without beating the dead horse i wont mention the pound puppies and health disorders plaguing purebreds because we already know about all of that anyway,
my question was hypothetical. i already made it clear that i hate dog clubs with a vehement passion and dont see a point in them other than preserving history and ancient useless ideals that "Pure Breds are Better" which they are not....
Dog breeding and Dog Showing should have little to do with each other. and the reasons abound - mainly because we didnt have these genetic SNAFUs until dog shows and closed registries came about.
Dogs must adapt to the changing needs of society, they have done so since the day they accepted man as a leader, but in this century dogs are not being allowed to adapt and change to meet our needs. when they do change they are called unacceptable impure useless mutts and have no right to pass on their genes. Why not? Those poor waifs are the suvivors while their blue blooded brothers are doomed to painfuly slow deaths in the show ring. And health problems effect ALL dogs, yes. there is no breed excempt from it, i dont care how reputable the breeder is. some breeds have been distorted so badly that its just a prerequisate that your shih tzu is going to snort and snore, your english bulldog wont give natural birth, and may have to have its tail removed due to it trapping poop in it, unless you want to wipe its butt for the rest of its life. Irish Wolfhounds have short lifespans for several reasons.. the larger the breed the shorter the lifespan, why is that? why do people accept that? Anyway i'm not expecting answers to THAT question because there are no answers. people just have to decide what they want to do.
I am very familiar with the different positions stock dogs focus on. But you can train a BC to heel or head, you can also train BCs to work cattle, goats, sheep, or any other livestock that is "Afraid of the big bad wolf".
How would crossing a Sheltie to a BC effect wether or not it prefers to head or heel? All the stock men i know dont normally work more than two dogs at a time, sometimes they use only one dog depending on the size of the herd and that one dog does both jobs as well as singling out an individual. Ever watched "A Man and his Dog"?
The only personality clash i can see is maybe crossing a drover with a herder..... which is why i didnt mention the drover breeds when i listed the herders.
OK, so if Rottweilers are drover dogs, does that mean that they cannot fetch or gather livestock, only drive it?No, all dogs considered of droving descent can be used to gather livestock. Likewise, herding breeds, like border collies can also be used to drive stock. BUT the drover breeds are larger and must work on their own with a complete stranger, in order to bring the stock to market... so yes there is likely to be a definate personality clash by crossing the two.
The GSD still herds in his native country, but yeah they arent as popular as they once were in the herding field. I'm not quite sure why either. There are other breeds designed to protect a man and his property... the soul purpose for the Doberman so i've read..... as well as some mastiffs - which i will address shortly. the GSD is a farely recent creation too... and no i dont mean within the last thirty years. i mean in refference to dog clubs. They came about in 1890-something. Many Mastiff breeds existed centuries before that and are one of the breeds that has adapted to what mankind calls progress. They are far removed from "War Dog" status, if you are referring to the Romans and such.
I know Europe has a rich war filled history, but once the warring was through and the frontiers were tamed, the mastiff settled down as a "Ban Dogge" -meaning they were chained during the day and then released at night to guard the estates. They werent something the common man was allowed to own, along with some sight hounds, because obviously if he had such a dog in his posession then he obviously stole it, not to mention the common man could hardly feed such a brute. the common man also didnt have game and property to protect from poachers. So the mastiff types are man stoppers from the start(but not the finish as most are big sloppy faced pillows now)
The problem i see with mixing mastiffs would be if you mixed, say, a Neo with an English. Neos are still old world dogs, they are high on the dangerous dog list because they are still high caliber guard dogs in their native country.. that wont last much longer since they have been added to the AKC. But anyway, a Neo and an English would have the unstable temperment because the higher level of aggression in the Neo. You wouldnt know which dog was going to develop into what. But what about an English and Bull Mastiff? Do people still use Bull Mastiffs for protection and guarding? Someone from another forum asked that question once and NO ONE could answer. All the breeder websites we found had only show dogs.
Now, onto something else.... Breed looks come about due to climate and terrain. Rough coats, short coats, wirey coats. But it was never so uniform as it is today. Why does it matter if your dog is black and tan or saddle backed? the colour has little to nothing to do with personality and functionality so why are breeders so bloody hung up on making them uniform in looks? So you can tell them all apart? Why? you SHOULD know what your dog is bred for....
I always wondered what would happen if several Dobermans got loose at the same time..... would the handlers be able to catch their own dog? How could they be sure its their dog? i know you get some characteristics to tell them apart, but really.... sorry just a funny scenario.
Some people attend dog shows when they are thinking of buying a new dog. They have a specific purpose in mind and what better place to shop for a dog than going to a dog show? Its like buying a car. Do you want a V8? Do you want 4 wheel drive, do you want a luxery sedan or a two seater hot rod? Do you want an over protective home guardian, or a friendly social running companion? Do you need a small inside dog with a calm personality or do you want a high strung field dog to help you track game in the field?
I disagree with the statement about scenthounds. But only because i have spent half my life hip deep in them. I've worked with blue ticks, black and tans, red bones, walkers, and beagles. The leggier hounds were all the same in temperment and personality, though the blue ticks seemed to have a slightly more laid back personality when it came to tracking alone, but once they were in a pack situation they always gave in to the excitement. The only thing i found that effected their attitudes was when you took one away from the pack. They are truly unhappy creatures then. Even if you raised it as a puppy without it ever having been in a pack they still dont seem to act right.
Now, the hounds i mentioned above were developed in the US, their common ancestors were the Fox Hound and a couple of other European pack hounds. Beagles hunt rabbits(but sportsmen over here like to use them for deer as well- i dont know why.. such a tall animal being chased by a short legged beagle seems kinda silly, but the beagles are good at trailing them), The other thing i find fascinating is the difference between show beagles and working beagles. my dad is a beagle fan. but not a single one of his beagles looked anything like the ones prancing around the show ring. For the most part they resembled these Beagles of Yore - [link
http://www.wdhs.org.uk/Beagles.jpg]http://www.wdhs.org.uk/Beagles.jpg[/link]
but there is usually an obvious visual difference between working dogs that actually work when compared to the same breeds that are merely for showing. The purpose of the beagle, really, was so people wouldnt need a horse to go hunting. they could follow their dogs on foot, but beagles are quite capable of keeping up with horses i'm sure.
Along with the short leggers you also have the Bassets, but good God, the American Basset hardly looks able to do anything. i KNOW there are some who would prove me wrong, but Eurpean working version of the bassets (to name two Basset Artesien Normand [link
http://www.thebreedsofdogs.com/BASSET_ARTESIEN%20_NORMAND.htm]http://www.thebreedsofdogs.com/BASSET_ARTESIEN%20_NORMAND.htm[/link] and Basset Bleu De Gascogne[link
http://www.pedigreesearch.co.uk/breed_guides/breed_description.asp?breed=bassetbleudegascogne]http://www.pedigreesearch.co.uk/breed_guides/breed_description.asp?breed=bassetbleudegascogne[/link]) although the bassets started out as an oddity, they were made into a breed, faced several hardships and near extinction, there were some offshoots of the basset that are now extinct, and the working bassets i meantioned above are rarely seen outside their own country, oddly enough (or should i say, not surprisingly) because this breed has been allowed to interbreed and had infusions of new blood- since the 1950's - its said to be a very healthy character, though he's starting to fall victim to the usual joint and back problems you see with other short leggers with long backs.
Terriers are an interesting group but they are pretty much share the same attitude of gameness. yes there are leggier terriers, but not as many as there are short leggers. infact many of them look the same anyway... skye terrier, sealyham, scottish. Norfolk, and Norwich... ok i dont really want to name all the dogs in the group....
Terriers are another working breed that should not have a standard for looks. looks meant nothing to someone with a plague of rats. Looks didnt mean anything to someone who wanted to rid themselves of that pesky lamb killing fox.
Again thats why i asked a hypothetical question like this. not to give someone the impression that i am going to mix breeds together, or suggest that others do the same. i didnt ask only to be reminded of homeless dogs. i wanted the opinions of breeders who know their history but are also open minded to ask these kinds of "what if" questions.