Speaking of Aaron..color genetics fun!

When Aaron was born, his red/gold brindle pattern was apparent. His hair grew longer; the brindle pattern became less and less visible. As he matured, the greying factor began to work upon the brindle hair. He underwent a transition from what appeared to be a gold and white parti-color dog to a black and white parti-color dog.

Some of his offspring, including Frankie, Robby and Allie, inherited his brindle coloration. See more photos of this phenomenon.

The Downside of Inbreeding

C.A. Sharp, the author of this piece Vickie shared with me and numerous other great articles, participated on Dr. John Armstrong’s genetics list. She starts this article with a quote from Hellmuth Wachtel Ph.D., another participant on that most excellent list (which has been defunct basically since the death of Dr. Armstrong). Hellmuth, a zoologist, not a dog breeder, is quite radical in his views. However, he, along with several other participants with ‘out-of-the-box’ views, are the people that indirectly gave me the courage to take on the Gompa dog project. C.A. is self-taught, extremely intelligent, has co-authored some scientific pieces with researchers and breeds Australian Shepherds. She is generous with sharing her many excellent articles. You can find read more of her articles, along with other articles along similar lines on the Genetics page of the FFT website.

Canine Lameness Learning Module

This is fascinating. Thanks Faye for sharing!

Canine Lameness Learning Module

About Motion Capture:
This learning module makes use of optical motion capture data. For the motion capture, reflective round markers were placed at the joints and key locations on the dogs.

Learning Objective:
1. to be able to identify patterns of movement associated with healthy gait, hip dysplasia and cranial cruciate ligament rupture.

Puppy Biting

Julie sent an excellent article, written by Ian Dunbar, about puppy biting. Even if you don’t have a puppy, I recommend reading it. Click on the above logo to explore that website. I’m really curious about the book titled Dogs Bite But Ballons and Slippers Are More Dangerous.

PlaqueOff

Darby emailed the following:

This product was purchased at last year’s Eucanuba Show in Long Beach Ca. by a friend of mine.  She is a breeder judge and hound judge.  She has used the product for almost a year now, and says, ‘in her opinion, it works’.  She has IGs.  Seems that some of this breed is prone to early tarter and gum disease.  She showed me how a very light gold cover may show up on the back teeth.  She then took her finger, and simply rubbed the cover off the tooth.  I was impressed, as I am facing a second loan on my house to have 3 of my dogs teeth cleaned.  Kidding, but it is not going to be inexpensive.

Read the info and see if this could be of interest to you.

Is anyone familiar with this product?