Irish Wolfhound Mole UK

13/01/2023

Maybe the UK Kennel Club could follow the AKC's lead and introduce a KC 'Fit Dog' title + encourage clubs to get involved and set up fitness events for Irish Wolfhounds.

08/01/2023

2022 heart test results

It’s always interesting to look at the heart testing results on the IWHG website. This is the official place for breeders to make their results public. Club members are reminded in their Codes of Conduct of this facility to publish heart test on the HG website.

When we looked, there were a paltry 70 results posted for 2022, split between show and non-show dogs. The IWHG estimate that there are approximately 2100 Irish Wolfhounds in the UK, take away 600 from this number as they are under two years of age, and that leaves 1500 wolfhounds. 70 represents just under 5% of this total. 95% of wolfhounds are either not tested or their results not published -there’s no way of knowing.

How do we get a picture of overall breed health with this flimsy data?

Out of interest, we checked the results against the recent Wolfhound of the Year show for 2022 to see how many exhibitors with dogs at that show had published their results. The vast majority had not. None of the owners of dogs in the veteran class had published results, including the winner who is owned by the IWHG heart testing coordinator! In the intermediate class, 4 out of 13 had results published and in the open class it was 3 out of 14 entrants.

The published results show a total absence of support from the leading breeders. Nothing from Sade or Caredig, who have never published a single result for any of their dogs in any year. There’s nothing from Brachan, Killoughrey, Glengail, Hydebeck, Mascotts, Bivarddi, Newdigate, Austonley or Ballyphelan. Random and patchy support from committee members of the two main clubs and the IWHG. Why are they on the HG if they don’t support their own policy?

These breeders maintain that they do test, and the information is available to people who buy puppies from them, but their data is private and nobody else’s business. They do not see it as their responsibility to give anything back to the breed, even though it may contribute to improving overall breed health. In short, they put their own selfish interests (whether that is winning in the show ring, maintaining an image, or simply selling dogs for £££s) above those of their breed.

Top of the pops with 15 dogs on the list is Bonaforte, next is Wolfhouse with 5, Wolvebrigg with 4 (including 2 Wolfhouse dogs) and five other kennels tied on 3.

The average age of the dogs tested in 2022 was 4 years and 8 months.

The Kennel Club’s Breed Health Improvement Strategy Guide focusses on four steps: Lead, Plan, Engage and Improve. This is a continuous cycle that starts with good leadership.

Who provides this leadership?

On these matters it should be Dr M Lyons, the current Breed Health Coordinator backed by the IWHG and the breed clubs. They have failed in this. There is no widespread commitment from the breed clubs to support the BHC and engage their members in improving breed health. The breed clubs will not take this on as they do not have the support of the breeders who are club members. The breed clubs dare not upset their lead breeders in case they walk away from the clubs.

That is the continuous cycle we are stuck in – lack of leadership, lack of planning, lack of engagement, and lack of improvement. The main show breeders will not publish their results, the breed clubs will not encourage them, and the health group will not lead. That is why our wolfhounds continue to die from heart disease.

13/12/2022

𝗞𝗘𝗡𝗡𝗘𝗟 𝗖𝗟𝗨𝗕 𝗛𝗢𝗦𝗧𝗦 𝗪𝗘𝗕𝗜𝗡𝗔𝗥 𝗙𝗢𝗥 𝗗𝗢𝗚 𝗦𝗛𝗢𝗪 𝗖𝗢𝗠𝗠𝗨𝗡𝗜𝗧𝗬 𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗔𝗡𝗡𝗢𝗨𝗡𝗖𝗘𝗦 𝗕𝗥𝗘𝗘𝗗 𝗪𝗔𝗧𝗖𝗛 𝗣𝗥𝗢𝗚𝗥𝗔𝗠𝗠𝗘 𝗥𝗘𝗩𝗜𝗘𝗪

The Kennel Club has organised a free webinar about its Breed Watch programme for dog show judges, breeders and exhibitors. Breed Watch serves as an 'early warning system' which monitors the health of pedigree breeds and provides further information about specific health concerns.

The webinar, taking place via Microsoft Teams on 𝗧𝗵𝘂𝗿𝘀𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝟵 𝗙𝗲𝗯𝗿𝘂𝗮𝗿𝘆 𝟮𝟬𝟮𝟯 𝟲:𝟯𝟬𝗽𝗺-𝟳:𝟯𝟬𝗽𝗺, will serve as an opportunity for those involved in dog showing to refresh their knowledge of the Breed Watch system, and to help ensure only the best health ambassadors are rewarded highly in the show ring. Those interested in attending the webinar can register here.

https://teams.microsoft.com/registration/VSq4OfLlyUiOE_6xpWj17A,4tnb0wolyUe9vlpAW5z9AA,jHzRAyKH1kKIOvujJzN-lg,pElcAUnuGE2U_KS2Df-9qA,55fKl1kSrUyG9Y7eeieF0Q,NQ9S8Yrkr0Chg-Xjgb-BNA?mode=read&tenantId=39b82a55-e5f2-48c9-8e13-feb1a568f5ec

The Kennel Club has also announced its plans to work with judges, vets and dog show exhibitors to enhance and evolve Breed Watch to ensure the system is effective in monitoring, protecting and improving the health and welfare of dogs.

As part of this, during 2023 The Kennel Club will be working with the Dog Health Group’s Breed Standards and Conformation Sub-group, which includes experienced judges, vets, and exhibitors, to update Breed Watch. Consideration will be given to the following areas:

What veterinary checks are required before and during shows and what Kennel Club guidance and training is required for the vets involved

What educational materials are needed to support judges and exhibitors more effectively

What training would enable judges to recognise breed-specific health concerns

How The Kennel Club receives health information from judges to improve upon its existing reporting and monitoring processes

How The Kennel Club can provide better support to breed clubs, judges and exhibitors with access to health data from shows

How The Kennel Club highlights dog showing as a positive lever for change when considering health and welfare

The process will include engagement with exhibitors and breed clubs.

Ian Seath, Chair of the Breed Standards and Conformation Sub-Group, commented: “We are really pleased to be implementing this important development of Breed Watch, alongside the wider community, to ensure it’s the best possible system for monitoring the health and welfare of dogs. This underlines our commitment to protecting and improving the health of dogs in the show ring specifically. Regular updates on progress will be provided in due course, and I’d recommend all those involved in showing or judging dogs to attend The Kennel Club’s free Breed Watch webinar in February to understand more about how we can all play a part.”

More information about Breed Watch is available at thekennelclub.org.uk/breedwatch.

08/12/2022

More snippets from the Breed Health Conservation Plan -

“A study of electronic patient records of 90,004 dogs examined at the University of California-Davis Veterinary medical Teaching Hospital, USA, between 1st January 1995 to 1st January 2010 found the Irish Wolfhound to be the fourth most frequently affected breed with DCM” (the prevalence for Irish Wolfhounds is 38 times higher than in a mixed breed).

“the breed continue to investigate ways of utilising the data [collected from Dr Serena Brownlie-Sykes] generated to enable breeders to breed in an informed way – with the aim that EBVs may be able to produced based on the data. The breed are (sic) further hoping to launch a new trial to test the efficacy of the NT-ProBNP blood test as a possible diagnostic tool for the breed.”
Is there any news on the trial to test the efficacy of the NT-ProBNP blood test?

Breed Club actions include:
“The breed clubs to investigate the possibility of developing a central database for health conditions in the breed”

Is there any news on this? Are the breed clubs familiar with the BHCP and do they realise what they are supposed to be doing?
Have they started developing a central database for health conditions?

Priorities
“Heart conditions, especially DCM and AF (with particular emphasis on using existing data produced to establish tools for breeders).”
Is there any news on this?

“The Kennel Club to investigate the possibility of developing a formal heart testing scheme for the breed, in collaboration with the Veterinary Cardiologist Society.”

“The Kennel Club to investigate the possibility of the results of the research collaboration between Dr Lewis and Dr Brownlie into DCM being made available.”

Are the IWHG doing anything about this? Are the breed clubs pressing the Kennel Club about developing a formal heart testing scheme? Has it been on the breed clubs’ agendas (no)? Have they even read the report (unlikely)?

All sounds good on paper, but so far very little action.

07/12/2022

The chart below is from the Kennel Club/IWHG Breed Health Conservation Plan 2021.

"Mortality Data
Respondents were asked for the cause of death data for any hounds that had passed away in the last 10 years. Responses were received for 286 dogs, with heart disease and osteosarcoma being the most commonly reported causes of death among deceased dogs, shown in Figure 3 below."

It looks like 28% of Irish Wolfhounds are reported as dying from heart disease. More than 1 in 4!

Do something about it today.

06/12/2022

https://www.change.org/p/1-in-5-irish-wolfhounds-die-from-heart-disease?recruiter=11874157&recruited_by_id=0e4976a0-c05c-012f-b45a-404067ca6a7a&utm_source=share_petition&utm_campaign=share_petition&utm_term=share_for_starters_page&utm_medium=copylink&utm_content=cl_sharecopy_35161903_en-GB%3A4

1 in 5 Irish Wolfhounds Die from Heart Disease

05/12/2022

02/12/2022

7) Wolfhound owners and Facebook
Browse through the popular Wolfhound groups on Facebook and what do you see? Wolfhounds on sofas, wolfhound asleep on the rug, wolfhounds lying down. You see cute, fluffy faces on great big shaggy dogs. For every picture of a wolfhound in the fields or woods, there are a dozen wolfhounds lying on the sofa.
What have we done to them? Many people don’t actually want an Irish Wolfhound. They want a great, big shaggy dog with no hunting instinct. A dog that’s easy to look after, that dozes for about 20 hours a day – a big, friendly companion. They are usually referred to as ‘Wolfies’. We like to think as them as WINOs (Wolfhounds in name only). There’s no harm in wanting a giant,shaggy dog and they may be wonderful companions and adorable to look at. But they are not wolfhounds, because when you take the hound out of the wolfhound there is not much left.

There’s nothing wrong with wolfhounds being spoilt and lazing about. But all the time? Really? These big, soft couch potatoes suffer the same problems as humans who sit around all day do - poor health.

Facebook has increased the popularity of these big chocolate-box dogs who enjoy a sedentary life and never get regular hard exercise. This lazy lifestyle does nothing for the health of these hounds.

You might not agree with the conclusions we’ve reached. In fact, you may not agree with anything we’ve written. But we hope you realise that something must be done. We can’t keep going like this for another 50 years or there will be no breed left. Maybe we’re completely wrong and someone reading this may come up with better solutions or call a breed seminar to look for solutions. Maybe it’s time for an expanded IWHG, an alternative HG or a new science-based group to work with the existing groups and clubs.

02/12/2022

6) The Kennel Club

The KC could stop the very worst Irish Wolfhound puppy farmers at a stroke, simply by refusing registrations from them. All good breeders should be working together to lobby the KC for this.

Or if that is too difficult (agreeing on a definition of a puppy farmer) then they could impose certain conditions on all breeders – such as making sure testing of the sire and dam has taken place before a mating takes place. No test evidence = no registration. The good breeders should already be carrying out these checks and all they would have to do is upload evidence, whereas the rogue breeders would either have to up their game or sell their puppies as unregistered which would affect the selling price.

Why don’t the KC do it? The registrations and transfers of ownership are income to the KC – and the KC is a business after all. Money talks louder than ethics.

The KC could follow advice from their own geneticists who realise that a closed gene pool, with everyone doing their own thing and an extremely high level of inbreeding, is a highway to disaster.

Irish Wolfhounds are very highly in**ed. A paper by Dreger et al 2016 reports on levels of heterozygosity (inbreeding) for pedigree dogs. The study calculated genomic inbreeding using DNA analysis of single nucleotide polymorphisms as well as whole genome analysis. Irish Wolfhounds were 15th on the list out of 112 dog breeds with an inbreeding coefficient of over 40%.

Opening up the gene pool through outcrossing -though still using selective breeding – before returning to the pure breed was one of the options Dr Lewis considered.

We all want wolfhounds that are healthy dogs, with great temperaments that can do the job they were bred to do. Wolfhounds that have been selectively and carefully outcrossed to bring in more genetic diversity and reduce inbreeding coefficients would look identical (if that is what we wanted) to the hounds we have now, but they would be healthier.

Dr Lewis looks at other solutions too, including increasing the number of breeding animals, breeding restrictions, and excluding dogs with high average mean kinships. All of these solutions require some kind of a shake up in the way breeders work.

The first steps though, are for breeders to recognise the problem, to want this to happen and be willing to work together – less competition and more collaboration. Can it be done? Is there a willingness among breeders?

02/12/2022

5) IWHG
We’ve written about the IWHG previously. We understand that they are (mostly) genuine individuals who give up their own time to try and improve the health of the breed.

But let’s look at what they do as a group. The IWHG consist exclusively of show people. Either former breeders or exhibiters. There’s no one with a different perspective on things, no one from a non-show background, no one who challenges their ideas. Because of this they act as an echo chamber.

The IWHG is a non-elected body, so there is no prospect of changing their makeup and no accountability within the group. They share the same ideas, the same influences, they are only exposed to people who agree with them and the evidence they use is one that supports their views.
They have little interaction with people who are not on the show scene.

Bizarrely the IWHG has a code of conduct of which they are very proud. But to whom does it apply? They have no members and none of them are active breeders. When the IWC secretary, Mrs Treadwell, broke the code of conduct by breeding non-heart tested dogs, the IWHG stayed silent.
Why? Because the folks on the IWHG are friends with Mrs Treadwell.

It’s the same reason that they do not speak out about the appalling breeders who are part of the dog show circuit. They are part of the same group; one hand washes the other.

They are also way behind on the science – or at least being open about the science.
Heart screening was in place before the IWHG was set up. In its day heart screening was a great step forward.

But it is abundantly clear that we will never test our way out of the health problems we have. We are fighting against ever dwindling genetic diversity in a breed that is carrying a huge burden of disease. There is a huge body of scientific evidence to support this.

There is a paucity of health information released by breeders. They hide behind their ‘privacy’ – which is shorthand for ‘the results show how bad we really are’ and like Dorian Gray’s portrait they are hidden away, never to see the light of day. Most breeders refuse to release their results because they do not want people to see them. What clearer message do you need?

Heart screening certainly helps provide valuable information only when its readily available. It is important for the individual hound who is tested and essential before a mating, but it will not eradicate heart disease in our breed. Not on its own and not in the ad-hoc way in which breeders use it.

For anyone who wants to read further about eradicating disease, here's a link to a chapter of a book published in 2017 by two scientists with expertise in the genetics of pedigree dogs - Dr Tom Lewis, who was the geneticist at the UK Kennel Club, and Dr Jack Windig, who is on the Animal Breeding & Genomics faculty at Wageningen University in the Netherlands.

http://bit.ly/2BN44wH

Many people continue to look to the IWHG for guidance and information, but they’ve been asleep for the past year. Their last newsletter was in 2021, their latest news on their website is October 2021. Their leaflets haven’t been updated in years and their seminar has been delayed again.

It’s high time that a new group was formed – one that reflects the interests of all wolfhound owners, and which includes experts and advisors. A group with energy, vision and dynamism rather than a tired and failing group that only represents show people.

Shared with Dropbox

02/12/2022

4) Show judges
Have you been to a show in the past few years? The wolfhounds are huge. Much bigger than the breed standard. Dogs of 37 and 38 inches are common. Dogs that are 34 or 35 inches look small. The dogs are getting bigger and heavier every year. No longer long and lean, they look more like giant mastiffs than hounds. No curves, no finesse, no fitness.

Many of these dogs have incredible strength and would certainly be able to overpower a wolf. But they would never be able to hunt one. They can’t run, and sometimes it’s hard to tell if the dog or its septuagenarian owner is puffing more after they’ve jogged around the ring.

Some of these dogs must weigh 190 pounds or more. This is 50lbs above the target weight that Capt. Graham envisaged. The extra weight carries consequences – extra strain on their organs, extra work for the heart. They look nothing like Captain Graham’s idea of a wolfhound. These are heavy-boned, overweight barrels of lard.

The fundamental definition of breed type should focus on the original function of the breed. We want our breeds to look like they can do the job for which they were bred. These big, heavy, ponderous show dogs that are being lavishly praised by judges are not capable of functioning as wolf hunters. Very few of these show dogs could purse a wolf for any distance. Very few of them are ‘fit for purpose’.

And yet judges still award them top prizes. ‘Wonderful line up’, ‘great quality throughout’. It’s not just single breed judges either, the all-rounder type judges sing their praises too.

The show dogs have moved away from their own breed standard, the judges are ignoring this, the breeders are breeding more massive dogs. And many of these dogs are being kept alive with medication.

02/12/2022

3) Non show breeders
𝗪𝗲’𝗿𝗲 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗱𝗲𝗳𝗲𝗻𝗱 𝘂𝗻𝘀𝗰𝗿𝘂𝗽𝘂𝗹𝗼𝘂𝘀 𝗯𝗿𝗲𝗲𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝗽𝗿𝗶𝗼𝗿𝗶𝘁𝗶𝘀𝗲 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗳𝗶𝘁 𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝗮𝗻𝗶𝗺𝗮𝗹 𝗵𝗲𝗮𝗹𝘁𝗵 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘄𝗲𝗹𝗳𝗮𝗿𝗲. The people who keep dogs isolated and use them to produce multiple litters a year, letting the puppies go to new homes as soon as they are weaned. The ones who put in no effort and extract maximum fees. The stories you have heard about these breeders are true. These people will never put in any effort to change. They are worse, much worse, than the worst of the show breeders. You will have read about them elsewhere and we don’t need to rehash all through all the horrors they put people through on here.

But there are a wide range of breeders who do not breed exclusively for the show ring. They are not just one homogenous group as some would have you believe.

There are some non-show breeders who do consider health, who do keep their dogs in good conditions, who complete all the health tests and who follow their pups and support people who buy from them. Why are they demonized in the same way as the puppy farmers? Pushing them aside is not helping.

The real divide is between good breeders and bad breeders regardless of whether they breed for the show or the pet market.

Continuing to promote a culture of condemning those who do not breed for the show ring or those who breed more regularly than some would like is not producing any positive results. As long as they do all the right things and provide the correct after sales service, what is the problem? People who want an Irish Wolfhound puppy are going to get one from somewhere, after all.

There is a market - an unmet demand – from people who want an Irish Wolfhound but don’t want to show it. They just want a pet. This demand will never be met by the show breeders so why not work with the best of the non-show breeders?

Ridiculing them, condemning all non-show breeders as puppy farmers, and telling people that if you don’t breed for the show ring then you are not a proper breeder, is not helping. It damages the overall health of the breed and drives people into the hands of the real puppy farmers and scammers.

The best of the non-show breeders need to put clear blue water between them and the puppy farmers, scammers and non-show breeders who don’t test, don’t offer support to puppy buyers or are solely motivated by the income from the litters.

02/12/2022

2)
Show Breeders
There are often discussions on Facebook that contrast ‘good’ breeders -the ones with integrity, who act responsibly, breed to the standard and improve the breed, who stay in touch with the puppy buyers, who do all the health tests and make sound breeding decisions etc etc- with the ‘bad’ breeders - the puppy farmers/mills, the irresponsible ‘breeders’ who only breed for money, the ones who don’t health test, who often keep their dogs in terrible conditions, who sell at inflated prices and so on.

The good breeders are always the ones who belong to the breed clubs and breed show dogs. The bad breeders are invariably the ones who don’t breed for the ring.

Well let’s look at these claims about show breeders being the best.

What do show breeders breed for?

They breed for the show ring – for competition. They breed to be successful in the ring. And the competition in the ring is based on how the dog looks. It is not a competition to produce the healthiest dog.

Some show breeders have health as a secondary consideration, some pay lip service to it, and some don’t consider it at all. Incredibly a few top show breeders don’t want their dogs to live too long because if they do, they will block the next generation coming through!

Show breeders do not breed primarily for health. Talk with a successful show breeder and they will tell you that they breed for ‘type’. Type is extremely important and show breeders understand that shows are competitive. And breeders want to win - that is their goal after all. Therefore, they breed for the ring first – they breed for type and conformation to their breed standard first. At the top levels, this drive to win often overcomes good sense and show breeders ignore health problems in pursuit of their dreams.

There are decent breeders who breed to show. Very good breeders who do make health a major consideration in their planning, who carry out all the health tests and who care about and support the people who buy their pups. These people are not often the most successful breeders though.

Good health and show ring success rarely go together. Show dogs tend to be highly in**ed and carry a heavy burden of genetic illnesses. The way show dogs are bred hasn’t changed much in the last 120 years and hasn’t really kept up with the science. Show breeders know this but still take the risks, knowing that inbreeding will reproduce ‘type’ for them, even if it also brings in health problems.

We have seen how some show breeders don’t follow basic health tests, indeed some of them knowingly breed dogs that will likely have health problems.

Let us look at the most popular stud dogs over the past 50 years. You would expect them to be the commercial breeders, wouldn’t you?

Here’s a list of the most popular sires over the past 50 years:
Jason of Sunningdale – 41 litters
Drakesleat Helyk at Ballalyn – 36 litters
Erindale Tristan – 35 litters
Shalfeet the Knigmaker at Ballalyn – 34 litters
Petasmeade Chieftan of Brabyns – 34 litters
Eaglescrag Toby – 32 litters
Damian of Pandomer – 30
Sovryn of Drakesleat – 30
Valheru Osprey lock of Barachois – 29
Franshaw Brannigan – 29
Caio of Eaglescrag – 28
Kellybourne Pilot at Ballalyn – 28
Pendomers son of Damian – 27
Nevada of Erindale – 26

We could go on with the list. But by now it should be clear – the breeders who tend to overuse their sires are almost exclusively show breeders. Don’t be fooled by thinking that money is not a consideration for these breeders. It is - and show breeders have increased their prices just as readily as commercial breeders. These matings did not improve the health of the breed. They were commercial transactions and a nice little earner for the owners of the stud dogs. But because the breeders were show breeders, there were no questions asked.

The president and a vice-president of one of the breed clubs have lived at the same address for decades. For reasons unknown (likely tax reasons) they split their breeding into two affixes. The hounds lived together, were fed together, were exercised together and often bred together. They were artificially separated by using different affixes. Between them they bred over 640 dogs. A huge amount and a considerable income. And that is without stud fees. One their dogs produced 122 offspring, another 135, another 110 and another 100. One of their bi***es was bred from five times! The first litter was when she was only 18 months old, the second litter was 6 months after this. Two litters before the poor bitch was two years old. Is this ethical breeding? Is this the kind of breeding record to be proud of? Is this the kind of contribution that entitles someone to be a president or vice president of a breed club.

Evidently it is.

Let’s look at the other committee. One prominent member had a penchant for breeding littermates to each other.

She bred brother to sister in 2005 and repeated the same mating in 2007. This ‘ethical breeder’ is a long-term member of the IW Society and also a member of the IWHG. This is a person who criticizes breeding by others on a regular basis. Her own breeding was woeful and everyone remembers the filthy conditions she kept her dogs in. Yet she has been on both committees for decades.

Most show breeders post up their wins very quickly but are extremely coy about mentioning the health of their hounds. We’ve managed to find only three breeders who have tracked their litters and put the outcomes on IWDB.
This is one of the litters:
1) 6 years 4 months – DCM leading to sudden heart attack
2) 6 years 5 months – DCM (heart)
3) Unknown
4) 5 years 2 months – heart failure
5) 5 years 9 months - osteosarcoma
6) Unknown
7) 7 years 3 months – Melanoma, aggressive mass and DCM
8 ) 5 years 7 months – osteosarcoma

This is the second one
1) Unknown
2) 5 years 7 months (spondylosis of spine)
3) 4 year 8 months (Endocarditis)
4) 5 years 7 months (Osteosarcoma)

And the third:
1) Unknown
2) 4 years 7 months (heart attack)
3) 5 years 5 months (osteosarcoma)
4) Unknown
5) Unknown
6) Unknown
7) 5 years 6 months (soft tissue cancer)
8 ) 5 years 4 months (Hemangiosarcoma)
9) Unknown

Make no mistake. These are good breeders who are doing all the testing and trying really hard. These are three of the better breeders and we admire them for being so honest with their results. Most breeders do not publish any health details. It’s incredibly sad, but these outcomes are not unusual in show bred dogs. The lifespans are about average for the breed. Breeding for type has bred in many genetic health problems and the predictability of dying young. We can’t just keep on ignoring this.

These good show breeders need to differentiate themselves from the ones who breed with scant regard for health – even if these are the ones that are successful in the show ring. It no good just deflecting things onto puppy farmers and saying they are the bad guys -they are terrible because they are even worse than us. That may be true but it doesn’t improve things, it doesn’t do anything to advance breeding for good health.

Many of the charges against commercial breeders can also be made against show breeders. Some show breeders do not health test, some sell for inflated prices, some breed too much, some breed indiscriminately, some keep dogs in poor conditions.

Show breeders have a lot to answer for.

02/12/2022

1) The breed clubs
The IW Club and IW Society (like other breed clubs) are there to run dog shows and encourage people to become involved in showing. They also have a remit to preserve their breed, promote responsible breeding and ownership, and provide accurate and honest education about the breed to prospective owners. They have been successful in running their shows but have completely failed in their role of promoting responsible breeding.

For a brief period in the 1980s and early 90s, they did concern themselves with the health of the breed and former members of the IWC and IWS were responsible for setting up the IW Rescue Trust and the IWHG (ironically the formation of the IWHG came from a suggestion brought to the IWC committee by Mrs Thornton!).

Their strength of the clubs lies with their members and their allegiance is to these members first. We have seen evidence of this recently, but it has always been this way.

The UK breed clubs operate a system of protectionism – rather like the Catholic Church do with their errant priests – and throw ring of steel around club officials or members who are successful in the ring. These people are untouchable. It doesn’t matter what they do, or have done, the clubs always rally around them. It doesn’t matter if the breeder has horrendous health problems in their lines, if the dogs are successful in the show ring.

The clubs collect donations for their health fund, although they just sit on the money and never discuss health. We’ve been through the committee minutes for the last ten years and health has never been a major agenda item.

They promote their breeders as ‘gold-standard’ breeders but joining the IW Club or Society doesn’t involve a magical ‘Stars in Their Eyes’ type transformation that makes a person into a good breeder. The breed clubs have no mechanism to check on members who are breeders. They don’t check them, never have and never will. And that mean there are some truly shocking breeders in these breed clubs. Breeders with terrible records on health. The clubs turn a blind eye.

As we have seen recently, they do not entertain complaints from people who are not members, even when it relates to the breeding practices of their secretary. When challenged, they instinctively close ranks and cover up anything that is detrimental to their club. They bury the unpalatable truths.

The clubs do have a code of conduct, but it is entirely for display purposes. Breeders are not expected to follow the code and why should they? The current secretary and one of the vice-presidents blatantly broke the code and mated their dogs without heart-testing them. They received unanimous support for their actions from the other committee members.

Buying a puppy from a breeder who is a member of one of the UK clubs is no guarantee that basic health tests have been completed. Club officials know this, they have been presented with the evidence, and still they cover it up. They know that some of their breeders cut corners (even with basic heart screening or liver shunt testing) and have atrocious records on health.

Not a single breeder has ever been thrown out of these clubs for breaking their code! Not one, ever. It’s simply a sham. Breeders can do what they want as long as they are producing dogs for the show ring.

The IW Club and IW Society have breeders on their committees who would be classified as rogue breeders if they had not produced dogs for the show ring. We’ll look at some of their records later when we look at show breeders. The IW club committee also includes a person who has a history of mistreating dogs (by mistreating we mean repeatedly beating his dogs). Interestingly, we remember that it was a strongly worded letter from Mrs Cole, the current Club chairman, that led to Mr Lefley being investigated! Now Mrs Cole meekly accepts him as chief steward.

The clubs do not have a focus on health. And crucially they protect their bad breeders even as the iceberg approaches.

This protectionism has led to the clubs ignoring and excusing bad breeding within its ranks rather than cleaning up their act by drumming out the rogues and working with others for the good of the breed.

And yet the general advice on Facebook goes like this:

“Lot's of things to consider when you are looking for a new pup, lot's of ways to look for them too but the best way is through your breed clubs. This way you will guarantee that you will be purchasing from a reputable breeder, that not only will be carrying out the necessary tests”

“Always[go to] your breed club, never go to the Kennel clubs as they will allow commercial and puppy farmers to be on their approved lists”
Now this may be valuable advice in other countries (and in other breeds) but when referring to the UK Wolfhound clubs it is simply wrong. Going via the UK breed clubs is absolutely no guarantee of buying from a reputable breeder. Many other breeds have forward looking committees who take their responsibilities seriously and actively work to improve breed health and ethical breeding, sadly the Irish Wolfhound breed clubs are not among these.

Why does this matter?
It matters because people are still being directed to the breed clubs to buy Wolfhound puppies, these breeders often have poor records on health, the dogs die young, and the breeder says that’s just the way it is with Wolfhounds.

UK breeders who belong to the Irish Wolfhound breed clubs are not in any way role models for ethical breeding.

The clubs defend these breeders and their narrow-minded approach, lack of transparency and culture of concealment make them a fetter to improving breed health.