Breeding Obed/agilty Titled Dogs Together

[Yarrowfell]

What do you think? Does it work?

We were discussing it the other day here and have no idea if it would work.

[t(AD)pole]

I doubt breeding agility/obedience titled dogs would make smarter dogs. Any dog as long as it has a good handler can be trained to be good at agility/obedience. Anyway, what is a smart dog? now that's a question to think about...

[poodlefan]

I would expect it to produce more consistently trainable dogs, not necessarily smarter ones Yarrowfell.

Any dog sports person will tell you the best indicator of the potential of the pup is the achievements of its parents.

[sidoney]

I think yes, if you breed together dogs that are proven to have aptitude, you are more likely to end up with dogs that have aptitude. (I refer to aptitude - smartness could be described in this instance as aptitude for the activity.)

My girl, Cedar, has four obedience champions in her pedigree (I think from memory) and quite a few other titled dogs. She has agility titles, her siblings are successful in tracking and obedience (and show). Obedience champion sister, others working in the UDX ring. Half sister and half nieces working high levels in agility. I have been told by more than one of the owners how smart the dogs are, how well they learn, also that they have stable temperaments, including compared to other dogs of the same breed that they have trained or are training.

Edited November 21, 2007 by sidoney

[t(AD)pole]

I should add, you won't get smarter dogs but you will get dogs that have the characteristics needed to be good at agility/obedience (im talking mental not physical here).

[FHRP]

Any dog as long as it has a good handler can be trained to be good at agility/obedience.

My first response is no. However I also don't agree with the above response. I guess it depends on your idea of "good at agility/obedience" . I think a good trainer can train most dogs to novice titles in agility and obedience, but for what I regard as 'good' there has to be something from the dog too.

Titles don't make or 'change' a dog. If I was looking for a performance dog purely on titles of the parents I certainly wouldn't be looking at anything less than Masters in Agility and UD in obedience. However, there are far more untitled dogs I see exploding with potential that I'd consider pups from for performance before many titled dogs.

If you were to consistently breed above average trainable dogs then I'd expect you'd produce trainable dogs

[dogdude]

I think what sets most trialling dogs appart is drive..........not intelligence, and handler skill.

I dont believe you can breed for that, it's hit and miss.

Some breeds are more likely to exibit it though, but not guaranteed.

I wouldn't try to breed one.......but look for one instead.

In stating all of this............. I think that looking at a dog with a title, or one that simply scores highly does not necessarily point to good genetics. You dont see many "very high scoring dogs" with ordinary handlers. You still need to know how to manage the drive to keep producing results...............Therefore.........how do you compare any two dogs accurately??

Edited November 21, 2007 by dogdude

[t(AD)pole]

Any dog as long as it has a good handler can be trained to be good at agility/obedience.

My first response is no. However I also don't agree with the above response. I guess it depends on your idea of "good at agility/obedience" . I think a good trainer can train most dogs to novice titles in agility and obedience, but for what I regard as 'good' there has to be something from the dog too.

Yes, I understand what you are saying. What I meant by good was definitely higher then novice, as you said masters for agility and UD for obed. What I should have said was most dogs, as long as it has a good handler, can be trained to be good at agility/obedience. I am relativity inexperienced with training dogs but I think that it takes more then a good dog. Also, I think one is better off breeding dogs with the characteristics needed to be a good performance dog (whether they be drive, impulse control...) then ones that have just titles.

[Guest rhapsodical78]

I think what sets most trialling dogs appart is drive..........not intelligence, and handler skill.

I dont believe you can breed for that, it's hit and miss.

Some breeds are more likely to exibit it though, but not guaranteed.

I wouldn't try to breed one.......but look for one instead.

In stating all of this............. I think that looking at a dog with a title, or one that simply scores highly does not necessarily point to good genetics. You dont see many "very high scoring dogs" with ordinary handlers. You still need to know how to manage the drive to keep producing results...............Therefore.........how do you compare any two dogs accurately??

I completely disagree that you can't breed a dog for drive. People do it all the time. There are dogs especially bred for the police force who are bred for extremely high drive.

[sidoney]

Yep, I agree with that. You can breed for drive in a dog.

Also you need controllable and usable drive - no good having huge drive if it's nervous or if it has problems learning.

I have seen and had related to me that some dogs retain information better than others. And/or pick things up faster.

++

I want to add an addendum to what I said above about my own dogs ... I have to keep in mind that most of them will end up in pet homes and so I don't breed for huge drive, but for medium drive. I also want a dog that is able to focus, and that will learn and retain information.

When breeding performance tested dogs, you also have to keep in mind other aspects as well, like health, breed type and so on. If breeding only for performance breed type is not so important (e.g. Xia, my working Kelpie, who also happens to be an excellent specimen anyway), but for a multipurpose breed like the V. you have to keep it all in mind. And so it becomes a balancing act.

[Lablover]

Great thread and so many excellent replies.

If both sire and dam, have achieved good results by awards, it shows at the very least, they may be suitable match. History and results from around the world, has shown duds can also result, even from the best (on paper) matings.

Genetic health is so important. And then we have training training and training.

Smarter (what do the experts say, even the MOSTEST clever dog, has the brain power of a 7 year old human child - or is it 4- whatever) .........better drive.........good nerves............good health.............

We want it all.

So often I have labrador pet owners, say their dogs, are great retrievers, fantastic swimmers being one example, but will their dogs perform a water swim, twice, thrice, if the going was tough???? Fun swimming with nice entry is one thing, to do it repeatedly for the love of the game - our game mind you, is another.

[dogdude]

I do not believe that the average breeder is able to accurately breed for drive. Without being a scientist in genetics, its all hit and miss.

If you cast your eye over all of the obedience champions in the country you will find that they are all from different lines and of different breeds.

Its my understanding that Police dogs and the like are sourced from a variety of places and chosen on their individual traits..........not necessarily lines they come from.

[Vickie]

What do you think? Does it work?We were discussing it the other day here and have no idea if it would work.

I think it's too broad a question to answer without going into a heap of detail & variables. In general terms, you would hope that breeding 2 dogs that are talented & successful should produce the same, it should give you consistent but I don't think we know enough about genes/traits to say it will give better.

I think performance traits are much harder to select for than say conformation or working traits. We know there are lots of good agility & obed dogs around but what are the specific traits that make them good? And what may be desireable for one handler may be a disaster for another.

I read a discussion ages ago about people breeding agility BC's in the US. Lots of people were breeding 2 successful agility dogs (and still are with varying levels of success) but many have gone back to breeding straight working lines because the selection of one thing is often at the expense of another. Since they didn't/don't know exactly which traits to select for, it really makes more sense to go with what they know already works.

I also agree with FHR, there are plenty of titled dogs around who are not exactly what you would call breeding material...I have 2 of them here. And there are also a heap of untitled or minimally titled dogs that could be spectacular in the right hands.

Not sure if this makes sense, it's late.

[sidoney]

It makes sense ...

I agree with the statements that say titles in themselves don't mean as much as the dog's aptitude or potential. Although it would also be fair to say that even in the lower grades, unless the trainer is VERY determined, the dogs that are really unsuitable are less likely to achieve titles than ones that are at least moderately suitable (doesn't mean that they are breeding material though). I do remember some time back hearing of a greyhound that took something like ninety something trials to achieve its CD. Can't remember its name now. But that is persistence!

Also there are many variables. However I do believe that if there is a history of aptitude, there would be a higher likelihood of getting what you want than with dogs with no aptitude. Again, that is likelihood. Not all and not all the time. Probably the range of aptitude would be higher (in a scaled sense) than breeding dogs with no known aptitude.

I think that it would give a higher proportion of dogs with the aptitude, whether it would give greater aptitude, that to me is less able to be said. Occasionally you get that outstanding individual - whether that breeds on is debatable. Sometimes it does, sometimes not, would depend on what it was that produced it.

Edited November 21, 2007 by sidoney

[bridgie_cat]

I feel that the increased number of dogs with trialling potential in certain breeds (working dogs, BCs especially) is all the evidence needed to say that: YES - you CAN breed for a better working/trialling temperament - otherwise, why are dogs so different in temperament as a whole? yup, you can have a good one or a bad one in any breed - but you need to look at the overall picture. This is of course on a large scale... but it must them be assumed that it will still work on a smaller scale (ie two tallented dogs of the same breed) but that a) the results will be less obvious, especially in the first couple of generations and b) that it still follows the rules of genetics, where it is a lot of luck if you acutally get the desired gene passed onto the pups and not the numerous other combinations carried by the parents - this goes even more so for temperament traits as it is not as strictly selected for and incorrect temp traits eliminated as the conf traits are... if that makes sense... factor in how much harder it is to select for temp since it is so hugely affected by environment!

Of course, titles are not necessarily a good indicator of this... they are a start, yes... but you can look at two dogs - one a velcro dog that has taken many trials to get a few Qs in the set time, and another that works away from the handler and completes their run way under time etc... both end up with the same title... but I know which genes I want to continue on!

Herding instinct is something that cannot be trained into a dog that just doesnt have it - so that would be perhaps an easier one to select for...

As to "what is a smart dog" - certainly we are talking about a TRAINABLE dog - I have a sheltie and a terrier... and sometimes I wonder if the terrier is more intelligent - but my god he is just untrainable!!! and for this reason we label him "dumb" etc, when infact he is stubborn, nervous, lacking in drive... but when selecting to get dogs with working potential you are looking at a number of traits, with actual intelligence as only a small part of it (and I doubt there is any way to actually compare intelligence between dogs - perhaps speed at which they learn?).

I know myself that I meet dogs from particular parents or lines and some are more outgoing, more energetic, more focused (whether there is a genetic component to that?? not sure) - and I absolutely think the POTENTIAL to be great at the various sports is genetic...

I think definitely YES - but with more selecting factors than simply a title - just like with conformation champs - being a champ doesnt make them breeding material and they dont just go to any other champ - you look at the pedigree and the individuals strengths and weaknesses etc - you would do the same for temperament if you had the information available!

eta - as others have said, by no means would all the pups be an improvement... the idea is that by breeding two above average dogs together - you will produce some the same, some worse and if you are lucky some better! As you breed on only the best, the avg becomes better - and the "worst" pups in a litter become better than the "worst" pups in a litter previously - the best dogs become better... etc etc ...

Edited November 21, 2007 by bridgie_cat

[Vickie]

I think that it would give a higher proportion of dogs with the aptitude, whether it would give greater aptitude, that to me is less able to be said. Occasionally you get that outstanding individual - whether that breeds on is debatable. Sometimes it does, sometimes not, would depend on what it was that produced it.

I guess that's my point, I'm not sure we can clearly define what traits make an agility dog good (I'm sorry, I know very little about obedience) so if we can't define them, how can we reproduce them? I suppose I am really talking here about outstanding, not just good, since the question revolved around improvement in breeding. There are lots of good agility dogs, producing good agility dogs, but if you wanted to select for perfection what would you choose? Even if we had the knowledge to combine the right genes without collecting those we don't want, which we don't, which genes would you select?

For instance, let's say I had 2 great agility dogs, both are fast & athletic & learn quickly.

Dog 1 is naturally efficent & very biddable

Dog 2 is naturally wider & drives harder but still biddable

Offspring?

1 efficent & biddable

2 efficent & biddable but doesn't drive hard

2 biddable & biddable - too soft

3 Wide & hard

4 Wide & recessive stubborn

And what if we decided not to breed for wide in agility since it's not desirable but wide was often linked to driving hard? What if we decided biddable was the most important thing & started doubling up on it everywhere only to discover that too much of it is not good at all?

I'm not keen on breeding solely for Obedience or Agility. I think there is too much potential for a breeds (especially popular sports breeds) identity & abilities to be lost in the process.

Edited November 21, 2007 by Vickie

[sidoney]

Let's relate it to racehorses, which I know a LITTLE about (although there will be people on here that know more). Racehorses have to run fast, and not be too freaky to cope with race meets. Not too much more than that, although there is a lot in it especially around the 1600m distance which needs a combination of aerobic and anaerobic ability.

You can get a consistent winning family. Families like these will be more likely to breed on - that is why people pay so much for horses from them.

Outstanding individuals can come from consistent families or crop up in other families. If it doesn't come from a family that has a background of consistency, it is less likely to breed on - look at Gunsynd as a well known example of that.

If one was to parallel to dogs, I'd think that you would look for the outstanding individuals in consistent families to choose for breeding, and if that was not available, choose something good but not necessarily outstanding from a consistent family before choosing something outstanding from a background that is inconsistent or perhaps unproven.

Thoughts?

[leopuppy04]

What do you think? Does it work?

We were discussing it the other day here and have no idea if it would work.

Too many factors come into play here. It also depends with what you consider workable. Some would say my boy is fab, others, not enough zing..... To me - he is a great worker.

By breeding two performance titled dogs together doesn't mean it is foolproof - that's like saying breeding 2 Ch or Gr CH together will produce only GrCH etc.

Takes a lot of homework to get what you want - you need to assess temperaments, structure, not to mention the working *type* you want. Also - just by having the titles means nothing. Breeding a CD AD JD ET dog to a Ch CCD JD or something - won't necessarily mean that you will have a top working dog. It may mean the dog will never get above those levels, the owner hasn't had time to achieve the higher titles etc,etc. You can only make this assessment by looking at the dog. There infact could be a better, un-titled dog/ parents that the owner has no interest in competing with etc . On the other side of things, a well titled dog could just be testament to a great trainer/handler

Having said that - there are some breeds where titles become important for me.... and the higher class titles. BUT, if you were breeding two superior performance dogs together (after much research) then yes, I think you will increase your chances of producing higher quality stock - suited for performance. That's how you get kennels with the 'top performing xxx breed in xxxx state'.... That's how, you will notice some kennels producing dogs that consistently seem to be winning in the rings. But, essentially - it is no different to breeding for the show winner either.... a lot of misses, before you get one just right.... if at all

[bridgie_cat]

There infact could be a better, un-titled dog/ parents that the owner has no interest in competing with etc . On the other side of things, a well titled dog could just be testament to a great trainer/handler

that is certainly what makes it difficult in practice! With relatively few dogs competing and with so much of it depending on training... it is hard to know if a) the great dogs you are seeing are the product of good genes or if they are not the norm for those lines... and b) if the numerous lines that do not have dogs in top performance homes could have the same or more potential - and another line could have other benefits in soundness or conformation that you also need to keep in mind when breeding etc...

[leopuppy04]

There infact could be a better, un-titled dog/ parents that the owner has no interest in competing with etc . On the other side of things, a well titled dog could just be testament to a great trainer/handler

that is certainly what makes it difficult in practice! With relatively few dogs competing and with so much of it depending on training... it is hard to know if a) the great dogs you are seeing are the product of good genes or if they are not the norm for those lines... and b) if the numerous lines that do not have dogs in top performance homes could have the same or more potential - and another line could have other benefits in soundness or conformation that you also need to keep in mind when breeding etc...

That's why for me, temperament is so important. If they have the right *temperament* you are looking for in a performance dog, then chances are they are going to produce/ be what you want . If a puppy doesn't play with toys, doesn't mean it won't have any toy drive etc :p. For me - I fell in love with Leo's dad when I watched him work - he just had this exuberance oozing out of him as he worked.... heeling was the best place to be and the closer and faster you could do it was better. Yes, it was excellent training, but it also is the dog's personality. I only got 1/2 of it in Leo :) He takes after his mother ;)