Brad - Thank you for resurrecting my thread ;p I personally don't really think it matters as to why they were created [ whether it was for looks or not ] the only poor opinion I have on them is the breed's history...not what breeders are doing now, but how they were first created...if that makes sense
Michelle - I completely agree with you...
& I sort of think that the certain task a Tamaskan was to perform was to curb people from buying real wolves / wolfdogs ;p~
any dog that is born should be intended for a purpose or for a loving companion home. If Tamaskans were bred specifically to look like wolves without any wolf content, then great, standardize them breeding Tamaskan to Tamaskan and getting Tamaskan.
I just wish that breeders were all in it for the purpose of maintaining and perfecting a preexisting breed. It seems when new breeds, or designer breeds, emerge into the mainstream, there is a high demand and the breed expodes, like the poor puggle. The petfinder listing on them is still growing. And with these new breeds, the variation tends to be huge. Like all those 'cockapoos' and 'labradoodles', breeders think they can throw 2 dogs together and call the pups a new breed - majority resulting in a random looking unstandardized pup. What is their purpose?
In 2008 there is a serious pet over-population problem, and there are hundreds of breeds in existance, so going back to my first sentence, I just hope the breeders of the new breeds or existing breeds are only doing so for a purpose and trying to standardize and perfect the breed. But even if you are dead set on getting a particular dog for a particular purpose, like a guard dog, why not just get a preexisting one that has been bred with the sole purpose of being a guard dog?
I agree, it is a bit troublesome that there supposedly aren't good records on the early stages of the Tamaskan breeding program; however, I would like to point out that with current technology, it is much easier to recover from poor record keeping than it was even 20 years ago. In our conversation, Brad pointed me to an interesting article. One of the points made in the article is that the importance of keeping good records is to ensure you can provide sufficient genetic variability in the breeding program. It sounds like the Tamaskan breeders are doing that now. Further, with genetic testing and mapping technologies, if they were so inclined I'm sure they could verify that they are headed down the right path.
As for why or whynot a new breed should be created, I would point to the fact that the out crossing that takes place to create a "new breed" is actually a good thing. Even if the breed is not created for a specific purpose (looks, workability, or otherwise), it is very likely to provide improved genetic variation in the dog population as a whole. Of course, the line breeding that is required to ensure type in the breed will actually work against those initial improvements. In fact, type is the core issue. And this was the big revelation (at least for me) in the conversation I had with Brad: From an evolutionary point of view, selecting for working ability is just as arbitrary as selecting for looks. That is, although my intuition makes me tend to be more friendly toward breeds created for a purpose (like herding, protection, etc.), those breeds are just as likely to decrease the genetic variability as those selected for looks.
So, in that light, the "designer" breeds we all love to hate are actually a good thing I think.
If they were bred for a purpose that no other breed could do (which I find difficult to happen) sure, I'd be supportive of a new breed done by people who understand what they are doing. But Man is Man, and being so will take advantage of anything possible to make a buck, even the best intentions by some will turn into an opportunistic profit for others, possibly damaging that new breed right form the start. So maybe what I'm getting too is: the world has enough breeds to keep everyone happy, and loads of mutts and mixes that are as capable of loving or working. I mean, the best dog I met until the day was a humble mutt.
Comments
Michelle - I completely agree with you...
& I sort of think that the certain task a Tamaskan was to perform was to curb people from buying real wolves / wolfdogs ;p~
I still love my two :-)
I just wish that breeders were all in it for the purpose of maintaining and perfecting a preexisting breed. It seems when new breeds, or designer breeds, emerge into the mainstream, there is a high demand and the breed expodes, like the poor puggle. The petfinder listing on them is still growing. And with these new breeds, the variation tends to be huge. Like all those 'cockapoos' and 'labradoodles', breeders think they can throw 2 dogs together and call the pups a new breed - majority resulting in a random looking unstandardized pup. What is their purpose?
In 2008 there is a serious pet over-population problem, and there are hundreds of breeds in existance, so going back to my first sentence, I just hope the breeders of the new breeds or existing breeds are only doing so for a purpose and trying to standardize and perfect the breed.
But even if you are dead set on getting a particular dog for a particular purpose, like a guard dog, why not just get a preexisting one that has been bred with the sole purpose of being a guard dog?
As for why or whynot a new breed should be created, I would point to the fact that the out crossing that takes place to create a "new breed" is actually a good thing. Even if the breed is not created for a specific purpose (looks, workability, or otherwise), it is very likely to provide improved genetic variation in the dog population as a whole. Of course, the line breeding that is required to ensure type in the breed will actually work against those initial improvements. In fact, type is the core issue. And this was the big revelation (at least for me) in the conversation I had with Brad: From an evolutionary point of view, selecting for working ability is just as arbitrary as selecting for looks. That is, although my intuition makes me tend to be more friendly toward breeds created for a purpose (like herding, protection, etc.), those breeds are just as likely to decrease the genetic variability as those selected for looks.
So, in that light, the "designer" breeds we all love to hate are actually a good thing I think.
Thoughts?