How would you improve the GSD of today? - Page 1

It is a question that I have not seen many answers to. I have read a lot about standards set 100 years ago but not much on how to improve the breed from today on. I want to know what you would change with the Shepherd and how you would change it...

I would consider not allowing the registration of puppies without the Sire having a SchH3 and the bitch say a SchH2. Best Chris

I would add that the closest linebreeding (inbreeding) allowed should be changed from 2,3 to 4,5 or higher. With a change such as this, a numerical limit should be placed on how many times a common dog or bitch appears. When one examines certain pedigrees, there is a ridiculous amount ot repetitive dogs/bitches in legs 4, 5, and beyond. We need to correctly make the gene pool much larger than it is today, as we are far from the early part of the last century and have many dogs/bitches from that to choose. Just my opinions. Bob-O

This is as subjective as it gets. The topic of the post, "How would you improve the GSD of today?" is quite different from the last sentence in the post, "I want to know what you would change with the Shepherd......." CHANGE does not neccesarily mean IMPROVEMENT. I often marvel at the claims of some breeders, that ONLY breed to "improve" the breed and if you are not breeding to "improve" the breed, then you should not be breeding at all. This is the mother of all poppycock! It is also a great marketing tool to attract the novice and seperate him from his money(sometimes lots of his money). I will not go into naming all the great dogs that have been the benchmark for this wonderful breed, because of their contribution to the breed and adherence to the breed standard, but I think the goal should not be "improvement", per se, but being able producing a great dog, within the standard(this is hard enough). One thing we could attempt is to genetically track some of the dieseases that are indigenous to the breed and try to eleminate the carriers, but that would be a massive undertaking, and would stand in the way of profits, take a global cooperative effort, not to mention the tedious LONG TERM work(generations/years) that it would take. Once those genies are out of the bottle, you can't put them back in, you just have to try to minimize them as much as possible. To honestly "improve" the breed means eradicating the dieseases(HD, Pancreatic defiencies, ect), anything else is just nice conversation. Just my opinion. Stephen

A lovely explaination by stephen!

How would we change/improve the GSD today???First and foremost, identify the setbacks of the modern GSD. This would be a long list. Secondly, what lines are known to carry these weaknesses? To improve the quality of the GSD today, we need to improve our mentality and have a better understanding of the GSD in every aspect. I have spoken to a lot of breeders far and wide, and quite a lot jhave no earthly idea as to why they are breeding. A small persentage would tell you what they are trying to improve, and then a smaller percentage would be able to tell you what direction they would go with the offsprings of the breedings after they are grown. It would also need to start from the very top. Our so-called VA dogs: why are they VA dogs without having proven themselves in their productive abilities. Why are dogs with good progeny groups so far down the line. Why do we see so many people looking for puppies saying "we are looking for dogs with only VA parents". These are all a mind set that has been instilled in a lot of us that we cannot see any further than we could throw. Scenario: 2 pups available for sale. One is out of VA*** and the dam is daughter of VA***. Pretty decent quality. The other pup is out of V40 and dam is out of V 40 male. Superior quality to the first pup. Which one would you buy? As long as there is a demand for crap, there would be a supply of crap. Look at the VA group from 2005, decent quality, also varying types. You would not see much consistency in this. Why is this so. In which direction would the top breeders go when they have no clue as to what the nexyt president would desire. We need to go back to the drawing board and explain the breed standard and have a good understanding of what it is. Why are dogs like Flipp, Yoker Quentin and a few others behind some of our VA dogs? Why would we have one of the biggest dogs in Ger. be the 2006 sieger??? Please do not ask me who as if you have to, your homework is not done.

My father once said: Rules can never produce results without enforcement. Whenever rules are laid down to guide the acheivement of an outcome, there will always be the persistent effort by some to claim the rewards of adherence without the discipline entailed for the same. The story of GSD breeding is the story of the dynamic tension between the ideals and vision of its founder and the qualities of hubris and greed of humanity. The more I read about the German Shepherd dog as conceived by its founder Max von Stephanitz, more I felt that what he was talking about was a canine with a type of personality. The actual physical form specified in the breed standard written originally by Herr Stephanitz appeared to be written only to complement and package the personality as conceived by him. His own writings amply support this conclusion.... " Beautiful is what serves a useful function", .... "A pleasing appearance is desirable, but it can NOT put the dog’s working ability into question!", .... "German Shepherd breeding is Working Dog breeding, or it is not German Shepherd breeding". With this as a background, I would start with setting the criteria of breedability as requiring a minimum score of 270 in SchH3 for both sire and dam under 2 separate judges in addition to passing the rest of the requirements in the typical Korung.

Stephen, Interestingly enough this topic was discussed with a breeder who is part of a group of breeders in Germany on one of my visits 2 years ago. I'm no expert but it sounded like they are in the process of studying the genes to identify the ones that produce unwanted whatever and eliminating the dogs from their breeding programs that carry the unwanted genes. Pretty sophisticated stuff. Imagine asking the owner of the VA dog you plan to breed to let you take a sample so you can check the dogs genetics and see if there are any bad genes. I'm guessing that more than one stud dog owner would not want such a test done.

lonewulf, You bring up a wonderful point, and I must ask it in this fashion: How many people(GSD breeders/enthusiests) have ACTUALLY read the 4 volume book by Captain Max V. Stephanitz, entitled, "The German Shepherd Dog -In Word And Picture". This should be REQUIRED reading(at least once). I am curious to know the real numbers.

stop buying and breeding titles.with a santa judge and an elf helper a dog will earn his title, show and work.money and politics also play a big role.look at each dog individualy and objectively.most german shepherd police dogs for example are not titled dogs. they pass a certification test meeting state standards.most have what all gsd lovers would want in their dogs,courage,trainability,drive,and loyalty.no title though, lets not breed them. wrong!!! look at the dog not the title.just my opinion.great topic.