OF PEAS AND PUPS
PART II
Dear Dr. McCue:
Received your
manuscript and thought it well done, and I enjoyed your article. You did a
swell job of bringing scientific terms and concepts down to the layman without
losing the science involved. That is a rare talent.
Sincerely, Dr. R.C.Busteed
ED NOTE: Dr. Busteed
is a geneticist at
INTRODUCTION
GENETICS is the
youngest of the biological sciences. It is, to me, interesting in itself. When
coupled with the dog, which also holds great interest for me, the subject
becomes truly fascinating. Genetics is a science which is far from complete, yet, the minute spark it does provide can
illuminate the darkened way of the breeder and keep him from stumbling, at
least over the larger obstacles in his path. The genes are no less interesting
or complex than the atoms....nor are the rules governing their behavior any less rigid. The genes are scientific fact, not
a figment of imagination or a pipe dream. For all the help genetics can give
the Shorthair none would say that it is some kind of IBM machine into one end
of which we can feed punched cards so that our "duals" slide out a
chute at the other end....ART is still the most important ingredient of
successful breeding, but art with science forms an unbeatable combination, but,
science, not art, is the topic of my discussion.
THIS SERIES is not
intended for the experienced breeder or the geneticist. These facts are
"old hat" to them...fundamental. It is primarily intended for those
who have an interested in the subject but have been unable to find the facts in
most books on dog breeding. Its purpose is to present to those most interested
in the breed, the NEWS readers, the fundamentals of
genetics. It is hoped that when these basic facts become common knowledge to
the GSP fancy, it will result in progressive breed betterment. A dream? Maybe.
From time to time
repetition will be used. It is intentional and its purpose is to emphasize. It
is not the result of old age.
For me to grasp an
understanding of heredity I found it necessary to draw myself a mental picture
of the genetic system and how it operates. It is by this graphic method of
visual aid that I hope to explain it io
you and to make it interesting enough that you will follow it through to the
end. At times the subject may become dry and dull but a knowledge
of the details is essential. The validity of the conclusions will be questioned
only if one is unwilling to expend the time and effort required to become to
become familiar with these basic details.
At the conclusion of
this series a list of sources of data will be provided. However, if any would
care to go into the subject more fully before that time, I would like to
suggest several readings of merit:
"Planned
Breeding" by Brackett - Dog World
"General Genetics"
by Srb & Owen - Freeman Co. San Francisco, 1952
"The New Art
of Breeding Better Dogs" by Onstott, Howell
Books, 575 Lex. Ave., NYC $4.95
"Practical
Dog Breeding & Genetics" by Frankling - Arco
Pub., 480 Lex. Ave., NYC 1961. ($3.95)
BIOLOGICAL
BRIEFS
THE CELL...We all know that the cell is the basic unit of life. It is from the
single cell that the organism developed. It is in the cell that the particles
of heredity perform their wondrous works. Whenever we think of a cell we think
of its microscopic size. The average cell, of the dog, if there is such a cell,
is about 1/4 the cross section of a human hair. In that cell there are 30 pairs
of Chromosomes (78) plus thousands of Genes about which we are going to talk.
The genes and chromosomes occupy but a portion of the nucleus and the nucleus
itself is but a part of the cell...so we are dealing with some pretty small
objects, yet objects whose influence, considering their size, is almost
incomprehensible...Not all cells areas small as that of the dog, in fact, a
dog-man might quickly think of a cell many, many times larger....the egg of the
pheasant is a very large, highly specialized, single cell. Very basically and
diagrammatically this is a cell...
THE NUCLEUS If we
magnify the "vitals of the Cell or Nucleus we see that this one contains
two Chromosomes with their gene strings.....
THE GENES Now let us pull the Gene String (I didn't say "g"
string) and lay the "beads" on the table before us. It looks so
simple. It is easy to imagine this way and it contradicts no known scientific
knowledge. Remember the genes have never been seen. The evidence for their
reality is experimental but it is conclusive and positive. Here is our
"string of pearls". Implant this picture firmly in your mind....
One strand comes from
the sire and one from the dam. This is a double necklace. Nature in her
infinite wisdom planned it that way. Our pups, as indeed we ourselves, are
double with respect to our genes and with good cause as we shall see. Actually,
a single set is sufficient to create a new individual.....If we consider the
white beads as recessive defective genes, we can readily appreciate Natures
thoughtfulness in providing us with an extra set....With but a single set, each
pup would be defective at each point a white "bead" appears, at: a,
b, c, d/d1, and e in (Fig. 5) With this double arrangement it is necessary that
both beads of the pair be white before the defect shows itself, so in this very
short Gene String illustrated there would be but one visible defect at d - d 1
instead of five. As has been said, a given gene pair (the Alleles - the pair of
determiners) represented by the pair of beads, control a particular function or
characteristic (such as the nature of the dogs coat - smooth or wirehaired)
with the dominant gene producing the visible effect while the recessive gene
lays dormant....Only when the recessive genes are paired, as at d - d1 above
are we aware of their presence. A familiarity with this simple double strand
necklace gives us the key to the arrangement and the basic mechanism of
heredity.
MENDEL'S FIRST LAW, the
Law of Segregation, which we considered in Part I, told us that characteristics
are governed by pairs of genes and that these pairs are separated during the
formation of the germ cells, one going into each gamete. The pairs come
together again at fertilization, one in the sperm and
one in the egg....The gene string of the sperm and that of the egg are then
merely single stranded necklaces which double up at fertilization. The reunion of these separated pairs occur in a definite ratio
based on mathematical probabilities. This simple dominant-recessive
relationship is basic to genetic understanding and is the most useful of the
genetic tools to the breeder, therefore, we shall
examine it in some detail.
First, however, let us
examine the related biological processes, by the steps through which the genes
pass from their pure round and pure wrinkled homozygous state to their
"impure", mixed-up, heterozygous state when hybridized....And then,
later, with this understood, what process can be used to restore both the peas
and the pups to their ideal homozygous state again, for this is the first
problem that we face.
CELL DIVISION
(Mitosis)
All life starts from a single
fertilized cell which divides to become two. The two divide to become four, the
four form eight, then 16, 32, 64 and so on. Man has been estimated to be
composed of some 26 billion cells and this astronomical number is reached by
only 36 consecutive cell divisions. Our high school biology taught us that this
process is called MITOSIS. It is a characteristic of all growing tissue. It
results in the formation of daughter cells identical in chromosomatic
and genetic character with each other and with the parent cells from which they
developed. In the following diagram (Fig.6) "A" shows the cell at
rest and containing two chromosomes. "B" demonstrates the unique and
interesting ability the chromosome has of duplicating itself in detail....The
two chromatids formed from each chromosome are
exactly like the original.....In "C" we see the nucleus growing
longer and a bit larger to accommodate the eight Chromatids
where there were formerly only four (two pair) chromosomes. As the process
continues further elongation of the nucleus takes place and the chromatids are drawn to opposite poles. Finally a pinching
occurs in the middle and then there are two cells. Two
identical daughter cells. For the purpose of our discussion the names of
the phases of mitosis or when each starts and stops is of no great importance,
what we must remember is that two cells are formed from one and that they are
identical. The following figure makes it look far simpler than it actually
is.....
MEIOSIS(Reproductive cell division)
The germ cell s divide in a different manner. Actually the manner itself is
not nearly so different as the end result....which consists of two separate
divisions rather than the single division of Mitosis. This phenomenon is called
MEIOSIS and is characteristic of only the germ cells and even then occurs only
during a particular phase of the reproductive cycle. Its name, which comes from
the Greek, gives the nature and importance of the process. It is derived from meioo, to make less, and osis,
process. It results in the formation of cells containing one-half (called the Hapoid number_ the number of Chromosomes (and therefore
genes) of the parent cells....these cells contain but a single strand of our
necklace.
Our pups have 78
Chromosomes (39 pair) and this full compliment is called the Diploid
Number....By the process of Meiosis each sex cell ends up with the Hapoid Number, 39. When the sperm with 39 meets the egg
with 39, the fertilized cell is restored to its full 78 Chromosomes. Of course
this intricate process is not the sole property of the germ cells of the dog.
In fact the consistency of the procedure makes the laws of heredity equally
valid for all creatures which reproduce sexually. This is significant because
it permits us, who are interested int he dog, to use
the knowledge gleaned from the fruit fly and other plants and animals which
have been more deeply studied. The fruit fly, with his eight chromosomes and
his giant salivary cells, has provided a far greater understanding of the laws
of inheritance than any other organism.
The Chromosomes are labeled R and r merely to indicate
that they contain these genes from our earlier round-wrinkled discussion. Of
course they contain hundreds more too. Meiosis provides the basis for the
segregation and independent assortment of genes. This is the gaming room (
At least this portion
of Duke shows why he is a champion..NO
PAIRED DEFECTIVES....He may have a good Phenotype (appearance) but his Genotype
(genetic make-up) isn't worth a damn or a dam either....I have been guilty of
saying with some pride, "His dad was K.S.VITO vd RADBACH". But here again, did he get the best gene
set Vito had to offer or the second best?...If one could see father and son
side by side or in the field together one might be able to tell if the pup
"took after" his sire or not. Of course, it is worse for one to say,
"His grandfather was Ch.Duke"...The odds
are that the grandson received
25% of Dukes germ plasm but he could have received
anywhere from one-half to NONE...and even then, was it the better half?...It is
an understanding of the process of Meiosis, that tells us why this is so.
One of the best selling
books on dog breeding insists that we must look at the grandparents to know the
pups. There is no question but that it would be nice to see the four
grandparents and certainly it could do no harm but we would do far better to
know the parents than the grandparents....The only factors which are going to
be visible in the grandparents and not visible in the parents and then show up
again in the pups are Going To Be Recessives, the White Beads, and we don't want
many of those...The fallacy of using the "grandparents only" theory
is obvious when one understands the workings of the genetic system...It would
be nice, if we could see back five or six generations, it certainly would help
in breeding decisions, but it is impossible....How many of the grandparents of
your pups have you seen?...Of course, we want the pups to have outstanding
grandparents because if they do not, the parents of the ups are of little
value...The farther back we go, the chances are, the less influence the
relatives have...And these relatives will have even less influence if the relatives are not related.
Boy, that's a mouthful! In other words, if the pedigree indicates considerable
"pedigree outcrossing", few, or no names
appearing more than once the comparative influence of each ancestor will be
less than if several names appear several times.....
This is true because
individuals who are closely related tend to have similar genetic patterns since
their genes come from common ancestors...This is important to the breeder who
is searching for homozygosity and should be
remembered: Closely related
individuals tend to have similar genetic patterns, because, their genes come
from common ancestors....The genes are passed from parents to pups
in a pretty regular manner but what variations do occur are Multiplied (rather
than just added) as we go back to the more remote ancestors, generally. We
continually interject "generally", "The chances are",
"probably", "the odds are", and the like, because these
factors are not certainties but probabilities....It is possible that a pup
might possess, in fact, the better half of his great grandsire. It is not
probable.
SUMMARY:
Mitosis - Meiosis
A familiarity with thee
processes is fundamental to heredity and the dog, or the cat, or the cow, or to
you and me...More detailed explanations are readily available from any genetic
text at your local library. My plan is to be as brief as possible, consistent
with a clear understanding as it relates to our subject and not to bore with
unnecessary details.
MITOSIS...is a growth
process where the cell doubles or duplicates itself exactly.....Each cell
containing the full compliment of 78 Chromosomes....Mitosis and Meiosis differ
in the end result more than in the procedure itself.
MEIOSIS...results in
cells containing one-half the number of Chromosomes and Genes...This is a
process of only the sex cells...The prime difference between the Male and
Female Gamete Formation by this mechanism (meiosis) is that from the primary
sperm forming cell (Spermatocyte) comes four
sperms;...while from the primary egg forming cell (Oocyte)
comes but one functional egg cell.....Meiosis, is where the "bookie"
sets the odds....where the segregation and assortment take place.
DIHYBRIDS:
Let us now consider, as
Mendel did, two more characteristics of our round & wrinkled seeds. Yellow
seeds, YY, are dominant to green seeds, yy, so that
pure round yellow seeds are RRYY and pure wrinkled green seeds are rryy......By Meiosis, the gametes of the round yellow seeds
are YR & YR, and of the green seeds, yr & yr....When these two
seed-types are hybridized, the F1 hybrids, or more correctly, DIHYBRIDS
(hybrids for two factors) produce the following gametes YR, Yr, yR & yr.
Mating double Heterozygotes or dihybrids, in
"dog-talk", inbreeding the hybrids (remembering our original
definition of hybrids page 3) - Weimaraner-GSP cross
or 2 varieties of the same species as between Schwarenberg
strain and the Oranien-Nassau strain of GSP- we find
four types of sperm and four types of eggs...This may be more easily diagramed than described. We will place the egg cells
across the top of the diagram and the sperm down the left side. Then we mate
each gamete and fill in the squares with the results...The squares are divided
horizontally by a light line...The upper half gives the Genotype (genetic
make-up) and the lower half the Phenotype (appearance).
Should we inbreed
enough Dihybrids, these are the proportions we will
get...9 round yellow, 3 round green, 3 wrinkled yellow and 1 wrinkled green. A
9:3:3:1 ratio......Do likes beget likes?? Both parents were round yellow!....There are 16 possible combinations of the four
different gametes. Sine single dominants determine the appearance, we have four
different Phenotypes...The sad result of this hybridization is that we have
only TWO (out of 16) pure breeding plants (of the original type) and we know
for certain only ONE of them...the Homozygous recessive wrinkled green in the
lower right hand corner. We have 9 round yellows and only One
of them is True Breeding or Pure an we can't tell which that is without
breeding all of them again. It fouls 'em up and then
hides 'em. Of course, there are times when this
hiding is to the advantage of the breeder...that is, it offers a 'short term'
advantage...covering up defects, but I can think of no time where it offers the
'long term' advantage of breed improvement and that's what we're after.
MERELY A GLANCE at the
squared diagram should be enough to convince the most skeptical
that Hybridization of Strain, Type or Breed complicates the genetic arrangement
and therefore should be avoided unless one has a definite purpose in
mind...Even with a planned outcross, we should be reasonably certain that we
can get back to our own strain without bringing along genetic complications
which would more than off set the advantages of our reason for outcrossing.
Now if, we want some
round green (Rryy) seeds, because, for example, they
are more resistant to mildew and green sells better, we outcross or hybridize
for a purpose. An understanding of these genetic fundamentals gives us a plan
to follow which assures success in a second of time compared to the long old
trial and error method still being employed by some.
What we actually want
is round yellow "dogs" RRYY, not round yellow dogs RrYy. These dihybrid ratios 9331,
apply not only to our peas but to our pups as well. Our example from Part I,
the German Shorthaired Pointer-Retriever and the German Wirehaired
Pointer-Retriever show the same ratio. W, for Wirehair is dominant to w for
smooth hair. Solid color T,
is dominant to spotting, t. I refer here to the large liver spots
with which we are all familiar, NOT the ticking which is RR or Rr. So, if we take a liver & white spotted Shorthair, wwtt, (Shorthair people would call it a "white"
Shorthair, since all Shorthairs have some liver) and breed it to a solid liver
Wirehair, WWTT, we will have 4 genetic type sex cells, Wt Wt,
sT & wt in the dihybrids.
When the pups from the Shorthair-Wirehair mating are themselves bred together
they will give the same results as we had with our other dihybrids,
the pea seeds. The Phenotype will show us 9 solid liver Wirehairs, 3 spotted
Wirehairs, 3 solid liver Shorthairs and 1 spotted white Shorthair...Again, only
2 pups are going to be true breeding for these characteristics and the only one
we know for sure is the Spotted White Shorthair because he's double
recessive....There are 9 solid liver Wirehairs...Which one will breed true??
There are ways out of the (nine-pointed)trophy dilemma but none are so simple
as not having to face the problem at all....If we take one of these factors,
say, solid liver T, to spotted t, we find ourselves right back with our 3:1
ratio. Counting the Phenotypes, we find 12 solid to 4 spotted,
we also find 12 wirehairs to 4 smoothhairs. This is
still our original 3:1, it's just (3 plus 1)2 equals 9 plus 3 plus 3 plus 1.
Not only does this
demonstrate what we already know...that Recessives must come in double doses to
show...but also that not all recessives are bad. Most recessives are
detrimental, most dominants are helpful. In many instances individual gene
pairs (and even gene groups) may be helpful in one breed and harmful in
another. We want the recessive, ww, in our Shorthairs
but they are not desirable in the Wirehair. A Ww,
Wirehair looks fine but occasionally two such are unknowingly bred together and
up pops a Shorthair. K for shorthair is dominant to k for long hair. The
recessive kk is fine for the setter but we don't want
any longhaired Shorthairs. Most recessives are bad in all breeds...deafness, hare lip, hip displasia
and the like are recessives. There are some dominants known to be harmful in
all breeds...extreme shyness is thought to be dominant or partially
so....Actually, so few genetic evaluations in the dog have been made that there
is still plenty of room for pioneering. As in saying "most recessives are
harmful" the prime source of data for such a statement come from drosophila, the fruit fly, and
the conviction has been re-enforced by what little work has been done on the
dog.
Now back to our
peas...HOW DOES NATURE HERSELF Make The Round Yellow Seeds Pure and the Green
Wrinkled Seeds pure in the first place?...By the most intensive form of
inbreeding possible...self-fertilization.
How Do the Seeds become
Pure again (homozygous) after being artificially hybridized?...By
self-fertilization. Self-fertilization of the hybrids (or the di-, tri-, multihybrids, too)
yields 50% pure, 50% hybrid...remember RR, Rr, Rr, rr.
F2 gives 75% pure, 25% hybrid. F3 produces 87½% pure, 12½% hybrid by
inbreeding. F10 would find about 0.1% hybrids left, actually there would always
be some hybrids left without selection. With selection, the purity of the pea
seeds may be established far more rapidly.
SO, when man stumbles
forward and mixes up, by crossing, the RRYY & rryy
peas, Mother Nature herself cannot right the wrong completely....She can,
however, restore about 95% of that purity, that Homozygosis we're after, in
four short generations of intensive inbreeding.
FOLLOWING DR. LEMLEY'S
fine article on breeding (NEWS June 63) in which he explained that for breed
improvement to occur, it was necessary to line breed or inbreed; a writer asked
how a GSP, with so many factors to consider, could be inbred. The alignment of
a few factors requires no different technique than the alignment of
many....Whether there is one or hundred, a thousand or a million....they all
follow the same rules...What tends toward Homozygosis for a single allelic
pair, results in the Homozygous condition for a very large number of allelic
pair...good as well as bad...dominant as well as recessive...Since all dogs
have the same number of Chromosomes the
Technique of gene alignment, is no different for the Shorthair than
for, let us say, the Saint Bernard.
THE problem for the
Shorthair is in the Testing &
Selecting, in knowing what we want and in being able to tel
hat we have when we get it.
We know, for example,
that the Bloodhound prefers to remain dry while we want our Shorthairs to love
the water. The gene or genes which control the reaction of the dog to the water
are present in ALL dogs, Bloodhounds, Collies, Boxers, Chows, et al, not just
the Shorthair. This is true for pointing, trailing, retrieving...tail set, eye color, angulation...every dog has
genes which govern each of these characteristics and the hundreds of others
which go to make up the animal we know as a dog. So I repeat,
The Technique of Gene Alignment
is the same for the Shorthair as the fruit fly, the same for the peas as for
the pups...The problem lies in testing. Except for the most obvious
faults and virtues, we must test for what we want, or have that Rare and
Special Artistic Gift, "an
eye for a dog".
We are getting ahead of
ourselves. Let us backtrack, let us examine, in a little more detail, using the
beads for genes, the mechanism of heredity...How two good specimens of our
breed can produce mediocre off-spring and how very average or even poor sires
and dams can produce outstanding pups. This apparent contradiction, contrary to
the blending of bloods theory, at least, is presented for the sake of
explanation....It does not represent probable results but rather possible
results and indicates that in this genetic game, almost anything can happen.
The double strand of
genes was no accident. It is further proof, if such were needed, for the
presence of an Omnipotent Being. It is interesting to speculate just what would
happen to each of us (and our pups) if suddenly one strand disappeared. An
individual may be industrious and intelligent and yet carry in the opposite
genes the tendency for laziness and stupidity which would be obvious were it
not for the better half of the pair to mask this weakness...This gives us two
chances to be good. Defects are so common that without this doubling, we and
the world would be in even worse shape than we are now. It would seem reasonable
that the need for this gene doubling is one of the most important reasons for
having two parents.....We know that each pup receives half his genes from his
sire and half from his dam...The parent which supplied the most dominant genes
is the one the pup is going to "take after". It is probably not
necessary to go into more detail to refute the old belief that the sire is the
most important parent and the dam of no concern. That pre-historic theory is
out the window, yet, the equally foolish "likes beget likes" remains
to plague us..
Let us take a sire
which has one defect and mate him to a dam which is perfect (for these six
genes) in both Phenotype and Genotype (appearance & genetic make-up).
ALL THE PUPS ARE GOING
TO LOOK GREAT. We know there is a covered up weakness because we can see the
weakness in the father, but, we do not see it in the son and only further
breeding is going to bring it out in the pup....
Now, let us take a pup
from that litter, we'll call him Arko, our first
litter, and breed him to a bitch which looks
equally good.
Recall Rr, Rr, Rr, rr. Where the two defective
genes double up we have a puppy, Benno, which is
defective.....This lets us know that the good looking bitch had a defective,
hidden, recessive gene, since the defect is not visible in either Arko or the dam....IF the defect is of sufficient harm, the
pup is disposed of ...Of course, if the fault is major neither Arko or the dam should be bred again except in "test matings". We know that this combination should produce
at least one superior pup but which of the remaining three is it?.....maybe a
real sharp "eye for a dog" might give the answer but the more
practical procedure, although admittedly time consuming, would be to breed Arko to his daughters, Betti and Bianka, and breed Bill to his mother...The odds are that
the only litter not show a defective pup would be Bianka's
litter, so we would have every reason to believe she was Homozygous Dominant
for that particular characteristic.
NOW, all we need is a pure sire for Bianka. (By "pure" I don't mean the sire must be
a "virgin"). We are pretty certain that Arko's
mother was pure for that factor since all the pups looked good, even, when
mated with a defective sire.....We can "make" ourselves a pure mail
with the material we have at hand, but it is going to take some time. We hope
that Bianka lives that long...it will be worth the
wait. We can make our pure breeding male by mating Arko
back to his mother...half of the pups should be Homozygous and half
Heterozygous as shown in Figure 12....Half of the pure pups should be males and
half females so we have one chance in four of getting a pre male to breed back
to Bianka.
Cynthia and Cid are pure
but Cathy and Cato look pure too. We've got to breed again to find out what's
what...but you can follow the procedure from here. It is enough to say
emphatically and positively that you "got" troubles when one of those
recessive defectives slip by you.
We have seen how good
parents can produce poor pups...The process by which poor parents produce good
pups is simply the reverse process....When we say "good" pups we mean
here good Phenotype for it is impossible for poor parents, genetically speaking,
to produce good pups, genetically speaking...Looks are deceiving...Here we have
a sire and dam both of which can be seen to be defective in different areas,
yet, all their off-spring look good.
Of course, we know this
mating should never have taken place, but it did, and some nice looking pups were whelped...If
you got a couple of the pups (of opposite sex) from this litter and had not seen
the parents and wanted to know what you had, from a genetic standpoint, the
quickest way to find out would be to inbreed the brother and sister. Try it on paper, then drown the ones
that look like the grandparents...it would be best to drown the whole litter. I
suggest you do it quickly before you become attached to the little
beggars....Inbreeding, as Dr. Kleeman has said, and
as we can see from these illustrations, shows us what we have..the good and the bad...it is the most effective
method of breeding, yet, requires the most experience and the most Testing and
Selecting for success.....
If you will take Figure
13 and follow it through as suggested, you will see the truth of the statement
made earlier, "The only
factors which are going to be visible in the grandparents and not visible in
the parent and then show up again in the pups, are going to be recessives, the
White Beads, and ...we don't want many of those".
We can carry this
deficiency of sire and dam to considerable lengths and still come up with nice
pups...Once in a Million...Below we can fault the sire for several factors and
the dam for several but their short-comings, do not
overlap.....
This is one of those
once in a lifetime deals, probably the odds are greater than one in a
million....Neither sire or dam could produce anything worthwhile mated any
other way. The pups show none of the defects of the parents. They are indeed
outstanding. Such an unusual gene combination is thought to also explain the
occasional genius which occur in man...It is known to
be the secret of success in hybrid corn....It is referred to as "hybrid vigor" and we will go into it in some detail later.
It is easy to see that
Elsa and Erick are superior pups. They both go "dual" at just over
twenty-four months and everyone is happy. The proud owners can now make plans
for matings. These are the kind of pups which can
bring real improvement to the breed. Maybe they can be the foundation stock of
a whole new superior strain. All such happy thoughts pass through the minds of
their owners. The pups from the two litters are sold before they are whelped.
Finally, the great day comes...there is great anticipation. The pups are
born...they sure look cute.... all pups look cure...but, as weeks pass into
months a discerning eye can see that the pups are not up to par. Not many
months had passed when it was clear the pups would be worthless. In fact they
were worse than worthless, because, so many expected so much, that they were
bred for more than is average and therefore, actually, had a detrimental effect
on the breed by scattering far and wide, the unwanted white beads....Erick,
sired many litters out of fine bitches; Elsa had the pick of the studs, but,
for some reason they just didn't "click". There were no outstanding
pups like their parents...With a knowledge of the genetic system and how it
functions and seeing the Genotype (an advantage the breeders did not have) it
doesn't surprise us at all...because that's a mixed up gene string if there
ever was one. This quite naturally, is often why good dogs, good in themselves,
cannot produce good puppies......We can see fro these bead arrangements that
the prepotent sire or dam...prepotent
for these particular genes must be pure, homozygous. A sire or dam presenting
such a genetic picture could do nothing but good. They couldn't produce a bad
pup if they wanted to...it just isn't int he cards,
or the genes.
This prepotent sire has the golden touch. Every bitch he visits
has beautiful puppies. These beautiful puppies out of the mediocre bitch, look fully as nice as those from the great bitch. But
as was said at the close of Part I, the females of that litter (out of the poor
bitch) must be bred back to their prepotent sire if
they are going to contribute to the over-all improvement of the breed.
When I said earlier
that we wanted round yellow "dogs", RRYY, I meant that we want dogs
like FRITZ.
We do not want
round yellow "dogs", RrYy, like
this....GUNNAR OR GRETA.
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Corrections to Part 12 & 13
Copyright 2001. Dr. James G. McCue, Jr. All rights
reserved. Postscript: And his legacy lives on in the German
Shorthaired Pointers of today. May they
always be healthy and bred with forethought and planning.
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