Importance of Bitches? - Page 5

Well of course Daryl.  The thread is about the importance of bitches.  Whether you view their contribution as beneficial or detrimental is immaterial.  The fact remains that the female contributes slightly more in nuclear DNA on the X chromosome and also in non nuclear DNA, and so has more influence on the phenotype of the offspring.

Only the X chromosome consists of probably about 45% tandem repeats, which is a staggering loss of potentially important coding information.  While the Y chromosome happens to be subject to a more rapid rate of change of any of the chromosomes.  "More" just isn't significant on any proven level, really.  Dogs have more chromosomes than humans, doesn't mean they contribute "more" to their offspring.  More genetic babble does not mean greater quality, greater efficiency, or even boil down to a greater number of expressed characteristics.  Females produce NOTHING without males.

Daryl, uh, eh.... um... you are trying too hard.... don't .... dis us females.... you got it wrong.... the probability of it all,.... please, in this case, more is more!

Your argument is invalid.

Excuse me, but POD made a very valid point! Just because it doesn't fit with your ... parameters ... doesn't mean you don't get it. 

And more is just that, more! More to protect maybe, more to enable, more to be more.... just a female kind of more... that is well, more or less better to have, than not! 

So if what pod says is correct and females are contributing more genetically and via nurture, why is it typically the males who gets all the attention?

Females are better to have than not, I suppose.  But I sometimes wonder.

There's nothing that can be done, males will automatically always receive the first note of attention if there's blame OR praise to be had.  Probably on account of their careers commanding greater notariety than females.  It's posts similar to this that that frequently pop up to make attempt to raise our awareness that it takes two to tango.  But, it's my belief that unless SPECIFIC females are brought to our attention, their careers and production results discussed at great length, they will always be cast in the shadow of their male counterparts.  There's lots of males that don't get talked about much, either.  I think it's important that females are not looked at as the SAME, because they're not, just that they are viewed from an appropriate perspective with due respect.  (did I just say that out loud?)

Interesting, but becoming more confusing, at least to me, it would be nice if in the end someone sums up what you agreed on and what remains debatable.

Ok, I'll try.  It's true what Daryl says in that males and females have equal importance to the *breed* because every litter has to have one parent of either sex.  Selected males, as individuals, certainly have the potential to excert more influence on the breed as a whole, on a 1st generation basis but this could also be accomplished by a female in suceeding generations if she were the dam of multiple popular sires.  It does remain though that there are far more bitches bred from than males, so the contribution to diversity is greater with the females as a whole.  This could mean that when choosing a male puppy to keep as a breeding prospect, it's more important to get it right because his potential is to have more influence on the breed than a female.

On an individual basis, it's clear that the dam has more influence on each of her progeny than the sire.  As already pointed out, there's the environmental aspect, and also the genetic contribution.  The X linked traits, no matter whether these are beneficial or detrimental, they all have contribution.  A female has double the chance of passing these on and in the case of recessive mode such as haemophilia, she can pass it on without showing symptoms, unlike a male who can only pass it on via his one X chromosome and he will be affected.

Then there's the non nuclear DNA.  Not that much known about Mitochondrial DNA so far AFAIK, but it is responsible for some aspects of cell metabolism and has an influence on energy levels.  There is no recombination of DNA with this, so the male is not involved at all.  It is passed on, almost exclusively by the female to her offspring, both male and female.