Breeding Dogs Discussion

Some good reading here, but here’s a little spin off, almost every breeding discussion is about line breeding and starting with good dogs to begin with, but hardly ever any talk about a person having to start from absolute scratch, not having the means, opportunity to own, or access to a family of dogs that someone else has already done the hard part, I whole heartedly agree that line breeding for what you want is the best way to consistently produce dogs of the caliber you desire in future generations but at some point in time said family of dogs was made from scratch like granny’s biscuits and was the result of best to best or best of what you own to as good as you could get your hands on or access to, I prefer line breeding but am not scared to breed to something I see that adds what I feel like is needed in my pack as long as both sides are for the most part very similar in style but one side lacks in dept that the other is above average in, I guess this would be considered corrective or compensation breeding to an extent, I won’t make the cross unless I have access to other family members on both sides and the parent families on top and bottom are prepotent in passing on the traits that I desire, to give an example of my personal situation, I took a running walker female that is of the type that runs a piece of game with the intentions of sinking her teeth into it and bays just as hard as any cur dog and is from a family of dominant speed and drive dogs who finish at or near the top in just about every trial they’re entered in but aren’t known for their trailing abilities and bred her to Cajuns Jack dog who was known for his nose and scenting abilities, I know I’m not mixing paint here and looking for some to have her speed and nose and some to have his nose and speed and hopefully if hybrid vigor takes over there’ll be a few who are
Good combination of both, this is a complete outcross of two different breeds from two families who aren’t heavily line bred themselves but are good reproducers with a good deal of prepotency behind them, I have access to enough of the dams close kin,( full sibs, nieces and nephews) and hopefully offspring of jack to cross back into one another to be able to line out what it is I’m wanting, and that being blazing track speed with the nose to back it up, on the other side of my yard I have some cur dogs that I was lucky enough to get my hands on before they died out and have made enough crosses within them to the point I have enough here and strategically placed with others to be able to breed around a few certain individuals behind them and have already started lining them out and have predicted what should be expected out of a few litters so far based off of their inbreeding coefficients and knowledge of their ancestors with pretty good accuracy, I’ve gotten them to a point an outcross is needed bc I’ve seen some inbreeding depression taking place based on the overall size of some of them, I’ve noticed the tighter crosses I’ve made seemed to throw smaller framed dogs compared to the parents and ancestors, these dogs are above the average as far as cur dogs but lacked in a few areas of importance to me and one being the ability to pick up a loss with the quickness and overall line control of the track, they are pretty fast on track but are known for overshooting a track then bobbling at times to get it lined back out, the more time a
dog spends trying to line a track out after a sharp turn or over run the more distance and hog is able to put in between himself and the dogs, I found a family of running walkers bred solely for running bobcats with about 50 years of EXTREME critique selecting and culling for those individuals who were “cat savvy” and are a bobcats worst night mare once his scent fills their nostrils that are heavily line bred themselves, and have and reproduce the track running style that I love and prefer and are tightly bred enough that the male I’ve bred to twice out of that family goes back to one individual male nearly 190 times in 11-12 generations and he himself was the result of some line breeding, my plans are to keep crossing the cur family and cat family back into each other until I get the consistency I’m looking for and then if the good lord is willing and the creek don’t rise later on take the results of the walker/plott and cur/walker crosses and continue on with my breedings around them, I know it seems like a long shot and it maybe to some but I’ve always liked a challenge, i know some my say what I’m looking for already exist and that it can be found in such and such breed and yes that’s true but I’ve always enjoyed making something myself and watching it manifest before me, I have put a tremendous amount of thought into this project and didn’t just dream this up in my head one day as the ultimate dog or something, instead this is the result of a lot of observations over the years about traits that I feel, in my personal situations and experiences are needed and my preference, I didn’t just go out and breed just any random individuals either, I’ve done my homework and waited until I found what I was looking for before I ever started adding anything into my cur dogs that I had been working on, I also selected individuals that performed and excelled and were from my region and areas that I mainly hunt, the walker/plott cross is a complete shot in the dark but one that I feel is going to produce, so far the pups all seem to be game crazy fools, just how fast and what kinda nose is yet to be determined, the cur/walker crosses seem to be working, before making the first cross I already knew what I was going to get out of my curs but wasn’t sure what the cat dogs were going to bring to the table, as of now that first cross is a little over two and there are 3 females and one male that a man could take anyone of them by themselves and start decent tracks and tie hogs any day of the week, the female cur I used this time is a good reproducer and her offspring have made some nice dogs and is one of the dogs I’m planning on building around as a cornerstone, I got a little long winded on this but find it difficult to try to translate my thoughts into words that might be understood, without giving a description about my situation and what I got going on so it doesn’t seem as if I just took some random dogs and began churning out pups without any forethought, if any of y’all have any input, questions, or criticism don’t be afraid to send it my way, I don’t mind input that makes me scratch my noggin....

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