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Originally Posted by concretegurl  I agree.
I try not to be overly judgmental and understand the standpoint of show breeders-they are fully focused on the betterment of the breed by conformity-to see what I perceive as an overall change in focus to health verses appearance is more than overwhelmingly positive for me.
Although to a certain point I understand things like ear cropping, tail docking, debarking, dew claw removal, it also makes me wonder about how far will we go?
I asked awhile ago about what people though of dog's having their claws removed-many people are doing this for both medical reasons but also for trivial reasons-nails will ruin wood floors, the dog jumps so we just removed heir claw s to prevent scratches.
I wasn't sure what I thought about this but it had me reevaluating how we medically alter dogs in many ways now.
I chose not to have my mini schnauzers ears cropped by her breeder, even though she was being evaluated for show potential and if she turned out worthy they would have considered showing her only if her ears were cropped per the show requirements.
actually-I LOVE floppy ears-but having to constantly pluck hairs and dry her ears over and over requires a lot of effort, Scoobers gets constant ear infects and at 5 the vet and I are considering a later medically needed cropping. It's sad to have to evaluate this.
Not to say I'm advocating for ear cropping, when it is needed for breed issues I understand first hand why now, or tail docking-which I for one truly see the benefit in, I also truly beleive in dew claw removal, but when it is too much and more so for our convince verses medical need?
How far is too far?  |
Hopefully, you have a good breed club who studies these things and truly loves the breed. Some breed clubs haven't been protective and bad things are happening the the breed because the way standard is written, but so far the Yorkshire Terrier is not suffer from problems because of the written standard. The breeders I've talked to who belong to the YTCA really do seem to love the breed, and I can't imagine them doing anything that they know would hurt the puppies. We have to remember that there are good people breeding and they love these dogs, just as much as we pet owners.
I don't know much about ear cropping, but from my understanding, its major surgery, I didn't even know it was legal for a breeder to do it, but I haven’t read much about it. There are some breeds who suffer more ear problems if they don't have their ears cropped, especially those dogs who are in the water a lot. I would hope if it's only done only for cosmetic reasons, they would stop this, I think people would get use to the uncropped ear very fast. I don’t think a pet owner can properly evaluate these things until it's too late. Your dog is suffering because you made a decision based on some information that dog advocates and pet owners know more than the breed than the mother club concerning this breed. I hope you use the information you have to educate the others about your experience with uncropped ears. I mean they are thinking about outlawing this and I know in other countries they have. In nature, if a dog was having reoccurring ear infections it would die out before it could reproduce, so the dog with naturally pointy ears would have a better chance at survival, or one with floppy ears and not prone to ear infections. I know proneness to ear infections is an inherited trait! When man steps in, we have to account for every attribute the dog processes and surgically modify it if it will cause problems. I think some people think the surgical alteration came first, and that breeders are designing some “perfect looking” dog because most of the show traits relate to physical attributes. I think surgical alteration came after, when loving breeders realized these traits would later cause the dogs major problems.
Concerning the other things you mention dewclaws, I’ve read many accounts on YT were the dewclaw was torn, and the dog had to have it cut off later in life, which is much more painful on the dog. To me, you should always go with the rule safety first, what’s safest and healthiest for the dog long term and causes the least pain and trauma? Hopefully, a good breed club studies a matter before any changes in standard are made.