhile at this time are those that are being done for research. For example, there’s one now for Golden Retrievers that collects the DNA of participating Goldens as puppies and then follows their health and development over their lifetimes. The idea is to identify the genetic markers asociated with diseases (e.g., cancers) and other problems.
“My dog identifies as a cat.”
Male or female?
I certainly agree with you-information like that could go a long way to prevent over breeding/breeding that reproduces life-shortening traits for the sale of perfect breed confirmation and looks. Maybe even put brakes on those AKC breeders who operate puppy mills for the petstore trade supplying the top listed breeds-those places are doggie hell...
I don’t get why knowing what breeds are in your non-purebred dog’s ancestry-and both my non-purebred shelter cats are convinced it is just going to make the dogs breed snobbish...
Some breeds have health problems because of design. The pushed in face breed who have breathing problems because they have been bred for flatter faces is one such health problem. If you breed two very flat faced breeds together the fact that it is a mixed breed will not help the problem. It is a design flaw.
A number of the toy dogs have fragile bone problems. If you breed two different toy breeds together this will not make the problem go away necessarily.
Instead of having a healthier dog a mixed breed may end up with the problems of both it's parents.
That’s odd. Two of my purebreds lived past 18 and two others lived to see 17.
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