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Game-'bred'?

Discussion in 'APBT Bloodlines' started by kitchener, May 14, 2014.

  1. kitchener

    kitchener Pup

    Hi,

    When does a "game-bred" line stop being game-bred?

    Breeds like AmStaffs and SBTs are all descended from fighting dogs, but you wouldn't call their current incarnations "game-bred," presumably. However, if a kennel's breeding program focused on weight-pulling (in other words, purpose-bred, function-over-form selection), would that line be considered "game-bred"?

    This isn't a weight-pulling/breeding question -- it's a thinking-out-loud, academic question regarding what constitutes a "game-bred" dog. If a breeder is advertising a litter with, say, a Jeep strain on the top, and a Chinaman strain on the bottom, is that a game-bred litter? (this example is just an arbitrary selection of two famous, but long-gone ROM sires -- you can insert your own famous lines in their place)



    I tried posting this earlier but must have screwed up submitting it -- if it's here somewhere, sorry for the double-posting!
     
  2. NAS

    NAS Big Dog

    JMO ,
    But the blood of the dog, ie jeep/chinaman means little if they are not hunting dogs sure they may still be called pit bulls, hell so are the blue one's oddly but to each their own. If they are not again jmo , if they are NOT GAME BRED AS IN OL SCHOOL WAYS AND DAYS then they are just pit bulls but yep you will still see many saying,calling them game bred and basing such of what the great great great great great grand parents did long ago. THAT IS NOT TO SAY THEY ARE NOT ready for something but are they READY for something??? again jmo and I am sure others think differently that is the wonderful silly thing about those with pet bulls We see differently, thankfully.




    NAS

    its a great question, hope you get the answers you seek,
     
  3. BLUE8BULL

    BLUE8BULL CH Dog

    ...when ya start breeding the dog for other pupose i;e:show/color/conformation/etc.... Than what it was breed for i;e the pit/the trials/etc/etc....thats how they stop being the word game-bred.......
     
  4. sadieblues

    sadieblues CH Dog

    I would say a dog based off a line of performance animals is no longer a performance bred dog once the dogs being bred are no longer being bred for their original purpose "performance". That means each and every generation should be checked and turn out proven performing animals and producers this is what makes a performance bloodline . All game bred really means is a dog who was bred to perform like it's parents, grand parents, and so fourth. When the dogs within a performance line stop performing and the person breeding them stops selecting performing dogs and producers of performing dogs to breed that's when they are no longer considered performance animals.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: May 14, 2014
  5. Agree with most of the above posts. Lots of people out there with dogs bred down from good family's, but I'll bet you that if things were like they used to be some would fall short. Most would fall way short. If you are breeding game dogs you must test, and cull every generation, and if you fail to do this you're on a downhill slide that ends with you loosing the very essence of this great breed.
     
  6. TDK

    TDK CH Dog Staff Member

    Very good explanation, Sadie. I would like to add to that fine post by saying that I feel it's an oft misused and slung around term. What determines a dog's breeding as having been game bred, is if the dog himself or dogs themselves ARE GAME DOGS.

    The use of game parents, grandparents, and so on is the means by which you increase your dog's chances of being a game dog. It becomes GAME BRED if he or she IS A GAME DOG. One can look back into the breeding of a dog and see many, many game dogs and yet your dog's chances of being a game dog are only as good as the overall gameness in its latest 3 or 4 generations of dogs. Therefore, a dog's latest 4 generations have either not kept a decent flow of gameness in the flow, or they have.

    It's the veering off or not veering off that Sadie mentions that determines much of this. This makes GAME BRED more a matter of ONGOING SELECTIVITY than it is anything else. You can go beyond those 3 or 4 generations and see all those game dogs, yet the parents, grandparents, great grand parents et al, were not representative of what is beyond, and behind them, and the task of seeing that they continued the flow of gameness was not tended to, and your dog's chances of being a game dog have diminished GREATLY because SELECTIVITY has been abandoned. Hence the veering off Sadie alludes to.

    It's that simple to me, and I think many newcomers need to get to a point whereby they comprehend this practical application to their dogs if they aspire to keep their dogs game by any reputable percentages, and not be fooled by a term used in a wholesale manner such as GAME BRED without this understanding.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: May 14, 2014
  7. treezpitz

    treezpitz CH Dog Staff Member

    Some very good posts on here and well said.
     
  8. Louis Cypher

    Louis Cypher Big Dog

    So if both parents were/are proven game (how that is determined is for another discussion lol), but pup eventually doesn't make the cut.......is said pup not "game bred" or just not "game"? Was pup not "bred" from "game".....thus making it "game bred"? Isn't that the very definition? Not trying to nitpick, and I understand what is being said about how you have to perpetuate the gameness thru the generations, but are we not discussing the breeding of the pup rather than the merits of the pup itself?
     
  9. TDK

    TDK CH Dog Staff Member

    Louis, SELECTIVITY is the ongoing reason for gameness, as I said in my post. There's no complication to that.
     
  10. NAS

    NAS Big Dog

    I am packing this Bowl for 3, me , myself and I.

    KEEP'EM REAL KEEP'EM GAME KEEP'EM SCRATCHING

    What are we breeding for if not GAMENESS, color bred dogs, pulling bred dogs, fat head bred dogs?? at the end of the day, if the dog does not meet the standards that were set long ago that the parents,grand parents,( and so forth ) were ( hopefully GAME BRED ) THEN WHY ARE WE FEEDING THEM???

    I am just stuck on what TDK said above, it is the only way. You want to continue what was then WE MUST CONTINUE as it were.

    NAS
     
  11. Louis Cypher

    Louis Cypher Big Dog

    My apologies. I can see now that the OP's discussion was one of "gameness" preservation rather than the literal interpretation of "game bred". No arguments with the above opinions.
     
  12. sadieblues

    sadieblues CH Dog

    The point is game bred is a term loosely thrown around it has become coined by the peddlers and paper pushers as a sales pitch to breed and sell dogs not worth a damn. Performing dogs are more than likely at the end of the day to come from performing parents. To keep up the tradition of breeding performance animals one must strive to breed proven performers and producers each and every generation making no excuses for breeding sub par animals this means culling what shouldn't be bred. I personally don't like the word game bred as I think it's grossly misused and over used by the dreamers and paper chasers. Proof in a performance line of animals always starts with the individual dogs themselves. Outstanding post TDK.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: May 14, 2014
  13. okcdogman82

    okcdogman82 Top Dog

    a serious hunter will not feed a hound that wont hunt plain and simple. a cold dog can still make a fine pet or even a weight pull dog but dont label him game or even gamebred if thats not what he is hes just a bulldog but if yyou like em or hes a good watch dog or good wit the kids then hes worth feeding just not breeding. all that to say hes only a hunter if hes been taken out and hunted its the same with all these pet labs there fuckin huge and some are nice lookin but aint about to retrieve shit!!!
     
  14. shotgun wg

    shotgun wg Big Dog

    In my opinion it should be down from a game line instead of game bred. Unless the parents were proven game the pups are only from a game line. They could only be considered game once tested . Now once u get away to far from the test they are just bull dogs. How far that is depends on ur idea I guess. I personally don't think its that far down the line unless very tightly bred.

    Again my take not necessarily right or wrong


    Shotgun
    Arkansas
     
  15. corvettedex

    corvettedex CH Dog

    Based on trail and error of buying and raising bulldogs, I have decided to get rid of 25 bulldogs awhile back and start over. I am not ashamed to admit that i needed to do that. I have bought some new stock. The best available to me, that i could afford. Having done this has brought some excitement back into my life with this worlds greatest breed. Gameness is a Rare trait. JMO. Dex
     
  16. Thunder98

    Thunder98 Big Dog

    Say I go looking for a retriever and the breeder tells me for whatever reason he couldn't get the mom or dad to get newspaper, the ball, the stick or whatever no matter what and they came from the same type. He later states he bred them because they had other attributes, color of coat, bone structure etc...I doubt the offspring will want to retrieve as well. Same with our breed, if the breeders breeding for strength or conformation then your more than likely going to get a strong will stuctured jeep chinaman dog. 40 years ago no testing no culling for generations = AmStaff.. JMO
     
  17. kitchener

    kitchener Pup

    This does circle back to my own pondering on this subject. And, I think the question "When does a 'game-bred' line stop being game-bred?" becomes even more troubling when you set aside the easy examples of peddlers and paper-pushers and begin understandably wondering, in view of very strong enforcement measures and sobering legal repercussions that didn't exist a few decades ago, about currently highly-respected breeders and their game-bred lines, despite their own best intentions to reproduce "Jeep" or "Chinaman" (again, insert you own favorite strain here). It's a tough reality they're working under, and maybe it's a tough, but realistic truth for us as devotees of performance-bred bulldogs to face that even among top breeders, terms like "proven performer" are likely highly questionable? And, if that's true, in view of what is widely agreed above in this thread, this suggests our generation could by definition be presiding over the slow decline of "game-bred" bulldogs into (to use a previous post's term) "something else."

    Don't get me wrong -- I really don't know the answer nor am I postulating an answer, I'm just wondering out loud about the reality of our breed's current landscape.
     
  18. sadieblues

    sadieblues CH Dog

    I would say in essence performance can be lost in a single breeding if the person breeding the animals is not breeding proven performers. One generation of crap is all it takes this is why serious dog men breed only their best dogs every generation counts it all starts with the parents reinventing the wheel is pointless as serious dogmen are not looking to create another machobuck or jeep they are breeding to create better dogs than those of the past. The goal is to breed forward not backwards.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: May 15, 2014
  19. TDK

    TDK CH Dog Staff Member

    Yes indeed, Sadie. And I truly think the proper formula is a SIMPLE one. It's purely academic. You adhere to the flow you want or you don't. I think Kitch might be over thinking it a bit. And kitch, there is also the variable that most don't consider or actually have the experience to discern..........and that is there can be a difference between performance and gameness. Depends on the context you are applying. Dogs can be excellent performers and not ever need to express gameness. Others do. A dog can have and do both, of course. But there is a slight variable to consider in there should a dog be one or the other yet not both.

    The main thing is to adhere to the proper flow one wants. Nothing really more to it. The term game bred should not be any term a serious breeder needs to use or say. The business at hand is just that......the business at hand.
     
  20. Louis Cypher

    Louis Cypher Big Dog

    Excellent post......and eloquently stated. Believe me, you are not the only one who's pondered the situation (read: rock and hard place) that must exist among breeders whose ideals are still based in the traditional sense, but are dealing with the "here and now" ramifications.
     

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