Cavalier challenge exposes fundamental flaws

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Dog World columnist Sheila Atter tackles health-testing in this week's issue (see here), broadly supporting cavalier campaigners' demand for an official heart-testing scheme for the breed.

She writes:

Many of us have been urging the formalisation of heart testing for many years. There is already a panel of recognised cardiologists and several breed clubs make use of their services, so it really can’t be too difficult to regularise this can it?

But Sheila has infuriated the campaigners by her lack of enthusiasm for a mandatory testing for the breed's other big problem: syringomyelia:

The problem with syringomyelia is far more complicated, not least because the geneticists can’t really come up with an accurate explanation of the mode of inheritance of the condition. There are many breeders who have been scanning for years, and still cannot predict with 100 per cent confidence whether their pups will be SM free. 

Instead of haranguing all Cavalier breeders – and in particular those who show their dogs – critics such as Emma Milne would do more good by throwing their support behind those breeders who are health testing, nearly always the same it’s show breeders who get all the flak. If the general public were continually urged to steer clear of unregistered puppies, virtually none of which come from health tested parents, some progress might be made.

It has prompted a sharp response from cavalier owner and campaigner Charlotte Mackaness, who has posted in the Comments section:

I read with alarm the suggestion that testing for Syringomyelia was somehow less pressing because of the condition’s complex inheritance. Just like MVD, SM is polygenic with no simple test that can give a guarantee puppies will be unaffected but studies have shown that their chances are greater if their parents are clear. Surely this makes scanning worthwhile because doing something to improve the odds is better than doing nothing at all and simply hoping for the best? Playing that kind of Russian roulette is morally indefensible. 

In my book, any Cavalier breeder who truly has the breed’s future and well-being at heart is scanning and putting the results through the official scheme so, even if for no other reason, researchers have more information with which to learn about SM and the KC may stand some chance of establishing Estimated Breeding Values. 

Ms Mackaness then goes on to tackle Sheila's assertion that the consumer must take some of the blame for buying puppies from untested parents:

Undoubtedly the consumer wields a great deal of power but finding a puppy from properly health tested parents can be a difficult task for even the best-informed and patient of puppy buyers. While many breeders and breed clubs talk a good game when it comes to health, my experience is that very, very few walk the walk.  

And she issues this challenge:

I wonder whether you could find 10 litters registered within the last 12 months bred following the MVD protocol (heart tested clear at 30 months or older with parents aged at least five and heart clear), eye tested, DNA tested and with BOTH parents complying with the MRI breeding guidelines?

I appreciate this might be quite a task given the absence of an official heart scheme and so few MRI scans going through the official CM/SM scheme but it might also lend an appreciation of the barriers and difficulties facing puppy buyers. Perhaps starting with Cavalier Club committee members might save some time as it would be sensible to assume that such people follow the highest possible standards when breeding.

Well, I'll happily save Ms Atter some time in telling her that it is impossible - Cavalier breeders at the very highest level are simply not complying - in no small part because they don't have to.

But the challenge raises a really key issue. We need to make it a whole heap easier for consumers to buy better dogs. Currently, we are asking them to do way too much work - ridiculous in an age where we can order a fridge off the internet with the full expectation that it will work and that we can secure redress if it doesn't.

We've got to stop being disappointed with consumers for not doing the research and opting for instant fixes like the one offered by the peddlers of the puppy in the pic above.

 My suggestions:

• a centralised resource,  offered ideally by the Kennel Club,  where puppy buyers can:

- review best practice for that breed
- see the compliance to this best practice for every litter advertised on the KC's website

• every puppy to be sold with a 2-yr warranty (extendible at the buyer's expense) against preventible genetic defects. Plain and simple and an added value something every consumer would understand.

• speed up the puppy-buying process so that people are not being asked to wait for weeks for a new dog.

• customer reviews: we do this for absolutely everything these days: hotels; sellers on eBay; goods on Amazon.