deerhound owner

Arggh we have one of those.. if it's not gently sauteed in olive oil he wont eat it. He didn't eat for 3 days when we tried to switch him to a raw diet. Mind you he found a half rotten roo leg in the bush the other day... nothing wrong with eating that apparently :D Maybe it's a deerhound thing

Title: Inbreeding and fertility in Irish Wolfhounds in Sweden: 1976 to 2007 Summary: A look at the effect of inbreeding depression on litter size in Irish Wolfhounds... basically there wasn't one! Open access article link

From memory they were going to link it in with the practice management software used by vets. If a question could be added (if there isn't one already) about "where did your dog come from?" It would then be easy to control for this factor in any subsequent analysis and look at differences in prevalence rates between different sources. You still might get some error from people saying.. "yeah I brought it from a registered breeder" when they may not be refering to a CC? All studies have some sources of error, the trick is to try to minimise them as much as possible and not give up on a project just cause it's not 100% perfect. No scientific advances would ever be made that way.

Here is the UK data for your breed http://www.thekennelclub.org.uk/download/1...hsdeerhound.pdf As you can see most of the areas they (RSPCA and the Uni) targeted for real animal welfare issues in large dogs are listed for your breed. It will be intersting to see how they will end up dealing with large breed dogs. I look forward to seeing reserch in this area. Thanks for the link, a very interesting read. There is currently a lot of debate amongst deerhound breeders about the trend for them to keep being bred bigger and bigger away from the sorts of sizes they were back in the day when they were used for hunting. Personally I think that they are getting too big and that it is likely leading to some of the diseases identified in the report and which certainly could cause some welfare concerns. Do I want my dog to drop dead at 5 in the middle of a walk from a heart attack... not really and i'd be happy to work with anyone towards improving my chances that that didn't happen. Again I think it's important that breeders need to avoid breeding to the extremes of the standards and particulalry judges need to stop awarding these dogs. Prehaps a change to the standard is what is needed to allay some of the welfare concerns, I son't see this as a major interfearence with my chosen breed rather they are returning it to more what it was like historically. I agree though, would love to see more research into large breeds in general. I know what you mean about people missinterpreting prevalence data but without doing the basic, easiest to do studies first, it's near impossible to get funding for anything more technical. Money makes the world go round unfortunately. I'm writing a paper at the moment about differences between purebred of different sizes and longevities and crossbreds in their behavioural ageing, interesting results so far... i'll let you know when it comes out

Compared with what? By contrast, studies conducted in northern europe made comparison across purebreds and mixed breeds. What's important is to establish the incidence of conditions across the general dog and cat populations. Yes, I remember an appeal going out from these folk at Sydney University asking for donations to fund the project. I sure wouldn't 'donate'. Prevalence is the number of individuals affected by a disease in a given time period ie. how common is the disease. Incidence is the risk of developing a disease in a given time period ie. what is my chance of getting cancer in the next 2 years Collecting incidence data like you suggest would involve longitudinal studies over a long period of time to assess the number of new cases that develop. I thought that the inclusion of crossbred information was discussed at the Building better dogs seminar in Melbourne and it had been agreed that it would be included. The problem with crossbreed data is that it is difficult to confirm what breeds went into the mix so it's hard to see if a particular cross is mor or less healthy than it's respective parent breeeds. Generalisations can still be made though as were done in the northern European studies.

Not sure what you arte talking about, can you share more? He seems very busy to me. Seems to be knocking out study after study. I posted the pug faced study below but no one commented on it. 2012/13 will be the year it really begins I think. That is how the scientific world works. The higher up you get, the more students and collaborations you get. That means you are often associated with the research but you don't have to personally collect all the data and analyse it yourself. It's not common to see papers with only one author as it takes a lot of work to produce the research and you need input from a lot of people. Thats not to say he's not very busy anyway The study on the effect of cephalic index on brain rotation that you mentioned was actually conducted by a Masters student from Canada who was over here to do some study. She was a fantastic person and worked very hard to produce that work. It's sad to see it instantly dismissed by people just because they have a persoal dislike of one of the authors. I think it was a facinating study and it will be interesting to see what information comes to light with further research in this area. Prehaps if you put a post in the general section you may have a more robust discussion as people often don't come into the Media section. Cheers

No studies have been done on olfaction and dementia in dogs yet (i'm working on it ) but in humans there is a well established link. In fact olfactory discrimination (the ability to tell the difference between smells) has been shown to be impaired well before any other clinical signs of dementia appear so it is a good early warning sign, later you lose your sense of smell all together. Without getting too carried away, they have also found that the part of the brain responsible for olfaction in humans is effected early by the build up of the bad protein Beta-amyloid. In dogs you would assume the same olfactory problems would occur but then brain studies have not found any amyloid in the olfactory bulb so who knows. Hopefully one day we will be able to answer this with more certainty but it is quite difficult to test olfactory discrimination in dogs without training them like they do the drug/bomb dogs which in a dog with dementia would be a little difficult!

Our deerhound boy was my introduction to showing too. At our first show when he was about 7 months, we made it to group (him being the only one there ) and he lay down twice when waiting in the line up and had a little nap, he then proceeded to chew the lead all through our turn and the judge just laughed and said "he'll get there". They certainly aren't the most animated performers but hey that's why we love them!!

It's possible that what you are describing is another symptom of the dementia. In humans and dogs, dementia causes a reduction in executive function, that is the ability to suppress feelings and behaviours that may not be appropriate. In humans this often manifests as rudeness, people say exactly what pops into their heads eg. "you're fat", instead of thinking a person is fat but then overriding the desire to vocalise the thought because it is not socially appropriate. when you translate this into dog world it means they tend to revert to behaviours that they had originally learnt were inappropriate such as housesoiling. In dementia dogs, housesoiling is not usually a result of the dog being physically unable to get outside or to remember in time, but rather that they no longer realise that it is an inappropriate behaviour. Reduced executive function tends to cause them to revert back to puppy like behaviours because they represent all the innate behaviours in a dog before we teach them what is and isn't socially appropriate to our lifestyles. Also remember that she does not realise what she is doing is wrong because all of those years of training have essentially been removed in her mind. Unfortunately I think it will be a management issue on your part as the other problem with dementia is that learning is impaired so you may struggle to remedy this with conventional training. You are right in that more toileting breaks probably won't help as it seems to be a marking behaviour. You may have to be more careful in leaving clothes around and in restricting access to the sofa the other dog lies on (if possible). Maybe even a nappy would make things easier for you all. Wishing you the best of luck, dementia is a difficult disease to manage and it is heartbreaking to see them decline in this way. If you want any more information feel free to PM me.

Oh my.. what an absolute cutie!! Erik is a great name, congratulations and don't forget we'll need lots of pictures when you get him home, he will grow like a weed and he'll be huge before you know it. I swear we would go shopping for an hour and our boy would look bigger when we got home.

Congratulations on a great choice I'm sure you will find a deerhound will slot into your life very easily. make sure you pop into the sighthound thread with lots of puppy pictures and if you're after any more information check out www.scottish-deerhound.com.

Also I saw these on your website, are they very cuddly? I'm really after a lap hedgehog dog!

Can I put in a request for one of these please?

Thank you

Mature dogs I'd like to introduce the website I designed as part of my PhD. Many DOLers helped out by contributing photos and stories and their help was much appreciated. It is a celebration of the golden oldies in our lives and includes stories, poems and helpful links. It also has some information about the research we have been conducting into canine ageing and cognition. Most excitingly it has a questionnaire you can fill out to assess your dog for Canine Cognitive Dysfunction (doggy dementia). Please feel free to pass the link on to family and friends you think may be interested. Many thanks Hannah (sydney uni)

or this??

I'm not usually one to suggest my own breed either but a Deerhound does sound like it would suit you well. Very laid back in the house and if you can wake them up for a 40-60 minute walk you are doing well. They are not all one colour either, they come in blue grey, light grey, dark grey, silver and brindle grey (see lots of variety ). Who could resist this:

Elfin, I'm so sorry to hear about Toby, he was a beautiful old boy who obviously landed on his feet all those years ago. Give yourself a big hug from me and an ear rub to Elfin, Bernard and Ronnie

The Deerhound also has an illustrated standard available that not only lists the standard but also gives diagramatic examples of good and bad. As a novice to standards I found this really helpful. Do other breeds also have illustrated standards available?

Yet this DOL forum has a stated purpose to develop purebred breeding via the registered system. Where there's much work already done to improve the health & welfare of various breeds, is currently being done....& needs to be done. There's also research findings of much interest. There's also great potential to carry out rigorous research because the registering system allows tracing via both depth & breadth of breeding. Which has been much lauded by researchers investigating the conditions that humans share with dogs. But now, matters on this forum have been turned to a commercially inspired supply system of 'pet' dogs. Implying that this is the one system for breeding & supplying pets, at a 'professional' level. Yet, there is evidence that the purebred system does better than the unregistered one in preparing well socialised puppies to be companiond dogs. What is next required is collecting data to see if this translates into a lower dumpage rate. You may well care for the welfare of crossbred puppies....& so would any genuine animal lover. But this thread has seen the hijacking of the specific purpose of this forum....the further development & promotion of purebred dogs. My appologies for the confusion, I used crossbred as an example as that seemed to be the main reason people were shutting down communication on what is a very important topic. A large proportion of commercially bred dogs are purebred so I don't think a discussion on improving the welfare of commercially bred dogs (not a promotion of) can be seen as going against the forum aims. Steve is also right, the RSPCA and other welfare organisations will look to schemes like the one Kate is proposing for ideas when proposing legislation, yet I very much doubt that the legislation will exclude registered breeders so I think if registered breeders don't take an interest in what is happening in the commercail world they may find them selves suddnely under a whole new load of restrictions. No one implied that Kate's suggestion was the "one" system, in fact most people have highlighted areas of her proposal that are inadequate or unrealistic, and have offered helpful suggestions of how these might be improved upon. You are right that the registered purebred system (in most cases) does an excellent job of producing great dogs but it is not the piece of registration paper that makes the welfare of these dogs better than their commercial cousins. It's the health testing, after sales care, good socialisation, hygenic living conditions etc that gives them a good standard of welfare. so is there not a way to make these things common practice in the commercial world as well? Steve, it is fantastic to know someone (as a person and CEO) so level headed and open to discussion has improving the welfare of dogs firmly in their sights.

I think you are right, handing over all responsibility to a petshop would just make commercial breeders more likely to use this as an avenue for selling pups. What if the breeder had to take the dog back and rehome it through avenues than other than a shelter (no idea how that would be policed - just throwing ideas around) and the pet shop had to deal with all of the transfer responsibility (testing, screening etc) and refunding the purchase price or a proportion thereof? I understand what Kate was saying that part of what the purchase price of a puppy from an ethical breeder includes is the after sales care so selling a dog cheaper to a pet shop to onsell, the pet shop is making alot of the profit and should therefore take some responsibility. I think the MDBA is taking the most responsible path by refusing to sell to petshops but Kate seemed to suggest that she wasn't flexible on that point. I suppose I'm just wondering if there is any way to improve the welfare and outcome of dogs sold through petshops? I don't know whether it is good or bad that beagle puppies wouldn't stay in a pet shop for 24 hours but there is a bedlington terrier puppy in the pet shop near me and it has been there for at least 2 weeks. It's breaking my heart

Past socialisation and genetics mean everything in this situation if you are trying to work out WHY a dog reacts in a certain way in a certain situation. If you are trying to develop a measure of HOW a dog reacts, why it does so is not so important. For example if you want to measuring how interested dogs are in playing fetch you need to develop some measure of "fetch interest" possibly the number of times they will fetch an object or the speed at which they fetch or a combination of both. The fact that a labrador is likely to be more interested in fetch than a greyhound doesn't effect your goal of measuring "fetch interest". Factors affecting your now measurable quality of fetch interest (such as breed) can then be the subject of future study. She did mention that in future they would like to develop tests that look at other aspects of behaviour but they have to start somewhere. Unfortunately "believing" something doesn't hold up in the scientific world, you have to be able to prove it and the only way to show that 'amicability' is not constant accross time and situation is to be able to measure 'amicability' and then look at it at different time points and situations.

Kate's presentation was "a model for an association of professional pet dog owners" not "why everybody should buy a crossbreed cause they are so much better". As a pedigree dog owner I don't agree with many of the things she herself does, but I am interested in the development of anything that may improve the health and welfare of crossbred puppies because I care about DOGS, not just the pedigree ones. We all know there are so many great breeds out there that everyone should be able to find one to suit them but the reality is some people do all their research and decide they want a crossbreed. I know someone who hired a pet search company to find her the exact crossbred puppy she wanted. Do we have the right to say "no you cannot have that because I don't agree with it"? Instead should we not be supportive of something that allows pople who do want a crossbreed to find one that has had all the relevent health tests, has been raised in a good environment, and comes with a the knowledge that the breeder will take responsibility of the dog if for any reason they cannot keep it. Instead of shooting the messenger, prehaps we could critique the code of ethics she is proposing and possibly even come up with some suggestions on how to improve it or make the logistics work. With the 7 litter/7 years thing, she did say that no one has done any research to say what is the optimal number of litters without compromising the bitches or puppies health and she would be very happy to change it if research did show that that was too many. I will start: There was the suggestion that puppies that are sold to petshops at a reduced price should hand the lifetime responsibility of the puppy onto the petshop as they were the ones making the profit. Do you think that if this was made compulsory for all pet shops, that they would be much more careful about where they sourced their puppies? Would this force the people supplying puppies to pet shops to lift their game? Would restirictions have to be made as to what avenues the petshop could use to rehome a returned dog eg: not just dump them at pounds etc. A second suggestion was that dogs must be kept in social groups of no more than 4 bitches, but not alone either. Do you think this is an appropriate number, or should it be focusing more on the amount of space each dog has? Anyway just some opening thoughts to hopefully get people talking about improving the welfare of the dogs out there that don't have lifes as spoilt as the majority of our dogs

I understand what you are saying, Deerhound, but in the scenario that you suggest, the shelter staff would have a pretty good guage of knowing what dog would do what, simply by the fact they interact. The dogs' behaviours would not be limited by breed/genetics only, so the only way a shelter would be able to say what you have suggested would be due to the fact that they have met the dogs in question. IMO. I suppose the test allows you to standardise that "gut feeling" of the shelter staff, what if the shelter was very busy and the staff member had been off sick for the past few days and hadn't had a lot of experience dealing with that dog? or what if the staff member was a sighthound person for example and didn't like dogs with short faces so didn't spend a lot of time on them. Would it not be better if they could look at the chart and say "well we tested this dog in exactly the same way as all the other dogs here and found ...XYZ" I suppose a standardised test takes out any errors cause by personal bias in the shelter staff.

Not for me because before I extrapolate how to quantify something I need to know exactly what it is constituted of, or at least bound by; so what is the definition of amicability, what are its boundaries/parameters? Where does it always exist and under what circumstance? The definition of amicability is the behaviours displayed in the test being used, based on my understanding that was how willing was a dog to be appraoched by/ approach a stranger with and without the owner present. They could have called it the green slime test, with dogs that are more willing to approach people slimier than dogs that weren't willing to approach people. This can be then used as a baseline for future studies, prehaps looking at the correlation between a dogs level of sliminess and it's likelyhood of ending up being back in the pound etc etc.