Roached/Banana backs - Page 1

There is a big controversy  going on regarding roached/banana back of GSDs.

It is true that mother nature has not produced animals with roached back. I always wondered about the  roached back generation who had straight backs as their predecessors.It seems to be artificial and man made. But anyone have an idea how do they made this banana back in GSDs???

And what was the purpose of it?How it helps the GSD to perform better?Or it was just for the looks..

Those are interesting questions. I would like to know too?

As I understand it, the roach-back is most directly a by-product of the angle of the hip and pelvic structure.

In attempts to get the perfect 45-degree croup this seems an inevitable side-effect. If the dog does not have the ideal croup angle, to present the appearence thus requires curvature of the spine to tilt the pelvic region presenting the illusion of an ideal croup and hind-leg position, when in truth it is not present. Breeders, whether through kennel blindness or just plain lack of notice didn't see the subtle changes in spine position -- especially since so many try to avoid "the dip" in the back which, though a natural result of vertebral position and muscle structure, can break an otherwise seemless topline. A barely perceptable roaching appears to cancel out the dip in the topline.

Thus these two factors combined to result in breeding that promoted an unnoticed roach back, until it became severe.

The reason the Am. GSD does not have a roach is that the emphasis in American GSDs (as I've observed) is the extension of the flying trot... at the sacrifice of structural integrity of hocks and pasterns. However, they do not have roached backs. The German showline GSD is bred to be angulated, rather than over-reaching in gait. Thus, compensations for lack of angle came subtly through generations of showlines until they hit the extremes we are now seeing today.

Could one define roach back please,ie any curve of the spine,point in backline what is ones definition of roach back?now watch and see how many definitions we get,who's definition will be correct,if any? just curious.  liz

Roaching is defined as anything that arches above the ideal straight-back topline whether minute or dramatic; the opposite of a sway-back (where the spine dips in). Roaching can be slight to just a little curve above the imaginary straight line, or it can extend to a complete "banana-back" that has been the topic of so much angst on the boards lately. 

As wildstrobe states why did they do this when they had nice dogs before without roach backs

Pagan,

It wasn't deliberate. It was just a side-effect of typical breeding programs emphasizing certain aspects of bone and structure. Sure the dogs were nice, but breeders were attempting to make them even better, and the roach-back just happened to be part of the package deal in many cases.

http://www.schlossbuldern.de/webblog.html

The Roached/Banana backs are only Legends, you should know about anatomie and you find why it lookes / has to look like that.

This topic came up earlier and I can't remember who provided the information with the links, but what I do remember is: Some GSDs started producing pups with weak backs or sway backs.  In an attempt to correct this defect, dogs with longer top lines where bred to longer top lines (keep in mind the top line had to be much longer than the bottom line like on a "normal" GSD).  It did correct the problem but, as we know, when screwing around with mother nature, stuff happens and the top line became so long compared to the bottom line that it had no where to go but up into a roach. As for helping with the hips and pelvis, there is still a debate about the health and hardiness of such severe roach backs. 

I hope the person who provided the info (and it was a good deal of info with quite a few links to research and history) can provide it again in this thread, I learned a lot from it.

I have seen very few GSD's with a true roached back.  A True Roached Back for any breed is when the back is higher than the withers.  The standard for an APBT states that a roached back is a fault of the dog's topline.  The old time APBT Game fanciers all believed that a dog with a roached back was a better wrestler and a much stronger dog.

below an APBT with a Roached Back