ohmidog!

Channel 10 News in central Texas has aired some of the video of a San Marcos police officer scolding a young couple that was rushing their sick dog to a veterinarian.

The couple claims they waited 20 minutes for Officer Paul Stephens to issue a speeding ticket — during which time the dog died.

The video, taken from the patrol car dashboard camera, shows the officer hollering at the distraught dog owner, ”Relax. It’s a dog. You can get another one.”

Cloning may be capturing the dog headlines these days, but the questionable practices of purebred breeders in their continued quest to shape the “ideal” dog are worth some scrutiny, too — though for decades they’ve mostly eluded it.

Tonight, a BBC report exposes how, through inbreeding, some breeders — in their attempt to accentuate certain features of a breed — are creating pedigreed dogs prone to genetic diseases.

By emphasizing looks over health, the report concludes, the breeders have caused many breeds to suffering acute problems — spaniels with brains too big for their skulls, for instance, or boxers suffering from epilepsy.

The program, Pedigree Dogs Exposed — for a sample, click here –  says dogs suffering from genetic illness are not prevented from competing in dog shows and have gone on to win “best in breed” despite their poor health. And the Kennel Club contributes to the problem by holding up as desirable physical traits such as short faces, wrinkling, screw-tails and dwarfism.

“What I see… is a parade of mutants. It’s some freakish, garish beauty pageant that has nothing, frankly, to do with health and welfare,”  RSPCA chief vet Mark Evans says in an interview for the program. “The welfare and quality of life of many pedigree dogs is seriously compromised by established breeding practices for appearance, driven primarily by the rules and requirements of competitive dog showing and pedigree dog registration.”

The program shows a prize-winning cavalier King Charles spaniel suffering from syringomyelia, a condition which occurs when a dog’s skull is too small for its brain. It also features boxers suffering from epilepsy, pugs with breathing problems and bulldogs who are unable to mate or give birth unassisted.

The Kennel Club says it works tirelessly to improve the health of pedigree dogs, which make up 75 percent of the seven million dogs in the UK.

The documentary reports that deliberate mating of closely related dogs is common practice among breeders. Scientists at Imperial College, London, recently found that pugs in the UK are so inbred that although there are 10,000 of them, it is the equivalent of just 50 distinct individuals.

Steve Jones, professor of genetics at University College London, said: “People are carrying out breeding which would be first of all entirely illegal in humans and secondly is absolutely insane from the point of view of the health of the animals.”

“In some breeds they are paying a terrible price in genetic disease.”

Dozens of dogs will take to the bay again next month during the third annual Little Ben’s Big Fundraiser Cruise.
All proceeds from the event — 7 to 10 p.m. Friday, Sept. 12 — go to the Animal Legal Defense Fund, whose mission is to protect animals through the legal system. 
Tickets are $49 per person and well-behaved dogs are free when accompanied by a paying, well-behaved adult.
Little Ben is the rescued dog owned by the woman who dreamed up the event, Michelle Kownacki, owner of Paws Pet Boutique in Annapolis.
On last year’s cruise, people outnumbered dogs just 2 to 1, with approximately 80 dogs and 165 humans enjoying an evening aboard Watermark’s Harbor Queen.
“It looks like Noah’s Ark with all the dogs walking up the boarding plank,” one cruiser commented. In last year’s event, Little Ben’s Big Fundraiser Cruise raised money to help ALDF with a puppy mill raid in Sanford, NC,  a case in which Ben was one of the more than 300 dogs rescued. 
The event features a silent auction and raffle items that will include a pair of roundtrip Southwest Airlines tickets to anywhere the airline flies. One ticket for the Southwest raffle comes with your boat cruise ticket. For tickets, visit Paws Paws Pet Boutique at 64 State Circle in Annapolis or call 410-263-8683.