Genetic Facts and Fallacies

[Julia]

ahh - he used to go from room to room and almost nod his head as soon as he saw the kid in bed.

btw Julia, (serious question)
what's your opinion of Shepherds and their hip problems .
Surely the answer is to introduce some "external genes" there somewhere.

Personally I would be real cautious about getting a Shepherd. - although I have a nephew who breeds them - spent many $, 000 for a male a while back - brought it out from Germany.

A good Sire of an established German line can cost more than $60,000.


Yes, you are probably right about introducing some external genes.
Mongrels usually are much more hardy than pure bred dogs of any breed.

The hip problems so much talked about with Shepherds (and equally with other large dogs, e.g. Rottweilers, Great Danes etc.) are often not actually hip problems. What often happens (and happened with one of my girls) is rather a neurological condition, similar to the effects of a stroke in humans, where the spinal cord fails to transmit the brain's message to move to the hind legs. The dog is otherwise perfectly well and when it tries to move, does so with its usual enthusiasm but after a couple of steps collapses to the ground. This is often interpreted as being a hip problem, but has actually nothing to do with hip displasia.

There is nothing that can be done about this (or at least there wasn't when my dog was so sadly affected). It eventually affects bladder and bowel and the dog really has to be put down.

Some years ago we used to see one of the Queeen's Corgis which was obviously affected by this problem skating along on a sort of skateboard, where the dog propels itself along by the front legs which are usually completely unaffected. I'd never subject a dog to that. I could never see one of my Shepherds with such a loss of dignity.

 

[wayneL]

What you need is a mongrel bred breed... like my Jack Rascal

Tough as an old boot.

 

[2020hindsight]

A good Sire of an established German line can cost more than $60,000.

Yes, you are probably right about introducing some external genes.
Mongrels usually are much more hardy than pure bred dogs of any breed.

Julia , thanx - yep I think it cost $65K

speaking of nerves to the back legs, sad way to go.

btw, these bokes have a real problem - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABoUWa_a4gQ

wayne (we agree for once) - I love mongels as well.

 

[Wysiwyg]

I caught a piece of a program about epigenetics yesterday and it was researched if gene characteristics are altered by environment, nutrition, stress etc. and grandchildren can manifest these changes when the switch is flicked.

Ghost in Your Genes was the documentary.

The mothers experiences during pregnancy appeared to bring on changes as well as being exposed to years of stories by the survivors of WW 2 holocaust appeared to bring about changes as the genes changed with perceived survival issues.

Accident prone, nervous disorders, smoking addictions, eating disorders etc. are apparently linked to previous generations.

An experiment was performed on rats by high dosing a female with crop spray and then observing the offspring over generations.The first generation manifested disease (can`t remember what they were) which in turn was replicated in three generations after the first rat dose.

Wik says

In biology, the term epigenetics refers to changes in gene expression. These changes may remain through cell divisions for the remainder of the cell's life. Sometimes the changes last for multiple generations. However, there is no change in the underlying DNA sequence of the organism,[1] instead, environmental factors cause the organism's genes to behave (or "express themselves") differently.

So don`t be too hard on yourself folks.It`s not all your fault.