Pedigree Dogs Exposed!!!

[Ladyhawk]

Originally Posted by YorkieMother

Although I have not had a chance to look at this as yet.
I am sure I will not be surprised unless they forget to mention that along with pulling the cute genes or the go smaller genes or what ever a breeder does to a dog to make it look great or be more resiliant to something, you take a behaviour gene as well.

All to many say they breed for temperment without a clear understanding that they are already doing so when they change anything in a dogs look.


JL

I'm not sure what you're trying to say here but you can't pull a gene. There is a gene that tells the body how to build every part of a dog. Some features are built with one gene but alot of features and traits are dependent on more than one gene, they are known as polygenic. You can breed to fix a certain trait by breeding until you have a dog that is homozygous for that trait be it dominent or recessive. Temperment is strongly influenced by the genes a puppy inherits. You can breed a dog down in size or breed for prick ears instead of floppy ears but if both parents have a correct temperment you have a very strong chance of producing pups with correct temperement. If you only look at one peice of the puzzle such as size or the length of muzzle and pick your breeding pair for that trait without considering temperment or health you're going to create problems.

[Cheller_]

It was very eye opening documentary. I never knew that there was such a great difference in the dogs of the past and the dogs of now. I always thought the idea was to preserve the look of the breed. I defiantly look at dogs with different eyes now.

[YorkieMother]

Originally Posted by Ladyhawk

I'm not sure what you're trying to say here but you can't pull a gene. There is a gene that tells the body how to build every part of a dog. Some features are built with one gene but alot of features and traits are dependent on more than one gene, they are known as polygenic. You can breed to fix a certain trait by breeding until you have a dog that is homozygous for that trait be it dominent or recessive. Temperment is strongly influenced by the genes a puppy inherits. You can breed a dog down in size or breed for prick ears instead of floppy ears but if both parents have a correct temperment you have a very strong chance of producing pups with correct temperement. If you only look at one peice of the puzzle such as size or the length of muzzle and pick your breeding pair for that trait without considering temperment or health you're going to create problems.

Sadly many a breeder only looks at the way a dogs looks without any understanding that you mess with the looks the traits for temperment go along with it.

I live with a dog that is a genetic temperment and health mess that a breeder never stopped to concern the fall out at all. Mine is lucky to be alive with all the concerns both aggression and pysical concerns my dog be one big money pit. But well loved.
I worked with one with legs that are very bad for a large breed again the breeder hide him fast and never carried.

I have a dear freind that got a call from a breeder that has top of the line spaniels and she breed for the looks in a litter she had one bad tempered whole unable to funtion little one...... what she miss the mother had fear issuses. Most aggresion is based in fear. Little man got lucky he made a fast move to a great trainer and lives a life of great care and love and works with dogs now that have issuses as he got caught young.

Another dog differnt breed... great show breeder ans working dogs... breed a litter. more then the one but one bad one reactive aggressive...... what got missed again the mother would flip out do to fear when going to the vets and going in the door...

Both those females should never have been breed.

You start messing with the way a dog looks your going to pull a behaviour trait.

You correct a floppy ear and what behavior gene goes with that.
You make a dog more resiliant to pain ... what gene goes with it.
You breed down in size what behaiour gene goes with it.
You want a smushed in nose on a dog .. what gene of behaviour goes with it.
You lenghten the nose what gene of behaviour goes with that.

Genes that change a shape of a dog are matched with a behaviour gene. Change one thing over time you change the behaviour of the dog as well.

Any dog showing fear or aggression of any type needs never to have a litter or alowwed to stud a litter as aggression and fear are passed down genration to generation.


JL

[C C Kent]

Originally Posted by YorkieMother

You start messing with the way a dog looks your going to pull a behaviour trait.

You correct a floppy ear and what behavior gene goes with that.
You make a dog more resiliant to pain ... what gene goes with it.
You breed down in size what behaiour gene goes with it.
You want a smushed in nose on a dog .. what gene of behaviour goes with it.
You lenghten the nose what gene of behaviour goes with that.

Genes that change a shape of a dog are matched with a behaviour gene. Change one thing over time you change the behaviour of the dog as well.
Any dog showing fear or aggression of any type needs never to have a litter or alowwed to stud a litter as aggression and fear are passed down genration to generation.


JL

I would have to see some research on this. If this held true you would be able to simply look at physical traits of a given animal and determine his temperament. I don't think that's possible. Genetic transfer is not that cut and dried.

Granted fear and aggression are to be eliminated from a program but it can be done without sacrificing type or structure. If a program is so focused on certain physical traits that temperament issues are ignored, then the program is doomed.

[Ladyhawk]

Originally Posted by C C Kent

I would have to see some research on this. If this held true you would be able to simply look at physical traits of a given animal and determine his temperament. I don't think that's possible. Genetic transfer is not that cut and dried.

Granted fear and aggression are to be eliminated from a program but it can be done without sacrificing type or structure. If a program is so focused on certain physical traits that temperament issues are ignored, then the program is doomed.

I agree, there are some linked genes such as sex-linked genes but temperment traits are not linked to physical traits. If they were than all red heads would have bad tempers and brown eyed people would be quiet and thoughtful. Genetics just don't work this way, at least not in my college biology books.

[YorkieMother]

Sorry double post

JL

[YorkieMother]

Originally Posted by C C Kent

I would have to see some research on this. If this held true you would be able to simply look at physical traits of a given animal and determine his temperament. I don't think that's possible. Genetic transfer is not that cut and dried.

Granted fear and aggression are to be eliminated from a program but it can be done without sacrificing type or structure. If a program is so focused on certain physical traits that temperament issues are ignored, then the program is doomed.

Here you go..
Never said genetics was that cut and dry.. but it is true you pull a gene for looks you pull a behaviour on they are all linked it not just one gene for floopy ears and a seprate on for being nice genes are a blend.

Welcome page This link that says welcome is to an aggression study
This is an on going study.

Have fun

Also I have read and recoomend a look at Genetics and the Social Behavior of the Dog by John Scott and John Fuller... your in for a surprise if you thing fiddling with looks does not effect the temeprment.
It was a ground breaking study done years ago, that has stood the test of time and is how we found out about stage development and age they happen.
They also breed differnt breeds and found pricked ears verses floppy ears verse what ever and what happens to temperment.

JL

[YorkieMother]

In the Genes
CAN A SINGLE GENE INFLUENCE BEHAVIOR?
By: Jean Donaldson

When behavior is hard-wired rather than learned, does it mean it's 100 percent genetic? How do genes create behavior? Can a single gene influence behavior? How can we be sure it's not environment that's causing changes in behavior that are deemed genetic?

These are fascinating questions. First, it's important to understand that genes can't 'make' behavior, especially complex behavior, any more than a single engine part 'makes' a car. Having said that, a malfunction of a gene can derail behavior, just as a faulty engine part can cause a car to break down. Behavior is a phenotypic trait - i.e., it is an observable characteristic of an animal. A phenotypic trait - including "hard-wired" or unlearned behavior - is always the end product of an interaction between the animal's genes and the animal's environment. An animal's genotype is the collection of all its genes, whether or not they are expressed ("visible") in the phenotype.

How genes do their part starts with the exact spot on the chromosome, called a locus, where the gene resides. Two alleles - versions of each gene donated from each parent - are at every locus. The relationship between the two alleles may be additive, meaning the phenotype is intermediate between the two. As a hypothetical example, imagine breeding a dog with a high drive for toys to a dog with a low drive and the offspring being moderately drivey for toys.

The relationship between alleles can also be dominant-recessive to varying degrees. Where one allele is expressed in the phenotype, the other - though present and transmissible to the offspring - is nearly or completely silent. This is the Mendelian inheritance taught in many biology classes, with eye colour in humans the classic example.

To answer the question about whether a single gene can influence behavior, the answer is yes with the operative word being "influence." Complex traits, such as behavior, are better understood as the product of the actions and interactions of many, many genes. Such traits are called "polygenic," meaning that each individual gene makes up only a small part of the genetic contribution to the trait. Body size is a well-known polygenic trait. Polygenic traits can be additive, as in body size. They can also be epistatic, where the product is not intermediate between the genes involved, but rather is more analogous to the dominant-recessive relationship that exists at individual loci. Coat-colour heredity in many breeds of dog is a familiar example of a phenotypic trait governed by epistasis.

Remember, it's far from over once a set of genes is turned on or off. Genes interact with the environment to result in the final phenotypic product, the body part or behavior that we can see. Even body size, though largely polygenically determined, is somewhat influenced by environmental factors like nutrition, illness, etc. In the case of behavior, environmental interactions often playa larger role. For example, famous research on mice bred for high aptitude at running mazes (maze-bright mice) and mice bred for low aptitude (maze-dull mice) also found that rearing the maze-dull mice in a more complex and stimulating environment compensated for their maze-dull genes and they performed as well on mazes as maze-bright mice.

Environment not only interacts with genes but can directly affect their activity. It can literally turn them on and off! In fact, about 95 per cent of genes that code at all do not code for proteins on the road to phenotypic traits, but rather regulate the action of other genes. Most of these regulatory genes respond to environmental triggers. This prompts them to turn the protein-coding genes on and off, both in utero when the organism is being built, during post-natal development and right on into adulthood. h1 other words, genes don't provide recipes in stone on how to build bodies and behave to organisms. More accurately; they participate in a give-and-take process with environmental signals throughout life.

Regulator genes may send instructions to genes that are themselves regulator genes. Eventually; further downstream, genes that will build proteins, specifically enzymes, are turned on. Enzymes then affect cellular metabolism, which in turn affects other cells. At the end of this chain reaction comes the tiny chemical increments that make up the genetic part of the genetics-environment cocktail that is behavior.

An interesting result of this string of events, all kicked off by a particular regulator gene, is that a single gene can have two or more effects. This is called pleiotropy and is quite different from polygenic effects, where multiple genes contribute to one effect. A famous example of pleiotropy occurred during the Russian fox domestication experiment (see the August 2003 issue) where strong selection for reduced flight distance also produced floppy ears, curled tails, shorter muzzles and occasionally even white markings on the coat.

There are different flavours of pleiotropy: For instance, one regulator gene can kick off chain reactions in multiple metabolic pathways in different body systems. Pleiotropy can also occur if a gene sits next door to another unrelated gene on a chromosome and then both stick together when cut and pasted into the new generation.

So how do we know it's genes? The way genes influence behavior can be teased out of the gene-environment interaction in a variety of ways. Even before the advent of molecular genetics, animals with identical or near-identical genotypes were studied in different environments and animals with different genotypes were studied in identical or near-identical environments. These measures did a reasonable job of controlling for environmental effects. The serendipitous (for science) 'experiment' of comparing human identical twins separated at birth yielded revealing data about the effect of genes on behavior.

Direct study of the presence or absence of specific genes and how this impacts behavior is now possible, too. Because it is so unlikely that single genes that have profound behavioral effects will be found, researchers concentrate their search for sets of genes that each make a small contribution to a certain behavior. Also, most behavior traits are distributed in a continuous rather than 'digital' fashion, which strongly implies multiple genes. For example, there isn't an on-off switch for anxiety, with some dogs completely lacking a predisposition and others completely riddled.

Research that attempts to link the presence of gene suites with elevated occurrence of certain traits in families can be confounded by partial dominance effects and the fact that the same traits may be brought about by different genetic routes. Scans of full genomes can narrow the search if there is a marker residing in close proximity to a candidate gene that is suspected to be associated with a certain trait. The spot on the genome of a control group without the trait is then compared to the same spot on the genome of the group that has the trait.

Experiments can really ice the cake when it comes to nailing down which genes do what. For example, once a suspect gene has been identified, it can be 'knocked out' of the genome of mice and replaced with genomes that are otherwise identical to a control group of mice and then the two groups compared in minute detail. Transgenics, where genes from another animal, such as a human, are spliced into an experimental animal is also a fruitful way to directly observe the effects of genes on behavior, body type and body function. When all these methods converge on the same conclusion, the evidence for the effects of certain genes is extremely compelling.


Canadian Jean Donaldson is the founder of the San Francisco SPCA Academy for Dog Trainers. Ms. Donaldson is the author of several books on dog behavior. Her first book, The Culture Clash, won the Best Behavior Book of 1997 from the Dog Writers Association of America and is the #1 book recommendation for dog owners from the Association of Pet Dog Trainers. MINE! A Guide to Resource Guarding in Dogs also won the Best Behavior Book from the Dog Writers Association for the year 2002. Her latest book, published this past October, is FIGHT! A Guide to Dog-Dog Aggression.

[YorkieMother]

There is a boat load of work on colour affecting temperment.. need to see that??

Need more let me know... I did a ton of work on this when I had t figure out if I was dealing with nature or nuture with my dog.... it both but mainly genetics.

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George M. Strain, PhD article published in The Veterinary Journal May 15, 2003,
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Sponenberg DP.Germinal reversion of the merle allele in Australian shepherd dogs. J. Hered. 1984 Jan-Feb;75(1):78.
Sponenberg, D. P. and M. Lynn Lamoreux, 1985: Inheritance of tweed, a modification of merle, in Australian shepherd dogs. Journal of Heredity 76, pp 303-304.
Sponenberg, D. Philip, 1984: Germinal reversion of the merle allele in Australian shepherd dogs. Journal of Heredity 75, p 78.
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[YorkieMother]

Heritability of dominant–aggressive behaviour in English Cocker Spaniels • ARTICLE
Applied Animal Behaviour Science, Volume 100, Issues 3-4, November 2006, Pages 219-227
Joaquín Pérez-Guisado, Rocío Lopez-Rodríguez and Andrés Muñoz-Serrano

Abstract | Full Text + Links | PDF (115 K) | To Purchase and Download the Full Article, Click PDF

A total of 51 seven-week-old English Cocker Spaniel puppies were measured for dominant–aggressive behaviour using the Campbell Test. The dogs consisted of a F1 full sibs and half sibs from matings of 4 sires with 10 dams. The purpose of this study was to determine if the variability observed in this behavioural characteristic has an additive genetic component and if so, to estimate heritability (h2). Coat colour and sex were examined as fixed effects.

According to the results of the study: (1) there are highly significant differences between sexes; with males being more dominant than females, regardless of coat colour; (2) there are highly significant differences in aggressive behaviour depending on coat colour with greater to lesser dominance found in golden, black and particolour coats in that order; (3) there is no interaction between sex and colour when exhibiting greater or lesser dominance; (4) heritability, estimated on sire components, is , indicating that the variability observed in dominant–aggressive behaviour is in part due to genetic factors; and (5) heritability estimated on dam components is , which implies that the maternal effect (genetic and environmental) is an important factor in this type of behaviour.

It is concluded that there is an additive genetic, and therefore, hereditary factor for dominant–aggressive behaviour in the English Cocker Spaniel. Some of the fixed factors include: sex (males are dominant over females), coat colour (golden-coated are the more dominant dogs followed by the black-coated and finally by the particolour coat dogs) and the common environmental effect due to litter.

[YorkieMother]

Fur Color Linked to Dog Personality
Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News

from Discovery News

Dec. 13, 2006 — The color of a dog's fur may seem to be just a whim of nature and genetics that reveals little about the dog. But a new study claims that coat color for at least one breed, the English cocker spaniel, reflects a pooch's personality.

Prior research has suggested that fur color is also linked to behavior in labrador retrievers, while the type of fur — in this case, wiry or long — may indicate temperament in miniature dachshunds. Wiry-haired mini dachshunds are often more feisty than their mellower, long-haired cousins.

The latest study, recently published in Applied Animal Behavior Science, determined that
golden/red English cocker spaniels exhibit the most dominant and aggressive behavior
Black dogs in this breed were found to be the second most aggressive,
parti-color (white with patches of color) were discovered to be more mild-mannered.
In labrador retrievers, the color rank from

most aggressive - yellow
mid-level in nature - black
least aggressive - chocolate
The behavior-fur color connection is likely due to related genetic coding that takes place during the pup's earliest life stages, according to lead author Joaquín Pérez-Guisado.

"Maybe the link (to coat color) is due to the fact that the ectoderm (one of the three primary germ cell layers) is where the skin and central nervous system originate in the embryo," he told Discovery News.

Pérez-Guisado, a researcher in the Department of Medicine and Animal Surgery at the University of Cordoba, Spain, and his colleagues measured levels of dominance and aggression in 51 seven-week-old English cocker spaniel puppies that were either full siblings or half siblings.

The tests looked at how quickly a person could capture a puppy's attention, how well puppies followed the individual, how the dogs behaved while restrained, how they exerted their social dominance and what they did when they were lifted off the floor.

In many cases, the golden-colored dogs resisted human contact and even tried to bite the tester, while the parti-color pups often wagged their tails and seemed to enjoy the attention.

While genes control coat color and appear to predispose behavior in certain dogs, Pérez-Guisado said that how dogs are raised plays the biggest role in behavior. For grown-up dogs, he determined that environmental factors account for 80 percent of dominant, aggressive personalities while genes only influence 20 percent of dogs' demeanors.
"It is very important to give the dog an optimum and suitable environment in order to have a dog with a low dominance aggressive behavior level," he said. "For that reason, owners are primarily responsible for this undesirable dog behavior."

Canine behaviorist and trainer Wendy Volhard and professional breeder Carolyn Sisson, who is president of the English Cocker Spaniel Club of San Diego, California, both told Discovery News they're not surprised by the findings. They said that coat color's link with behavior has been "a well-known, old wives' tale" for years.

Although they both think there is "some truth to the recent findings," Sisson believes a dog's genetic lineage, going back many generations, is a better indicator of temperament than color.

Sisson explained that there are 29 recognized different coat colors for English cocker spaniels, and combinations other than golds mating with golds can result in a golden dog.

"It's the line breeding out of puppy mills in England that probably resulted in the dominant traits," Sisson said.

She added, "The very best and worst of my dogs have been spaniels. They seem to cover every behavioral extreme."

Pérez-Guisado and his colleagues next plan to study the English springer spaniel and English cocker spaniel genomes to pinpoint common genes associated with so-called dog "rage" and coloration.
__________________

[YorkieMother]

Sorry lots of info at one swish... no not all of it will support what I said some will. like everything you have to look at it all.

Dr.Karen Overalls study in the first post of this batch is ground breaking look at which lines in several breeds run to fear and aggresion. What the genetic marker is or is not... to my knowledge it not done yet.

Fuller and Scott is best read to understand you can get the book at Amazon cheapest way to do that for this book is expensive.
Yes I have read it cover to cover.

JL

[DejaVu]

yorkie mother - at first i was skeptical and thought this theory was far fetched but the resources you have provided has def got me thinking. I plan to buy a couple of the books and read up on it and do research. Dog behaviour is a huge interest of mine, thanks so much for the information!!!

[Ladyhawk]

I have to agree with Carolyn Sisson that alot of the color/behavioral correlation has to do with ancestry and line breeding to obtain certain colors. You can't just pick out one trait that you want passed down, when the genes shuffle you will get more than just one trait from each parent. The wire haired dachshunds would be more terrier like than the other varieties of dachshunds because they threw terriers into the mix to obtain the wiry coat type. The standard even calls for a different temperment. Your best bet seems to be being very selective in what dogs you breed and to know the pedigrees of those dogs very well for both temperment, health and cosmetic issues.

[YorkieMother]

Originally Posted by DejaVu

yorkie mother - at first i was skeptical and thought this theory was far fetched but the resources you have provided has def got me thinking. I plan to buy a couple of the books and read up on it and do research. Dog behaviour is a huge interest of mine, thanks so much for the information!!!

Let me know if you need help with books... Dog behaviour is not just a intrest it a passion with me and without it one dog be gone of mine and one not be turning heads with its amazingly great behaviour.

JL