Bad things happened at Petsmart. :(

[Anky]

Well I had one of my BRILLIANT ideas today to take the boys into one of those Petsmart Rabies Clinics, as Hobo was due, and Nee hadn't had his before.  Matt came with me and well, the boys were HORRID.  They just wanted to play with each other and tear around corners, then I get the paperwork out and Sanity's dragging my arm off wanting to play with all the puppies and Hobo's talking a mile a minute and getting him riled up so I took the clipboard and Sanity and locked myself in the bathroom.  When we came out Hobo went off again so I told Matt to go to the car with him and I'll get him for his turn when Nee and I were done. 

We sat in the obedience training ring with all the other people who were waiting.  Lots of typical Dane comments, which I answered nicely, and then there was a mismark mantle (All black but white chest blaze, feet and a star between his shoulders.) and Sanity freaked everyone out by doing the deep rooing thing and they all thought he was growling until he went into his play bow.  Then the Dane started to leave and Sanity decided to follow him and dragged me (Still sitting in the chair) across the floor rooing the whole way.  Yeah...... so much for my perfectly trained dog  

Anyways for the sad part.  There was a guy and his wife there, nice enough, and they're asking everyone about their dogs, and this older guy comes in with a GSD.  He's 8 months olds and his hocks are AWFUL.  SO awful that when Matt (Who knows that dogs are fluffy and lovable and that's about it) came in with Hobo later he pointed it out to me.  The tips of the hocks were about 3 inches off the ground, plus he was down on his pasterns.  I don't pass jusdgement because for all I know he's a rescue dog right?  So these people start asking about the puppy and that's how we find out that he's 8 months old.  Then the wife says "How much did you pay for him?"  The guy answers "$2,000"  My heart just sinks.  He then goes on to tell them how he's a breeding dog.  Lower.......  The lady says "So that's the most expensive kind right?  The German shepherd?  Cuz aren't there different kinds?"  The guy says "Oh yes, there are German shepherds, Alstations (SAME THING!), Chzek, AUSTRALIAN, Belgian, all kinds!"  Yeah I'm feeling sick to my stomach about now.  I SOOOO wanted to say something but Matt gets mad when I get all "Prima Donna" with the dog stuff, so I kept quiet, besides, who would listen to me, when this guy was old enough to be my grandfather, and it wouldn't help anything.  I just hope he takes care of that poor puppy.

[henrysmomma]

Awww, poor puppy    I just hope the pup isn't in any pain...

Rose

[RedyreRottweilers]

Just a tiny little bit of FYI, but lots of GSD puppies who later turn out VERY nice can look that way at his age.

GSDs are preferred lower on the pastern than many other breeds, and the extreme stifle turn required to get the rear extension and flying trot look most extreme in puppies about that age.

I'm not saying he was a well bred show type puppy, but judging from your description, he could have been.

I get people all the time who ask me if Penny is purebred. LOL

[lilysmom]

My shep mix was lower on the pastern and she's a mix.  She looked funny as a pup too.  I thought there was something wrong with her.  My vet gave me the ok though and now she looks great.

This pic is kind of dark, but you can see she looks just fine.  Not a show dog by any means, lol, but she can sometimes still have that sitting back look when she's standing.  I haven't seen her do it much lately though.

[Anky]

The puppy had a hard time walking, which really bothered me.  His front pasterns were also very swollen.  I know that it's in fashion for shepherds to have the low hocks, but that doesn't mean it's right.  I'm sorry just my personal opinion, when the dog has trouble walking (But looks GREAT trotting) it's not a healthy dog.  When I was looking for a GSD breeder for my friend I did alot of research, and it took alot for me to find a breeder that I felt could produce a sound dog. 

One of the places I went was www.germanshep herds.com, and on one of the conformation posts I found this.



I should say that Left to right it goes American line show dogs, German line show dogs, and German working dogs.  You can see that the dogs that NEED to be able to move don't have the same back legs as the show dogs.

The issue then came up, are breeders producing these more extreme, often crippled dogs because the judges place them higher?  Or are the judges placing them high because that's all there is to choose from?  It just sickens me when a breed is destroyed due to popularity. 

[ZooCrew]

I agree with you on this one.  I have NEVER liked the way that show shepherds looked.  Up until about 15 yrs ago, I never even knew they could look like that.  Back home all the shepherds you saw had straight legs and backs, like a normal dog.  Frankly, I see no advantage in herding for them to look that extreme.  Show dogs are supposed to still be able to perform what they were originally bred for.

The way they appear now looks painful to me to watch them move.  But that's just me.  They are still beautiful dogs, I just wished they were bred to look a bit more natural.

[lilysmom]

Now that I see those pics, it does look extremely uncomfortable for them.  Do they always stand like that even out of the show ring?  My GSD I had as a child never stood like that.  He always stood with a straight back.  I'll see if I can dig up a pic of my Max.  Anyway, after looking at those pics I don't think raven was as strange to look at as I thought.  lol.  But when she was a baby, she looked pigeon toed in the back and like she was walking while trying to sit up.  Does that make sense. lol.  I don't know all the terminology.

[henrysmomma]

I heard a good line once that describes perfectly these over-typey dogs...."poor craftmanship", I'm just glad my bully henry isn't overdone and still has really good health.

Rose

[VdogLover]

The issue then came up, are breeders producing these more extreme, often crippled dogs because the judges place them higher?  Or are the judges placing them high because that's all there is to choose from?  It just sickens me when a breed is destroyed due to popularity. 

My opinion on this is, the judges are the cause. It took many years of breeding in those extremes to get to where they are. So for many years judges did have non extreme GSDs to pick from if they had not continued to place up the extreme ones the breeders would not have continued to breed for it.

GSDs are not the only breed in which you will find breeding changes due to judge preferences. For example if you look at Brittany's from 10 years ago they do not look like or move like the Brittany's that are winning today. One very big winning dog caused this change. If judges start placing up one dog that looks a certain way soon other judges do also either do to their thinking that is the correct look (after all the other judges place it) or due to a big time handler at the end of the leash. Soon breeders start also thinking it is the correct look or just want to win so they follow along.

[Anky]

Tina,

If you look at the pictures you can see they didnt always look like that.  They don't look like that over night either.  You can see in the pic (I know it's small but if you right click, hit properties, and copy and paste the link into your browser it'll be bigger.) that it was around the 70s that it started to change.

And as for are they always like that.....  Another tirade on that same post I got the pic from was that the dogs are only stacked that way.  Well just at Petrock Moni and I saw a dog that even standing was almost on it's hocks.  It could barely walk.  But when it stopped it looked like the "Perfect" show shepherd.

 

[ZooCrew]

I'm assuming that there was a genetic "fault", if you will, that caused a slight change in the structure of one or a few dogs.  Once that "look" won shows and became popular, they bred it more and more to become more and more extreme.

I know for a fact that they are not just stacked like that.  The stacking makes it more obvious how they are standing, but I have seen plenty of shepherds that look like that w/o being stacked.  It saddens me to watch them run all hunched over.