Puppy with weird head...anyone seen anything like this? - Page 12

Really, Jamie? What are you posting about if not the line on his head? His coat quality? Color?  I thought the line was what we were talking about. It's what I was asking about, anyway. 

I'm taking all things into consideration, color, coat quality, the line on his head. Even without the line I would be really curious about him. For the record, I think this is a very nice litter. Weird things happen with genes.

You just lost me...what, besides the line on his head, is weird about him, in particular? 

Jenni.  No, I can't show you a picture or even just an article, from the web or
from my own library, that shows exactly the same as your pup, in the same
shape and at the same life-stage.  Which is why this has only ever been a
suggestion to you that this may be DCA.  I've never said it MUST be, just that
FWIW I think it is likely.

I have described as well as I can the circumstances with two adult dogs, Storm
and the Willises' Chihuahua, but clearly as I did not see either of them as new-
borns I have no idea what it started out looking like.  It did manifest itself slightly
differently in the two dogs,  the baldy patch on the Chi's head was a smaller area,
pro rata, and much more 'stubbly' in the Chi (and apparently had been, for some
time).   The Chi was the elder of the two.   I do so wish Malcolm had lived long enough
to update his books or write another in which this got a mention;  but I find it hard to
imagine he didn't check it out, nonetheless, with his wife having the problem with her
dog, under his roof.  Which is how she was able to educate me on CDA, I don't believe
she made the condition up, or the fact that it is possible in GSDs, even while rare.

Articles seen while surfing Veterinary etc websites have varied - some include the
 GSD in their lists of breeds known to them to be affected, some don't.  Not sure that
tells us anything, but I didn't once find anyone, Vet / geneticist / serious fancier  WHO
COMPLETELY RULED OUR BREED OUT.  Much of what I looked up was a while ago;
a combined research into Storm's problem AND the overbreeding / extreme inbreeding
of 'rare' Blue dogs (and 'Chocolate'/ Liver ones)  for pure profit from the pet market.  I had
a brief look around again when we started discussing the causes of Einstein's 'headline'
but I have not had much time, and am crap at putting links on to here.  It is hardly difficult
for someone to Google  Canine Alopecia for themselves and read through the suggested
pages that come up, though;  I surely don't really have to spoonfeed anybody that  interested
in the topic.  I have conveyed the useful gist of what I've read.  Not interested in playing any
silly games by leaving out info that I don't 'like' !

Which brings me to KitKat's statement above:  "It's those like Linda who make these pups
meet their demise.  She wants to insist that problems are inevitable based on Blue dogs from
one shit breeder in the UK".  Now Joni KNOWS that is a distortion of what I have been saying.  
As I have said before, both on the threds @ the end of 2012 on Epilepsy and other problems,
AND in PMs to herself:   what I am pointing out is that we cannot under estimate or continue to
ignore the damage done to the GSD breed by people who fall into the category of over- and in-
breeders [as mentioned in my previous paragraph].  As others have confirmed, doing that sort
of production-line  marketing of the odd colours, rather than simply selling the few naturally
produced in other litters (alongside an honest reminder, maybe a price reduction, that they 
are technically faulty as far as Showing or future breeding is concerned), simply concentrates
whatever genetic problems are there.  Thus, 'off-colour' , by probability, pose a higher risk factor
for various inherited problems and need therefore to be treated with some caution, and preferably
not bred from.  I have never said they are necessarily inferior specimens, though many of those
who have been DELIBERATELY bred ARE such.  I have never said they can't work.  I have never
said they do not make excellent companions (although as with ALL GSDs I believe that much
depends on who buys them !)  I HAVE gone on record as saying I do not credit many of the bucket
'demise'/culling stories.  I have never yet met one breeder, personally, who would rather kill their
non-Showable ​pups than raise them, enjoy them, and get some money for them as pets.

As examination of the 'Net can also show you, there are many many many websites advertising
the breeding of the faulty colours;  some of the US ones have been exposed on PDB, as doing so
with less than adequate caution about health issues.  Believe me, there are far more than the 'one
shit breeder' doing the same in the UK.  Just 'cos I cited one example of one dog I had my own
hands on, and know he originated from one of those kennels, hardly guarantees he is the only dog
that kennel has produced with this particular problem , or that no dogs from that kennel (and others
using related lines) have subsequently been bred from ...

Whoa, I only asked if you'd seen any reference to CDA evident from birth, in a pattern that did not change. It wasn't a loaded question, truly. The answer is no, I guess. Me neither. Vets, same. I think Susie called that one right! I guess basically, the short answer to my original question in this thread is "no, no one has seen anything like this before." I do appreciate your posts, but this is turning into more of a personal thing between you and Joni. I have no knowledge about your previous discussions and there were no veiled references to anything like that in my post to you, I swear. 

As to not believing that people would rather cull than sell, I guess that's geographic and/or cultural, and another reason why there may be sooo many more off-colors in the UK than elsewhere. The stud owner commented about it to me, that his German friends (he is German) were shocked that we (Americans) can sell them and that we let them live. On another forum, a big name breeder had a blue pup and told how the stud owner was upset with her for NOT culling a blue pup she had, basically, because now everyone would know their dog produced blues. I have no reason to believe this woman was lying. If I got 3 in this litter, where are all the rest? These lines aren't exactly super-rare. 

I think he is cute! I didn't catch his lines, working home might not use him for breeding but if he can work, most the people I know wouldn't care about his hair (to much). :)

1/2 working lines, 1/2 proven showlines that can work. He is most definitely not suited to a pet home. ;-)

Thanks!

I passed this by initially, but it has an interesting "discussion" section about possible modes of inheritance for CDA, among other things, for those that want to read further.


http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2671874/

Interesting that MollyandJack's link on Dobes  (which I have not had
time to read right through yet - I'll come back)  lists Berners as another
breed which can be affected (but does not mention GSDs).  Anyone
ever hear of a Blue Bernese ?  As this was (coincidentally) the Willis's
third breed, I am even more convinced Malcolm knew what he was talking
about.


Jenni I am devastated to hear that the situation Stateside is as bad as you
describe, re 'bucket' puppies.  I knew the Germans were more likely than
us Brits to take that attitude, but I guess I had assumed more people in the
US were generally like 'us' in not wanting to actually kill non-Standard pups.
Particularly in terms of relative population sizes.  That is very sad.

Makes you curious about who all those many (American) websites are selling
to, though.

Hundmutter, in all fairness to us "stateside," the breedings I'm familiar with are German breedings. The stud I used is here now, but is German and German-owned, and the story I mentioned about the gorgeous showline bred blue pup, I believe that stud was still in Germany and the breeder got a lot of flack for publicizing that puppy. The only blue dogs I've seen in photos online seem to be American lines, which I am totally unfamiliar with. Even my homebred dogs are only a couple generations from German dogs. VKGSDs posted him before when we were discussing blues. He came from Nikon's sister, maybe? Not sure I'm remembering that perfectly, but we're certainly not talking about a BYB who's looking to sell to the pet trade to then start registering them and breeding. On another forum (I don't think we're allowed to link to other forums??) she discussed the attitude about letting the pup live. I PM'd you. 

The only American websites I can see with blues are pets- bought and sold by ignorant people for many generations. If they have health issues, surely it's due to poor bloodlines to begin with, and off-color is just the icing on the cake. This is why the blue thing in well-bred dogs is hard- there is too small a sample population to say much about them. The people who tend to let them live (painting with a big brush) are the ones who are less concerned with the standard, therefore, it's a slippery slope to "less concerned about any potential health risks." What I'm saying is that I hate to be an elitist, but I don't feel I can accurately gauge how healthy or not healthy my blue pups will be based on sites like K9 Pines or any other the other BYB because their dogs were shit to begin with. Aria is not shit, and Filius is certainly not either. They're from long lines of health tested, titled, proven dogs. So, I don't see it as so much "denial" on my part when I don't think my pup(s) are going to be nightmares as I do simple logic that color doesn't CAUSE problems; it merely gets packaged up with problems in certain type breedings. 

You want a hard task? Find more than small handful of pictures of GERMAN-bred blues! I was pulling my hair out trying, so buyers could get an idea of what they might look like. The Alta-Tollhaus dog was the only one I could find.