I´m mo fan of showdogs, see no use for them, but my point is that sometimes people look down on a dog just because there could be some showlines in the pedigree, I´m talking german showlines not american. If the dog is of good health,structure and mentality, I could care less if he is 100% workinglines or not. I don´t think that we should starting mixing show/workinglines, but if a showline bitch has produced well with a workingline male, then I see no reason to not make the same breeding again. But of course it´s not a good idea to bred back a show/workingline GSD to a 100% showdog.

When I´m talking about good looks i certainly don´t mean the typical look of the westgerman show GSDs. The showline bitch I´m talking about has had three litters, the two first litters with the same male. 16 out of 17 dogs in these litters had excellent hips, and one dog with a small amount of HD, which doesn´t affect his work. Many of these dogs are in service as PSDs,security,armydogs or working in sports. They look like typical workingdogs, great structure and workingline colours,even better structure than some pure workinglines.
The bitch has had a third litter with another male, going back to brando vom rasserstandard and fado von karthago. This litter also looks promising.
Here some pics of a solid black PSD from the second litter, looks and acts not like a showdog at all.
http://hem.passagen.se/waktah.98/Akil014.jpg
http://hem.passagen.se/waktah.98/Akil013.jpg
http://hem.passagen.se/waktah.98/Akil001.jpg
One of his littermates, also a PSD, the dog at the bottom of the page "Lindemans Azco"
http://www.svenskbruksschafer.com/hanhundsformedling.html

I feel it doesn't matter if your looking for a certain type of dog and you found it in a cross between work and show. It would matter if you were then thinking about breeding it. Most working people are not going to want to buy a work/show cross. Most show people won't want to buy a cross either.

From the standpoint of a breeder I can't see any reason why a working breeder would want to cross out to a showline. Anything they want can be found within the working lines. From a showline breeders perspective I can see a reason to cross to working lines. There are attributes in the working lines that can't be found in extreem enough quantity in showdogs to produce a significant difference. Of corse some would argue that if your going to do this why not abandon the showlines all together.

I have had only showlines. The one female that has lasted works as good as most working dogs. I'm kinda dealing with the same question. I haven't decided yet to abandon breeding her.

I wouldn't buy a working/show cross from someone else either.

Yes, Eric's point is right on it. It's certainly possible to find a good pup or even an entire litter of show/work crosses (of course we're talking about European show lines, not american hyenna dogs). Genetics can throw you a curve now and then, it is not an exact science or the job of breeders would be really easy.

The problem w/the crosses is that you won't get *consistency* when you breed.

And even I have had to eat some crow lately and realize that there are showline dogs who can really work :rolleyes:

Originally posted by Eric Lund:
I wouldn't buy a working/show cross from someone else either. I find this statement troubling... If you don't have faith in other's abilities to breed such dogs, why then do you feel that somehow when you do it, it will magically be different?

Since you admit that most people from either camp will not purchase a mix of the two, who do you sell the litter to? Club dog people? Will they be trained to their true potential? Will they end up nice housepets? What are your goals in breeding? I am not looking for you to necessarily answer, but just to think about these questions.

If I wanted to show, I would buy showlines, proven showlines with a pedigree to back it up.

When I bought a working puppy, I bought a working line puppy, from proven working lines.

The hypothetical litter may indeed be very nice, but as everyone knows, puppies are somewhat of a crapshoot from either camp. It is easy to say not to get hung up on pedigrees, but when looking at puppies what else do you really have?

I tried to stack the odds in my favor for what *I* wanted in a dog.

Stig,
While your first 3 links didn't work, I saw the dog on the last one, so the brother you're talking about is Akil (I'm assuming)? If so, I had a rather lengthy discussion about him and a breeding not too long ago. To cut to the quick, we determined that he might be a great "end user" dog, but his genetic contribution to a breeding might be lacking. Thus my friend (and long time breeder of PSDs) turned down the pup that she'd been on a waiting list for (for over a year, maybe 2), because it wouldn't work well within her breeding program. The showlines killed everything that she was after in the genetic sense, so she passed. Bottom line, great end user dog, but not what either one of us would want to ad to a working breeding program.

Deanna,

I don't think I can do a breeding or crossing better than anyone else. I probably wouldn't buy a showdog or show/work cross again.

If I could be assured of getting exactly what I have I would but I don't think that's going to happen. Since I know what I have I may consider one more breeding for myself. I don't feel I can breed to a showdog and maintain the working ability I have already. The only option then is to cross her to a working male to try and maintain what I have. The jury isn't completely out yet. I'm still waiting to see what my male turns out like. If he turns out to be like his mom I would breed to the show dog Karat's Witus again and repeat the breeding.

One other thing. If you outcross a show female to a working male the outcross should be to similar lines. For example my girl comes down form mutz numerous times. I would pick a working male that went back to Mutz through VA Anderl vom kleinen Pfahl, and Nick haus Beck numerous times.

 Quote:

Originally posted by Eric Lund:
One other thing. If you outcross a show female to a working male the outcross should be to similar lines. For example my girl comes down form mutz numerous times. I would pick a working male that went back to Mutz through VA Anderl vom kleinen Pfahl, and Nick haus Beck numerous times.

Kinda hard to call that an "outcross"

Kevin it would be considered an outcross because there are no similar dogs in the first 5 generations. But I would think if an outcross was done you should back mass on certain dogs in the 5th to 8th generation. My female goes back 12x to VA Mutz von der Pelztierfarm, 8x to Nico haus Beck,23x Vello zu den Sieben-Faulen-Bodo and Berndt's father, Bodo 3X, and Klodo 6x (the dog Grief zum lenental was line bred on). So to me it makes sense to breed to a working male that has these dogs multiple times in the pedigree.

A number of people might call that an outcross, but really there have to be no common ancestors for it to be a true outcross.

But, for all intents and puroposes over 7-8 generations is pretty far out. 5 I'm not so sure about.