Australian Cattle Dog color faults and the rainbow
04/06/16 11:42
As 2016 moves on our main focus has been on showing and training up our next special male Sisko, nice red boy who holds a ton
of promise is both his structure and his potential to pass that on in our breeding program.
Having said that my thoughts go over to color differences in ACD's and the variations from the standard.
Having seen so many different variations on the arc standard for the ACD in red and blue and realizing that most of these have little if anything
to do with health or structure or working ability I wonder though how we got to this place where the variety is the two standard color is mind boggling.
The answer rest in two areas I believe, # 1 that the majority of backyard breeders or those who truly just breed for the sake of having a litter and making some money (tiny puppy mills as I call them) really focus on color very little if at all, a spot here or there or an creeping tan situation just is of very low if any priority to them, so they continue to produce those "faults" and the pool is enlarged with that.
#2 and probably most important to my world of ACD's is the good legitimate breeders who make the decision to continue to breed a color faulted dog due to his other great qualities.
Not saying that's wrong at all but color is one of the super easy to see things by the educated and the uneducated alike, and while the standard tells us what it should be like it doesn't truly make too much fuss for it not being like that. My problem is if those in most control over color, the breeders don't seem to care then judges and others won't care either, we can't complain about color and then seem to not really care when we breed the faulted dog because he has so much "going for him".
When does it stop? Black dogs….White dogs? Solid Red ? Not judging anyone here but just stating that in the ACD world our colors are not getting tighter but getting far more varied everyday in my opinion.
Remember the best dog is the one you take home no matter what ………
of promise is both his structure and his potential to pass that on in our breeding program.
Having said that my thoughts go over to color differences in ACD's and the variations from the standard.
Having seen so many different variations on the arc standard for the ACD in red and blue and realizing that most of these have little if anything
to do with health or structure or working ability I wonder though how we got to this place where the variety is the two standard color is mind boggling.
The answer rest in two areas I believe, # 1 that the majority of backyard breeders or those who truly just breed for the sake of having a litter and making some money (tiny puppy mills as I call them) really focus on color very little if at all, a spot here or there or an creeping tan situation just is of very low if any priority to them, so they continue to produce those "faults" and the pool is enlarged with that.
#2 and probably most important to my world of ACD's is the good legitimate breeders who make the decision to continue to breed a color faulted dog due to his other great qualities.
Not saying that's wrong at all but color is one of the super easy to see things by the educated and the uneducated alike, and while the standard tells us what it should be like it doesn't truly make too much fuss for it not being like that. My problem is if those in most control over color, the breeders don't seem to care then judges and others won't care either, we can't complain about color and then seem to not really care when we breed the faulted dog because he has so much "going for him".
When does it stop? Black dogs….White dogs? Solid Red ? Not judging anyone here but just stating that in the ACD world our colors are not getting tighter but getting far more varied everyday in my opinion.
Remember the best dog is the one you take home no matter what ………