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Breed Misidentification


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As for supposed 'purebreds' - its really hard to be definitive. A dog can look like a dead ringer and still be a mix.

Yes, the claim for a dog to be a 'purebred' can only be made when papers are sighted.

Without papers, I agree, it's anyone's guess....as in 'looks like'.

And being a dead ringer is not a guarantee of being a purebred.

Friends in SA had a little dog who came from generations of mixed breeds in their small country town. By sheer chance, she came out looking like a purebred tibbie. In an added twist of fate, she needed an operation on her front legs which left her with that slight 'bow' that's characteristic of the breed.

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Yep, not many people get what my Aussie pup Quinn is either. A surprising number say "oh a Coolie!". She gets husky x as well coz of her blue eye.

Sometimes I worry a bit when people say oh what's she crossed with, and I say she's an Australian Shepherd, pure bred, that people will think I've made it up like people do with oodles! (ACD x GSD maybe...)

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One of our Standard poodles in lamb trim was refered to as a short coat poodle and our show dog in continetal trim was the long coat. The "expert" went on to explain to his friend that only the long coated poodles could be shown!

Oh wow, I am lost for words on this one...

I would have literally been rolling on the floor laughing and speechless...

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Alkhe, I'll have to bring my black and tan Lapphund down to your park one day so I can hear your boyfriend call her a Dobe cross! I can add it to the list of things people have thought she is, my favourite being 'Really Big Pomeranian'. The best guess I've had for Tarja, Samoyed x Kelpie, actually combined origin, looks and function pretty well. My boyfriend is not terribly familiar with dog breeds, and has come up with a couple of clangers :laugh: He is slowly being edumacated!

The breeder my family got our first boxer from used to board her puppy people's dogs and we once went to collect our girl and saw a large all-black smooth coated bitch which looked, if anything, perhaps like a lab x pointer. It was our purebred boxer's older half-sister, courtesy of some unknown dog jumping the fence one night while her owners (not the breeder) had her with them on holiday. There was no way anyone could ever have guessed that this girl was half boxer.

ETA I assume that most people haven't heard of Lappies, so I explain what she is if people ask. I try not to assume that I know what other people's dogs are, but will ask the owner to confirm, it tends to go down better.

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I was asked at obedience where i had got my "poor looking rescue dog from"..... I then explained that she is very well bred pure bred whippet from a registered breeder! I was then told that I hope she fattens up soon and doesn't look so sick.......I didn't know wether to laugh out loud or shake my head. I bit my tongue and carried on training....

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I was out walking my dogs a week or so ago when we meet a fellar with a young tan rough coated Lab type dog with a red nose. I asked he he was a Golden x with an Am Staff but was told he was a rare pure bred short coated Golden Ret.

I have a small cross breed dog that is black & tan. She is about the size of a JRT. Yep, I get does she have Doberman in her & Oh look a sausage dog. :laugh:

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We got some great comments about the Australian Shepherds at the royal last week. :D Although you get used to it, I have people asking me all the time what sort of cross he is, oh what a good looking coolie he is, is he blind with his marbled eyes? haha

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I remember striking up a conversation with a lady who insists she owns a pure bred 4th generation "labradoodle" but then also proceeded to tell me that he's got spaniel in him. I tried explaining that "labradoodles" aren't purebred and even if, for the sake of the argument they were, the fact her dog has spaniel in him too, that makes him a cross-breed. She didn't want to hear it and just went on to explain how she paid over $2000 for him so what would I know. Then she tells me she has to watch his diet as he was born with only one kidney. :eek:

I walked away laughing: she paid over $2000 for a "labraSPOODLE" and a defective one at that. Oh well, at least he's well loved!

I on the other hand welcome discussions about Zeus. I bought him as a beagle x JRT, however, I don't really see much JRT in him as he's very tall and leggy. I love hearing what people think is in him and he sure keeps me guessing too.

A lot of people ask what Kirah is crossed with and are surprised when I say she's a purebred Aussie Terrier. Most people then say "a silky terrier" or "a yorkie terrier" and don't believe that the Aussie is a "real" breed. As I own one, you'd think they'd believe me. :shrug:

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I'm sorta glad my dalmatian can't be mistaken for anything else =]

I get a little annoyed when people do get it wrong, hey I get annoyed when people spell wrong (although I myself am a culprit, and yes I get annoyed at myself). My parents' next door neighbours, a girl I went to schoool with, have a "shih tzu x maltese" from a pet store...it's the size of a chihuahua and looks nothing like a shih tzu! The maltese part I think is correct. I told them what I believed, and that they pet store they bought her from is not really to be trusted.

I love meeting new breeds, but I hate being mistaken, so I usually ask and don't assume...unless it's obvious - like a dally lol.

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I was at the Royal with the Old English one year... worst torture ever!!! People all have the most original joke, "Which end is the head?" by the end of the day I felt like going "Well sniff here and then tell me"... :o

I also heard a person call Weimeraner puppies "Minature Weimeraners" and Zora was labelled both a hairy Weimeraner and a White Flat Coat depending on whose bench she was on :laugh:.

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I had a rescue group a while back trying to convince me they had picked up a xoloitzcuintle, I tried everything to explain it no doubt wasnt ( IT WASNT!!) but they were very hard to convince, it was a dog with a bad case of mange, the teeth were normal which was not a hairless breed in the hairless sense, and besides the fact no other xolos are here in Aus ( I wish there were!)

With all the cross matings these days one must feel for the rescue people at times.

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I was walking my very large Digby dog past some kids the other day and they were admiring him, saying what a biiiig dog he was. And then one of them said authoritively to the other "Do you know what breed he is Ben? No? he is a Horse Dog" :laugh:

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When the owner hasn't seen either parent and the dog has no papers, there's really no way of knowing.

I've seen some so called designer dogs at puppy school who really don't look much like either of their supposed parents yet their owners still insist on calling them a Maltese/Shih Ztu, Pom-oodle or whatever. I think there's some kind of deep seated need in humans to have accurate labels for everything. Plus when you have spent $900 on a puppy, you don't want to have to tell people that you actually have "some kind of crossbreed"!.

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I asked someone in my obedience class what mix their puppy was, it was supposedly about 6 different small breeds, she had some silly "breed" name for it but couldn't remember it, so we called him a mix breed :D

I got told off for starving my rottweiler once (it was a Dobe, and not at all starved)

Elsie is a mix breed, we get some interesting guesses... Rat terrier (don't think we have them here in NZ?) and Tenterfield terrier... Or heading dog puppy :)

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Ahh this reminds me of the argument I had about 5 years ago with someone at obedience (when I hadn't quite learned to nod and smile yet). I was there with Cody who was a definite border collie x australian cattle dog. He probably could have passed for a working border if I wanted to but knew he was a cross. The only thing really ACD about him (other than temperament) was the black and white heavy ticked coat, he had the longer coat (about the length of most of our working bcs) and his body shape was BC too.

This guy came up to me and asked what he was, I told him and he replied that he wasn't actually a crossbreed, he is what they call a "texas heeler". This went back and forth for a bit until he asked how much I paid for him. When I told him about $200 he got incredibly excited and walked away muttering about how much of a bargain that was and how I was too stupid to realise I had got such a great deal :laugh: I later googled it and realised that a "texas heeler" is supposed to be and aussie crossed with an ACD so I still got to have the last laugh :rofl:

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