I want to thank Hanna-Lenna Joesph for sending me this link. Bernhard Flinks tied for 13th place - pretty cool. Itor is one of the best dogs I have seen in the Bundeseiger in years - that is the reason I am keepiong all 7 puppies I have from him and my bitch. I am sure we will see these puppies in the sport in the next two years and in my bloodline for years to come.
I bred him to one of my better females. I had 4 bitches in season while he was here in June - two were otis daughters. I felt the lines and temperament from this bitch were the best match to Itor. all I have is her pedigree on my web site. http://leerburg.com/anna.htm Itors pedigree is at http://leerburg.com/itor.htm
Bernhard would stud his dog but Itor has only been bred a couple of times in Germany. Simply because he never placed high in the BSP - just another example of the fact that the Germans are not "the all mighty experts on GSD breeding" that everyone plays them out to be. Here is one of the best dogs I have seen in years and he is not being bred because he did not score high enough. Maybe this will now change.
I often wonder where Bernhard would have been had he got this dog as a young dog and not at 4 years of age with ALL KINDS OF SERIOUS SERIOUS PROBLEMS from the other handlers.
Ed
You said you wonder where Bernhard would be if he had gotton Itor earlier. Could a lot of rank issues in dogs be from not getting them as pups? If a pup is raised by the right owner, would the rank issues still surface? Just one of the questions always bouncing around by head.
Very few people could handle Itor even from a pup. Let me rephrase that VERY VERY VERY VERY few people could handle Itor even if they got him as a pup.
I realize Itor, like Otis, is a dog few people could handle. My question was more general in refering to dogs, brought over as mature adults, having rank problems. If that new owner, assuming he/she is qualified to handle such a dog, would that dog have been less a problem if the new handler raised it as a pup, or would the rank issues still surface as strongly. Is a lot of it just the new handler getting the respect from a mature dog, new to him/her? Hope I'm not confusing you to much. I'm not very good at getting my questions across sometimes.
Its not confusing at all. Its a given that raising a dog from a puppy that had dominant genes will make it easier. The fact is not many people understand pack drive, rank drive and how to handle a dog that is dominant or turns dominant. Just because someone has raised 10 dogs does not guarantee that they can handle dogs like this. Too often people think they can and when the dominance issue raises its ugly head - the handlers loose the fight. I can give a list of people who bought Otis dogs that will attest to that.
With this said - I am not a fan of dominance. It sucks. Too many people (and I used to be one of them) think its cool. Well it is not cool. Getting bit by your own dog gets old. I shake my head when I hear people saying they want the most dominat pup in the litter - they don't have a clue.
Thanks Ed. Thats pretty much what I figured. I might be wrong on this, but if the handler looses the fight, he/she wasn't in charge in the first place, if they raised it from a pup.
Old E, I think it depends on the dog. A really dominant dog is always in that stage of thinking for the next time. There are dogs that will test you all the time at low levels and if you let it slip the game is on. These dogs stay in the "teenage rebellion" waiting for the moment to fight. Even if you win with the dog it doesn't mean that dog will not try it again. Add to that some hardness and you have an interesting situation at best. You have to be smarter than the dog.
There is a male in the club that is a dominant butthead. If he is at the top of the stairs and he doesn't want to come down, the husband, who has raised shepherds for a long time(read old enough to be my grandfather), has to use the baby gate to essentially push the dog back down the stairs without getting bit. Needless to say he isn't loose in the house a whole lot, and after they title him they are done with SchH. She could have had a much easier time with a dog that wasn't such a butthead. They got what they wanted...
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