Question about HD - Page 3

Jonah, what about the hip scores of the second and third generations out of NZ dogs? Any statistics on them?

I understand that most xrays are not sent to OFA. That holds true for all breeds so the OFA stats are skewed since thay can only speak to what they have seen. Not a perfect system, but neither is the SV way of going.  It makes good sense to only breed good  hips to good hips. 

If the only goal when planning a breeding were to greatly reduce the incidence of HD in the breed, then using NZ's would not be the best way to go.  As the result of breeding only normal hips to normal hips some other working breeds prone to HD have a very low rate of HD compared to the GSD and  it's not unusual for entire litters to have OFA certified clear hips.  As far as I know, it would be rather rare for an entire litter of GSD's to have normal hips.

In the big picture, there are a lot of demands placed on this breed, so  some/many/most breeders are not willing to sacrifice other qualities for good hips and will use an NZ dog that  exhibits the traits they wish to bring into their breeding program.  Not saying it's right or wrong, that is a decision best left to the individual breeder. Just saying that as long as NZ's are used, the percentage of HD is probably not going to decline.

I have a bitch ,excellent ofa and when she was 1 year everyone laughed at her lazy side sit and told me , she has bad hips....every one in the schutzhund club back in the mid 1996-99 period, said same thing and when here x-rays were done , we knew she would pass but I went running all over the field the day the OFA excellent came and have had upset puppy  buyers here in Tyler Tex when an ignorant vet told not only my owner=, but a mastiff owner , that sat sideways at 5 mos old, "this dog has hip dysplasia and his ears , also will never stand"......tried to sell her a bottle of Gluco and Chrond and how stupid can someone be,,,,,,wont help a puppy and not needed.......my vet laughed and said  " send her over here to me, Ill sell her a $65.00 bottle of Gluco every month, it just wont be of any use on a puppy anyway.........treating something you dont need to do until you xray and have a real reason to do so.......I am really tired of explaining to everyone that freaks out about HD.....I would have to have a million dollar budget to study and try to find out about every pup in every llitter produced by every dog in every dog I have on my premises and have or every gonna have bred......so there......do your homework  and pray the pups all have good hips, and good health and the dog food in the sack you buy is what the company says it is and the chicken and liver you buy was not infected or fed something that they didnt tell you it was fed, and the water you feed isnt infected or full of wrong minerals, and the shots and wormer you give dont give immune disfunction or are fresh and didnt sit on a dock and you were lied to by the store or vendor you bought it from,    WOW do I still want to be a breeder or shall I just sit on my bench with my kids and let them love me and when their gone I wont have one to replace them with???????

Some where over the rainbow?  someone knows all the answers and it sure isnt me?   or you?

It's not toohard to keep track of dogs with OFA numbers, their sibs and what they've produced since OFA posts the verticle pedigrees on their website.  I don't know if that information is available from the SV or not. I can log on the OFA website and find every dog I owned with an OFA number as far back as the  early 70's. My first OFA'd dog was whelped in 66, OFA certified in 68 and she and one other  whelped a bit later are not in their database but all the others are there. The sire's, dam's and sib's statistics are also listed for the more current dogs and you can do a search for the specific ratings for the dogs that were certified before OFA used that designation in the number (ie  E,G,F).

It's almost impossible to get pet people to xray dogs unless they are having a lameness problem. Some breeders I know request that this is done when the dog reaches 2 years of age. They rebate x number of dollars to the buyers when the dog is xrayed and if they want the dog certified, they will pay the OFA fee.

From the early 70s to now the percent of dogs with Good/Normal hips have risen about 15% on both sides of the Atlantic.The percentage has peaked out in the last 15 years to what it is now. There have been breeding programs that have made hips the primary focus of their breeding. If done over an extended period of time it seems that temperament always suffers. Their is a certain amount of elements that will never be bred out of the breed with the current knowledge we have WITHOUT adverse consequences occurring.

I worked with the BIO-SENSOR (super dog) program out of Aberdeen Proving Grounds, by the US Army. This was very early 70s and a primary emphasis was hips. They did sringent breeding on only the TOP X-rayed dogs they could at that time. We received many shipments of these dogs at Ft. Benning and they did have superior hips. They also were very lacking in nerve.

Probably the best breeding program for hips was the DDR dogs in the 60s and 70s. But...they had the ability and fortitude to ruthlessly cull any elements that didn't meet their specs in this area. In an open society this is not going to happen!

In conclusion, hips to me are second to temperament for the survival of the original breed(both are important). I have seen many dogs that were grade one hips that served this country and saved soldiers/police lives as the military accepted grade one hips. I have seen these grade one dogs working at 8 or 9 years of age. What I didn't see was German shepherds with noise/nerve issues that were able to save anybody but themselves. One last thing, using examples of crippling displasia as a basis for decisions is so over exaggerated to me. Yes, in 35 plus years I have seen puppies with crippling displasia but it is so infrequent for responsible breeders that I will not let that skew the equation. What I have seen is many functional dogs that with early diagnostics were found to be displastic. Not condoning diplasia at all, just think that if we treat displasia like color or gait in breeding we will get the same end result.JMO

OFA's most recent stats are available on their website. Briefly, of  almost 90K GSD's whelped before 1980 to March 2004 the percentage eceiving excellent ratings has improved from 2.6% to 4.8% percent, an increase of 84.6%. The number of dysplastic dogs overall has improved from 20% to 19.4%, a 4.4% decrease. If you want to see the chart and compare these results to those of other similar breeds, the link is http://www.offa.org/hipstatbreed.html?view=2 The problem with taking these stats as gospel is that OFA is probably not seeing most of the dysplastic xrays. Why send off an xray on a dog that is obvioulsy dysplastic. They probably only see the mildly effected dogs that are questionalbe or those owned by someone who for some reason wants everyone to know that their dog has bad hips.

I agree that in this breed there are many factors to consider in addition to hips while some breeds cannot work as intended unless the hips are perfect. Those breeders will probably place more emphasis on hips that those breeding GSD's.

I've bred a litter where 2 out of the 7 puppoies were so severely dysplastic that they needed to be PTS. The parents, the paternal g-sire, the maternal granddam and grandsire were all OFA normals. The paternal granddam was moderately dysplastic as was her dam.  Over the years I've owned 2  severely dysplastic dogs - one was PTS -both were from clear parents where one or more g-parent was known to be mildly dysplastic. My problem with breeding dogs that are even mildy effected is that in my experience and that of others I know and have read about, the progeny tend to have or produce worse hips than their mildy effected relatives.

If breeding a good GSD were easy, there would be a lot more of them around, not?

Blitzen,   I don't think posting results necessarily makes you a "smart" business person but it certainly makes you honest.  OFA does not for some reason post results of hips that don't pass OFA,  so like a Mild won't be posted,  But I posted the results here in the DB with the pedigree,  I'm not gonna try to hide it,  I think that would be dishonest.  The pups I had bought when I bought the female,  out of a male that I did NOT breed to,  so I took a chance on them and got kicked for it,  But hey it happens,  They have both been placed into pet homes spayed and neutered.  They will likely live happy little lives, and show little to no signs of displasia with a borderline mild, the other mild moderate ratings.  But I'm still not gonna hide it.

I think the best any of us can do is try to breed good hips,  I don't take a chance on Fair hips some people think I'm nuts but oh well, that's ok.  It's my choice.  As far as educating the public well...  I find that a complete loss.  Once they hear displasia all is lost and they are into space and oblivion with they're own predisposed "ideas" and Vet opinions.  Yeah !!  urrrgggghhhh  We will loose that battle to anyone who is not reasonable enough to further investigate the issues and degrees of displasia and even the issues of appropriate xrays.  But we have to continue to try...  We do what we can,  and that is all any of us can do.

We all know there are many factors for displasia,  so why would we think we should hide a displastic diagX.   It happens,  Simple as that.  Even the best of breeders with 10 gens of great hips will produce a displastic hip maybe through no fault of they're own,  But eventually something is not going to xray well and be diagX with displasia.  I personally would be more comfortable with the person who posts those results than one who would hide it.