Hybrid Dogs or Mutts and Mongrels?

(~4 minutes to read)

Time was when dogs were bred for usefulness. Collies run after sheep. Jack Russells chase foxes. Dachshunds flush out badgers. Beagles hunt food. Any food. But the breed was originally developed to hunt hare.

Greyhounds can’t resist an electric hare. Chihuahuas are canine hot water bottles.

But in the 1980s, a cross-breeding act of compassion unwittingly started a whole new industry—designer dog breeding.

Breeds are now being crossed in order to up the ante on the cutesy factor. Most of us have heard of labradoodles, but it doesn’t stop there. Oh no…

There are Puggles (beagle & pug), Maltipoos (Maltese and poodle), Shih Poos (Shi Tzu and Poodle), Pithuahuas (Pitbull & Chihuahua—the mind boggles) and Gollies (Golden Retriever & Collie).

And let’s see if you can work out which two breeds “rubbed noses” in order to create a “Gerberian Shepsky”?

Apparently, indiscriminate cross-breeding causes conflict in the dog. In the last example above, the husky’s hunting instinct conflicts with the German shepherd’s desire to round animals up. Faced with a fox or a rabbit, what does the dog do? Herd it? Hunt it down? Phone its therapist?
Perhaps that’s how fighting dogs came about; take two breeds with opposing instincts, let them “rub noses”, then work on the inner conflict of the pups to encourage the fight part of the “fight or flight” response.

Probably not.

An aside: the subject of fighting dogs got me searching other blood sports online, and I discovered such human-animal delights as badger tossing, goose pulling and octopus wrestling.

In the animal-animal category, there’s camel wrestling, donkey baiting and insect fighting.

And in the human-human list of blood sports, in amongst boxing, martial arts and gladiatorial spectacles, I spotted ice hockey.

Hilarious.

But indiscriminate cross-breeding aside, I do wonder what new hybrids (posh word for “cross-breed”, apparently) the designer dog people have in mind. Lots, if one website I visited is kosher. Mastadors, Newfypoos, Horgis, Italian Greyhuahuas… there are hundreds to choose from.

My guess is that someone, somewhere, sometime soon, will cross a labradoodle with a cockapoo and call it a cockadoodle.

And when the new hybrid is taken out for a walk, its owner will take poop bags with them so they can pick up the cockadoodle do-do.

While I was researching for this piece, I discovered a few things about dogs that might be worth sharing here.

Poodles were originally gun dogs. (True.) But they started refusing to go out hunting when their owners started giving them ridiculous haircuts. (Ok… probably not true.)

Terriers were bred to kill. (True.) Yorkshire terriers were bred to kill the reputation of terriers as killers. (Maybe I made that up.)

There is such a breed as a “eurohound”. (True – kinda. Wkipedia refers to it as a mongrel though.) Brexiteers hold it up as an example of EU bureaucracy gone wrong. (Nah.)

Greyhounds, whippets, Rhodesian ridgebacks and 23 other breeds listed on Wikipedia are classified as “pariahs” or outcasts. (True.) Rumour has it that the hare fraternity, having got totally fed up with running around in circles, used their connections to get the greyhounds and whippets classified as outcasts. (Really?!?)

“Dachshund” means “badger dog”. (True.) “Weiner dog” means “ridiculously long, ridiculously low-slung dog”. (It might be true…)

Great Danes are known for their size and their inability to understand that they’re not lapdogs. (True in my experience.) Hans Christian Andersen was a great man and a Dane. However, there’s no record of him thinking he was a lapdog.

Dalmatians have filled many roles, from guarding to accompanying horse-drawn carriages to hunting to horse-sitting. This last role is connected with horse-drawn fire engines—horses would get spooked by fires, and dalmatians—having formerly been employed as a status symbol to trot beside a horse-drawn carriage—were comfortable clearing a path for the horses on the way to a fire and to keep the horses under control at the fire. This role became redundant with the advent of horseless carriages and fire engines, so most dalmatians are now companion dogs. (All true.) Their popularity increased with the release of the movie, 101 Dalmatians, when people realized that as companion dogs, they make great mobile, erasable dot-to-dot drawing boards. (K—that was an outright fib.)

However, dalmatians are large enough to be intimidating for young children. Fortunately, I’ve heard that designer dog breeders are working on the problem—they’re planning a series of different-sized spotted dogs. First off will be the Beagatian (beagle & dalmatian), then for smaller children they’re working on a Dalhuahua. And to complete the set, a Great Danematian will be developed to provide a dot-to-dot drawing board for parents.

I can’t wait to see these. As our grandson gets old enough to do dot-to-dot drawings they could provide hours of fun for him and us.

I wonder where they’ll be available for purchase?