Katelynn & Gang Posted March 28, 2007 Report Share Posted March 28, 2007 Bonnie, I am very disappointed that you would stoop to the level of attempting to discredit someone on a public board, with age of all silly ways, just because you have no intelligent factual reply to give. I expected more from a full grown women. A kid I may be but I am nobodies fool. Katelynn M. Sulaica Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sharkie Posted March 28, 2007 Report Share Posted March 28, 2007 just wondering .... should the design of the breed ideally be in the hands of knowledgeable breeders and everyone who buys from them not allowed to breed? If so how much influence does puppy mills have on the overall evolution of the breed nowadays? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lenajo Posted March 28, 2007 Report Share Posted March 28, 2007 Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger. Children speak, in their simplicity, more wisely than most elders. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eileen Stein Posted March 28, 2007 Report Share Posted March 28, 2007 just wondering .... should the design of the breed ideally be in the hands of knowledgeable breeders and everyone who buys from them not allowed to breed? That would be good in theory, but I can't imagine how it could be brought about as a practical matter. If so how much influence does puppy mills have on the overall evolution of the breed nowadays? I don't think they have much influence on the overall evolution of the breed. They are producing excess dogs, as far as the breed is concerned. They are mostly breeding just to have pups to sell, not moving toward any specific goal, so the results are pretty random. They do tend to breed more for flashy colors, and to that extent they are increasing the number of dogs with those colors within the breed, but they are not influential breeders, nor are they selling to influential breeders, so the impact of that on the breed is somewhat limited. Mostly they are producing the detritus at the bottom of the gene pool, but unfortunately the real life consequences of that are all too many miserable and unwanted dogs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sharkie Posted March 28, 2007 Report Share Posted March 28, 2007 ic ic. the excessive number of puppies does place a big burden on the shelters/rescues. but from a genetic point of view, while it may slow the phasing out of "nonideal" genes in the overrall bc population, having a population of random bcs can be a "safety net" or back up in case something goes awry in the good, goal oriented, exclusive breeding lines? this is of course assuming that the mills are not doing too much of dog design themselves Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rossie Posted April 1, 2007 Author Report Share Posted April 1, 2007 I just read the Wikipedia entry on the border collie, and thought it was pretty poor. Poorly organized, very haphazard, inaccurate in many respects, containing obvious biases, and strangely dominated by a treatise on NCL. I would be willing to put some effort toward editing it, but it seems futile if any ignoramus can come along and change it back again tomorrow. Is that the case? BTW, returning to the subject of the thread, the Wikipedia article has been improved since my earlier critical post. Whether it will stay that way is anybody's guess. Yes, it does seemed improved. It is my understanding that the wiki can be edited ad infinitum by other users, but when an entry is rich with citations and references it less likely to be altered by random, ignorant users. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ljrphoto Posted April 1, 2007 Report Share Posted April 1, 2007 Back to the criticism of Wikipedia... perhaps rather than outright disparaging of an incredible experiment, you might take it as a teaching opportunity for your students (sorry, after reading the ABCA vs. AKC entries I can't remember who made the comment). Ask them to analyze carefully any Wikipedia entries they might be tempted to use. The good ones are well written and well referenced. The ones that have no referencing are flagged as being in need of references. Regarding the border collie entry, I am sure that because of the sensitive political nature of working breeders vs. conformation breeders the article will be written and rewritten and vandalized ad nauseum. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
haleigh Posted April 1, 2007 Report Share Posted April 1, 2007 Deviating a bit from the current discussion::::: Funny how progressive retinal atrophy wasn't mention under health...when that neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis was a huge deal Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
voices4animals Posted April 2, 2007 Report Share Posted April 2, 2007 As usual, I'm jumping in on this thread a little late - my apologies if this subject "died" or fizzled but I've been moving for the past 3 weeks, husband is deployed, etc... so rarely have time for message boards. Was scanning for BC rescue news - and then came across this topic. All the input from varying viewpoints, has me thinking about something.... While there is all this hoopla surrounding AKC vs. ABCA, etc etc -- a battle that clearly has no end, and everyone is right <G>, the one thing we fail to acknowledge is how fortunate the BC is that so many people truly care about the breed. In the end, don't we all want the same thing? An end to BC suffering, whether it be by human hands, or from dreaded diseases? An awareness of the very traits that make the BC so unique and worthy of our devotion and attempts to maintain it? Must we waste so much time arguing about who loves them more? It's like when my kids were in grade school, and they'd fight about who mom loved more......... kind of erroneous. While we have major differences in opinion on the topic, don't we also have issues in common? I find it all exhausting, really... it never ends. And while we chat on forums and argue about whose BC is real and whose is not - there sits hundreds upon thousands of homeless BC's heading to a purple injection or a gas chamber. It matters not where they came from... a farm, a backyard, a flyball club, a show ring, etc... what matters is that if we are truly devoted to the welfare of the breed, we all need to do more about policing our own. Period. If we did enough -- then there would be no need for BC rescues, now would there? Just my 2 cents. Take it or leave it. Sincerely, Kim in NY -------------------- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eileen Stein Posted April 2, 2007 Report Share Posted April 2, 2007 In the end, don't we all want the same thing? No, I don't think we do. Sure, we all want an end to BC suffering, just like we all want world peace. But some of us want to preserve the border collie as a working stockdog, and to others that just doesn't matter. If you don't know anything about working ability, or have any reason to value it, then I can understand why to you that seems like fighting about nothing. Must we waste so much time arguing about who loves them more? It's like when my kids were in grade school, and they'd fight about who mom loved more......... kind of erroneous. I fail to see the parallel here, since the dogs don't fight about who loves them more, and we're not arguing about who loves them more. The issue isn't who loves them more. I've never claimed to love my dogs more than an AKC person loves his/her dogs. Crack mothers love their babies, for heaven's sake. They just don't do right by them. While we have major differences in opinion on the topic, don't we also have issues in common? Well, I would say it this way: While we have issues in common, we also have major differences of opinion. Since they are important to the future of the breed, it makes sense to discuss them. Of course, if you don't think they matter, you would find it exhausting and pointless. All that deleting . . . And while we chat on forums and argue about whose BC is real and whose is not - there sits hundreds upon thousands of homeless BC's heading to a purple injection or a gas chamber. It matters not where they came from... It doesn't even matter that they're border collies. A dog of any breed or a mongrel who faces death because it's unwanted is just as great a tragedy. That's a dog issue, not a border collie issue. Except, of course, that AKC recognition greatly increased the popularity of border collies, and hence the demand for them by clueless irresponsible buyers, and hence the breeding of them. Nearly all the "Choosing Your New Pup! What's the Right Breed for You?" type books list only AKC-registered breeds. Before AKC recognition, we had much less visibility than we have now, and a much smaller market. And breeding is market-driven. I made this argument to the BCSA leadership before recognition, but despite their professed concern, they didn't care. They wanted what they wanted. If we did enough -- then there would be no need for BC rescues, now would there? Really? Seems to me there are plenty of breeds with no fundamental disagreements such as the ones you find so exhausting here, who have dogs needing rescue. What exactly could we do that would bring about this happy state of affairs? Sorry if this sounds harsh, but it seems to me that you're basically saying this: "What matters to you is unimportant. So you should stop talking about it, and spend your time only on what matters to me." If I thought this stuff didn't matter, I wouldn't be talking about it, would I? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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