TNS

[Julia Hunt]

Whilst the UK based email lists and forums seem to be awash in posts on this subject, I see nothing on the US lists, so thought I'd post. Here is a link that describes this nasty disease http://www.freewebs.com/wessexbcc/trappedn...hilsyndrome.htm Whilst generally thought of as a barbie collie problem, if you look at the pedigrees of known and suspected TNS litters listed on bordercolliehealth.com you will see that in at least 1 case a suspected carrier is from straight ISDS lines.

Since a number of the sport collie lines in the US are a mixture of working and show-bred border collies, there are most definitely dogs here in the US, outside the conformation kennels, that are at risk of being carriers and should be tested before breeding.

 

At the moment only relatives of known/suspected carriers/affecteds can be tested, but the test is relatively cheap, so when it is generally available like the CEA test is I will definitely be testing mine!

 

Julia

[Rebecca, Irena Farm]

I think I'm dense. I'm not seeing anything but dogs from, at best, mixed show and ISDS lines. There's one with "ISDS lines" but not working dogs, clearly, and even that one goes back to Show Champions.

 

There's clearly some names I'd avoid if I were crossing my dog to show lines, which I'm not. I see lots of really big show line names implicated throughout those pedigrees. Names that have been linebred over and over to set that pretty show type that is the only thing that wins now. Sounds like this is a problem of the show lines and they should get their own house in order before coming and poking a finger at working Border Collie folks.

[Julia Hunt]

I think I'm dense. I'm not seeing anything but dogs from, at best, mixed show and ISDS lines. There's one with "ISDS lines" but not working dogs, clearly, and even that one goes back to Show Champions.

 

There's clearly some names I'd avoid if I were crossing my dog to show lines, which I'm not. I see lots of really big show line names implicated throughout those pedigrees. Names that have been linebred over and over to set that pretty show type that is the only thing that wins now. Sounds like this is a problem of the show lines and they should get their own house in order before coming and poking a finger at working Border Collie folks.

 

 

1. I don't think anyone's poking fingers.

2. One of the pedigrees shown which is believed to have produced TNS is all ISDS on the bottom. TNS is like CEA, carrier x carrier results in affected. If you look at the dogs behind 'Mobella Merry Miss' her sire may have been a show champion, but his pedigree reads like a whos-who of UK herding lines. On her dam's side it's obedience dogs on top, all of which appear to trace back to wellknown herding dogs if you follow the pedigree beyond what's shown on bordercolliehealth.com, and again all herding on the bottom. There are no Australian or New Zealand dogs in that pedigree, it's all UK.

3. It is a problem of show lines, but if you follow the pedigrees there is certainly reason to believe that it may exist in working lines too, so i felt it was worth mentioning.

 

 

Julia

[Katelynn & Gang]

"Mobella Merry Miss" pedigree reads to me like a pedigree of a breeding that was trying to add in some Border Collie traits.

 

Her Sire was a show Champion from working lines, correct.

 

Her Dam's Sire was from all obedience lines though, which to me is just the same as conformation lines health wise (I'd check both obedience and conformation bred dogs for rare things like TNS and CL). BUT because there was obedience lines in there (same as conformation lines to me), that is why she could have been a carrier which in return be a reason for her producing affected puppies (when mated to a conformation dog that is a TNS carrier).

 

The chance that TNS came from her working lines is very VERY unlikely because it'd have shown up in our working lines a long time ago, considering how much the "proven" working dogs in her pedigree where used and line bred a lot to get good working dogs.

 

Untill a fully bred working dog (such dogs as you'd find winning Open Trials) is matched up with a carrier conformation dog and produces affected TNS puppies there is no leg to stand on that is came from ISDS lines. There is no proof, leaving it a myth in the "ISDS Border Collie" just as CL is.

 

Katelynn

[Eileen Stein]

Julia, I don't think I'm reading the pedigrees the same way you are. Mobella is a show kennel -- has been since back when border collies were first accepted for show by the KC -- and it incorporates imported show lines. Not one of the pedigrees currently shown on its website is without at least one OZ-NZ forebear. I don't know Merry Miss's breeding any further back than what's shown on the bordercolliehealth.com website, but it appears there that at least half of her dam's ancestors are KC dogs, at least one of the furthest back (great,great,great,grandparent) being a Mobella dog. Another of the furthest back is a Stillmoor dog -- again I don't know the pedigree of that particular dog, but there is certainly a lot of OZ-NZ show imports in the Stillmoor lines, through Beagold and Goytre. And since Merry Miss is a carrier, she is carrying only one TNS allele. The fact that she has a lot of working sheepdogs in her ancestry doesn't matter much unless there's reason to think the allele came through them, which apparently there isn't at this point. So based just on what's published, I don't think we have much to fear, or much reason to be awash in posts about TNS.

 

That's not to say that you shouldn't have your dogs DNA tested when the test becomes available. If any of your dogs are descended from these lines, that would be a sensible thing to do. Even where they're not, if it gives you peace of mind, that's a good thing in itself. And data is always good to have. However, I think it's important to keep in mind a point that Denise Wall has made here previously: All dogs carry a number of deleterious recessive genes. As work continues on the canine genome, a flood of tests are likely to become available for these defective genes. It certainly makes sense to make use of any particular test if there's a reasonable likelihood that the mutation the test identifies might be present in your dog. It doesn't make a lot of sense to test where there is little or no likelihood that the mutation would be present in your dog. What makes the least sense of all would be to test for every testable deleterious gene, and eliminate from breeding any dog who carries any one of them. Paradoxically, the likely result of doing so would be the concentration of other undesirable recessive genes, and the expression of diseases not previously seen, in a gene pool whose diversity has been much reduced.

 

I suspect you already know all this, Julia, but I think it bears repeating whenever issues like this are discussed.

[Julia Hunt]

I don't know Merry Miss's breeding any further back than what's shown on the bordercolliehealth.com website, but it appears there that at least half of her dam's ancestors are KC dogs, at least one of the furthest back (great,great,great,grandparent) being a Mobella dog. Another of the furthest back is a Stillmoor dog -- again I don't know the pedigree of that particular dog, but there is certainly a lot of OZ-NZ show imports in the Stillmoor lines, through Beagold and Goytre.

 

 

The 4 dogs furthest back on the obedience 'leg' of the 5 generation pedigree shown are Stillmoor Jamie ISDS 44438; Glade of Sealight ISDS 44662, a grandaughter of Int Sup Ch Garry II; Tannasg Tobyn who i couldn't find a reg # for, but is a son of Patch of Thornby and a Tannasg bitch who's parents are both ISDS reg.; and Mobella Flair whose sire is Plas Major Dart ISDS 42185 and she's out of a bitch called Gem who I couldn't find a reg # for, but with a name like that, i'm thinking farm bitch :-)

 

I'm not saying i think there is some huge problem with TNS in ISDS collies, what I am saying is that this would suggest that there may be carriers that have come from outside the NZ/OZ show lines, unlike CL which pretty much seems to be limited to those lines.

 

I'm not going to post anything further on this topic as I feel I am about to find myself cast in the role of 'defender of show dogs' and 'enemy of the poor working dog' by some other posters on this thread, which is pretty funny.

 

Julia

[Journey]

I'm not saying i think there is some huge problem with TNS in ISDS collies, what I am saying is that this would suggest that there may be carriers that have come from outside the NZ/OZ show lines, unlike CL which pretty much seems to be limited to those lines.

 

I think "suggesting" is just what many show breeders would like to do. The litter, and Mobella Merry Miss, are "unconfirmed". So, why are they even listed? It's been asked several times on many lists for documentation "confirming" affected status or carrier status on any dog w/o OZ / NZ in the pedigree. None has been provided which in my opion "suggests" TNS like CL is limited to those areas and crosses of those pedigrees. I get the impression they are thowing a lot of mud at working dogs and hoping some will stick.

 

Karen

[Eileen Stein]

I'm not going to post anything further on this topic as I feel I am about to find myself cast in the role of 'defender of show dogs' and 'enemy of the poor working dog' by some other posters on this thread, which is pretty funny.

 

Well, I hope not. It IS a peculiar phenomenon that show BC people are so anxious to cry "It's in your lines too! It's in your lines too!" without any demonstrable evidence, about diseases that have been found only in show lines, but I would never put you in that category.

 

Then again, maybe it's not peculiar. We criticize their breeding policies, and don't want them in the same gene pool with us. They criticize our alleged irresponsibility re health checks (on which they pride themselves), and do want to be in the same gene pool with us. When hereditary diseases manifest in their lines, I guess I can see where it would burn them up that they're the ones having the genetic problems. It's obvious that many of them are just hoping and praying that these problems will show up in working dogs of today. And maybe they will -- it's much less likely, because we don't do the inbreeding to fix physical type that they do, but ya never know. If they do, I think it will then make sense (as it does today with CEA) to use genetic testing to assess the scope of the problem and to assist with breeding decisions. I don't really think that's the case right now with TNS, but reasonable minds can differ.

[Rebecca, Irena Farm]

OK, so I'm going to pretend to be the crotchety old working breeder here, though I fit the description in no way. Let's say TNS does show up in our lines. What is the worst that's going to happen? It's not like CEA where an affected dog can quickly increase the rate of the disease. I breed two carriers, get a litter where many of the pups go blind, are born dead, or die early.

 

Since I'm a stupid old farmer that don't know nothin', I say, "Well, that sucked. Let's try that again!!" No, of course not! I say, "Dang, bad breeders." Probably I'll blame it on the bitch but if it happens even one more time to the sire, word will get around.

 

Farmers aren't stupid. They knew about recessive traits before most conformation breeders suspected there was such a thing. They also don't breed precious little Foo-foo just because she's pretty - she's got other things to do beside produce pups.

 

Sure, it might be in "ABCA dogs" - which aren't equivalent to working breeding any more than all ISDS dogs are, by the way - but not in lines where the work the parents do is more important than the puppies they can produce, and not in lines where any suspicion of unsoundness is viewed as a threat to the usefulness of the dog, and the dog's get. I've seen the most insane things come out of puppymills. But don't purchase your pups from a puppymill, or the descendents of puppymill breeders, or backyard breeders.

[Katelynn & Gang]

Plas Major Dart ISDS 42185 and she's out of a bitch called Gem who I couldn't find a reg # for, but with a name like that, i'm thinking farm bitch :-)

 

ETA

 

Plas Major Dart ISDS 42185 isn't out of working lines.

 

Play Major Dart ISDS 42185 Dam is Obedience Champion "Glare of Sealight" #3034.

 

Play Major Dart ISDS 42185 Sire is Obedience "C" (what is that? lol) "Plas Major Tarka" # 27370.

 

Katelynn

[quicksilver]

This is one of the threads where the subject was recently discussed in the UK:

http://f51.parsimony.net/cgi-bin/topic-fla...eadNummer=21733

 

My collies are both from pure working ISDS lines, and initially I felt the same way about the subject as most of you - an Oz/NZ show lines problem. But then with more info I began to have doubts ...

 

Have a read and let me know what you think - I'd value your opinion.

[Eileen Stein]

Quicksilver, if I had a dog from Mobella or Locheil lines, or from Oz/NZ show lines (as if!), I would certainly have that dog tested when testing becomes generally available. I wouldn't feel the need to do so with dogs from pure working lines at this stage of knowledge.

 

It's not impossible that one or more of the dogs imported to Oz/NZ carried this mutation. It's not even impossible that there might be the odd British dog with no Oz/NZ in its background that carries this mutation. All dogs (and people, for that matter) have deleterious recessive alleles (gene variations) of one kind or another. These genes do not become expressed unless one carrier is bred to another, and this is spectacularly unlikely in ISDS working lines.

 

Obviously, the Oz/NZ show breeders have concentrated this gene (whether it was a mutation that occurred after importation or before importation) in their dogs through inbreeding to "fix" physical traits that are desirable in the show ring. That is evident from the very high percentage of Oz/NZ breeding in the pedigrees of known afflicted and producing dogs. However, few if any working breeders breed like this. Indeed, the only known line that is all-British which is suspected (and rightly so, it appears) of having produced TNS is a KC line whose breeders breed for show as well as sport.

 

It is pure sophistry for anyone to say "Look, that bitch has Wiston Cap and Bosworth Coon in her pedigree! We know how often they were used! That must mean TNS is all through working lines!" There is no reason whatsoever to think that Wiston Cap or Bosworth Coon carried the mutation. Actually, the very fact that they were used so often is very strong proof that they did NOT carry the mutation, or the disease would have shown up in their working-bred progeny by now. There are 14 other dogs at that level in Merry Miss's pedigree, and any one of them is far more likely to have been a carrier than Cap or Coon, and for all we know the actual carrier may have no offspring surviving in working ISDS lines today.

 

The show breeders make the point that vets were not aware of this disease until recently, and therefore it may be (and have been) much more prevalent than we realize. I agree that if one has had pups dying of infection or unknown causes before reaching the age of 4-6 months, then it's possible undiagnosed TNS might have been involved. But that is just something we are not seeing among working bred dogs in the US. I have never encountered it, either directly, or through friends and acquaintances, or through the ABCA. (As a member of the ABCA's Health & Genetics Committee I would be aware of any reports of such cases to the registry). If we're seeing no symptoms consistent with the disease, and the disease is one that produces drastic symptoms, doesn't it make sense to conclude that the disease is either non-existent or so rare that, as a practical matter, there is no need to test?

 

I'm not in a position to know first-hand whether the disease is equally unknown among ISDS working breeders, but if I were in the UK and saw that early deaths from from infection were not being found in working-bred ISDS litters, I wouldn't feel the need for testing before breeding or buying those dogs either.

 

This is not denial on our part, as the show breeders like to claim. I would never deny, for example, that we have epilepsy present in our dogs, and some of it is almost certainly genetic. I think it makes sense to go all out to try to identify the genes involved and develop a DNA test for them, and use the test when it becomes available. Our registry (ABCA) was one of the principal contributers to CEA research and the development of the DNA test for CEA, because mild as CEA usually is, we knew we had it in our dogs. But I see no evidence that we have a TNS problem in our dogs, either from real life evidence or from the published pedigrees, so I see no need to test for it.

[donna frankland (uk)]

wow there is a border collie club in wessex? woo hoo! oh its show peeps i thought i might have found somewhere new to play

sorry bout that but it was kind of interesting as i live in the wessex area.

 

i dont know if this is of any interest to anyone but.......

i have been bc obsessed for well over a decade, indeed i notice that article was written in 05 (the one eileen posted) and yet reading this thread is the very first i have ever heard of TNS.

but the only bc people that i know and spend time with are trials people, farmers and shepherds. none of them have ever mentioned it to me either......

i really cant imagine something like this ever getting the chance to spread through working dog lines, farmers over here can be ruthless, i certainly cant see them giving a second chance to a pairing that has produced sickly pups before :s

anyway, sorry for the rambling i dont even know if what i have written makes any sense but i thought i would share it anyway!