Czech GSD's with bad hips - Page 28

I am a lay person, not a breeder and no where near as knowledgable as most the people here that breed,train and/or compete with the GSD's.
I have been following this thread with great interest, I am doing my research and plan on purchasing my pup around march or april, once I research and gain as much information as possible.
Prager's 2nd post on this page makes all the sense in the world to me and gives me insight into why he feels the way he does about the OFA. Most consider the OFA the end all be all of Hip designations. I find that I have to agree with Pragers assessment in the difference between USA hip certification and those done in other countries. I definately like the idea of a permanently ID'd dog used rather than saying it is this dogs xrays because I say it is. I have known less than honest breeders ( not gsd) that regularly switch papers to pups just cus this bitchs pups bring more money than that bitchs pups.
I had asked about PennHip because a few years ago there was the same debate.
It really gets confusing for someone that is trying to do their best to ensure they get a good pup, from a good breeder with minimal health complications.

Also, people are not going to change their breeding practices because of my opinion...trust me I don't have that kind of influence. But people will have another perspective in hearing my opinion. Now here's the part I don't understand....if what I write is so wrong, then people will quickly see in their travels of breeder or buyer that what I am writing is bull----! ....but if their experiences or their colleagues experiences that they are familiar with resonate with what I write....then this needs to be said and examined. That's why I don't understand the chagrin about my opinions, if they are seldom exist ant in the breed world, then people will run from them. Most people are trying to acquire nice sound healthy stock, if what you do or say is not producing this the word will travel fast. I don't condemn anyone that is producing good sound dogs.....doesn't have to be my way cause my ego is not large enough to think that the way I see things are the only way to go.

Regardless of how many controls are built into a system, in the end, it's all of human design, and therefore there's always going to be humans who will put the time and effort into figuring out how to get AROUND those controls so they can cheat.  It's simply a distasteful fact: some people simply cannot play by the rules, and simply will never do the honest thing.  It's not the responsibility of any particular organization to 'keep any breeder or owner 'honest'--in part, in fact, it's the responsibility of the community of dog breeders and owners to keep each other honest, and that's done by publicly calling out those who are not comporting themselves that way.  That needs to be done with FACTS, however, not just exaggerations and suppositions as this thread was begun; if available information is incomplete, then it is proper to ASK for further information in order to establish what the full story is in a given concern.  That is how this thread advanced, despite its inflammatory beginning.

Shandra, OFA DOES strongly encourage permanent identification of dogs, and when x-rays are done, if the dog has such, OFA directs the veterinarian to personally confirm the ID by reading the tattoo and/or scanning the microchip [the vet also must sign a form attesting to having PERSONALLY done this], and then record that ID on the x-ray itself.  It's easy to tell which animals had permanent ID that was verified at the time of x-ray, and which ones were not, because OFA adds the notation "PI" to the dog's OFA number [presuming the dog passes].  

Hans, tell me something--do you know if OFA advised the vets who took the films being used as examples that the films were not positioned correctly?  After all, given that correct positioning wasn't going to improve the condition of those hip to any degree, was there really any reason to subject the dogs to another x-ray so the positioning could be corrected? 

That said, I will do something that you could do yourself, since these images bother you so much--I WILL contact OFA and advise them that the use of those particular images as examples of affected hips resulted in it being pointed out that doing so could suggest (a) OFA really ISN'T returning films right away when they are incorrectly positioned, (b) that OFA will go ahead with reading and rating films with extremely bad positioning, which certainly could make a difference between a passing grade and a failing one for any given dog, and (c) does not help educate the pet owner as to what correct positioning is supposed to look like, making it more likely they will not recognize a poorly-positioned film when their vet shows it to them for their approval to send out to OFA.  I will do that for you, because these are not points which I view as being high up on the list of problems, they are not invalid ones, and OFA could certainly identify other examples that show better positioning.

Now, I am going to ask you to do something for me--I'm tired of playing word games, so I am going to ask you a couple of questions that need only a simple 'yes' or 'no' answer.  Nothing open-ended, just a simple yes or no.  They are not difficult questions...anyone, from a novice to an alter kaker, should be able to answer these easily. 


Here goes:

For the purposes of these questions, let us establish that the hypothetical dog in question is a 2 year old dog, irrespective of gender, and considered to be a breeding prospect based on pedigree, performance, temperament, and phenotype. The dog has everything you want in a stud dog or brood bitch--all that remains is knowing the status of the dog's hips.


Question 1:  Hans, if you have the dog x-rayed and after viewing it with your vet, you conclude the dog's hips are sound and normal, but when you send the films to OFA, they return a rating of "Dysplastic, Mild", will you elect to disregard the OFA rating in favor of the opinion of you and your vet, and use that dog for breeding purposes? 


Question 2:  If you have the dog x-rayed as in the above question, and again you and your vet conclude the dog's hips are sound and normal, but the OFA rating comes back as "Borderline", would you ever elect to disregard the OFA rating in favor of the opinion of you and your vet, and go on to use that dog for breeding purposes?

Question 3:  In either instance above, do you have new x-rays done of the same dog, and submit them as such to OFA?

Question 4:  In either instance above, do you have new x-rays done of the same dog, and submit them as such to the SV [via USCA or WDA], or some other certification entity that is recognized by internationally by FCI member registries?

Question 5:  In either instance above, do you have new x-rays done of the same dog, and submit them as such privately to a board-certified radiologist?

That about covers all the bases, I believe. So.  What say you to these queries?  Remember, no elaboration--just answer yes or no.

Oh, one more thing--I DO have one complaint about PennHIP:  it's a closed database, and I don't think that benefits anyone but UofP's research efforts, because a puppy buyer can't confirm the information when a breeder tells them the parents of a litter have both been found to have sound hips per their PennHIP evals.  Sure, the buyer can ask the breeder to send them a copy of the documentation, but with Photoshop and such, you can fake just about every official document in the world these days, so it would be better for the buyer to be able to just log on to an official website and confirm that info that way.

Other than that, though, I have always been 100% behind the PennHIP technique.  Just need the data to be available to the public, that's all.

If man created it man can beat it. If someone wants to beat the system of the permanant ID of a dog it will be beat. It will start in European country's. Because they make a ton of money selling the (mystic) of the european is better dog mentality to the west, people in the U.S. get blinded by accents and hooplaw culture of european country's and in the end it makes people feel better about themselves and higher up to have something european it dosent end with dogs. Maybe things from the old country have a different meaning than a newer country like the U.S. Remember when the ranch dog was one of the healthiest dogs around some of those were German shepherds but things have changed/evolved sometimes to fast to keep up.The OFA is what we have here in the U.S. If you have a problem with that then get elected to the boards of some of these outfits and do your thing.Otherwise we will just work with what we have and observe the rest.
                                                                      Now i am going to get with my european wife and let the sparks fly

Hexe, I emailed OFA too asking them some similar questions. My query was not as well written as yours will be, so not as complete. It will be interesting to hear their response.

Has anyone clicked on the link to Dallas' health information? Any comments about the content and how easy it is to surf the OFA site for information? It doesn't matter if you know Dallas or care about his bloodlines, I just picked him because I knew he sired a lot of normal hips and would get a big response to the search. It's about how much valuable information is archived by OFA on one site. You can plug in the registered name or part of the name or DOB or AKC number of any GSD that has ever been tested and the results reported to OFA and it will all pop right up . Or you can search by individual tests and breeds and dates. Want to know the names of all GSD's with OFA normal hips certified since 2000? It's there and there are a lot.  You can also search by hips grades if that's of interest to you.. GSL's GWL's. Czech dogs, all are represented. It's fun to do...try it if you get bored .

BTW there are 25 to 30 Jirkova dvora dogs listed on the OFA database, mostly for certified hips and elbows, one or two for DM testing.

Blitzen wrote:  "Any comments about the content and how easy it is to surf the OFA site for information?"

Yeah--unlike the SV's hip database, unlike PennHip's, probably unlike any of the European hip certification organizations [disclaimer: as far as I know; admittedly, I have not tried to find every European country's hip registry & access it], ANYBODY, from ANYWHERE, without having to belong to ANY club, organization, fraternity or school, can just blithely pull up the OFA website, and with MINIMAL information find out if a dog has been given a passing hip rating by that organization.  You don't have to have the dog's registration number, you don't even need the dog's full registered name--you can look it up with just PART of it's registered name.  You can look up every dog that got an OFA passing rating that's registered with a particular kennel name, even. 

Yeah, really shitty organization, this OFA, harumph-harumph-harumph...