Did anyone watch Channel 4 Supervet about the Bulldog

To me there are much bigger issues at play here.

Crufts is just a big dog show, where dogs are awarded prizes for their adherence to a written breed standard. Any dog that wins a first place at a Championship show can qualify for Crufts.
Crufts is not a barometer of healthy dogs, as long as they have teeth and the males have testicles, nor are most other dog shows, nor do these shows recommend or endorse animals for breeding.
Showing classes are, in the main, a beauty pageant for dogs.
Until the kennel clubs stop registering puppies from parents which do not have the recommended health tests for their breed/good results, and as long as they continue to allow top honours to be awarded to dogs with poor results, no results, or born from dogs with no/poor results, until people start actually start doing their research and reward the breeders who are doing things right when they are buying a puppy, then the situation will continue. That's it.
These situations occur, because they are allowed to, because there are no hard and fast parameters and no lines drawn in the sand.
Most people do more research into a mobile phone they will own for two years than they do into a dog that will ideally live in their home with them well into double figures.
 
CorvusCorax said:
To me there are much bigger issues at play here.

Crufts is just a big dog show, where dogs are awarded prizes for their adherence to a written breed standard. Any dog that wins a first place at a Championship show can qualify for Crufts.
Crufts is not a barometer of healthy dogs, as long as they have teeth and the males have testicles, nor are most other dog shows, nor do these shows recommend or endorse animals for breeding.
Showing classes are, in the main, a beauty pageant for dogs.
Until the kennel clubs stop registering puppies from parents which do not have the recommended health tests for their breed/good results, and as long as they continue to allow top honours to be awarded to dogs with poor results, no results, or born from dogs with no/poor results, until people start actually start doing their research and reward the breeders who are doing things right when they are buying a puppy, then the situation will continue. That's it.
These situations occur, because they are allowed to, because there are no hard and fast parameters and no lines drawn in the sand.
Most people do more research into a mobile phone they will own for two years than they do into a dog that will ideally live in their home with them well into double figures.
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Absolutely agree with this. I think the majority of pet owners assume that KC registered automatically means they are buying a ‘top of the range’ puppy. Sadly this isn’t true in the slightest. I have no direct experience (I would probably actively avoid a ‘show dog’ line, but some of the dogs I’ve seen while watching Crufts make me very sad.
 
I think NF was dead right this puppy was the result of unscrupulous breeding, the xray of those hips are horrendous and the response to the owner from other breeders is very telling.

I thought the British Bulldog was one of those breeds that the KC had said it wanted improved, cant remember the exact wording but anyone reading it would have been heartened to think that something was being done at long last to address these problems.

As for the general public doing their research they are still keeping puppy farmers in business by their inability to research despite the RSPCAs slogan always see the dog with its mother so for them to know what health testing is let alone asking to see the paperwork is never going to happen unfortunately.
 
twiggy2 said:
As for NF recommending PTS it must have been very bad as he IMO tries to save animals far past the point of saving being in the animals best interests.
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I would not be a fan at all and have never been able to watch an episode right through - but a LOT of the problems he deals with seem to be because of poor purchasing decisions.
I am also not a huge fan of the blog author either, whether intentional or not, her programme sent a lot of people into the arms of puppy farmers and backyard breeders advertising 'healthy' cross-breeds full of 'hybrid vigour', who weren't being health tested either - for me, that's a case of out of the frying pan, into the fryer in terms of dog health.
The kennel clubs have their faults, but when a dog is unregistered, it's much harder to keep track of health problems and inbreeding. For all I know all the (for example) cockapoos in this town are related and interbreeding with each other, how would I know whether they are or not, when there is no written record of who and what they all are?
The sooner DNA testing is a pre-requisite in the breeding of all pedigree animals (as it should be, according to EU legislation!!) the better.
This isn't about 'evil showing/evil show breeders' - it's about people doing their research. Bad breeding exists in showing, working, pet dogs.
There ARE good breeders breeding health tested, fit and functional showline dogs. The problem is that people have to wait for one, as doing things properly requires time and money and research and there is a waiting list for well-bred dogs. The problem is low levels of patience, an 'I want it right now' attitude.
 
Dobiegirl said:
As for the general public doing their research they are still keeping puppy farmers in business by their inability to research despite the RSPCAs slogan always see the dog with its mother so for them to know what health testing is let alone asking to see the paperwork is never going to happen unfortunately.
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NO ONE buys a household appliance these days without looking at reviews or shopping around. The problem is PR IMO, for me the money is being spent in the wrong areas, and whether or not the registration bodies and show runners are prepared to take a temporary financial hit by cracking down on bad breeding practices, which could be made up later by creating incentives for those who do it right.
 
Why anyone would want to buy a breed of dog in danger of suffocation on exertion is beyond me. It is certainly not "cute" to be struggling for breath and life.

It will remain a problem as long as people buy the poor creatures; there is no incentive for breeders to change when people continue to buy them.

I saw the programme, it was heartbreaking.

ETA. Isn't it more to do with commonsense (or lack of) than Crufts?
 
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CorvusCorax said:
I would not be a fan at all and have never been able to watch an episode right through - but a LOT of the problems he deals with seem to be because of poor purchasing decisions.
I am also not a huge fan of the blog author either, whether intentional or not, her programme sent a lot of people into the arms of puppy farmers and backyard breeders advertising 'healthy' cross-breeds full of 'hybrid vigour', who weren't being health tested either - for me, that's a case of out of the frying pan, into the fryer in terms of dog health.
The kennel clubs have their faults, but when a dog is unregistered, it's much harder to keep track of health problems and inbreeding. For all I know all the (for example) cockapoos in this town are related and interbreeding with each other, how would I know whether they are or not, when there is no written record of who and what they all are?
The sooner DNA testing is a pre-requisite in the breeding of all pedigree animals (as it should be, according to EU legislation!!) the better.
This isn't about 'evil showing/evil show breeders' - it's about people doing their research. Bad breeding exists in showing, working, pet dogs.
There ARE good breeders breeding health tested, fit and functional showline dogs. The problem is that people have to wait for one, as doing things properly requires time and money and research and there is a waiting list for well-bred dogs. The problem is low levels of patience, an 'I want it right now' attitude.
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When deformed dogs are winning at Crufts how are people expected to know which breeders are bad and which are good?
 
I think people need to get (the showing part of) Crufts out of their head, personally, I think it's a bit of a red herring. It's one dog show among thousands that take place up and down the country and for me, the short snapshot that people see on TV isn't a realistic representation of what is out there, for the same reason that people don't model all their wardrobe choices through what they see at the Oscars. And if they do, they are generally bitterly disappointed!!
 
meleeka said:
When deformed dogs are winning at Crufts how are people expected to know which breeders are bad and which are good?
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I would advise them to do proper research and ask the right questions about whether parents have been health tested - winning at Crufts means nothing, same as winning at HOYS means nothing, the animal concerned can still be obese/poorly constructed etc

The writer of that article is a past master at manipulating information to misrepresent people and distort the truth - I know for a fact that she did so in the Pedigree Dogs Exposed programme - I wouldn’t give her or anything she writes/presents the time of day.

Of course there are massive problems in pedigree dog breeding which the KC and those involved in the breeds concerned need to urgently rectify, but there are good breeders out there trying to do just that
 
I’ve got to say that the whole hysteria about Crufts - perpetuated by the media and by the Kennel Club - drives me absolutely nuts and always has done. You don’t get the best examples of every breed at Crufts, you would be far better off going to the championship show of the parent club of your breed and seeing what goes on there. You will have specialist judges not all rounders, who might - possibly - be less likely to put up ‘faces’ and top winners because they know who they are.

Some people - not all by any means! - who start off in showing will tout their dogs around from show to show with the one aim of qualifying for Crufts so they can boast to their friends/neighbours/relatives. It’s a numbers game a lot of the time, and if you have a half reasonable dog in a breed that isn’t numerically huge then you are likely to qualify. Sadly it doesn’t mean your dog is an exceptional specimen of its breed....
 
About 40 years ago I attended a talk given by a vet to a group of dentists. One case he focused on was a pedigree dog with a severe mouth deformity which he corrected. The dog went on to be a big show winner and sire a lot of puppies. The vet did great work but the dog should have been castrated and not shown or bred with.
 
ester said:
Re. the poor purchasing decisions I won't ever forget the couple on Noel's program who had to PTS their GSD at 12ish? months for hips I think. Then went and got another from the same breeder.
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I don't know because I don't like the show so I don't know if it was genetic, but some breeders will offer a replacement pup or a refund in the case of a dog with poor health as part of a guarantee process.
If it was the same sire and dam and the issue was definitely proven to be genetic and they didn't close those lines off, I can understand the concern, but like in the case of a friend, who had a dog with an elbow issue which precluded him from showing and working, no others in the litter or close relatives were affected, and the breeder offered him another puppy from different parents, I don't see anything wrong with that.
He didn't avail of the offer, just retited the dog and he's still a pet.
 
I could not buy a dog prone to breathing problems. Years ago I saw a couple with an adult bulldog in the town. The dog stood there with a heaving rib cage and really noisey breathing, as he struggled for breath. A few people were standing admiring him and cooing over how gorgeous he was and I looked at that poor dog and felt incredibly sad for him :(
 
I too am ambivalent about the author of the piece but she needs full credit for highlighting the absolutely gobsmacking fact that there are no required health tests for the bulldog, and the recommended ones do not involve any respiratory grading or hip scoring, in a breed known to have both problems in spades.

CorvusCorax said:
Any dog that wins a first place at a Championship show can qualify for Crufts.
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It's first, second or third and it's a rare judge that's brave enough to withhold, making it entirely possible to qualify as the only exhibit in the class or as third of three, or to put it another way, from last place. :p It's farcical, and I say that as someone who shows and will be attending Crufts (albeit with a health tested, dog-shaped dog...)
 
blackcob said:
It's first, second or third and it's a rare judge that's brave enough to withhold, making it entirely possible to qualify as the only exhibit in the class or as third of three, or to put it another way, from last place. :p It's farcical, and I say that as someone who shows and will be attending Crufts (albeit with a health tested, dog-shaped dog...)
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There you go then. There are better shop windows.
 
ester said:
Re. the poor purchasing decisions I won't ever forget the couple on Noel's program who had to PTS their GSD at 12ish? months for hips I think. Then went and got another from the same breeder.
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I‘d be way too paranoid to trust them again.

I don’t understand the current obsession with brachycephalic dogs. Surely people want a dog which is at least fit for function ie can breathe? I cannot get my head round buying one that can’t breathe or run.
 
Lownthwaite Rob said:
I could not buy a dog prone to breathing problems. Years ago I saw a couple with an adult bulldog in the town. The dog stood there with a heaving rib cage and really noisey breathing, as he struggled for breath. A few people were standing admiring him and cooing over how gorgeous he was and I looked at that poor dog and felt incredibly sad for him :(
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Thats so sad. While not my cup of tea, my friend breeds bulldogs on a small scale, working towards fixing some of the facial issues. Her dogs while admittedly not able to do as much as a long nosed dog go on long walks, mooch around her stables and are pretty fit and healthy.
I used to see one on the flyball circuit and although not capable of doing a full days racing, he too had a great life unlike some of the ones I see in the park struggling to breathe doing a ten minute stroll.
 
From what I see the majority of British Bulldog/Brachycephalic dog owners do not base their choice of dog off who/what is winning at Crufts. Much like my personal choice of horses have nothing to do with what breeds are winning in the show win at the moment.

They are sold by the “cute” scrunchy faces, “adorable” snoring and “sedate personalities” - often due to the fact they cannot summon up enough oxygen to misbehave. The general dog owner population is so poorly educated about breeds I don’t think hip dysplasia would even be considered, bearing in mind how evident the respiratory issues are and are still ignored.

IMO there needs to be a huge crackdown on breeding any dogs repeatedly born with serious issues in particular respiratory issues. If other breeds were born with a brachys deformities the puppy would be PTS in welfare grounds.
 
For my breed, the FCI lists as a disqualifying fault something that is completely acceptable under the KC standard. The AKC standard differs again from both. Which only goes to further demonstrate that it's all bollocks! (Why do I do it again, don't ruin Crufts for me will you :p)

I've yet to see, for example, a French bulldog at a championship show that has any semblance of a tail, which goes to show that some judges pick and choose which bits of a standard they will apply anyway. More bollocks...
 
The AKC are a law unto themselves as the UK KC are.... and judges are another matter altogether. Everyone slates the KC but judges are equally culpable for putting up unhealthy specimens of the breed.... but nobody censures them or suggests they shouldn’t judge any more.....
 
[QUOTE="blackcob, post: 14196190, member: 47014(albeit with a health tested, dog-shaped dog...)[/QUOTE]

I really love this.... “dog shaped”..... nooooo he is a baby shark ? or a small fluff ball ? or a cross between them ?
 
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