ALSATIAN DOGS

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 17406, 3 November 1930, Page 2

ALSATIAN DOGS

fTo fun Editor of the Herald.) Suv-In your issue of November 1, it i : .red that the executive .of tin. ertv Bat and East ul , opposing the further ™potation ,f Alsatian dogs on the ground that ‘•the breed is not very far removed from the wolf strain, ami that .They might cause trouble by interbreeding. ■betters to this effect have been published !„ tho press Inirly trequently. »nd. when written bv individuals haps can hardly be. expected -to hnovv anv better, one reads them with a feeling of tolerant pity. I am absolutely amazed, liowever, that suidi a hotly as the P.B. an 1 E.C, Sheepowners Lnion should, apparently in all seriousness, bring forward such an argument against the importation of .Alsatians-,. . ••• The facts are available to ..all. who ai interested, and it is surely deploraj.'ii; that any responsible executive sifould advance such a plea without taking the trouble to verify the facts. No less an authority than the secretary of the Kennel Club in England has stated categorically that- no r . Alsatian registered in any European Kennel Club is tho product of the mating of s dog and wolf. Horowitz., probably the greatest living authority on Alsatians, states that there are very marked structural differences between tho skulls of wolves and dogs, and in the position and shape of tbq eye. This fact precludes any possibility of wolf blood being surreptitiously Introduced into tho breed. It seems afjarcely probably that there are many people in this country who are ignorant of the facts, hut in case there are, perhaps it will he as well to reiterate that the Alsatian is a Sheep Dog. Before the war they were known as German sheep dogs, hat because the international complications starting in 1914 gave rise in Allied countries to an not unnatural prejudice against all things German, the name was changed to Alsatian wolf hound —“Alsatian” for obvious reasons, “Wolf Hound” being simply a literal translation of the French “Chien loup” a name given to any prick-eared sheep dog. It is most regrettable that so many simple-minded people should have been led astray by the name. As Mr. 11. N. Watson said some time ago in an admirable letter to the Dominion, ‘‘there is no more wolf blood in tho Alsatian wolf houndthan there is butterfly blood in the French ‘papi 11 on.’ ” Had the executive of the Sheepowners’ Union contented themselves with opposing importations of Alsatians cm the ground that New Zealand could produce all the sheep dogs and'.ptheif dogs required without bringing in foreign blood, and for this reason asked for an increased registration lee of Cl IQs, they would have commanded wide .sympathy, including thajt of many Alsatian owners. But to oppose importation on the grounds that wolf blood may lie brought in to the dogs of this country by interbreeding is surely to make them a laughing-stock. Similar agitations against Alsatians _hayp been made in (America and Englamd, but in these countries they have died a natural death, with occasional spasmodic revivals in the “silly season.” It is to bo hoped that when the flush of novelty has worn off, the people of New Zealand will show themselves no less intelligent in this respect than their American and British cousins. I am, your faithfully, MARION A. BLACK (Mrs.]