Souff

a white shep can and is still purebred!! if it had pedigree papers and was in a reg litter then it is a registered pedigreed dog... i dont see how it is no longer a purebred just because it is white?? Thats like saying a sable border collie isnt purebred cause it isnt black and white?? edited to fix my wording re the above post Correct KG Go to the top of the class If a dog has been bred only from dogs of the same breed, then it is a purebred dog. See Jed's post. It can be blue, it can be pink, it can be green, and yes it can be white. Whether the dog is registered anywhere in the world, or never registered anywhere in the world, has no bearing on whether or not it is a purebred dog. The rules of one canine registry can be different to the rules of another canine registry but if a dog is purebred and can be proven to be purebred then no rules of any registry can change that fact. Souff

A pedigree is a record of a dog's lineage - a record of its parents, grandparents, greatgrandparents and greatgreatgrandparents and other known direct ancestors. Usually a dog's pedigree is recorded and printed and the paper on which it is printed is known as the pedigree paper. A stamp is put on the pedigree paper that says "certified" when the document is issued from a registering body. A dog cannot be defined as "a pedigree dog" because the word pedigree is a noun and should not be used as an adjective. However it is perfectly correct to describe the dog as "a pedigreed dog" or "a dog with a known pedigree". In the human race we call our pedigrees our family histories. Fortunately we humans are rarely called upon to produce proof of our pedigree - if we did we would all need to be certified. The meaning of "purebred" is totally unrelated to "pedigree". Two totally different things but can often be found together. The description of "purebred" has adequately been given elsewhere in this thread so Souff will now return to cuppa and cookies and allow you to find those posts and make your comparisons to the above. Adieu. Souff

Another happy little purebred snob has just checked in! Souff never flies in aeroplanes that don't have wings, or if they don't look like aeroplanes. Long live the properly bred animals! Souff

Answer to your question is in the bolded type. The LxP cross is made up of 2 different breeds and many of these dogs do not resemble each other because one inherits the features of L and another dog inherits the features of P. The differences don't stop with the progeny of the mixed mating, throwbacks occur. The differences between the two different breeds are too great to ever get to the stage where the majority of dogs bred this way "resemble other dogs of the same breed" ...... without culling about 50% of the pups along the way. Glad you got ole Jed to dust off the recipe for the Lithuanian Goat Catching Retriever again though it is one of his better works! Souff

:D

tell that to our old workers, who mostly get PTS or die at around 14/15 . Some breeds have all the natural gear to live completely outdoors, if necessary, and still kick on to old age. Souff

I agree. Some breeds are not going to live as long as other breeds, with the occasional exception. Also, every time a dog has to have an operation, or recover from some sort of trauma, their immune system takes a dive and you rarely see a dog that has had a lot of serious health problems along the way go on to be an old dog. The dogs that are kept healthy along the way, and particularly keep the dental health good, you have got a better chance of seeing your dog through to old age. And then you can look forward to them being slightly odd, a little bit stiff in the mornings, and have a touch of dementia. :D Souff

Or perhaps the dogs who exhibit this awkward gait are not likely to be the dogs that are shown? I would be very concerned if I saw dogs bunnyhopping around the show ring, but you actually make a good point. They could still have papers. Souff

If it is happening while your dog is still trotting evenly, it is possibly much like the problem I was first thinking of. It is as if the dog can only trot for a very limited time, then the hopping/rolling gait kicks in. Some dogs will gallop at great speed over distance, but then can easily trot when they slow down. Souff

15 years old + here and has almost a full set of strong teeth and few joint problems. Heart and eyes are good - recently checked. Apart from being neutered, has had no operations and no ailments. - Fresh meaty bones - Lots of clean fresh water - Fat is always trimmed off meat and lean red meat given. Roo and veal preferred. No pet food crap mince. - Good quality dry food - Canned or fresh fish - An occasional raw egg yolk - BARF patties sometimes - Natures Gift canned food sometimes - Table scraps that are good basic meat and vegies - no curry, pasta or junk food, no desserts or cake - Very few treats - Soft cheese to get any tablets to be taken :D - Never has big meals, is not allowed to "graze" so the stomach always completely empties before another meal. I think these points, and regular exercise, are as important as the quality of the diet. Many dogs are fed way too much food and are eating themselves to an early death, at the owners expense. Souff

Okay I can kinda see it now. It sounds pretty strange. Is it like his legs aren't moving back and forth so sorta fixed at the shoulder? I think KK means it is when both hind legs are bent and moving forward at the same time, and both front legs are moving forward at the same time. Sort of rolling along, at speed. Have I got it KK?

Just read the bit about "at speed" so I think I am talking about a different gait problem. Is what you are seeing more like a gallop? Souff

It is a problem that inhibits the dog's gait and as Poodlefan has suggested it is coming from the hip and spine area. It is not a patella problem. I have been watching this rarely mentioned problem in pet dogs for years. I have not seen it in show dogs so can only assume that it is the result of very poor selection. Some Jacks, Corgis and other small dogs (crossbred or purebred) have done it for most of their life and owners accept it as normal. "Oh, she's always done that!" Often nothing abnormal shows up under X-ray. One owner was concerned and the x-ray revealed that one hip socket was a different shape to the other and the spine was crooked. Cute little crossbred fluffy that had multiple conformation problems - the result of crossbreeding. :D - we wont see that little dog moving quickly and easily in old age. Some of the affected dogs gait normally for a while, then 'switch gear' into this hopping gait at a slower pace. I sometimes wonder if there isn't a vertebrae/nerve problem and the full nervous system 'power supply' is not coming through. If I had a dog with this gait, I would be getting the spine checked out. Fortunately these dogs do not have to run many kilometres every day - if they did they would be a right mess at the end of each day. It is a very inefficient way for a dog to gait. Souff

Megan, How are your dogs tonight? Just as an aside, most dogs do not eat the rats that they catch. Some do cart the disgusting things around as "trophies" ... until they are removed and binned! Lots of rats and mice around at this time of the year, they are looking for places to make nests for the winter. At least one rat wont be doing that. Souff

It's the rat poison - it kills them in the most awful manner (breaks down red blood cells, internal bleeding etc). Hmmmm ... have you put out rat poison? Souff

And the lowlife scum that did this is still at large. Had they been my dogs, I wouldn't be moving anywhere until the b*stards had been found and dealt with. Souff

Oh, so I have to continue to bear those slobbery kisses, all in the name of good health and now science Interesting subject. Just as an aside, the health of a particular tree in Africa relies on Giraffe saliva. The giraffe eat the leaves of the tree, drooling saliva at the same time, and the tree thrives. Without the giraffe slobber, it dies. Based on that little speck of saliva knowledge, Souff has been pouring leftover water out of the dogs bowls on to pot plants for years and they are still alive. I have no idea whether the potted plants here know that they are enjoying a symbiotic relationship with the dogs and whether this is the sole reason for their staying alive..... oh well, if nothing else it is another way of recycling the water and the dogs get to drink fresh clean water. Souff

The risk to the owner is limited, so they think they are OK to say "my dog is fine" ..... until it bites a child. Then they had better have what is needed to pay the legal bills. You are teaching Little Bit to respect animals, and that is what all parents should be doing, but sadly are not. Many have it in their brain that dogs are something for their child to play with. The dogs needs and instincts are a long way from their thinking. Children will be a lot safer around animals when all parents teach respect, but unfortunately some of the parents first need to learn it themselves. Souff

Way to go! : ) Scare the hell out of the people who thought you were dead !

Not before our time, we don't .... unless you are unlucky enough to be a Kurd, or live under some maniacal dictator.

Hey Justin, please stop agreeing with Souff it is not wise, not wise at all :D And good luck with trying to get politicians and the media to get anything right. If something is right it immediately loses its entertainment or political value! Souff

Really? I have heard some pretty awful things about the rspca here but I didn't know this. Please tell me what brand of fertiliser so I make sure never to buy it. A dog that gets put down ends up as fertiliser if they are buried, or if their ashes are scattered. Think about it. Souff

:D Souff loves this one, whether it be for cats or dogs. Firstly the whiskers vary in length from animal to animal. Some have quite long whiskers, others have short whiskers. Whiskers vary in length on the same animal. What do the short whiskers do when the longer ones are processing the data that they have collected about the width of spaces? The skull on some animals is the widest part. On other animals it is the shoulders or the ribcage. And on some animals it is the hip area. Now, can somebody please tell me which whiskers are working with which part of the body? Souff actually believes that whiskers have mystical powers ...... :D .... perhaps to tell the animals of weather changes that are coming and that we know nothing about, and of course to collect some of the cobwebs off the lower part of the brickwork so that the spiders can keep busy and make more webs. I mean if spider's webs lasted forever and were not destroyed then we would all have to face the prospect of fat lazy spiders around the place ..... another obesity epidemic in the animal world! Thanks Evans for whiskers I say, and may their true intended use remain forever mystical. Souff

Why does it matter? Purebred or crossbred, or one breed or another? At the end of the day it is a dog. Whilever we keep focussing on the name of a breed when a dog bites somebody all we are doing is feeding a media frenzy and bolstering people's negative opinions of any one breed of dog. Souff

Yes, it is double edged sword indeed Poodlefan. But, just like with the tail-docking laws, I can feel that such a law is going to be inevitable. Based on "contemporary community attitudes" ...... and mostly because of the bluddy slack attitudes of many humans, particularly those who cannot manage to observe the basic rules for dogs that we currently have. Those dog owners have brought this one on the rest of us. Souff