Purity

[JamsHundred]

Let me make one thing perfectly clear to you Duncan and to all others. I am at ALL times honest and ethical. I make mistakes, but I do not, at any time, alter the truth. The truth IS, there ARE errrors on the online website of the DCS and I suppose in recorded pedigrees? Hasn't this recently been discussed and debated in your council meetings? Let me assure you that *I* work diligently to process information as given by DCS in the herd books. In the case of Saltaire Platinum, there are obvious errors. These NEED to be corrected by council. Because of the non-scientific declaration of "novel mutation" without requiring any scientific proof whatsoever, Dexter herds around the world, have been drastically mutated from horned to polled, and more importantly, the very identity of the breed has been altered significantly.

Now to address your comments.

I have corrected the error made on Homer Rixey Piella in my previous post. I was typing on an Ipad and did not notice the adapted info. Homer Rixey Piella was first registered in 1969. Her entry was not A169 ( 69 being the year of the herd book) but A138, You can look that up and you will see that every comment I made on this animal was accurate, I just did not notice when I proofread my message I wiped out the section between A138, 1969.

I have a copy of the archived DCS card on this animal. It shows the original registration that is crossed through and the second registration made later with a different sire entered, then that is crossed through and the original entry entered again. Further more, when I reported this, the importer of the semen confirmed the originial entry as the accurate one which she confirmed with her source in England. This acknowledgment of accuracy as to the fact that the parentage of Homer Rixey Piella as an appendix animal can be searched and read on the board from which you copied your original entry on this thread, Duncan!

As to A16 and A6, they are just as I stated, animals in the pedigree of Saltaire Platinum. They are the first entries leading to the purebred registration status of Templeton Michaelmas Squeak EM2043, and Pigeons Black Bryony EM1463 sire of Woodmagic Blackcap EF6571.

Again, you have made a generalized statement that is ABSOLUTELY in error and which I refute, and when asked to offer examples you have yet to do so, that I alter pedigrees. I do NOT. In the instance of Saltarie Platinum, his pedigree is entered twice, and one is clearly entered as CORRECTED.

Duncan, for goodness sake, the entire world was told by DCS that the bull, Saltaire Platinum was PURE, that he was a NOVEL MUTATION. This is NOT suppported by science, and an entire breed is being altered physically and genetically. Perhaps not so drastically in other countries, but most certainly in the US where now over 90% of our herd descends from him usually in less than five generations with multiple inclusions. He is NOT even purebred and if nothing else, DCS has a responsibility to correct the errors so those of us fighting to maintain this breed as it was founded do not constantly have to fight misinformation and registry error.

Kirk is NOT arguinig the issues. He is attempting to legitimize his herd, and he does this by filling chat groups with selective photos that fit his agenda, nor does he copy the pages of reports of dead calves littering the pastures of America, or those pulled or cut from their mother's wombs, nor does he discuss whether his animals can survive and maintain condition on minimal forage as I have witnessed in foundation bloodlines, or the increasing list of bulls who are not the gentle docile creatures reported in the breed pamplets. This is NOT about purity, this is bout a breed that in the US, is losing any similarity to the breed traits that were valued in Dexters!
One of them happens to be HORNS.

The pages of history are littered with the "improvements" that man has made to various species.
The changes are drastic in many dogs for example, with their health and even their lifelines being severely effected. I cannot help but wonder if those who fought against the harm they were witnessing finally gave up, weary of the personal attacks and vilification by those who want what they want with little regard to the breed they are drastically altering or eradicating.

Finally Duncan, other than Saltaire Platinum, where one copy of his pedigree is clearly shown and noted as "corrected" I insist you back up your allegation and insinuations of pedigrees being altered by me with specific instances, for it simply is NOT true. I have not only an interest in accuracy and honesty but a committment to it, and if there are any mistakes I would welcome that information so they can be corrected. Even the most diligent proofing sometimes fails.

Judy

[JamsHundred]

Mr. Boyles, are you still a member of council?

If so, I beg of you. . . . please bring the issue of Saltaire Platinum's pedigree and it's influence on the breed, especially in America, but also around the world, to a discussion and remedy. It DOES make a difference that breeders in the US were told this animal was pure, when he isn't even purebred. I do understand and appreciate the difficulties in resolution, and there would have to be special circumstances extended to male offspring, but his registration was a special curcumstance to begin with. All I ask is that the pedigree be corrected so that we are not constantly debating an inaccuracy as if it were fact and breeders are making informed decisions based on fact rather than fiction. Evey debate ends with the stipulation that the DCS pedigree is the last word and from it all decisions are referenced.

As to the question, "where did the polled come from"? I will refer only to Godstone Esmeralda for that is the only English animal that is pertinent to the US herd. It is either an accidental breeding of a horned animal to a polled one, with the polled parent being unknown, or it was a mix-up of heifer calves born in close proximity in the herd, one of them supposedly from a polled appendix cow. ( I do not know where that information comes from since polled was not approved for registry until after the time period, and I do not know if polled was permitted in the appendix entries but I have seen it reported that the appendix cow was polled).

Judy

[Rob R]

This is NOT about purity, this is bout a breed that in the US, is losing any similarity to the breed traits that were valued in Dexters!
One of them happens to be HORNS.

The pages of history are littered with the "improvements" that man has made to various species.
The changes are drastic in many dogs for example, with their health and even their lifelines being severely effected. I cannot help but wonder if those who fought against the harm they were witnessing finally gave up, weary of the personal attacks and vilification by those who want what they want with little regard to the breed they are drastically altering or eradicating.

I have horns on many of my cattle, I like the look of an animal with horns, but I'm unsure how horns were/are valuable in the Dexter breed. As a significant proportion of horned animals are dehorned (certainly in the UK), perhaps you would be better presenting your case with an explanation of the values of these traits in the animals so that breeders can appreciate them better, rather than just essentially ranting with the internet equivalent of shouting [the use of capital letters] in forum posts which is more akin to a conversation with a tired toddler.

The above isn't meant as an insult, you are absolutely losing your point in your manner and it's not doing your concerns, genuine or otherwise, any favours at all. I'm interested in the horns debate but I'm NOT (sorry) interested in the picking over of pedigrees of animals, so this isn't really a debate I'm interested in joining as it seems like those issues (pedigrees) are more important to you than the breeding of cattle and the traits you wish to preserve in living animals.

[Jac]

Judy said

Kirk is NOT arguinig the issues. He is attempting to legitimize his herd, and he does this by filling chat groups with selective photos that fit his agenda, nor does he copy the pages of reports of dead calves littering the pastures of America, or those pulled or cut from their mother's wombs, nor does he discuss whether his animals can survive and maintain condition on minimal forage as I have witnessed in foundation bloodlines, or the increasing list of bulls who are not the gentle docile creatures reported in the breed pamplets.

Rob said

I'm interested in the horns debate but I'm NOT (sorry) interested in the picking over of pedigrees of animals, so this isn't really a debate I'm interested in joining as it seems like those issues (pedigrees) are more important to you than the breeding of cattle and the traits you wish to preserve in living animals.

I have to say that I am with Rob (for a change) over this one. Please explain to me Judy by what scientific method you have linked 'dead calves littering the pastures of America' with Saltaire Platinum?..... BVD, Lepto, Neospora, Iodine deficiency, Selenium/Vit E deficiency, the odd malpresentation perhaps?

[Duncan MacIntyre]

Judy,

there was no 1969 DCS Herdbook.

Duncan

[moomin]

Duncan, there is a 1969 List of registrations, which I am looking at now, but not a herd book as such.
Miss Robinson [Statenboro'] used to print all the herd books for the society at that time and I used to help her! We only had 104 members! When Miss Robinson died I recovered the 1969 birth cards etc. and they are now in the society office somewhere. She never finished the herd book printing as she ran out of W for Woodmagic. [ Printing was very different in the dark ages when typesetting was used].
Homer Rixey Piella's sire was a crossbred, appendix A 138 and her dam was Woodmagic Petrel 7727
At that time we were very short of Dexters and animals were allowed into an Appendix register after inspection by a breed inspector to see if they were of Dexter type. All our bulls were inspected at that time as well before registration and the inspection was very thorough.
I also knew the Godstone herd at that time but do not wish to comment!
I don't wish to get involved in long discussions on the website - I don't type very quickly, and I am very busy farming Dexters but am happy to deliver facts.
P.S. Do not get the Appendix register mixed up with the Experimental register-they are entirely different

[Duncan MacIntyre]

Thanks for the explanation Di, I never did know why the book had not been printed. Do you know why Homer Rixey Piella appears in the hand written list of births I have a copy of (which was largely, I am told, produced by David Key) with the sire which appears in the on line herd book. I presume Council of the day must have had some good evidence to alter from the original.

To be honest I do not want to be in an endless debate on pedigree details either, nor do I want anyone to think this a personal argument with Judy. We have corresponed on and off for many year. It is really about different approach to so called impurities and errors in the herdbook.

We have too much doubt being cast on the historical evidence in our herd book We should be defending it, as the credibility of the breed depends on it. Much of the evidence for doubt on pedigrees offered by Mr Sheppy has no foundation whatsoever, the so called original population list must contain so few as to be unviable as a separate section of the breed, and the scientific evidence in the Cardiff project shows the breed to be a good distinct breed without undue influence of introgression.

We know that the genetic material inherited from any ancestor is halved every generation. So after 10 generations there is only 1 thousandth left - I know the poll gene is easy to see, so it is easy to select to keep it. But at the end of the day whether a polled cow or bull sneaked in as a wrong parent entry, if we select for breed standard it is of very little consequence. In fact it is necessary for a breed to have occasional introduction of genetic material as there is a slow loss if it is strictly kept closed - see Prof. Sponenberg's book.

Those intent of dividing the breed would be better to employ their energy and enthusiasm in encouraging present day breeders to be more interested in the breed structure, to pay more attention to how they are breeding, and to be much more selective about the breed standard - especially on large individuals, both long and short.

I am beginning to wonder, after much thought over a long number of years, if we can continue with one breed standard for short and long. Too many shorts are too big, although within the breed standard, and they when they produce a long, it cannot be within standard.

Incidentally when I say "both sides of the Atlantic" it is the ocean, not the experimental register.


Duncan

[Louisa Gidney]

Devil's advocate here. How on earth can we know how "pure" the foundation animals were, when phenotype was the only character to go on. It is salutary that most of the "pure" Irish Moiled cattle in the 1980's were subsequently shown by genetic tests to be anything but pure bred. However, they looked like Moiled so were assumed to be Moiled. The breeders were merely responding to increased demand for their product in a time-honoured way. I'm sure the early Dexters went through a similar phase of supply meeting demand by creative breeding. I know my neighbour had a beautiful red short Dexter calf one year out of a commercial cow, after my short-leg bull went under the fence the previous year. It was a visual twin to one of my own calves that year. If the two had gone to a rare breed sale together, no-one would have guessed which was the cross bred. How much compunction, a 150 years or so ago, would an Irish small holder have had in passing off such a calf as pure Dexter to an English buyer?

[Duncan MacIntyre]

Yes Louisa you are probably right, but fortunatlely the world is flat, so we can all jump off the edge.


No, seriously, when registrations began lots were just registered on inspection, this is mentioned in the Dublin herd book. Even with the inspection there are a few surprises, such as cow no 126, Lily II, White, with very little red; calved 1887; owner The Earl of Rosse, Birr Castle, Parsonstown earmark No 1090, qualified by inspection.

But the originals were what they were, and they formed the future breed. And the breed today is what it is too, with all the ravages of time, accidental mistakes, deliberate deceptions, and grading up appendixes and the experimental register.

I just think we should accept that, my only motivation for debating details is to expose how ridiculous it all is. At least Judy has been open enough to enter the debate, those on this side of the Atlantic who would wreck our breed in favour of just a few "original" animals do not show face.

Duncan

[JamsHundred]

Miss Di,

I had never stopped for a moment to think of the labor required to produce a herd book. Reading your comments on their printing over the years and the reason the 1969 book wasn't printed raised my awareness. I spend hours upon hours transcribing the information from herd books to the online pedigree site. I have a keyboard, moderate typing skills and an interface that speeds the process and still it is very time consuming to copy and then check each pedigree entry.

I cannot imagine the hours it took to set up the books for printing. Something I had never considered or had referenced before. What an interesting bit of history indeed.

Thank you!

Judy

[Kirk- Cascade Herd US]

I don't really want to enter this debate but there are some simple things that stand out a little to a person that really does not have a great deal of interest.

Kirk, if Platinum was pure where did the polled come from, I see they compared to markers from 14 breeds but what about the british Red Poll, I am sure there was some kind of input from that breed somewhere way back?

Every feature of Dexters has come from other breeds (or is a rare novel mutation)

Black came from other breeds
Horns came from other breeds
Chondrodysplasia came from other breeds
Dun came from other breeds (or may be a novel mutation)
Polled may have come from another breed in some cases, and may also have arisen as a mutation in other cases.

The dun gene isn't really a "dun" gene and the polled gene isn't really a "polled" gene.

Dun is the result of a broken, defective tyrp1 gene. The working version of the TYRP1 gene helps make black pigment look black. Without at least one working tyrp1 gene, genetically black cows will look dun. Dun's are, in a sense, a defective black. "Dun" or brown, occurs in many other animals including mice, cats, pigeons, etc., when a tyrp1 gene is broken due to a dna copy error.

Polled is the result of a broken horn regulator gene. Those accidental breakages are thought to occur in perhaps 1 in 10,000 calves.

We'll NEVER know for certain if Saltaire Platinum's gene was a novel mutation (broken gene) in his grandmother, or if his grandmother was the result of an accidental calf swap and she actually descended from an upgraded Dexter with Milking Shorthorn in the background. Both are possible.

But what is a "Pure breed" and what does "Purity" mean?

A 'breed" is defined as animals that share a common set of traits

Purebred is defined as an animal that consistently throws that defined set of traits because its genes have been cleaned up over a number of generations via selection and culling.

Pedigrees are only partially useful in determining if an animal is actually purebred.

If we make a list of MANDATORY traits for dexters, we'd likely all agree that they should be 1. compact, 2. very friendly bulls and cows 3. hardy, 4.trouble free, 5. multi-purpose, 6. red,black,dun with little or no white), Obviously, horns have NOT been a mandatory trait, or we would have banned dehorning long ago.

A "Pure" dexter would consistently throw calves with these mandatory traits. Purification is a process of making certain that your animals have these mandatory traits, and don't have genes that interfere with these mandatory traits.

Pedigrees are only minimally useful in establishing purity. Actual selection and culling for key traits is everything. A pedigreed "pure" dexter that isn't friendly and throws unfriendly calves, isn't "pure" at all. A dexter that needs lots of vet care isn't "pure" at all. A dexter that throws lots of too-large or lots of too-small calves isn't "pure" at all, no matter what the pedigree says.

An animal with upgrading in the distant background, that has been selected for several generations for pure dexter traits, is far MORE purebred,than an animal with a spotless pedigree that throws calves that don't meet the critical elements of the breed description.

In general, within 3- 5 generations after an upgrade, you can be BETTER than pure, if you worked harder on appropriate selection than a breeder with their nose buried in ancient pedigrees. Paper purity doesn't equal real purity. But papers do have their place.

[Saffy]

Absolutely brilliantly put and easy to understand!

Thank you.

Stephanie

[Rob R]

Absolutely brilliantly put and easy to understand!

Thank you.

Stephanie

Apart from the bit about dun being a dominant phenotype, that's the opposite.

ETA - my mistake, I misread what was being said about the broken gene.

[moomin]

Duncan,
Would be interested to see hand written list, I may be able to recognise the writing! Would you like to scan it and send? The list I have is typewritten and is the official DCS one.
There are mistakes on the website herd book but it is up to all of us to point them out, instead of being critical, so they may be corrected. Most of the input was by a previous member of our office staff a long time ago.
There is a nice little job for somebody! Anybody out there with a lot of time on their hands and who has got a set of herd books they can refer to and do the corrections? It will be a mammoth task!
I'm not ready to retire yet.
Di
P.S. Did you know that only about 300 members out of about 1,450 are interested enough in the breed to buy a herd book? Much better for posterity to have a paper one than an electronic one .

[JamsHundred]

Kirk is like the politicians I see and hear on a daily basis as I live quite close to Washington DC. They have no respect for truth. They take a little piece of the picture and they convince you that you see the entire picture. Why do we bother to develop a breed if we don't protect and preserve it as it was founded? In the UK, I believe there was a greater awareness of, and attempts to maintain the breed standard because of the involvement with showing. There was little showing in the US and the breed standards totally ignored. If there was a wish for polled cattle why not give them the identity of a new polled breed and keep them seperate rather than eradicate the Dexter horned breed as is happening in the US? Is there one among you who agrees that having 95% of all animals in a breed descend from one bull, with an average of 5 generations is a good thing? It is a new breed trading on the virtues of the original one, ( and failing as I see it). Look back on Kirk's long message filled with capped words for emphasis, ( which did not remind Rob of a tired toddler at all), and read where he tells you this one bull appears seventeen times in the one pedigree. Not only is this bull in 95% of all animals being born he is there multiple times. Did you not enter Dexters and purchase them for their original foundation qualities? Do you not admire the photos and videos depciting the unique beauty of the early Dexter herds like those you see of Grinstead? Or their followers like Atlantic? Why do you applaud and support the loss of something so wonderful and unique being changed into something that is so commonplace that you cannot place it in a field with several existing beef breeds and sort them out? I sincerely do not comprehend. In America, you can place an Adult Dexter in a field with a Lowline or a Red poll or even an Angus calf and have difficult sorting them out. That would never have been the case with a Grinstead cow or any number of the early Dexters we celebrate. Never! I ask you again, why we stopped celebrating and creating unique and moved to commonplace?

In the 1940's if you were to place a Dexter in a pasture of cattle of every other breed, you would be able to find that Dexter immediately. It would stand out as uniquely conformed. I simply do not understand the unwillingness to protect that unique creature who not only in appearance was a stand out, but in function as well.

I hope I can advocate to breeders to move backwards and work towards restoring the treasure trove that was the Dexter breed and which future owners may never know. Why don't breeders wish to maintain the breed as the breed brochures describe them? Isn't that why they you chose them? For what they WERE?