What did the Germans and others do, as far as breeding, before X-rays? - Page 1

So...people that breed and by breeding stock say, "Are the X-rays good?"...etc.   What did the old school breeders do prior to x-rays?  I have my ideas.  Does anyone out there have knowledge of what really went on? Not just "hear say"  I realize that wa slong ago and far away.   Did they breed females to males, and I know that some males were used because of their desired characteristics.  Why do we depend on "just x-rays" and not consider what other desired characteristics may be availabble?  I know that there are some excellent dogs out there that bring a good all around package to the table that's x-rays, accoding to standard , "don't cut it".  Waiting to hear from the  knowledgable and the experts.

         Best Regards,

             Don De Leon

My guess & answer is this Don,

Watch the old Schutzhund trials on Youtube,

Long BEFORE Schutzhund became an Official  Sport  (and so began the slow Decay of a great breed) replete-with  egos, corruption, money, politics,  breeding priorities or lack thereof)  the early  SchH  trials had, amongst other things,  required a Vertical Wall Scale Jump, of about 8 feet. 

Not even a  moderately dyspastic dog would or could  perform that,  or the Other demanding physical feats required, in such a rigorous BREED TEST.  Almost similar to a  KNPV  test of today.   The physical demands require & weed out any unfit specimens.

IMHO... In early days of the breed the gene pool was so small that dogs were bred which had there been more options may not have been.  Today the genetic pool is quite large, and deleting any dogs who have a certain fault, be it drop ear, high tails, cow hocks, bad hips, bad elbows, PRA, Von Wildebrands, lack of drive, unstable temperment etc... still leaves a large choice of dogs who do not posess those faults... or at the very least allow people to breeding away from a specific fault and decrease it's presence in the breed.  While some breeders will never breed a dog with borderline hips, or without a working certificate, or without an SV rating, or without a Championship... etc... others will.  Everyone has their own "hot button" where they say no way, never....

   I'd like to believe that if x-rays were available earlier breeders would have chosen not to breed a structurally weak dog and would have chosen a simular dog with better hips. Now we are looking at things like digestive issues (bloat, toxic gut etc) Degenerative spinal problems and such which need markers identified earlier so that those dogs aren't bred as well. While there are some one issue breeders, I like to think that more look at overall picture and breed for the best complete dogs.  And I'm by no means an Expert... just an opinion.

Having been around in the late sixties when very few dogs were x-rayed, Uglydog is closer to the truth. Things like the vertical wall/jump helped to eliminate defective dogs. Also, people bred dogs primarily based on working or temperament strengths as opposed to diagnostic testing, angulation, croups, color, sidegait, etc. You usually bred to a superior physical specimen in the work and temperament department. Were times and dogs better then?, I won't comment, but I will say you could go to a show breeder and get seeing-eye, police, military, show, or pet stock. There were not the divisions based on color/sidegait/etc. Oh how things have changed!!

I am not so sure. Sometimes HD may become a factor only long after the dog has reached reproductive age, say 5 years old. It is then too late as a few litters may have been bred.

Of course xrays are not the be all, end all, subject, but, they are necessary for breeding the ENTIRE package. You must have it all nowadays, good xrays, good temperament, good looks, that's how you get an acceptable dog. If your're not doing that, then stay out of having puppies. Leave it up to the experts who are sticklers about trying to breed for the entire package, it benefits us all in the long run. It's always a bummer when you have  great dog that doesn't have tight enough hips, fine, shit happens, just don't breed that dog. VL

You are right Uglydog - those YouTube videos show how difficult it would be for a dog with structural problems to do the work.......... and that, of course, was the point. As far as there being a "large" genetic pool today, that isn't the case -  articles on this Messageboard from earlier this year, posted by Jantie, illustrate that the showlines (in particular) are extremely bottle knecked on just a couple of dogs from the late70's/early 80's. I personally wish there had never been the division into show/working.................lucky you, Gustav, to have seen what it was like before the split.

I agree with uglydog and gustav, and I know that for a fact, as I know few old time breeders in Europe, and many of them still use that approach. I asked one ones as I knew that the dog he was breeding had no xrays done, why would he breed the dog, he replied "this dog can do "8 feet Vertical Wall Scale Jump" and other jumps like he was borne to do that, as a matter of fact that dog would jump on anything and over anything I would tell him to, do you think dog with bad hips would be able to do this"? After the x-rays become more common in use by breeders he did say that he believes this will not solve a problem, because as we can see now people will pumper their dogs more, and not let the nature shuffle the week one form the good ones.

"Leave it up to the experts who are sticklers about trying to breed for the entire package, it benefits us all in the long run"

The so called experts that you refering to caused more problems than actully solve anything, just look at what is happening with the breed, I see more and more working people moveing away and going with a different breed.

"I personally wish there had never been the division into show/working"

The division is human made (caused by ignorance, and too much pride), there are breeders out there that use both with better and better results every day.

If these x-rays are so necessary for the entire package, (Pam Powers), then answer the posters question of how did they breed the dogs before the x-rays and produce the type of superior working animals they had in that period. Or answer the question of "why did their showlines in that period have strength of nerve and health and agility(to be able to scale the vertical jump) and the showlines today are only used for show and pet primarily? The comments about the experts is laughable, because if you use the criteria that these superior "experts" use, and all the top showline people use the same criteria....explain how have they have f-----ked up the working breed so much!  And noboby but these people should breed....PLEASEEEEEEE....listen to yourself and equate reality with what you said. I would take a puppy from the old German breeder that breeds based on performance and knowledge any day over the KKl dogs I see bandied about as so great because of the artificial titles of today.