advanced genetics

[EWO]

This is true. Selection is the difference. If you breed two exceptional dogs that in turn throw exceptional dogs at a very high percentage and out of 30 great dogs your favorite one happens to be a ten minute cur, well, when you breed that cur you will get a lot of good dogs because everything in and around him are great dogs.

In the next few breedings you center the program around the cur the percentages will fall. In time there will be a six generation pedigree chock full of dogs that should have performed and produced and did not, that is the result of selection.

Selection cuts both ways. If dogs are selected for the wrong reasons or the ones who are selected are sub par, then that selection process will have some negative affects.

Look at college football and a lot in the NFL. The spread offenses made defenses stop playing the majority of the time between the hash marks and now they must play from side line to side line. The ultimate grade is placed on speed. Now every body is bigger, faster and stronger because that is what the coaches are selecting. Freak athletes. Along the way the kids no longer learn how to tackle.

In dogs that would be like selecting the hardest biters over and over, and in time you will have a yard full of freak mouthed dogs. They won't scratch but they sure will bite.

It is all about selection. Selection can only come from experience within a family of dogs and experience in recognizing not only like traits in a family but traits that have been repeatable.

Selection also nixes paper breeding dogs vs. trait breeding as well.

EWO

[bolero]

This is true. Selection is the difference. If you breed two exceptional dogs that in turn throw exceptional dogs at a very high percentage and out of 30 great dogs your favorite one happens to be a ten minute cur, well, when you breed that cur you will get a lot of good dogs because everything in and around him are great dogs.

In the next few breedings you center the program around the cur the percentages will fall. In time there will be a six generation pedigree chock full of dogs that should have performed and produced and did not, that is the result of selection.

Selection cuts both ways. If dogs are selected for the wrong reasons or the ones who are selected are sub par, then that selection process will have some negative affects.

Look at college football and a lot in the NFL. The spread offenses made defenses stop playing the majority of the time between the hash marks and now they must play from side line to side line. The ultimate grade is placed on speed. Now every body is bigger, faster and stronger because that is what the coaches are selecting. Freak athletes. Along the way the kids no longer learn how to tackle.

In dogs that would be like selecting the hardest biters over and over, and in time you will have a yard full of freak mouthed dogs. They won't scratch but they sure will bite.

It is all about selection. Selection can only come from experience within a family of dogs and experience in recognizing not only like traits in a family but traits that have been repeatable.

Selection also nixes paper breeding dogs vs. trait breeding as well.

EWO

perfectly said EWO. that is one thing i have seen and read once you stop selecting working dogs you will lose those working traits it is just inevitable

[bolero]

I am not saying it can not happen but i will say i have never seen a successful program based on continuous outcrossing. now dont get me wrong i am not saying that you need to inbreed the shit out of these dogs i am saying the exact opposite. But i am saying that line breeding which when you get down to it is inbreeding and only animal breeders differentiate between the two is a successful tool when you are trying to lock in traits.

another form of breeding that some have tried is assortative breeding which is breeding like traits to like traits regardless of relation. this can work but again it can only take you so far say for instance you have a stifle dog and breed him to another stifle dog yes they have the same trait but it was not the same combination of genes that created it.

Breeding is called an art for a reason because it is part science and part intuition. Like EWO said half the battle is having the experience to know which animals to select to create the next generation.