By now, I expect that most of you will have seen the statement from The Kennel Club’s Tom Lewis which states: ‘It is demonstrated in this study that, when ‘hereditary clear’ status is repeatedly assigned over a number of generations, a modest rate of false paternity can result in a notable proportion of ‘hereditary clear’ assignments being false, unless the disease causing mutation frequency is very low.’
‘In light of these findings and to reduce the risks of producing puppies destined to be affected by such diseases, the Kennel Club has determined to limit the assignment of ‘hereditary clear’ status of registered dogs to 2 generations, with effect from January 2022.’
It’s good to hear from a disease management standpoint that the Kennel Club is taking this into consideration. Tom Lewis is formerly from the AHT and so knows the importance of working with causal variants and hereditary testing. There is a link to his full paper on the club’s health web site – www.keeshondhealthmatters.co.uk under the PHPT category. The new joint breed club health website can also be accessed from either of the breed club’s websites via the Health button.
The paper states that this proposal was discussed among the Kennel Club’s various health committees and a subsequent recommendation that HC status should be limited to 2 generations (with re-testing undertaken at a minimum of every 3 generations) from 1st January 2022 was agreed. This updated policy will therefore require a dog with parents and grandparents with HC status to undergo testing itself to confirm its genotype. Where parentage is confirmed by DNA profile, it is recognized that incorrectly recorded parentage, the major contributor to erroneous HC status, will be identifiable early (i.e. at the first generation) allowing the correction of publically accessible results before any affected puppies are born. Therefore, it has been agreed that, where parentage is confirmed by DNA profile, HC status may continue to be bestowed in perpetuity.
I suspect that at some point DNA profiling will become compulsory (as it is already in many countries) All pedigrees and the subsequent registrations of puppies are done on trust; trusting that all breeders are honest and that they have entered the true sire and dam of the litter. But as we all know, there are breeders who are not so scrupulous in their dealings and not all matings registered are by the listed parents. Aside from the health issues, I imagine that many breeders/owners would simply like to know that their pedigrees are correct.
At the weekend at Totnes & DCS Keesies had just one class scheduled, and Vikki Marshall and Arabesque at Devonia kept up their winning streak as Ghost was BOB with BPIB, then went onto win Utility Group 3 and the Utility Puppy Group under judge Gary Thomas (Jonsville).
As I write these notes, in this gloriously hot weather, I am constantly amazed by the number of people who are still walking their dogs during the day. Swigging from bottles of water for themselves and yet with nothing apparently for their dogs. They have footwear on, yet the poor dogs have to walk on red hot pavements, in some cases with the tarmac starting to melt. Dogs are not fire walkers!
With all the messages put out via the press and social media over the years, it beggars belief that the message still hasn’t got through. It has been the one thing that I’ve kept on impressing on my new puppy owners; to keep their puppies cool both in and outdoors, in the shade, with cold wet towels to lie on and to make sure that they have access to water – be it for either drinking or recreational purposes!
A reminder that raffle prizes will be appreciated for the NoEKC’s Open show on Saturday.
Anji Marfleet