so I went to see some pups today and it was awful :-(

[AllergicToNutters]

They were living in rank cages outside on concrete floors. The smell was horrid. There was Dad and a Portuguese pointer in a cage, Mum was sooo skinny and looked as if she had been bred and bred. The pups looked healthy enough but the one remaining pup ( so I had no choice in selecting one for us) was shaking and whimpering. He was absolutely beautiful but I didn't take him. I felt awful. The pups were kept in a shed away from the other dogs and Mum. They were clearly not 'indoor' dogs. Very sad and don;t know what I can do.....

This is a good spectator sport... Everyone is !!WRONG!! except Flatbread!!
My nanna bred once, from her cavalier, many years ago in the early 80s. She said it was so stressful and exhausting she would never, ever do it again. I have great respect for responsible breeders who put the time, effort and research in. It's costly, emotionally and physically draining and a LOT of hard work.

I assume this means that Flatbread was clueless when she launched a personal attack on a poster on this thread - calling her a hypocrite. She did apologise, but the attack is still there...

This thread is bonkers. Let's go back to discussing how defective our dogs are.

Jasper dug a hole in the garden, dropped his rawhide bone in to it, and reburied it with his face. He now looks like a commando. And keeps sneezing strings of mud snot out of his gigantic nostrils.

sadie tackled half a chicken today she never uses her paws.

i've spent the last few weeks trawling rescue pages. i want another dog - thinking a smallish one and a rescue this time.

I would love to rehome one of the many unwanted Staffies in rescue but it's not something I can consider right now. My mutt is a rescue (I suspect a drop of Staffy in there, short legs/barrel chest/shark grin) and so insecure he follows me everywhere- even to the toilet. He's also as dumb as a rock, chews his fur and walks into stuff a lot. Hardly the hale, intelligent naturally selected mutt of legend :o

Allergic, I hope you find a dog very soon and then you don't have to wait til summer. Arthur would be a great name for a dog, btw.

My mutt has been alarmingly well behaved today. I am waiting to find a hole, chewed up toy or a ripped up sock stolen from the washer. He must have done something wrong. I simply refuse to buy the idea that almost a whole day has passed and he has behaved perfectly. Even on his walk he behaved, asides from when he spotted his arch nemisis, but we don't talk about that

He is saddened to see that they still have the Bog of Doom fenced off. I'm not sure what he'd make of them turning it into a wildlife pond full off tasty ducks . He talk so I can't ask him

Whippy was silly earlier. She stood on the dining table with her head down and her back end stook up, drooling. For future reference if your Whippy, should you have one, ever do this, don't just laugh at them. They have a bit of bone stuck to the roof of their mouth and are too dim to cry or whine or do anything other than stand on the table looking confused.

Well mine is obviously over her depression from being in season and not going for walks.

So far today she has eaten, 2 tea towels, my NEW ovengloves, the empty packet from the multipack of crisps, a sponge and a crayon.

Slubber,

I really get why people are assigning personal motives to my arguments. It is silly. I could just do the same to others, ' oh you are defending pure breeds because that is what you have or because you are a professional breeder'. I am avoiding that nonsense because it doesn't matter.

I think I read somewhere that 75% of the dogs in UK are purebred. I would suggest that probably we should reverse the ratio, 75% mutts and 25% pure bred. Or something along those lines.

I just mentioned this thread to my husband, and he started laughing. He is Icelandic and the only purebred dog variety they have is the Icelandic sheep dog. This was bred to help farmers with the unique task of herding in the Icelandic climate and terrain.

Most people have mutts and when he was growing up, if people wanted dogs, they just mated two mutts and the families involved gave out pups to friends. No money exchanged hands and the dogs were neutered afterwards. There was really no major issue of stray dogs or overpopulation. And most importantly, no industry of professional breeders selectively breeding and selling dogs.

It might have changed now, but I am so surprised that this is such an alien and horrible concept to the average mnetter. I just have to assume it is a unique breed that lurks in this space.

And sorry for not responding to every point. This is a forum, and as such, just an informal exchange while one is doing other stuff

I thought we'd moved on

Oh, the constant noshing of inappropriate items. Jasper stole some of my pants from the washing basket last night and proceeded to scoff the gussett in the middle of the living room floor. Put DH right off his chicken chasseur.

I am really lucky mine don't eat anything in the house. I have to watch the husky cross like a hawk on walks though. Today he found some eggs at the side of the road (hens eggs - maybe someone dropped them on their way home from the supermarket?). I didn't mind that but sometimes he finds stuff that is rotten and still eats it.

She is terrible although, never eaten any of my pants!

She is a serial theif and will take anything off the kitchen sides if you forget and leave something in her reach! Nightmare

Oh and on walks she doesnt eat food or rotten things but, dog poo, horse poo, cat poo, sheep poo (you get the picture) is fair game.

Mine eats assorted poo sometimes too. Nice.

Red,

I had read the study you referenced. It is about maintaining some amount of genetic diversity and discouraging inbreeding. It doesn't really increase the genetically diversity, just mitigates somewhat the culling of the gene pool while dealing with HD.

The studies I linked to were empirical, not theoretical arguments. Essentially they looked at a large sample of the dog population, breeds and mutts and measured their health along certain criteria. The aggregated data results show mutts were healthier and lived longer. This was similar to the in-house Churchill insurance data which showed mutts need less vet care and live longer.

Nothing more complicated than that. The inference is that the natural genetic diversity in mutts makes them healthier. Obvious and uncontroversial, I thought, till I came into the unreal MN doghouse run by pure breed zealots

nice smile there, really adds to the preceding three words.

'Pure breed zealots' - another personal attack? I thought people who did this were clueless....

How is the frothy lab, beer? Did she fart bubbles?

I actually have very little interest in pedigree dogs. If people wish to responsibly breed mutts e.g health screen both parent dogs, find suitable homes prior to mating and have the contacts/space to guarantee they will take the puppies back at any point in their lives, that's fine with me.

My problem is with irresponsible breeding. Not mutts.

Oh yes, I remember seeing the threat about the soad, as soon as I saw the title I knew you had a lab

soad?? Of course, I mean soap