Coi - Letter From Dogs Today

[UKUSA]

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Sorry Wendy, I know that I said I wouldnt get involved with this but I cannot let Ecenis previous comments pass by without making a few comments of my own.

You are assuming that ALL we breeders care about is the next champion and nothing else, I think that I can speak for many of us when I say that the great majority of our puppies go into pet homes and the great majority of us take great care over the health of our puppies. Maybe you have friends in our breed who have had problems BUT that is not all of us. You say when you were a vet, when were you a vet? and how many sick Whippets did you see? Were they any more or any less than any other breed? Because, interestingly enough every vet Ive ever had has told me that Whippets are amongst the healthiest dogs they see.

Yet again you are making it sound as though the breed is in dire trouble and that they are dropping like flies, they are not. I have absolute sympathy for those with ill dogs and I can understand that they want answers , so would I but to make out that if we dont listen we are doomed is to insult all of us that have probably been breeding healthy, long lived Whippets longer than you have been practising any form of veterinary medicine.

Nicky

 

[Eceni]

Eceni I totally agree with Nina, many breeders have put many years of dedication into the whippet breed, breeding sound healthy beautiful dogs, if it had not been for sound line breeding in the past we would not have what we have today.  On the other hand if breeders have run into problems and gone blindly on do not tar us all with the same brush. Whatever you might think we do all have the breed  at heart and have enough experience to be able to carry on improving the breed. I for one will not listen to anyone who has never had any input into the breed. I have a wonderful vet, he says you are a dog breeder I am a vet, but for years he has never seen any of my dogs except for inoculation, old age or maybe a sting or injury.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

And does the science not matter at all?

I know you found it hard to understand what Natalia was writing, but she's a geneticist with an interest in dog population dynamics and a particular interest in whippets... it doesn't get much better than that.

And Malcolm Willis is prepared to go into print with what he must know is a massive over-estimate saying that the CoI is under 10% in most pedigree breeds - which it very clearly isn't - Natalia was getting numbers up near the 50%, which is close to brother-sister matings and I defy anyone to suggest b/s is a good idea...

so the science is immensely clear - if you carry on doing this, you will create a genetically crippled breed. The fact that you haven't so far is because you started off with a relatively high gene pool and have been able to draw on that. But people ARE seeing problems. And if you don't live long enough to produce them, you'll have been practising something that is guaranteed - cast iron guaranteed - to produce a genetic crisis somewhere down the line

you don't have to understand the genetics (tho' it really isn't hard - the web site on canine diversity explains it in very straightforward analogies - Canine Diversity project

I've said this before but it bears saying again:

As breeders:

- you are practising genetic science on a daily basis

- you are custodians of your chosen breed

- you have an absolute professional and moral obligation to be up to date with the science as it stands OR, if that's too much, then you have a similar obligation to listen to the people who do understand the science - and you have Natalia on here who is a gold mine.

If you use her, you could transform UK dog breeding for the better.

what more could anyone ask for?

m

 

[UKUSA]

Absolutely spot on Nina and Patsy.We are not saying that there are not problems But not to the extent that is being made out here and it needs for breeders of long standing to stand up and be counted and not allow our wonderful breed to be dragged through the mud. I swore that after the last thread on health and all the trouble it caused I would not get involved but a line has been crossed. Many breeders from around the world read this thread and I know that Many breeders in this country who do not post have read whats been going on and are very angry. As Patsy said this and the way that it has been handled has caused a lot of trouble within the breed.

No Eceni, I disagree with you, it aint broke, maybe some that need a little repair work and if thats the case they know where to go for help but that is not all of us.

Nicky

 

[Eceni]

Absolutely spot on Nina and Patsy.We are not saying that there are not problems But not to the extent that is being made out here and it needs for breeders of long standing to stand up and be counted and not allow our wonderful breed to be dragged through the mud. I swore that after the last thread on health and all the trouble it caused I would not get involved but a line has been crossed. Many breeders from around the world read this thread and I know that Many breeders in this country who do not post have read whats been going on and are very angry. As  Patsy said this and the way that it has been handled has caused a lot of trouble within the breed.No Eceni, I disagree with you, it aint  broke, maybe some that need a little repair work and if thats the case they know where to go for help but that is not all of us.

Nicky

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​

Fair enough; we can let it go for now and a decade from now, when we revisit, you'll either be proved right, or I will, or enough people will have let go their anger/vested interest and listened to the science and perhaps there'll be enough of a mix for neither extreme to have been reached. That would be good.

I do think you should talk to/listen to your geneticist though. Not many breeds have such a gold-mine on their doorstep.

m

 

[patsy]

Eceni I totally agree with Nina, many breeders have put many years of dedication into the whippet breed, breeding sound healthy beautiful dogs, if it had not been for sound line breeding in the past we would not have what we have today.  On the other hand if breeders have run into problems and gone blindly on do not tar us all with the same brush. Whatever you might think we do all have the breed  at heart and have enough experience to be able to carry on improving the breed. I for one will not listen to anyone who has never had any input into the breed. I have a wonderful vet, he says you are a dog breeder I am a vet, but for years he has never seen any of my dogs except for inoculation, old age or maybe a sting or injury.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

And does the science not matter at all?

I know you found it hard to understand what Natalia was writing, but she's a geneticist with an interest in dog population dynamics and a particular interest in whippets... it doesn't get much better than that.

And Malcolm Willis is prepared to go into print with what he must know is a massive over-estimate saying that the CoI is under 10% in most pedigree breeds - which it very clearly isn't - Natalia was getting numbers up near the 50%, which is close to brother-sister matings and I defy anyone to suggest b/s is a good idea...

so the science is immensely clear - if you carry on doing this, you will create a genetically crippled breed. The fact that you haven't so far is because you started off with a relatively high gene pool and have been able to draw on that. But people ARE seeing problems. And if you don't live long enough to produce them, you'll have been practising something that is guaranteed - cast iron guaranteed - to produce a genetic crisis somewhere down the line

you don't have to understand the genetics (tho' it really isn't hard - the web site on canine diversity explains it in very straightforward analogies - Canine Diversity project

I've said this before but it bears saying again:

As breeders:

- you are practising genetic science on a daily basis

- you are custodians of your chosen breed

- you have an absolute professional and moral obligation to be up to date with the science as it stands OR, if that's too much, then you have a similar obligation to listen to the people who do understand the science - and you have Natalia on here who is a gold mine.

If you use her, you could transform UK dog breeding for the better.

what more could anyone ask for?

m

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

Eceni, yes we are custodians of the breed and the majority of whippet breeders have served it very well. I suggest that you stop scare mongering in a breed that you have never owned [edit]. I only wish that Dr. Edward Jones was still alive, a top class vet and a very good whippet breeder you would have been no match for him.

 

[nina]

I can only speak personally but i have owned whippets now for the past nearly 30 years & all my whippets have been from long established lines. I can honestly say i have NEVER had a health issue with any one of them, like Patsy the only times i have ever visited a vet would be for minor cuts & injuries & innoculations which incidentally after having lost a dog from i now only do once as a pup & homeopathically from then on & before any of the vets amongst us throw up their hands in horror this has worked for me for the last 15 years so again i aint gonna fix it.

Having also been involved in another much smaller numerically breed for many years that suffer several different heath issues i can only say that the odd issue that does crop in whippets for the size of the breed is relatively minor in comparison.

Also as has already been stated most reputable long standing breeders will be the first to discuss any issues they know about & would immediately curtail any breeding programme that they felt would perpetuate such a problem.

I for one know that it is more than possible to produce a healthy sound typey animal by carefully line breeding & to be able to continue doing so as long you are careful, honest & have the integrity & welfare of the breed at heart.

Obviously there are those that wont agree & feel that the breed in general are already little short of being deformed crippled mutants but i guess we all have our own opinions & thank goodness most of our long standing top breeders do not also seem to feel the same way.

 

[UKUSA]

Well said Nina, I wholeheartedly agree with everything you ve said, I "vaccinate" the same way and it has worked for me as well and Patsy you were right, it needed saying.

Nicky

 

[Eceni]

Well said Nina, I wholeheartedly agree with everything you ve said, I "vaccinate" the same way and it has worked for me as well and Patsy you were right, it needed saying.Nicky

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​

This is becoming infantile to quite a startling degree.

You are entirely free to disagree, to resort to hyperbole (I have been at pains all along to point out that the whippet is, relatively speaking, a particularly healthy breed. I wouldn't have been interested in buying one were that not the case), you can ignore valid points and core science...

[edit]

and you can, of course, continue exactly as you have always done.

but no amount of shouting or name-calling will change the base science. I had rather hoped to move the discussion onto that, but we seem to keep missing the point, which remains a pity.

ms

 

[nina]

Well said Nina, I wholeheartedly agree with everything you ve said, I "vaccinate" the same way and it has worked for me as well and Patsy you were right, it needed saying.Nicky

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

This is becoming infantile to quite a startling degree.

You are entirely free to disagree, to resort to hyperbole (I have been at pains all along to point out that the whippet is, relatively speaking, a particularly healthy breed. I wouldn't have been interested in buying one were that not the case), you can ignore valid points and core science...

You can even resort to falsehoods if you have to, but be aware that it does somewhat undermine the strength of your argument.

[edit]

but no amount of shouting or name-calling will change the base science. I had rather hoped to move the discussion onto that, but we seem to keep missing the point, which remains a pity.

ms

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

I think its fairly obvious that we dont all agree on this subject & have differing opinions.

I for one am not a scientist & nor do i want to be but i do care deeply about the breed & can not agree to a statement that is both damning, derogatory & untrue that basically states the breed on the whole is totally unhealthy & that it has all been caused by line breeding.

Maybe it is best to just agree to disagree.

[SIZE=8pt]___[/SIZE]

quoted post edited

 

[UKUSA]

Well Eceni to a degree you are right. However you must understand,where we are coming from. If you were talking about dogs in general fair enough but it appears that our breed has been singled out for your attention and yes I know why that is because of you interest in buying one etc. You cannot expect to make the statements that you have made backed by science or not and expect those of us who have been in the breed a long time and disagree with you to say "oh alright then". You make a lot of assumptions about us as dog breeders which arent fair or true and yet expect us to take it and do not like when we wont. For the great majority of us its not about"anger or vested interest", its about the very thing that makes us tick, its the reason we get out of bed in the morning when we would love another half hour, the reason why we might be on sofa number4 or the fact that we dont go on holidays.

Most of us have never had any problems you(vets) wont see our dogs except for the things that have already been mentioned but because we wont listen to you we re doomed, your way or the highway. Please credit us with some intelligence.

Nicky

 

[patsy]

Well said Nina, I wholeheartedly agree with everything you ve said, I "vaccinate" the same way and it has worked for me as well and Patsy you were right, it needed saying.Nicky

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

This is becoming infantile to quite a startling degree.

You are entirely free to disagree, to resort to hyperbole (I have been at pains all along to point out that the whippet is, relatively speaking, a particularly healthy breed. I wouldn't have been interested in buying one were that not the case), you can ignore valid points and core science...

You can even resort to falsehoods if you have to, but be aware that it does somewhat undermine the strength of your argument.

[edit]

but no amount of shouting or name-calling will change the base science. I had rather hoped to move the discussion onto that, but we seem to keep missing the point, which remains a pity.

ms

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

I think its fairly obvious that we dont all agree on this subject & have differing opinions.

I for one am not a scientist & nor do i want to be but i do care deeply about the breed & can not agree to a statement that is both damning, derogatory & untrue that basically states the breed on the whole is totally unhealthy & that it has all been caused by line breeding.

Maybe it is best to just agree to disagree.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

Well said Nina, science is a small part of breeding top class specimens, and I for one don't need blinding with it.

[SIZE=8pt]___[/SIZE]

quoted post edited

 

[nina]

Well said Nina, science is a small part of breeding top class specimens, and I for one don't need blinding with it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

With your track record Patsy i think you have proved that adequately :thumbsup:

 

[chelynnah]

I have edited some personal comments from posts. Please try keep the discussion to the topic, and the statements, and not make personal comments. I know it's a fine line and people are frustrated.

Perhaps the time has come with this topic to agree to disagree. I think the one thing we can all agree on is that for the most part people DO have the best interests of the breed at heart even if they believe differently about how to go about achieving it.

As for the comments about breeding for the next Ch and not worrying about other implications - again for the most part that is unfounded. As the majority of pups from a litter will go to 'pet' homes, of course we still want them sound and healthy - even moreso. They are not just 'breeding stock / show stock' they are family - which to most of us is the primary reason we have them. My own dogs are pampered spoiled pets/family first, and show/agility/whatever else second. Why would I want to pass anything less on to another home?

Wendy

 

[nina]

Well Eceni to a degree you are right.  However you must understand,where we are coming from. If you were talking about dogs in general fair enough but it appears that our breed has been singled out for your attention and yes I know why that is because of you interest in buying one etc. You cannot expect to make the statements that you have made backed by science or not and expect those of us who have been in the breed a long time and disagree with you to say "oh alright then". You make a lot of assumptions about us as dog breeders which arent fair or true and yet expect us to take it and do not like when we wont. For the great majority of us its not about"anger or vested interest", its about the very thing that makes us tick, its the reason we get out of bed in the morning when we would love another half hour, the reason why we might be on sofa number4 or the fact that we dont go on holidays.Most of us have never had any problems you(vets) wont see our dogs except for the things that have already been mentioned but because we wont listen to you we re doomed, your way or the highway. Please credit us with some intelligence.

Nicky

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

I agree with these points. I think a great breeder who has produced outstanding stock both healthwise & in the ring in whatever breed deserves some respect equally as a good vet in their chosen field deserves it also.

A vet & a breeder will always see things differently & also their understandings of certain issues will be different. Normally a breeder will not try to dictate to a vet how to perform a surgical operation so i dont think a vet or a scientist should try to dictate to a top rate breeder how to breed Just my opinion of course.

 

[UKUSA]

Well Nina, twas ever thus! Many years ago it used to be there were quite a few vets who bred and showed dogs, quite a few spring to mind so an evening at dog club you could quite often get a few things sorted out with a like minded person who happened to be a vet. Now you are lucky if the vet you get to see has ever whelped a bitch, good with all the book stuff but not a clue with the hands on and on top of that wont listen to you. I even had one vet tell me that the horrible green stuff my bitch was passing was quite normal and that she should have a puppy any time soon! Fortunately for her and her puppies I didnt listen to him. And then ofcourse you have the vets who like to, even encourage new owners to spay a bitch puppy before its had time to have a first season! Well and the list goes on!

I do have a lot of respect for vets but as you ve said(I think) it should be a two way street, especially when sometimes the vet you are dealing with has the same number of years on him as Ive had breeding dogs!

Nicky

 

[nina]

Well Nina, twas ever thus! Many years ago it used to be there were quite a few vets who bred and showed dogs, quite a few spring to mind so an evening at dog club you could quite often get a few things sorted out with a like minded person who happened to be a vet. Now you are lucky if the vet you get to see has ever whelped a bitch, good with all the book stuff but not a clue with the hands on and on top of that wont listen to you. I even had one vet tell me that the horrible green stuff my bitch was passing was quite normal and that she should have a puppy any time soon! Fortunately for her and her puppies I didnt listen to him. And then ofcourse you have the vets who like to, even encourage new owners to spay a bitch puppy before its had time to have a first season! Well and the list goes on!I do have a lot of respect for vets but as you ve said(I think) it should be a two way street, especially when sometimes the vet you are dealing with has the same number of years on him as Ive had breeding dogs!

Nicky

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​

Well funny you should say this. I have only ever known personally one vet who also bred & showed & i have to say he had a totally different outlook to most vets i have known since.

I have a fantastic vet who i have been with now for many years who is a bone specialist & i greatly admire him for his brilliant surgically skills however when it comes to day to day things he is always happy to listen & is respectful of your opinion as a breeder & the owner of the dog. I remember taking an ig bitch to him many years ago & telling him i thought she had a pyo. He disagreed after examination & even did an xray & said it showed nothing. I knew my dog & i knew she had a pyo so after a bit of a "deliberation" shall we say he finally agreed to open her up & yes she had a full blown pyo. I think he learnt something that day in the respect that an owner may not have the qualifications & expertise that a vet does on paper BUT they often have a font of knowledge regarding their dog/ breed that the vet doesnt have

 

[Eceni]

Well Eceni to a degree you are right.  However you must understand,where we are coming from. If you were talking about dogs in general fair enough but it appears that our breed has been singled out for your attention and yes I know why that is because of you interest in buying one etc. You cannot expect to make the statements that you have made backed by science or not and expect those of us who have been in the breed a long time and disagree with you to say "oh alright then". You make a lot of assumptions about us as dog breeders which arent fair or true and yet expect us to take it and do not like when we wont. For the great majority of us its not about"anger or vested interest", its about the very thing that makes us tick, its the reason we get out of bed in the morning when we would love another half hour, the reason why we might be on sofa number4 or the fact that we dont go on holidays.Most of us have never had any problems you(vets) wont see our dogs except for the things that have already been mentioned but because we wont listen to you we re doomed, your way or the highway. Please credit us with some intelligence.

Nicky

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

If I didn't credit you with serious intelligence, we wouldn't be having this conversation at all - it was sparked in the first place by the honesty, integrity and forward-thinking that I read on the UK/USA thread a while ago

so - one last try.

You get up in the morning for your dogs. I'm entirely happy to believe that and commend you for it. I get up in the morning for my one dog and to write my books - but in the days when I didn't have time to have a dog at all, I got up in the morning to go to work to sort out (largely) the products of pedigree breeding. I was an anaesthetist - note past tense, I gave up clinical work 8 years ago - in one of the referral centers and spent 12 hours a day sorting the anaesthesia, intensive care, pain relief and general aftercare of the surgical patients. A percentage, obviously were trauma cases - RTAs, domestic abuse, the classic, 'the hare turned too fast and the dog didn't and all its crumple zones have crumpled' of the working lurcher (or whippet, except they tend to be a tad faster)

But after that, we're fixing the hip dysplasias from breeders who think it's amusing either not to test at all or to pretend that a hip score in double figures is a laudable thing, or the dachshunds that have had spinal pathology since before they were born, or the bulldogs that have never taken a full breath in their lives and stop breathing as soon as you bring their pulmonary CO2 down to a normal level....

And clearly you will find GSDs that can walk and (maybe) bulldogs that can breathe, just as you will find people who have thrown sticks every day for their dogs and not had one spear down their throat causing a traumatic pharyngitis - but that doesn't mean we didn't see the dozens that were not so lucky.

and we hardly ever saw Whippets. We all loved sighthounds for this very reason. We saw the racing injuries and the stubbed toes and the occasional RTA, but for the most part, they were immensely healthy dogs and I can't tell you the relief of not having to remember the lists of potential gremlins when you're doing and emergency GA - is this going to try to bleed out on me? Is its heart going to kick into all kinds of weird dysrythmias... all that kind of thing

So I vividly remember the day one of the surgeons stormed into the coffee room, threw something heavy at the wall (emotional people, surgeons) and said something to the effect that the [expletive deleted] show people have created Autoimmune arthritis in the whippet.

that was nearly 15 years ago. When I had time for a dog, I got a lurcher, and sad tho' it was, it wasn't my problem. So when I came to the breed, it was in the hope that it had been sorted.

which it hasn't. Clearly. BUT IT'S NOT YET ENDEMIC. I am not trying to say it is. What I am trying to say is that you have very early markers of a disease that is, in itself, an index of the fact that line-breeding has gone as far as it can sensibly go.

I don't know what you can do about it - that's what I'd hoped to discuss.

The first problem is that you can't test for it - you can pick up affected animals IF you look for them, as and when the problems appear but finding carriers will be difficult because this isn't a simple dominant/recessive like CEA - it's more like hip dysplasia which has multiple genes (but at least you can objectively score the hips that result)

And then, even if you could test, what do you do?

When I look at the pedigrees I have available on peoples' web sites and the Whippet Archive, it's not easy to begin to sort out the unrelated lines. It would take someone with far more data than I've got (and a lot of time) to do it. Some people are trying - I have off-list mails to that effect - but then, we don't know what they'll get.

It may well be that in trying to find a complete out-cross, the resulting offspring don't have the right ears or the right fronts. And it doesn't guarantee health....

I imagine that if someone does the testing, they may find there are say (for the sake of argument, I'm not saying this is fact) 5 distinct unrelated lines - call them A - E

It may be that we already know AxB, AxC and BxE are not wise. It may be that nobody's ever tried AxD or AxE and they, too, throw up problems.

so it's not an easy minefield.... I'm not pretending it is. But I still think it could be done - IF health becomes the priority.

open to ideas to move this forward?

ms (edited to improve spelling)

 

[UKUSA]

You know I think that in some ways vets are like hairdressers(only an example) in that sometimes you have to shop around a bit. Ive had some great vets, both here and in the states, vets that have said" you know your dog so if you tell me that something isnt right Im going to listen". Now generally they have been the ones that have been practising for a while. Its funny you should say about a pyo, the same thing happened with my I.G. I have to say that my vet now is very good, in fact quite a few Whippet breeders in this area use him

Nicky

 

[fable]

Fascinating to hear different opinions - I wonder if someone can answer my query:

if I decided to mate my line-bred bitch to an outcross stud dog(who is also line -bred along different bloodlines) would I still be running quite a risk of doubling up on recessive genetic nasties - assuming only certain health problems occur in the breed - obviously a bulldog might have problems that don't occur in whippets.

Val

 

[nina]

Well Eceni to a degree you are right.  However you must understand,where we are coming from. If you were talking about dogs in general fair enough but it appears that our breed has been singled out for your attention and yes I know why that is because of you interest in buying one etc. You cannot expect to make the statements that you have made backed by science or not and expect those of us who have been in the breed a long time and disagree with you to say "oh alright then". You make a lot of assumptions about us as dog breeders which arent fair or true and yet expect us to take it and do not like when we wont. For the great majority of us its not about"anger or vested interest", its about the very thing that makes us tick, its the reason we get out of bed in the morning when we would love another half hour, the reason why we might be on sofa number4 or the fact that we dont go on holidays.Most of us have never had any problems you(vets) wont see our dogs except for the things that have already been mentioned but because we wont listen to you we re doomed, your way or the highway. Please credit us with some intelligence.

Nicky

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

​

If I didn't credit you with serious intelligence, we wouldn't be having this conversation at all - it was sparked in the first place by the honesty, integrity and forward-thinking that I read on the UK/USA thread a while ago

so - one last try.

You get up in the morning for your dogs. I'm entirely happy to believe that and commend you for it. I get up in the morning for my one dog and to write my books - but in the days when I didn't have time to have a dog at all, I got up in the morning to go to work to sort out (largely) the products of pedigree breeding. I was an anaesthetist - note past tense, I gave up clinical work 8 years ago - in one of the referral centers and spent 12 hours a day sorting the anaesthesia, intensive care, pain relief and general aftercare of the surgical patients. A percentage, obviously were trauma cases - RTAs, domestic abuse, the classic, 'the hare turned too fast and the dog didn't and all its crumple zones have crumpled' of the working lurcher (or whippet, except they tend to be a tad faster)

But after that, we're fixing the hip dysplasias from breeders who think it's amusing either not to test at all or to pretend that a hip score in double figures is a laudable thing, or the dachshunds that have had spinal pathology since before they were born, or the bulldogs that have never taken a full breath in their lives and stop breathing as soon as you bring their pulmonary CO2 down to a normal level....

And clearly you will find GSDs that can walk and (maybe) bulldogs that can breathe, just as you will find people who have thrown sticks every day for their dogs and not had one spear down their throat causing a traumatic pharyngitis - but that doesn't mean we didn't see the dozens that were not so lucky.

and we hardly ever saw Whippets. We all loved sighthounds for this very reason. We saw the racing injuries and the stubbed toes and the occasional RTA, but for the most part, they were immensely healthy dogs and I can't tell you the relief of not having to remember the lists of potential gremlins when you're doing and emergency GA - is this going to try to bleed out on me? Is its heart going to kick into all kinds of weird dysrythmias... all that kind of thing

So I vividly remember the day one of the surgeons stormed into the coffee room, threw something heavy at the wall (emotional people, surgeons) and said something to the effect that the [expletive deleted] show people have created Autoimmune arthritis in the whippet.

that was nearly 15 years ago. When I had time for a dog, I got a lurcher, and sad tho' it was, it wasn't my problem. So when I came to the breed, it was in the hope that it had been sorted.

which it hasn't. Clearly. BUT IT'S NOT YET ENDEMIC. I am not trying to say it is. What I am trying to say is that you have very early markers of a disease that is, in itself, an index of the fact that line-breeding has gone as far as it can sensibly go.

I don't know what you can do about it - that's what I'd hoped to discuss.

The first problem is that you can't test for it - you can pick up affected animals IF you look for them, as and when the problems appear but finding carriers will be difficult because this isn't a simple dominant/recessive like CEA - it's more like hip dysplasia which has multiple genes (but at least you can objectively score the hips that result)

And then, even if you could test, what do you do?

When I look at the pedigrees I have available on peoples' web sites and the Whippet Archive, it's not easy to begin to sort out the unrelated lines. It would take someone with far more data than I've got (and a lot of time) to do it. Some people are trying - I have off-list mails to that effect - but then, we don't know what they'll get.

It may well be that in trying to find a complete out-cross, the resulting offspring don't have the right ears or the right fronts. And it doesn't guarantee health....

I imagine that if someone does the testing, they may find there are say (for the sake of argument, I'm not saying this is fact) 5 distinct unrelated lines - call them A - E

It may be that we already know AxB, AxC and BxE are not wise. It may be that nobody's ever tried AxD or AxE and they, too, throw up problems.

so it's not an easy minefield.... I'm not pretending it is. But I still think it could be done - IF health becomes the priority.

open to ideas to move this forward?

ms (edited to improve spelling)

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Ok so my take on this is that what you are saying is 15 years ago a vet you knew made a sweeping statement that show breeders had created Autoimmune Arthritis in a whippet?

I appreciate your opinions & your worries BUT i can only speak personally that i have not as of yet come across this nor have i yet spoken to anyone in whippets that has seen or had this problem. Note i say YET as obviously i am sure if it is a great expanding problem i'm sure i will find out about it sooner or later.

I do know of this problem in another breed where a single dog from a litter was struck by this. No other siblings had it neither dam or sire or any relative that could be traced back as far as was known. The dog was never obviously bred from & with medication lived to the ripe old age of 15.

I would be interested to know if anyone else knows of this being rife in the breed today ?