The "Judges Committment Declaration for Conformation Judges BSZS" - Page 4

Susie - I agree with your comments that the disease began before our breed came into existence. I also think that in the very beginning of the GSD and with the limited dogs that could be bred from epilepsy could have been present in the foundation material. If this is so then we should be looking at the earliest affected animals in Germany, an impossible task. It would also justify the point that where possible epileptics should be identified today and researched together with the bloodlines that we know for sure exist today with some historical content. The difficulty in tackling this problem is secrecy because the disease is not found until it is too late, this plus the difficulty in getting litter information especially from the pet owners.

Mackenzie

Susie, I think that the issue is not so much how far it goes back as the way Epilepsy is transmitted, and how ghastly it is when you've got it in your dog, and therefore the dire need to avoid producing more of it.
I do think the waters here are getting rather muddied by (Alamance) talking of dogs with EPI - as far as I am aware there is no obvious connection between Exocrine Pancreatic Insufficiency, its presentation or its inheritance, and Epilepsy.

Willis on Pancreatic Insufficiency:

"Familial ties have long been seen. Weber & Freudiger ('77) looked at 19 GSD cases and argued the condition traced back to ...(almost certainly) Erich Grafenworth, who is found in the pedigree of every dog alive today. At this late date it would be impossible to isolate him as the source dog. Nevertheless Humphrey ('28) suggested Hettel Uckermark was difficult to condition and his ... son Alex Westfalenheim died of intestinal trouble.Alex sired Erich, and Hettel was grandsire of Erich via his dam, as well as via Alex. Other lines from this source also had a reputation for digestive upsets. It is not unreasonable to suppose that these ... were pancreatic problems even if not so recognised at the time.
"Westermarck ('80) looked at 59 GSDs from related bloodlines and concluded the disease was inherited as an autosomal recessive ...A more recent study (by Westermarck) of Rough Collies in Finland found an incidence of close to 1%, & suggested a simple autosomal recessive might be involved, but ... data did not exclude polygenic inheritance."

Mack, sorry to hear you had to go into hospital, hope you are recovering well ?

Hundemutter - Many thanks for your best wishes. Everything is OK at the moment.

Mackenzie

The reason I brought up EPI in this thread was for several reasons. One one the very attitude as evidenced by the poster naming me!!

I was treated as if I was someone evil for daring to post an EPI piece of information just as one should not post about about epilepsy. No the two are not the same but only in the fact that those two problems do not exist!!

Because the PhD wanted to know where this different gene for EPI came from via the regular EPI, I posted. I told the Dr I would not tell what she found, but this dog proved that there are more than one EPI gene producing the problem. Evidently this version is not as bad as others and can be very easily controlled.

Because my fields are research and analysis, I wanted to help this research doctor and thereby helping our breed.

I was not looking at 1899 when I would be dealing with the "other" versions of this gene but a close relative to this gene, so genes and maybe mode of expression just might be studied and compared.

The breeder is or was an alcoholic and at times very nasty, so trying to work with her was totally impossible. Plus she moved, so paperwork is probably gone. Some of the siblings were not AKC registered, so only the breeder would know the sibling's human owners.

Not knowing the mode of reproduction of this gene, better to look on both the sire and dam's sides. Even close up there were duplicate ancestors, so on each side it could be the same dog's gene being producer of this gene.

But it is so much better to make fun of someone trying to help the breed than it is to help. And as time passes, memories fade about important facts. So go ahead and laugh your heads off and when someday a dog of yours suddenly comes up with EPI either this version or one of the others maybe you will remember when you might have helped brake the case for one version of EPI. Without help, I can go no further on this problem. So laugh all you want and be as nasty as people were when I asked a few questions. And don't cry when it is too late for you.

@ Alamance, you misread my intention. I wasn't trying to be nasty to, or dismissive of, you/your problem, and of course I feel sorry about the experiences you had with the breeder, I was genuinely concerned that the EPI references were getting muddled in with the Epilepsy comments in a way that was detrimental to discussing and tracking BOTH. EPI deserves - and has, like Epilepsy, had (do a site search) - whole threds devoted to it on here and that is only right. Hell, this isn't even a topic about either illness, in the first place !

It does not seem to me there is 'more than one' version of EPI, just varying degrees of severity. If there is now some 'new' variety, specifically, it is likely to be down to a mutation of one of the (multiple ?) genes involved, I would have thought. (This has been known to happen before; my mentor once got Haemo. A where it was distinctly UNexpected !) Given that the EPI condition is SO old and deeply entrenched in the breed's history, though, while there may be different genes at work I am not sure how you would identify them in the matings behind ONE dog/litter, you would need a much wider study; with Epilepsy it was always fairly specific and startling, so the whole 'blood-trail' was more immediately recognised. Unfortunately even where you identify where something comes from it won't stop some people breeding with it, as Epilepsy has more than proved, if they think it profitable ! And so, sadly, I feel that while there are breeders who think it ok to continue to produce litters while their heads are muddled by alcohol (for instance), even if you could identify where it came from in your dog you would be fighting a losing battle to stop it happening to others in the future. Neither disease is like hip Xrays, (and gawd knows there are still people hanging out to blame HD on anything but heredity !); you cannot persuade people to get a test done for it, for no pre-testing exists. Take some comfort that quite a lot of work is beginning to be done on IBS and related conditions, in dogs generally and GSDs in particular, and I suspect that is going to throw new insights into development and treatment of Endocrine Insufficiency alongside that research.

After two months since the Sieger Show it looks as though Herr Messler has thrown his own rules out of the window. Nothing much appears to be happening regarding the rules that he laid down. The only thing that I have heard is that some helpers were disqualified after the show. I thought that some were pretty poor together with the Judge who passed some dogs as “lasst ab” when clearly they did not perform. Also, there were some dogs placed who were clearly oversized and received no penalty and, nor did the Judges that placed the dog.

I think that either Herr Messler has completely lost the plot, or, is too afraid to enforce his own rules. Perhaps he is thinking of retiring when the elections arrive in the not too distant future. Alternatively, perhaps the money men will get him removed whether he wants to go or not.

I often wonder for how much longer will the breed be abused together with all of the honest breeders and enthusiasts. Who is there in Germany who can step up to the plate and guide the way out of the mess? Sadly, I cannot think of one name although I am sure that some will come forward as prospects. The SV needs someone who can clear out those who care not for the breed but only for the money. Gone are the days when people were satisfied with a high honours that were a benefit to the breed as a whole.

Mackenzie

Susie for SV President

They would kill me one day after the election - I  love life...

LOL