setter's numbers in the UK?

[silvia]

Hi all,

we read with sadness the news that the English setter is facing extinction (234 new puppies registered in the kennel club last year).. Does anybody knows what is the situation for IS and Gordon setters (i.e. how many puppies are typically registered in the KC in these years)?

I am just wondering for personal curiosity, since we dont see many of these wonderful dogs around.. :(

best, silvia

[Ann Millington]

Actually Ossian, I cited these 'Irish' dogs as an example of English breeders making the effort to find dogs, outside our country, with a less close relationship to their dogs.  Their COIs are not particularly low - there are English bred IRWS whose COIs are lower - but the puppies produced have satisfyingly low COIs and the exercise is something to build on.  Do you find fault with that? 

[Ossian]

Having read this response regarding "Irish dogs" I have several times thought to respond and cant quite marshall the thoughts. I realised after a caffiene shot that it was not my inability to write a valid response it wad more simply that the post is vacuous. It says nothng, means little and attempts to validate itself by ending with a question!

I am deeply conscious that this was shaping up to be an interesting discussion about registrations and it has been hi jacked by a lister who, be her own admission, has not had showed or woked an Irish or a reed and white since the 1980s.

 

Would it not be polite to return to the original topic now?

[Margaret Sierakowski]

Not only hasnt shown or worked an IRWS, but hasnt even owned or bred one for nearly two decades .

[Ann Millington]

Well certainly, Ossian.  I find your remarks a little puzzling, personal and not contributing to the topic at all!

Setter registrations are falling, there's no doubt about that and as we have seen here on this list, there is a demand for English Setter puppies, but litters are small and bitches are 'missing'

I know Irish Setters expend a lot of energy on health and education matters and that Gordon Setters are now alert to eye problems among their other health concerns... might it not be helpful if all the Setters ran surveys of their breed to establish if they are encountering Inbreeding Depression?  As well as going out of fashion?

Just depending on COIs alone can give a biased picture:-

The breed average COI of UK Setters is: IRWS 16.5%, Irish Setters 13.4%, Gordon Setters 10.7% and English Setters 10.6% - What do you all make of that?  

I know this topic was prompted by a newspaper report about UK English Setters, but is there any way to know the Breed COI for non-UK Setters?

It's all very well encouraging breeding from imports to increase diversity, but more information is needed, general and individual, to be useful.

[Ossian]

I think you are out of touch!

Puppy registrations provide a statistical snapshot at any one time. There are currently many other factors to consider!

Gordon owners are farther through the process of coping with the devastating news about RCD4 and I will say that registrations in the next quarter will have risen

This may have more to do with owners of "carriers" taking an unscheduled litter in case there are restrictions in the future.

The test then will be whether all of these pups will find homes. The largest percentage of Gordons go to existing Gordon owners and 2012 could be the year that households wont stretch to meet another addition.

English Setters are coming off the back of a PPS which has reduced breeding numbers and anecdotally some problems are perceived temperamentally. There are good kennels stil; breeding very discriminately

Irish are where Gordons were three years ago. There is a collective process of anger denial and grief to be gone through before the  breed will move forward again.

This is a hiatus and whatever else it is it isnt a time to send out surveys for health reasons

As to COI? Yes have a look at them as part of your overall plan but I think they are the new black and something else to beat breeders over the head with!

Here is a radical thought on puppy registration reductions.. . (hypothetically).I have my much loved and very pretty bitch that we bought foe the kids last year. Dad allways took a litter off his bitches, so I phone the breeder to see if he has ideas on a mate for her and he says "you are in good time - get her hips dome and then the DNA test for her eyes and you will need to ..........." As a pet owner who actually has a nice example of the breed and might have been of use to the genetic base for the future, I have actrually taken fright at the cost and worked out I will be cheaper to have her speyed.

You can go too far with "health" and the major proponents of testing eg: AHT, BVA all stand to make shed loads of money from us in the process.

In the last ten years we have just been recovering it seems from one health problem when

we are affected by another,  By dint of historic and scientific proof we KNOW that RCD4 must have been in Gordons for at least the last thirty years and dogs must have gone blind. No one has yet predicted the age at which that will happen! If its five we should be worried bur if its nineteen.......(as they say) doggone!

 

Science has moved forward and we find "new" stuff every day. Its not new! Yes there are some diseases we should know about but I am becoming more convinced that we are "finding" ever more and being asked to test again and again not so much for the benefit of our dogs but more to put money in somebodys pocket!.

 

So to neatly round off these thoghts and come back to falling registrations, give it time! We have Crufts soon and that might cause another dip or even an explosion