Me Animal

Poodles Breeding
http://www.canine-genetics.com/legacy_of_sir_gay.htm
That is one of the problem with dog shows!

Another problem in dog breeding:
For some reason, show dog breeders like dogs who hold their neck vertical.
http://www.canine-genetics.com/extend.htm#zec

It is so bad, that you can see it on most of the dog shows on TV, where the handler practically strangles the dog with a tight little choker put on the dog’s neck, right under the dogs head.

Why? Not sure, but if you look at some of the Halloween costumes for dogs, that show the dog sitting and facing the camera, you will notice that the costume is designed to make it look as if the dog were a person, and his front legs are his feet – often false costume ‘arms’ are added, and often the body and rear legs of the dog are ignored.

I believe that the reason for wanting a vertical neck in show dogs has to do with human psychology – and a desire to humanize the image of the dog into that of furry people, not by having the dog walk upright, but by focusing on the front of the dog, and ignoring the rear.

The opposite of this (which IMO makes for healthier dog breeding) is where the dog breeder blurs their own self image (I am an animal), instead of trying to re-make (and sometimes crinkle) the dog into quasi-human forms.

Because when dog breeders choose to live with, or invite into their home 20, 40, 60 dogs – then there is IMO an identification between the dog breeder, who has that many animals, and those animals, or some part of the animal (like a fur fetish).

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Sir Gay

Poodles Breeding

http://www.canine-genetics.com/legacy_of_sir_gay.htm

Notice where it says that in the 1960s, Sir Gay was the father of one out of four standard poodles who became show champions.

That is called The Popular Sire Problem – it just means that a large chunk of the puppies are related to each other , because show breeders all wanted to breed to show winners.

Like IF (in people) 25% of the Babies had been by Einstein,

then in the 1950s & 1960s, if 25% of the babies born had been by Elvis,

and then IF 25% of the babies born had been by Michael Jackson

– then a big percentage of dating age people would be related to each other.

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Variety

Back to my commenting on what retrieverman said about dog breed splits.

The bad part right now, is that some show breeders produce whole litters that other show people don’t want. The breeder might want one puppy out of the litter, and the left overs are sold as “pet quality”.

I’m sure many breeders would market the left over puppies as “hunting quality” if they could find hunters stupid enough to buy them.

And, it is wrong to assume that puppymills don’t show their dogs, and that they don’t buy show bred puppies as breeding stock. Puppy mill owners can fall into believing all the dog show propaganda too.

They can start out with a pair of any type of dog and go from there. Dogs multiply fast.

People often don’t use common sense when thinking about puppy mills. Some people assume that they crank out mutts or mixed breeds. Puppy mills want to produce what sells for plenty of money. Mutt puppies don’t sell for much money, so why would puppymills breed mutts?

People who are shopping for a puppy are usually very ignorant (like how often do you shop for a puppy? Once every 10 years?) or they are terribly mis-informed (the propaganda is thick enough to be a mist).

Puppy mills produce purebreds because that is what people shopping for a puppy have been taught to want. “It’s not so much the people are ignorant, as they know so many things that just aint so.”

Marketing the hybrid variety of puppies, is one of the biggest hurdles in reforming the field breds as varieties of one breed for each task. the hybrids are healthier, and less extreme, but buyers don’t know genetics.

The idea, if you have been reading on this ring, and it’s associated groups, is to split all of the breeds into kingdoms of hunting, working, ballsport, show, pet, etc, and then re-clump them into varieties within a breed.

(Like: All of the field bred curly coated water dogs are varieties of one breed of general purpose water dog, all the other field bred retrievers are different varieties of one breed of retriever, all the field bred pointing dogs . . .)

Such a change is best done if the show breeds split at the same time, so that wars of words don’t break out with show breeders chanting ” German shorthair Pointer X Vizsla hybrid = a mutt”, and the field breeders saying “Your incestuously bred pure show breeds are unhealthy and stupid!”

The field bred suffer from lack of diversity, but for all their vast numbers, so do show dogs.

What did the Imperial College of London say? Pedigree dogs exposed (on YouTube in 6 parts) quoted them. I think it was: most of the breeds in Britain have only the genetic variety of less than 100 individuals.

Simplified, you could call all the rest of the dogs in a breed “copies”. Actually, it is that they have only more of the same genes, not unique genes, but “copies” paints the right picture.

If you killed 9,900 of the 10,000 Pugs in Britain, would you loose any diversity? Not if you carefully selected which 100 dogs to save.

Think like, you would don’t want to save 50 copes of Spike and 50 copies of Muddles. You would want one copy of each type, not lots of copies of one type. (Okay, that is simplified, but it is the basic idea.)

The system we have now is a mess.

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Ape Man

photo source:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ape_man_from_The_Lost_World.jpg

What would a real apeman look like? Chewbacca? or this guy in the above photo?

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cat girl

Has my idea caught on already? Not likely, there are always mutations, even in people.

But someday, a ‘Doctor Moreau’ will head a department of human ‘advancement’.

Let’s hope they learn from the mistakes of dog breeders.

Article on myfox about a girl which is half covered in what looks like cat fur.

http://www.myfoxdc.com/dpp/news/dpgo_Doctors_Baffled_by_Chinese_Cat_Girl_mb_200910241256416050393

And a girl with mermaid syndrome has died. Has DNA similar to what changed carnivores into seals and then whales, jumped to partially affect on occasional person? Maybe the DNA hitchhiked on a virus to a fetus? Probably not, but it could happen.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091024/ap_on_en_tv/us_obit_pepin

I also found this photo of big foot, but I doubt he is the product of trans-species gene transfer, but it looks like hard work went into creating him.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gbyte_travel_china_wuxi_0031.jpg

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un-blind mice?

Today there is a real important happening announced today over at the Los Angles Times.

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A doctor has improved the vision in 12 blind persons. Sounds like really spectacular improvements.

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There are many different things that can cause blindness, these 12 blind people all had a genetic defect called RPE65 type blindness.

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The thing which made this treatment so noteworthy was that it was done with genetic therapy, like if you injected normal genes into an albino, and then they started making pigment on their own.

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The article itself isn’t speculative, it raises many scenarios in my mind:

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-gene-therapy25-2009oct25,0,2334183.story

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Although no mention was made, one way or the other, whether or not any animals were used in making this treatment possible, it raises a question of how animal are employed in research.

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While some people want all harmful research stopped on all animals, other people are content with improving animal conditions without shutting down research, like:

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1) restricting using animals to only necessary experiments – not just training students who aren’t going to be scientist anyway.

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2) using as few animals as possible.

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3) keeping the animals where they can enjoy life between being used, and where they can socialize with their own kind & with people.

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4) providing pain killers, and stress relievers, so the animals is harmed as little as possible.

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5) providing happy pills for the animals in the cages as an option.

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6) Retiring the animal after one use.

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7) marking the animals with permanent I.D. so that they same animal is not used twice!!!!

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8) only using animals that can be retired to homes, or to a company retirement home for lab animals, or who will be promptly and humanely euthanized.

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Even when animals are employed as ‘lab rats’ (experimental subjects) there is no reason to tolerate cruelty.

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Although the animals are lesser on the company totem pole, they are still company employees.

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Use without Abuse, or no use at all.

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Good Pool & Puddles.

You can google “gene puddle” – it means a group of animals, or plants, severely split off from other varieties of their species.

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A “gene pool” are all the genes available to a group – the shared genes.

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Like think of all the people you would have a baby with if you could. Now delete from that list all of those who would NOT have a baby with you. What’s left, their genes, are in the potential gene pool of your children.

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Then think of all the people your kids might grow up and have a baby with. The genes of those people are in the potential gene pool of your grandchildren.

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Now think like you know that tomorrow morning, you are going to get cryogenically frozen for 1,000 years. What people alive today, might become the ancestors of your great- great -gggggggggggg grandchildren? All the genes of those people are in the same POTENTIAL gene pool with yourself.

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The “humane gene pool” means all the genes found in people. All people.

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The “canine gene pool” is all the different genes that are in any canine.

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The “wolf gene pool” are the total genes in wolves – a subset in the canine gene pool.

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Is the “domestic dog gene pool” separate from the wolf gene pool?

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This issue gets wild wolfdogs shot for not being pure wolf – conservation people don’t want to waste their time conserving dogs – dogs are plentiful, wolves are rare.

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But the issue of unhealthy wolves from reintroduced wolves has come up. When all the cubs descend from the inbred offspring of one wolf pack, health problems can become a real issue.

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It might not be possible to preserve some species AS A SET TYPE, because of them seem to require change – if their gene pool gets too resticted, it stagnants and gets yucky.

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We expect natural selection to weed out the unfit, and multiply all the fit – but nature has to work with what she starts with. The end isn’t always pretty. (Especially if you don’t exercise enough.)

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Knowing when to breed in, and when to breed out is an art based on a science.

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Purebred dog breeders have simplified that issue – they always breed in -they stay in their own breeds gene puddle – that’s what “pure” breeding means.

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Why is it called “pure” breeding? If it were called “incestuous mating” the puppies would not sell as well, would they?

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Is “pure” just an advertising word? I don’t think so – I think it is part of the theory of eugenics, or more correctly stated, the mis-applied theory of eugenics, but lets not get into a discussion of Nazi philosophy.

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The idea is that some individuals are “better”, like “our show dog is a better show dog than your show dog” or “showdogs are better than pet dogs, pet dogs should all be castrated, only show dog breeders would be allowed to have a pregnant dog”.

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Think that sounds nutty and snobbish? It is the very foundation of most dog shows – finding “best of breed” (BoB), and “best in show” (BiS).

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You can’t just watch a dog trot around a ring and judge which animal is best with kids or least likely to chew things up, dirty the rug, or bark at the neighbors. If you really think people can see this by watching dogs trot, then I think you are being made a fool.

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Many many many dog show breeders (AKA: ribbon fanatics) have told me, posted on the web, and put up signs in pubic places stating that only show dogs should be bred. (They should be the only people allowed to breed dogs).

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This was largely modified en mass, to exempt other ribbon chasers that use their dogs in competitive events. Since guys aren’t into ribbons, these events often hand out trophies. Often a sort of cup or vase, or a small statue of a dog.

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This junk (I did NOT say propaganda), went so far as to enter legislation (California’s bill # 1634) which, had it passed would have given a monopoly to purebred dog breeders.

http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/postquery?bill_number=ab_1634&sess=PREV&house=B&author=levine

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If you like my posts, you can thank bill # 1634, which caused me to de-lurk and start posting.

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Dog Gene Puddles. Now.

To me, it seems that in dog breeding, “pure” has come to mean: “We don’t mix our dogs with dogs not related to them”.

Incest is NOT best, the gene puddles must flow back into each other, but the current system fights that, and only a few breeders will to swim against the stream of conformity even try at hybrid dog breeding.

The result is inbred and often deformed, and seriously unhealthy dogs, and dogs with unfit temperaments.

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Horse Shoe

Photo source:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Horseshoe_lucky_on_door.jpg

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What Am I?

If you gave a pair of these dogs to 10 different breeders, in 20 years each breeder would make a different kind of dog.

The breeder who wanted longer legged dogs would silently cross her dogs and keep longer legged puppies.

The breeder who wanted hairier dogs would cross her dogs and keep the hairier puppies.

The persons who wanted extreme tininess, or most flat face, or most curly tail, or most horse-like trot, or most wiggly, would all eventually get their own line of dogs.

Then a foreigner could come into the country and see 10 different ‘breeds’ of dogs and proclaim them too different to be allowed to be allowed to intermingle.

But the dogs would really be kin to each other.

This is a Happa Dog, whatever that is.

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Halloween Dog.

No it’s not a glow in the dark dog. It’s a thermal image of a dog. This is how a rattlesnake would see a dog in the dark – by seeing the heat radiating off the dog. Animal have senses that we do not have.

We could really use these senses, so you know that one day we will – hopefully by helping animals work with us, not by hurting them more.

photo:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Infrared_dog-cropped.jpg

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2 Brown coat

My teacher said the original mammal coat color was brown.

The books had pictures of brown mammoths, brown early dogs, brown early horses. How would they know what color their hair was?

Someone asked the teacher. He said that most wild animals were brown.

Where he came from, that might be true.

Moose are brown – they blend in with the WET ground around lakes where they feed. Buffalo (American Bison) are brown. Wolverines are brown.

But out in the grass or brush lands, deer are tan colored, rabbits are tan colored (actually it’s agouti color which is a mixture of different colors on some hairs, and a peppering in of other colored hairs).

Look at a coyote or wolf, or rabbit, they aren’t a chocolate brown.

And the default color of cats is clearly tabby (striped). Even lion cubs are spotted when they are young. And the tabby pattern reappears on the orange tabby and can’t be removed.

What is the default color pattern in dogs?
Black & Tan – then agouti overlayed?
Agouti then with a black & tan (tuxedo) pattern overlay?

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9 Giant Pumpkins

Jack-o-lantern.

Did you know that there are contests for growing giant vegetables, like a giant pumpkin?

People will do all kinds of crazy things to win. I read on how to grow giant veggies.

Yes you buy seeds that grow big.
But then you add chemicals around the plant.

And then, after the plant is grown, and the pumpkin starts to grow on the plant – YOU FEED THE VEGETABLE WITH AN I.V. DRIP!

You get these huge vegetables that way. It makes some sense for growing jack-o-lantern pumpkins, but they get so huge that nobody can carry them, and they are either craved where they are grown, or moved with a lift and a wagon.

The I.V. drip has sugar water in it, so the vegetables grown this way aren’t very flavorful, but they are huge!

Why would a farmer grow huge vegetables that aren’t worth eating?

Farmers don’t. People growing plants as a hobby do.

They enter the giant vegetables in fairs and plant shows. Like:
Who can grow the biggest green bean.
Who can grown the biggest ear of corn.
Who can grow the biggest strawberry.

I like small dog and large dogs too.
There are giant breeds of dogs.
Giant dog slide show.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iLd55uMb7k

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