Crisis, Typical size has been low to mid 30's for bitches and mid 30's to mid 40's for males. However, I have seen evidence in past litters and my most recent one that there is an increase in size coming into the line. This is really not supposed to happen with an inbreeding program, but I personally believe that the line is increasing in vigor and size, reverting back to the type of some of the large Carver dogs in their ancestry.
Amen SGC. We live in the era of fast talking hustlers who masquerade as dogmen, and will never recognize the value of a clean genetic pool.
Abe, Thanks for asking, share away.
Crisis, I never focused my breedings on Abbott, although in hindsight I dipped into that well very deliberately and with good reason. Several of the most destructive dogs I saw in my early career were sired by Abbott. When I set out to base a yard of dogs on CH Bad Billy with a Reuben catalyst, the Billy dogs were almost all gone. There was Mother's Buckwheat who was 75% Billy son and a 2X winner, and there was Abbott who was 50% Billy with a double shot of Hannibal. I was very inclined to breed to Buckwheat, but my dear friend Smith steered me towards Abbott, probably because he figured he could benefit by brokering the deal before Abbott's owner Eddie and I became good friends. Everyone in our camp was running Reuben dogs with Billy as a catalyst. I wanted to run more Billy with less Reuben blood. Abbott became my chosen sire. When Costello was born, he was in a litter of 6, and was the only one who was black like Billy and Abbott. I naturally kept him, their sister Cassie, and Hosea who I later gave to Smith's partner Pyeatt. Hosea went on to win once in a little under 2:00, and then lost to Ch Chance in 1:50. By keeping Costello; who went on to make Champion by winning over Smith in 1:46, I had the one dog in the litter who was a real throwback to the Billy/Abbott traits, and Cos was fairly prepotent in stamping his progeny with the same look and the performance traits.
If you want to see how the traits jump around, look at the Joker dog who is only 5/16ths on my Spotea bitch, and then click on Spotea.
http://apbt.online-pedigrees.com/mod...&dog_id=212921
We sent Black Widow and Beaver to Italy in the 1996-1997 time frame. The guys over there are still running this stuff blended with the Nigerino blood, and they absolutely loved what we sent them.
Jack, much like you I started out as a kid in this hobby, and now find myself one of the old guys. As we have spoke about many times, if I could start fresh today with what I know, it is almost unfathomable how much better off the bloodline would be. Chris and I squandered so much time trying to breed to this, that and the other, that we damn near lost the genetic treasures that we had right before us. We have held onto it, but oh the mistakes that were made in the process. I am convinced that we got rid of some very good dogs along the way, but by golly the ones we kept were better than good.
Crisis, you are seeing what most people see on the paper, Frisco and Red Johnny, and rightly so because it is right up front in Roto. Look, I had the opportunity to have as much of that stuff down from Garner or Boyles as I wanted, but I was stopping it right and left with my homebreds. However, Roto and her sister Precious were such high caliber animals that even an idiot couldn't help but take notice. Either one could have made Champion or Grand Champion, they were extremely good dogs. The sister was pissed away after her first win and fell into the hands of a blithering idiot dog theif. Roto was held back by her owner and played with in almost a perpetual keep on every training device known to man, but never hooked up. She was over 4 when we were able to obtain her, and was shown promptly winning in :39. By then she was 5. Having suffered with more than our fair share of cold bitches because Spotea being double bred on the cold Kudo bitch, we were on a mission for females who were consistent, high powered athletes with evil intentions. So, here we were with a 1X winner who came from a good dam, a winning granddam, and a winning greatgranddam. We didn't even like her pedigree per se, but it was time to breed her because she had the traits we wanted. The rest is history. She ended up with over 8 hours of pit time on her, taking many females the distance to find out what they were made of. If they could hang with Roto; or at least keep their head the right direction, they were worth keeping for sure. Much like our CH Costello, she was a terrible chest dog, would hit the throat and stifles, and was very ringwise. They were really the same kind of dogs, which added a measure of consistency. CH Cos lived to be 12 as a kenneled dog, and Roto lived to be 13, so these dogs have good longevity. Batters will be 10 in May, and he still looks and acts like a 4 year old. He is in better health than Roto was at 10, and he still has a set of teeth like a 2 year old.
When CH Cos was about 9 he was bred back to Ariel. She had one beautiful son, who later died of parvovirus. When I think back on the direction our kennel could have taken with that one male had he been an honest dog it's heartwrenching. Then I have to stop and say
"75% CH Costello, or the 31% I have now, what's the difference?" You see, there really is no difference as long as one has harnessed the
traits of the dogs they valued as performers.
Originally Posted by CRISIS
Reply With Quote
