What makes a good pedigree

Pedigree dogs health problems Are pedigree dogs more likely to have health issues? Which puppy is right for you. A puppy dealers advert. Finding a good breeder. A healthy, happy puppy. Dog breeds. The American Kennel Club makes certified four and five generation pedigrees available for purchase to every breeder. Each AKC certified pedigree includes complete information about every dog in the pedigree.

Along with the names and registration numbers, this information includes colors and markings, competition titles and any health-related information available including AKC DNA registration information. There are literally dozens of good books written on the topic of canine genetics that thoroughly discuss the practical application of genetic principals through pedigree analysis. Our dogs deserve at least this much forethought and dedication.

Knowing the sire, dam and grandparent is not nearly as telling as knowing their history to the fourth or even fifth generations, where all sorts of surprises both pleasant and disturbing may dwell in the darkness of decades past. Consider, also, whether your dogs are inbred and how closely, and what might happen to the future of your breeding program if you use Grand Champion Mister Majestic on his niece that is your beloved companion and a multiple specialty winner.

Unfortunately, it is not at all terribly uncommon to breed two truly outstanding individuals and get a few puppies that you would swear were a mistake. Looking at the two dogs involved on the basis of conformation, temperament, and so on may not illustrate why the mating did not work as you had expected. A study of the pedigree just might reveal certain recessive traits common to both bloodlines concerned that combined to create the less desirable characteristics you had hoped would not be present.

It is no wonder that many breeders find researching pedigrees a daunting task. A five generation pedigree contains sixty-two names. That is more than enough to cross your eyes or bring on a massive headache for any breeder, and if an individual is coming to the breeding process with little or no prior experience, it must assuredly seem incomprehensible.

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Correspondence to Bernice Bovenkerk. Reprints and Permissions. J Agric Environ Ethics 30, — Download citation. Accepted : 20 June Published : 28 June Issue Date : June Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:. Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article. Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative. Skip to main content. Search SpringerLink Search.

Download PDF. Abstract Pedigree dog breeding has been the subject of public debate due to health problems caused by breeding for extreme looks and the narrow genepool of many breeds. Footnote 2 A longstanding debate in animal ethics has focused on the moral acceptability of adaptations to the genetic make-up of animals, either through genetic modification GM or through selective breeding Holland and Johnson ; Thompson Resultingly, the central questions of our study were: What arguments and concepts are brought forward in ethical theory, that can be applied to the case of pedigree dog breeding?

To what extent can we find these arguments and concepts in everyday-life reasoning? What criteria do people use in order to draw boundaries regarding what is acceptable and not? Do the arguments people use in practice go beyond welfare arguments? What could ethical theory learn from everyday-life reasoning about pedigree dog breeding?

What recommendations for the debate on pedigree dog breeding can we make based on our research? Methodology: Case Driven Approach Involving Literature Review and Framing Analysis The unchartedness of the topic and the kind of research questions that were raised, called for a multi-method case-driven approach: the case being moral reasoning concerning the limits of interfering in the genetic make-up of dogs, in ethical theory and in practice.

Table 1 Bibliographical summary of our conversation partners Full size table. Animal Welfare Many general arguments about our treatment of animals focus on animal welfare consequences. Dignity, Integrity, and the Non-identity Problem Two Kantian arguments that have been put forward to explain what is wrong with disenhancing as well as with enhancing animals, are that they violate animal dignity or integrity. Objectification and Instrumentalisation One argument that is related to integrity and dignity, but that has a slightly different focus, is that changing animals solely for our purposes instrumentalises or objectifies animals.

Argumentation in Practice: Results of the Empirical Research Where the previous section dealt with the arguments and concepts in ethical theory that can be applied to the case of pedigree dog breeding, in this section we report if and how these arguments and concepts showed up in everyday-life reasoning. Arguments Categorised Under Existing Ethical Concepts Not surprisingly, animal welfare forms a basic go-to argument in our pedigree dog breeding case study. Other Arguments of Importance In the pedigree dog breeding case, several arguments repeatedly came up that fell outside of the regular moral arguments but nevertheless were important.

Multi-dimensionality, Balance-Orientation and Worldview In contrast to ethical theory, arguments regarding the acceptability of certain pedigree dog breeding adaptations for the respondents cannot easily be separated from one another. Discussion and Conclusion: Insights for the Role of Ethical Theory in the Debate on Pedigree Dog Breeding How can we interpret the results of our empirical research in relation to ethical theory?

The Value of the Unnaturalness-Objection Ethicists warn that unnaturalness-objections have to be approached with great care, because invoking nature can be misused for social or political goals Soper Conclusion In conclusion, our empirical research into how far we are allowed to interfere in the genetic make-up of dogs, through breeding and genetic modification led to an appeal to virtue ethics, in particular the virtue of temperance.

Notes 1. The conversation reached that point while conjecturing about one of the great South African stallions of all time, Foveros , who had little to recommend him from a pedigree perspective, yet was just about as good a stallion as had drawn breath in the annals of South African breeding. The short-term response to such an approach, if you happen to be lucky, is that you may see the financial outcome you envisaged in the first place, but more often than not, the outcome disappoints, and the breeder, after just a few, and for those with long-suffering appetites, many years, disappears from our ranks.

Discussions were often intense, but never dull. Of course, if the client was Stavros Niarchos , whose pocket was as deep as the ocean his ships traversed, then the number of quality performers in the immediate removes mattered, because there were millions of Pounds on the table, but when it came to dealing with people like ourselves, whose budgets were distinctly measured, there were other considerations.

And thank heavens this was the case, because it made us look harder and work harder when it came to our selections, and it gave us something of a small chance. In a manner of speaking, and largely because of budgetary constraints, we were forced to approach the sales in much the way that most revered of Italian breeders, Senor Tesio had done decades before, and that was to get the best value for our limited money. Always in our thoughts though, was the need to buy a good individual, with the physical attributes to produce an athlete.