At it again?

Oh yes, we were trying to find ways to save dog shows. First reform the standards. Then give each group of dog owners their own kingdom, a sort of breaking up the show breeder monopoly on claiming to be best.

We have:

1. WORKING. (Their breeds are already developed to specialize in this work.)

The Hunters. Their domain is all dogs that hunt.

The Ranchers. Their domain is all herding, droving, and flock bonding dogs, tha actually work with livestock on a ranch or farm.

The Mushers. Their domain is all dogs that pull sleds or carts, and all sea dogs (transportation and draft dogs).

The Watchers. Their domain is all dogs that are kept to bark an alarm or scare away trespassers, and yard dogs that actually guard an enclosed area. (Only dogs NOT able to jump a 6' fence.)

The Patrollers. Their domain is actual police dogs, military dogs, and shutzhund dogs that attack on command, yet have to be trustworthy in public. (Only dogs that can jump a 6' fence.)

2. PROFESSIONAL (These have dogs that can NOT be sorted by breeds. Dogs must be trained for these tasks.)

The Sniffers. Their domain is all dogs that do search and rescue, city tracking, sniffer work, scent matching, arson sniffing, border patrol sniffing, customs sniffing, medical sniffing, drug sniffing, or other sniffing work except hunting.

The Special. Their domain is all the dogs that have special permission to go into pubic places as an assistance dog for handicapped people. or to cheer people in need. Guide dogs, hearing dogs, wheelchair dogs, etc, and visiting dogs taken to hospitals and such places to visit with people in a challenging situation.

3. COMPETITVE DOG SPORTS

The Stars. Their domain is all the dogs that perform obedience, drills, acting, or such competitive performances that require training.

The Ballsport People. Their domain is all dogs that are entered in ballsport type event. Excludes bloodsports and sports that involve animals other than dogs, or aggression. Includes agility, lure coursing, ball herding, circus acts, stunts, and all sports that involve balls.

The Field Trail People. Their domain is COMPETITIVE hunting type events. (Actual hunting, not as a sport, but people who take their dogs hunting, is covered under "hunters".)

The Show Dog People. Their domain is competitive dog shows judged on appearance, conformation, or gait.

4. PET DOGS & HOUSEDOGS (A House Dog must have been bred to be especially good at living in a house. They must be easily and completely house trained, not need to crated, not be yappy or noisy, must be good with children and guests, and have a coat that is easy to care for and which doesn't shed much.)

The Pocket Dog People. Their domain is all House Dogs for people who want a tiny, carryable dog, that travels well.

The Little Dog People. Their domain is all House Dogs for people who want a cat sized or twice cat sized dog, that is especially good as in indoor, uncrated pet.

The Middlepet Dog People. Their domain is all House dogs 22 to 44 pounds, that are bred to be good with children, and good alone in the house.

The Large Dog People. Their domain is all House dogs 44 to 66 pounds that are bred to be very tolerant, gentle, easy going, good with children and the elderly.

The Bigger Dog People. Their domain is all House dogs 66 to 88 pounds, bred to be exceptionally gentle with all people.

The Giant Dog People. Their domain is all House dogs 88 pounds or more, and bred to be very gentle with all people.

5. THE CANINE PRESERVERS

The Dogish People. Their domain is all dogs that are created from mixing with wild dogs or feral breeds with domestic dogs, in order to preserve the wild or feral type or genes.

The Wild Dog People. Their domain is all kept wild canines or feral type dogs, mostly unmixed with modern breeds of domestic dogs, to preserve them. Wolves, coyotes, foxes, etc.
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This clear sort of division, keeps each type of persons from trampling and taking over areas that they are not breeding for, just selling to. This is very important.

People without flocks of sheep should not breed 'sheepdogs' which they sell as herding dogs.

People who keep their dogs in kennels, crates, cages, or yards should never sell their puppies as pets - they have not selected which dogs to mate based on how good the dogs are in the house, or on a leash, or how good they are with children or guests.

These are the traits pet people usually buy a pet House Dog for - not looks; when pet people buy a House Dog for looks, it is usually because they assume the puppy comes from dogs that are good with children or can be kept in a house.

OT Global Warming - Climate Change

Over on retrieverman, the post on the talking gorilla KoKo (she uses sign language) got a bit off topic and strayed to global warming. I want to interrupt the series here on thepdkc to comment on global warming.

http://retrieverman.wordpress.com/2009/12/04/koko-and-all-ball

Is it a good thing, or a bad thing?

Depends on if you ask a guy while he is shovelling snow in the winter or while he is mowing the yard in the summer, doesn't it?

If the ice sheet is getting thinner, is it because more ice is melting during the summer (warming) or because less snow is falling in the winter (drying - less falling moisture).

Drying of the weather - less rain, less snow, less moisture, is different than temperature change. AFAIAC, drying is a huge problem - in many areas, seedlings die without enough rain in the spring to support them until their roots are deep enough.

Our cereal grains are annual crops - they die in the fall, and most be regrown from seeds every spring (unlike trees that can live for thousands of years).

Warming itself doesn't worry me. As retrieverman said, in the 70s there was a big scare over a coming ice age - and a gasoline shortage - where we would be cold and out of fuel.

As for rising oceans from icebergs. No. Melting ice and snow ON LAND can cause water levels to rise. But the icebergs are like popcorn, bigger than what they were before they were popped, but weighing the same.

Melt an iceberg and the water from it will fill about the same area that that the iceberg did. Terrierman mentions that this morning as "displacement", as why concrete ships float.

AFAIK, you could melt the entire north polar icecap and the ocean level will not rise any. If I remember right, ice takes up MORE room than water - but I doubt that melting the north polarcap will DROP the ocean level, because some of the iceberg are floating above sea level. I think it evens out.

Now if melting the north polar ice cap caused Greenland to melt, it might raise ocean levels a little. And IF that spread to the antarctic (south pole) and IF it could melt the south pole - that I do believe would raise ocean levels a bit.

The north pole is little more than a giant ice cube held in place by a few islands.

But the south pole is a continent that is covered with ice and snow.

Warmer ocean water could melt the north pole - which would be very good for shipping! (AFAIK, no animals live on the polar ice cap, although I guess some sea mammals might go there some part of the year).

But to melt the south pole, air temperature must be warmer. (Penguins and some seals live along the coast - but no animals live inland).

So, would melting the north polar ice cap hurt anything? Or would it help temperature?

As for melting icecaps raising water levels. Get out a glass, fill it with ice, pour water in it, cover the top of the glass with something flat like a saucer or small plate so that the glass is completely filled to the very top but no ice bobs above the surface, dry up all the water split around the glass.

As the ice melts, does any of it overflow the glass? That will tell you about melting icebergs in the ocean.

PS - you might have to sop up condensation from the glass - this is NOT water flowing out of the glass. It is the water that jumps out of the air to cling onto the cold surface of the glass.

Kasper Hauser

You don't hear about people being outraged over dogs with kennel syndrome anymore.

Is it that people care less about it? Or that they haven't heard about it? Or that we now have it too?

I went looking for a link to post, explaining what kennel syndrome was.

But the post I found described a different condition, although they called it kennel syndrome.

What I am talking about is where the dog was left in a stark environment for so long that it's brain fails to develop. This is why breeders were urge to sell their puppies before they were 4 months old.

What was on the net were a couple of articles about imprinting. I guess I could have dug deeper, but I think it will be easier to just explain.

Strange, the other part of this, is not the same as I was taught either. Wikipedia's post on Kasper Hauser is nothing at all like I was taught about him.

Casper Hauser was a subject that teachers didn't just dutifully teach, it was a subject that they liked to talk about. My parent knew the tale, teachers frequently used it as an example for their point of view.

Like: Women should not be allowed to work, so their babies can get full attention, and not grow up like Casper Hauser.

This is because, back then it was common for working wives to just leave the baby alone in the house in a playpen, and have a neighbor come over every four hours to feed and change the baby. It was not unusual for babies to be left alone until school age. Some had no knowledge of the world - they were kept in a room with a locked door;

other children had the opposite - they wandered the streets with a pack of other children (like Our Gang?) until old enough for school.

Now that we have day care, where little kids can play with other little kids, it almost seems like isolation to NOT put a pre-schooler in day care once or twice a week so that he can explore relationships with other children.

Kasper Hauser, was also used as an example of why we should study hard. Someone would ask the teacher why we have to learn this junk we will never use, and we would get told that we didn't want to end up like Casper Hauser - our brains needed to learn something every day to develop normally.

Kasper Hauser was said to have been a 'lab rat' (an 'animal' use in an experiment).

In Europe, each area had it's own language, and dialects. Much of a student's time was spent learning other languages. (They didn't have Google Translate This Page or Babblefish, they didn't have electricity).

The holy grail of the time was to find a way for all of Europe to speak one language. The study of languages was very important then for political unity. Animals don't talk, so they couldn't be used in experiments on language. But birds have song, and so studies were done on bird song.

Some scientist found that the eggs of some song birds could be removed from a nest - and the male birds would still sing their species mating song at puberty.

It was hypothesized that people were meant to suddenly start speaking at puberty, but that we had outsmarted ourselves, and since we are all one species, we should speak the same language.

It was believed that children (clever little 'birdies' that they are), mimicked adult languages and thereby, ruined their ability to speak the natural human language at puberty, and that this corruption of natural language had been passed down through the generations.

So 2 scientists, paid a woman who couldn't speak (deaf-mute?) to raise a baby (Kasper Hauser) without him ever hearing speech. She and her husband (who did not speak to his deaf wife) lived in a rented cottage way off where Kasper would never hear people outside.

The woman kept him in one room, and raised him like one might a hog. She fed him, but ignored him. The husband attacked Kasper if he tried to leave the room.

After puberty, one of the scientist came to find what language Casper spoke. Casper didn't speak any language. The scientist tried teaching him language, but later took him to the city where the other scientist lived and dumped Casper Hauser there.

That's what I was taught.

There was a study on rats which proved the point, rats raised in isolation were retarded and their brains under developed. But even older rat's brains would develop if removed from the isolation and deprived environment and given an enriched environment - according to what I was taught in school.

Found this little book, that you can scroll through and read:
http://books.google.com/
enter: Casper Hauser an account of an individual kept in a dungeon.
It was written in 1833, and is a short read.

It is interesting that alligators raised in the dark, grow very very differently than those raised in the light - they are said to grow very quickly, and reach huge size in a few years.

This, of course, is cruel, like keeping long haired shows dogs in a cold dark basement in the belief that the darkness and cold will make them grow super long coats.

How accurate can are guesses about the intelligence of animals be, when they are raised in cages, or taken from their natural abode and tested in a strange environment?

Even those watched in the wilds, have such uneducated minds, that we don't really know what they could be if taught concepts in a manner they could understand.

What IQ would a man have, before he had a culture or any learning from previous generations?

Judging the inbreds.

If the standards can't easily be changed, can the judging be changed? Can there be a rule made like the rule that applies to all breeds: "All male dogs must have 2 testicles, fully descended in the scrotum"?

Can that universal rule be expanded upon to read things like the dog must be healthy, move well, not have saggy skin, -

- not have loose lower lips that cause the saliva to run out of the dogs mouth (yucky for the owners & dry mouth for the dog - AFAIK, only useful for Frankensteins that want to measure saliva production (Pavlov?), and I don't think scientist do that same experiment anymore.

etc.

How about the rule that the dog can't try to bite the judge? Can that be expanded upon to have where the dog must be friendly towards the judge?

Can it also say that all dogs must be friendly towards people at the show, and towards other dogs?

Is that too much to ask of show dogs?

It might be. That is probably one of the things novices first notice at a dog show. They know that their own dogs would be overjoyed to be at a dog show - in the belief that they could play with other dogs.

Pet owners can often picture what their dog would do at a show - jump up and down, wag his tail, grin, make eye contact at the other dogs. Whine at the in season females, or flirt with the boy dogs.

But I have noticed that at the dog shows, so many of the dogs move around like zombies - that is, the dogs don't try to play with each other.

They often act like they are the only dog there. Like the other dogs and other people are not there at all. Like a negative hallucination - like they are not seeing reality, as if they fail to smell that these are other dogs, and that there are other people there.

After a few dead end conversations, someone told me "They aren't trained to do that, they have kennel syndrome."

What? Harking to terriermans post "Do Kennels make dogs stupid?" It has a name "kennel syndrome".

http://terriermandotcom.blogspot.com/
Dec 3, 2009

Have you noticed how people have gotten that way? We have! People use to say "Good morning", "Good afternoon" or "Good evening" to everybody who walked by the on the sidewalk.

Crocodile Dundee (one of the movies in the series) had a scene where he first goes to New York City (having been raised way out in the boonies of Australia) and he greets each person that walks by him on the side walk with "Good Day!" and tips his hat at the ladies. Because that is what he was taught, and that is what everybody did in his little town - just like people use to do in America.

Now we walk by each other like one show dog does another.

Eeeeks, is this a sign that we have "House syndrome"? Did we fail to notice that we were causing dogs to suffer from this, and in divine retribution, now we suffer from it?

I have said for some time, that dogs so mean and un-sociable that they can't be kept in a pack should be neutered/ spayed. Now, I believe that even more.

If they are written only on paper?

If the standards can be legally be changed, then the answer is easy, re-write the standards.

What to change? Want my opinion?

Get the breeders themselves to reach that moment of realization where they understand that they have been breeding for harmful mutations.

Those breeders who can't understand will have to adjust to "We are all doing it this way now, breed accordingly."

What to change in the standards is very easy - maybe if you are too close to it, you can't see it, but just breed normal looking dogs.

Some basics:
1. Dogs have a tail. The tail expresses the dogs emotions.

2. The dog's tail should NOT curl over it's back. A curl in any part of the spine, could mean a deformity in other parts of the spine, which might not be obvious when the dog tries to stand normally.

In dog sign language, a tail temporally curled over the back is a sign for aggression or suspicious alertness - which is not generally the baseline temperament you want your dog to have.

A genetically curled tail, that usually stays in that position, communicates this mental state all the time - leaving owners and guests unaware of when the dog is hyped, because he always looks like that.

3. Dogs have two ears. Dogs with one ear, might have had a damaged ear, dogs with two cropped or chomped off ears should not be shown, because how would you know what type of ear he genetically has? And if you let people show cropped dogs - some people will crop their dogs ears.

Dogs ears come in various forms. Some dog's ears are like a wolf's ears - they usually stand up, but are mobile. Some dogs have ears that flop down. Some dogs have ears that part way stand up. These are all okay.

But some dogs are bred to have very long ears. This does NOT help them hear better, it's like having giant ear lobes (although it is actually the whole exterior part of the ear).

Very long ears are bad, especially if they are wrinkly. The dogs can get ear infections, and the tips of the ears can drag the ground when the dog puts his nose to the ground.

3. Dogs should not have very short legs. Dogs should not have very long backs.

4. All dogs should have teeth that meet well. The incisors should meet in a scissor position. Level or slightly undershot is a fault. Obviously undershot or overshot is a DQ.

5. Dogs like to see, they should be allowed to do so. All dogs whose hair covers their eyes, should be shown with their hair pulled away from their eyes, or with their bangs cut. (This one is easy to do, it is not a breeding change.)

6. Dog's hair has a natural growth direction. Dogs with cowlicks or ridges of hair that grow the wrong way, should not be shown.

7. Dogs have a snout, a muzzle. If a dog doesn't have a snout, he can't breathe right. Dogs without a snout (flat-faced dogs) should only be bred to dogs who do have a snout. Dogs without a normal snout should not be shown.

8. Dog's skin should be elastic, but not wrinkled or in folds.

9. Dogs should have eyes that are set like a wolf's eyes, or somewhat deeper or a little bit shallower set. Dogs should not be shown if they have pop eyes.

10. Dogs have four toes and one dew claw on each front leg. Each back leg should have 4 toes, with one dewclaw being optional.

There are probably lots of others, if I took the time to think on it, but you get the idea, of what I mean.

And what about all the health problems that can't be seen? Aren't they even worse?
Yes, they are. But we have to start somewhere, and this is something the breeders can see without testing. Judges can see it.

Changing the standards?

As some of you might have read, people sued when one breed club & the multi-breed kennel club which it belongs to, changed one breed standard.

Some dog people are really into the show scene and they don't like changes that put them at a disadvantage or push them out of the game.

As far as I know, neither of the clubs had to pay anything out in any settlement, but court battles still cost money.

Which brings us to the question of: Can breed clubs change their standards (without courtroom conflict), or are they like a steel hulled ship, strong but not very flexible?

The British are changing some of their standards a little bit.

IF, if, if, if American dog breed standards are not truly changeable, then what?

Could any of the multi-breed kennel clubs in America safely drop any breed because they no longer feel the standard describes a healthy dog?

If not, then, although the standards were not written on stone, they might as well have been, for they are no longer erasable, or editable. They have turned to stone (wasn't that a song?).

Even if they are dieing like dinosaurs, they would not be able to change?

If the court case was more of a test, and the standards are changeable, and the standards are re-writable then what?

The first question isn't "How should the standards be re-written?", but "How do the big kennels, and active breeders want the standards to be re-written" - that will tell you what to watch out for.

The people involved are very apt to want the standards to describe their own dogs, even if those dogs are having genetic problems.

If you followed the arguments against ear cropping, breeders whose dogs had ears that looked good uncropped were not so much against banning ear crops -

-but breeders whose dogs did not naturally have the desired type of ear, tended to be against banning ear crops, as then their dogs would lose in the ring, and be out of favor with the pet buying public.

It comes down to the question of just how changeable the standards are.

Could any multi-breed kennel club oust one of their breeds, without it being more effort and expense than what they could be asked to do?

1. First Step. 2. Second step.

1. Change what the judges give ribbons for.

After getting council from lawyers, who don't breed dogs/ have a conflict of interest, plan the changes in what dog show judges look for in dogs.

There is no need to get every dog breeder in the country stirred up about this - you know what the vast majority will want - they will want changes that give themselves the best advantage over the other breeders.

You are planning changes that will help the dogs themselves, and the public at large.

Why are you doing this? Because the animal loving public increasingly doesn't like what you are doing.

2. Second step: Respect pets and the people who love pets. Pets are NOT any animals that doesn't show well.

The public who are buying "pet quality" puppies, expects that to mean the puppies have been bred to be quality pets.

The term "pet quality" is a misnomer. Aren't they really just "not good enough for the show ring"?

If I breed dogs as pets, can I label the puppies that are too bad tempered to be sold as pets, "show quality"?

It is the same thing. Call it a lie if you want, but the truth falls on both sides.

If Mary breeds puppies with most of the right instincts to be good pets, and who are usually good with children, can be left in a pack loose in the house, don't bark much, don't require much coat care, and don't shed a lot, and she sells them as good pet puppies - what do you call those puppies who have a bad temper?

Are they "nothing"? "Culls"? "Show Quality"!
Terms like "nothing" or "culls" wont sell the bad tempered puppies. So can Mary call them "show quality" to sell them?

If Joe breeds puppies with most of what it takes to win in the show ring, what do you call those puppies who don't have what it takes to win in the show ring?

Are they "nothing", "culls", or "pet quality"?
If you think they are "pet quality" then, in all fairness, aren't Mary's rejects automatically "show quality" when they aren't good enough to sell as good pets?

Giving it a go (or a heave-ho)

For the people in the small upper percentile, who know what the problems in dog breeding are, have some big picture of the situation at the breeder level, AND who care enough to want to improve dog breeding -

- but for some reason don't want to send the old structure into the trash bin, I am going to try to write a patch up job.

I don't know that it can be done. The world is full of greater minds than mine - and no one has done it yet, but then it doesn't look as if anyone has tried.

My ego is NOT so grand, that I think I can do this, but I am going to try, and if anyone comes along and takes it to the next step, that'll be good with me.

So consider it a first rough draft - that I am letting the public read - not so much because it is great, or even good, but because nothing will get done, unless people try.

I have written about some of the problems (below), now I am going to try to find a few answers, or rather, a few possibilities that might be worth discussing.

I have no idea where this will lead. I might give up after a short while, but for right now, I am going to try to be helpful, and constructive not destructive - although I won't hesitate to conclude that the whole system will never meet my standards and should go down, if I can not find a step by step way to chart a course for improvements.

So lets start off with the assumption that dog shows could be useful to the future of dogs, and that it is possible to divide dogs into separate breeds and still have things go well. (Start with the least likely scenario?).

Patch it Up, or Toss it Out?

There are major problems in dog breeding.

There are puppies being sold with genetic diseases.

Puppies are being bred for one purpose but sold for another - bred for the ring, but sold as family pets.

Health and temperament are often NOT priorities with show dog breeders.

The person producing the puppies (the dog breeder) is often trying to produce traits which the buyers (puppy owners) don't want, or don't care about.

While traits that the family buying the puppy want their puppy to have, are often traits that the dog breeder doesn't want or care about.

Genetic variation is being lost very rapidly. Some of it can never be recovered even if we could stop the inbreeding, and popular sire trends right now. There is no recycle bin for genes, once a gene is extinct, it is gone forever.

There are puppy mills, and smaller scale puppy mills: basement-puppy mills, garage-puppy mills, and extra-bedroom puppy mills, where dogs are kept in crates or cages. It is cruel to the dogs, and often produces inferior puppies that are not bred to be good pets.

Salon agriculture?
There are people breeding purebred dogs who don't even like dogs. They breed a few litters, so that they can claim to be in the business of selling puppies, so that they can use their dogs as a tax shelter. They can be a bossy and very vocal group, trying to get the rules changed into their favor.

Real puppy farmers?
Covered that, under puppymills. That is what for profit breeding often is.

Hobbyist?
On their own, hobby breeders might not be too bad. But they tend to get social, and led around by craftier people who are using dogs as a tax shelter, selling dog related services, using dogs as sport objects, or using dogs in experimental research or product testing.

Dr. Frankenhound?
That bunchers get dogs and sell them into research labs (laboratories), and product testing centers is a fact. It is a business. Pets do get used this way - it can be torture.

Some breeders produce puppies with genetic diseases to sell into research. But many of these puppies end up being sold into pet homes, or to other dog breeders.

Competitive Sports Breeder?
They only want the few puppies that are most likely to win in the ring or in the field. Their left-overs are taking over other areas of dogs, like kudzu in a southern summer. Like someone who breeds fancy carp, and sets the not-fancy-enough carp loose in public waters.

Family Pet Owner?
Pet puppies traditionally have come from other people's pets. A neighbor's dog has a litter of mutt puppies, and one of your kids asks "Can we have one?". This seems to be the best way to produce pet puppies.

It is often best that ranchers produce sheepdogs, that mushers produce sled dogs, that hunters produce hunting dogs, that pet owners produce pet puppies.

Two things have messed up this traditional method of producing puppies.

1. The pet market is the largest demand for puppies. Commercial breeders have pushed the pet owners out of their own turf. Pet owners are too naive, and the business people too organised.

2. Some uses for dogs, produce a large unwanted surplus of puppies.

Competitive events, like dogs shows, means that only those puppies most likely to win in the ring, have any value to the show breeders - the rest of the show-bred puppies will not find a home with a show dog person.

So the left over puppies are sold as pets, or as "pet quality", although there were not bred to be good pets. The traits selected for were NOT: how good they are with children, how easy they are to house-train, if they can be left in the house without destroying it, if they don't bark all day, and if they have a desire to please.

Other competitive events have a similar effect. Only the most likely to win puppies have value to their breeder - the rest are sold as pets. This includes breeding fighting dogs: the puppies that are not quite "game" enough, or not "game" at all, are sold as pets.

Time Magazine

One of the best articles on buying a puppy or dog, what NOT to breed dogs for, and a general understanding of the problem. By Time Magazine.

And, no, nothing has been done to fix the problems in dog breeding.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,981964,00.html
A Terrible Beauty.