I want to have a whinge!!! German Shepherds..

GSDs were overbred in the 60, 70s, 80s, 90s and today - and we are still suffering the consequences.

Some of the temperament issues can be traced back to certain lines and even, certain dogs.

One dog, a working police dog who was incredibly sharp, turned out two champions in different litters, which both went on to serve hundreds of bitches.
The dog we had to get PTS for being overprotective, was a grandson of his.

Yes, people of a certain generation are scared of sheps, and I feel sorry for the staffie/bull breed people who get it now!
 
Aye I do feel for the staffies and their owners these days in particular. All the ones I've have known have been such lovely soft lumps, and they get such bad reps now as 'status dogs' due to careless breeding and ownership.

I hadn't realised that over breeding with sheps was still a problem, although perhaps I should have, as indiscriminate breeding obviously is, and the two often go hand in hand. I'm such a newb :)
 
Well I am over 50 and I'm not scared of them! But you are right, I think it is a generation thing. In the 60s/70s shepherds had a really bad image, then it was rotties and now poor staffies have the awful reputation. I don't remember packs of GSDs roaming the streets :p, but the biggest problem was that there were a lot of bad temperaments as in nervous dogs, and this led to shy biters, if the dogs were in stressed situations they would snap. A dog with a good strong temperament can handle all sorts of situations, working dogs such as police dogs don't attack because they are scared, they do it because they are trained to do it, therefore their behaviour is generally predictable. A dog that is nervous is a real loose cannon , you never know when it will bite. Athough todays GSDs still have their faults, I think many breeders of my mothers generation, and mine, can take credit for improving temperament, and in turn the breeds reputation.
 
Indeed, was going to write that you are more likely to get bitten by a nervous dog than any other sort, but was afraid to get flamed :p

Things are SO much better now in terms of so much more people, thanks to people like MM and her mum, and my Mum, who was a very early signatory to the hip scoring thing, know which lines to use and which to avoid and what to look out for in breeding stock and when selecting a puppy.

There are too many litters of too many breeds being bred, full stop, IMO.

There are still people who breed for colour, for coat length, for cash, rather than thinking of the bigger picture, but thankfully character seems to be much higher on the agenda. I'd rather have a crippled dog that I could keep in my house than a perfect specimen that wanted to eat everyone. Although, obviously, there is a happy medium :p
 
When I was work exp-ing at the local dogs home, the amount of GSDs, Staffies, Rotties and Springer Spaniels in was unreal.
People buy these dogs thinking it'll give their image a real boost in the way that nobody would challenge them (the WRONG reason to buy a dog!!!!!) and can't cope, can't handle them, can't train them, can't afford to feed them and in the case of the Springers, just don't realise how much exercise they need - the same goes for Greyhounds too, at one point we were overrun with ex racers that had been kicked out, poor dogs.

I think ownership lessons would be a good idea for people who are first time dog owners - what difference it would make to the people who KNOW they're buying a dog for the wrong reasons, I don't know, but to the people who are just naive and uneducated...surely it would help a little?
 
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