Posted by Dave
on 11/7/2009, 7:12 am, in reply to "Re: GARY"
"dave, you did'nt clear anything up for me actually."
Gary, I don't think anything is going to be cleared up for you. That was not the intention of this post. If you want to think that the hip probelm in this breed can't be solved, then that is what you will think. No amount of evidence will convince you otherwise. There were folks working seriously on the hip issue before our (as in you and I) involvement in the breed. I just continued their work, but that was not going down the conventional path that led to all the hip dysplasia in the first place.
"and nope i don't have the answer to hips."
That is fairly obvious Gary, by both your comments, and the dogs you breed. Which is fine with me. But it appears you are angry that others took an different approach, and got different results. You had your priorities, and I had mine.
"i don't know that any of us do, we only have ideas."
Ideas put into action for the last twenty years have produced results. Ideas not put into action will never produce any results. "You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someday you'll join us."
"i just get the feeling from things youve said here that you feel you have cured the hip issue in your line of dogs."
There was no hip issue in the line of Bulldogs I bred. That is the key. It was just a matter of testing the hypothesis, and validating it.
"this is'nt a gary against dave deal its just a person questioning another on statements."
Well, I cerianly don't mind answering questions. But things you have said make me feel there is more to it than that. Things like calling my dogs pictures "pitiful". Did you call anybody eles dog pictures "pitiful"? Your implication that my dogs temperments are not up to snuff in your very first post on this subject. As I have already stated and proven in real life, my dogs have super temperments and working drives. A person does not have to sacrifice one trait to achieve another. It's just the little stuff like that Gary, that makes me think there is more to it. But let's forget all that. I am going to give you the benefit of the doubt. I am going to get down to the meat of the subect right now.
To fully understand things one must go back to the beginning. Twenty years ago, the situation with ABs hips was pretty much the same as it is right now. That is, terrible hip dysplasia. Severe hip dysplasia that caused dogs to go lame, just as it does now in many cases. But what got the AB to that point to begin with? Did Scott's Mac the Masher have bad hips? Did Johnson's Sandman the Great have bad hips? Did Johnsons's Original Dick the Bruiser have bad hips? Did Scott's Dixieman have bad hips? Did Painter's Ma Belle have bad hips? No, of course not. They all lived to advanced age, and manifested no symptoms in themselves or their immediate offspring. Several pivitol things happened after that. The one that probably had the most negative impact was the dogs were inbred, and severely linebred after that. What resulted betrays the notion that these drastically different types of dogs were any sort of pure breed to begin with. Recessives like hip dysplasia (and others that are not the focus of this thread) surfaced. The other pivitol thing that happened was Johnson incorporation of an AKC English Bulldog into his lines. This alone introduced terrible hip structures into the "breed" which of course was no breed at all. The introduction and subsequent linebreeding of an English Bulldog into Johnson's lines should have reduced the physical size of the animal, but another strange event happened. Johnson's dogs got drastically bigger, to the point of doubling in size over many of his original dogs. This betrays another infusion. Rumors are generally unrealiable, but sometimes very true. The prevelant rumors where Short Haired St. Bernard and Bullmastiff. Nobody will ever know for sure whether Johnson bred it in himself, or just used dogs that were already crossed up with those breeds. And it really does'nt matter, as either way the damge was done. Both those breeds are riddled with hip dysplasia.
By the mid-eighties all the history of the breed I just wrote about was generally an agreed upon consensus. Different breeders took differenet approaches. There was a cresendo of outcrossing to other breeds. It was apparent that what had been labled the American Bulldog in 1970 was not a breed of dog in the traditional sense, but a type of dog. Furthermore, just what type of dog appeared to be open to ones personal interpetation. Well, nobody pays $1000 for a type of dog, so the facade of breed was continued to maintain market value. Now, I am not sayin' that there is no American Bulldog. It is my belief that the old working Bulldog of England and Europe was always bred in this fashion. So, by 1990, what we have is a group of haphazard breeders with different agendas employing scientific linebreeding schemes to homogenize their strain into a breed that was called the American Bulldog. It is paramount to fully understand just what went into each respective strain to understand todays Bulldogs. I am getting tired of typing...I will finish this story later.
Gary, please don't take offense to things I say. You did ask. You have been a decent guy to me in the past and I respect your opinion on catch work and things you are knowledgable on. We may have a differenece of opinion on some subjects. Please...just bear with me as the story unfolds. You will get your information you requested as best as I can provide it in time.
Thanks,
Dave
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