Inbreeding
QUITE SIMPLY, inbreeding is the mating of animals related by descent, such that there is an increase in the progeny of the incidence of genes identical by descent from the sire and dam. This is a general definition that holds true no matter what precise methods are used to go about it. Dog breeders usually think that there is some qualitative difference between inbreeding and "linebreeding." There is none. The only difference is the rate of increase in the incidence of genes identical by descent from the sire and dam. Linebreeding is a less extreme form of inbreeding than the mating of full sibs (brother and sister) or parent and progeny (mother and son or father and daughter). The important thing to understand here is that inbreeding increases the likelihood that the progeny are getting the same genes from both the sire and the dam, and thereby decreasing the overall amount of genetic diversity in that bloodline.
It follows logically from the above definition that dogs from any gene pool such as that of Seppalas (or of registered Siberian Huskies, or of virtually any modern registered dog breed) are inbred, no matter what the first four generations of their pedigrees might look like. When you go back further than the first few generations of pedigree, you start to encounter the same ancestors over and over again in many lines of the same pedigree. The nature of the small founder group and the closed stud book mean that all the dogs in a modern breed are inbred. Not just a little bit inbred, either; often it amounts to quite a lot.
If you get the pedigree software known as "Breeder's Assistant" (or some of the other pedigree/kennel management applications like BreedMate or Compu-Ped) you can run a search for specific ancestors and find out how many times they occur in the entire pedigree, provided you have entered ancestral data all the way back to foundation, which isn't impossibly difficult with Seppalas. You can also calculate an "inbreeding coefficient" or percentage of inbreeding. I have done this for Seppalas and came up with figures averaging 30 percent inbreeding in the most recent ten generations of ancestry! (I was told by Dr. Hellmuth Wachtel, cynologist and canine geneticist, that there has never been a Thoroughbred who won the (English) Derby that had an inbreeding coefficient higher than 3%!
Seppalas are already highly inbred, just by virtue of having come out of the closed stud books of CKC and AKC after three-quarters of a century. Doing further, close-up inbreeding is asking for trouble. Breeding brother and sister, father and daughter, is irresponsible. There is absolutely nothing to be gained by it, rather a strong probability of producing progeny that will be weak or defective in some way. DON'T TRY IT.
The "ABB Index" is a rough-and-ready tool for monitoring mainstream inbreeding in Seppala pedigrees. This is an index that monitors the percentage-blood concentration on the SURGUT OF MARKOVO/HELEN OF MARKOVO progeny, UELEN'S ALI, UELEN'S BEOWULF OF SEPP-ALTA, AND UELEN'S BARON OF SEPP-ALTA. I've seen ABBs as high as 55% -- too high, in my opinion. It's a good idea to try to keep it under 40%, though sometimes that may not be possible. This is another reason why it's a good idea for us to introduce new Siberia imports to the mix; to do so lowers both the ABB index and the inbreeding coefficient.
Inbreeding Depression
"As genetic variability diminishes and homozygosity rises through inbreeding, a syndrome known as inbreeding depression sets in. It is characterised by a reduction in viability (survival of individual progeny), birth weight, fecundity (number of young) and fertility (reproductive success), among other things. Much of it is caused by the homozygous presence of rare, deleterious recessive alleles. Part of it may also be due to the relative absence of overdominant heterozygote combinations. As inbreeding depression becomes more severe, highly inbred lines tend to become extinct through the loss of ability to reproduce successfully and/or inability of the young to survive. It varies somewhat in intensity from species to species, due probably to variations in the number and nature of lethal, sublethal and subvital alleles involved. Some wild mammals which show almost no juvenile mortality when bred in captivity without inbreeding, exhibit 100 percent juvenile mortality when inbred! A survey of captive breeding records for 44 species (Ralls and Ballou, 1979, 1982) showed that juvenile mortality of inbred young was higher than that of noninbred young in 41 of the 44 species for which records were analysed."
The foregoing paragraph is a direct quote from my paper Purebred Dog Breeds into the Twenty-First Century. I still can't describe it any better than that! I tried breeding Bernese Mountain Dogs briefly -- for exactly one litter! Now, there's a breed with inbreeding depression. Breeders of "Berners" expect to get a couple of stillborn pups in every litter! This isn't happening yet with Seppalas, and I would just as soon try to arrange things so that it never does. That means getting some genuinely fresh genetic material into the mix -- not just more of the same traditional RSH blood that all goes back to KREE VANKA, TOSCA and TSERKO anyway, with no additional ancestral input at all except the DUKE x TANTA OF ALYESKA mating contributed by the Seeley lines in mixed lineage. Don't think you can relieve the inbreeding situation by "cross-strain breeding"; that's sheer fantasy --the ancestry is all the same. Mainstream Siberian Husky bloodlines are stripped of their genetic diversity to a much greater extent than Seppala lineage, anyway, having usually been inbred and cosmetically selected for three times as many generations over the same period in AKC and CKC's closed studbooks.
Signs of inbreeding depression are showing up in Seppalas these days, in the form of increased incidence of genetic disease, immune system problems, hypothyroidism, irregularities in heat cycles and other reproductive problems, etc. The evidence is there to see if you open your mind and look carefully and objectively. We need to address the problem NOW by adding new Siberia import lineage to basic Markovo Seppala. Those who reject recent Siberia import lines are pursuing a self-serving and pointless vendetta that is against the best interests of Seppalas. Racing Siberian Husky cross-straining is no answer; many of the cross-strained bloodlines have actually shown an increase in genetic disease instead of any relief.
Linebreeding
DIDN'T WE JUST DEAL WITH THIS ONE? As I said, it's another name for inbreeding! Probably I didn't convince you, though. This is one of the myths that dog-breeders cherish; they want to believe in it. So let's look at some practical instances of this technique. Look at the pedigree of SPOOK OF WHITE WATER LAKE. SPOOK is one of those highly-cherished WWL dogs -- by those who go in for that kind of thing -- from the tail end of the Anthony Landry breeding, born around 1963 I think. His three-times great-grandsire was MARAK OF SEPPALA (that's all but one of the great-grandsires). The other great-grandsire was SMOKIE OF WWL II -- sired by MARAK OF SEPPALA; the maternal great-grandam (the bitch bred to SMOKIE, that is) was also sired by MARAK OF SEPPALA. SPOOK was linebred to a fare-thee-well on MARAK! He was also "linebred" on KOBE OF GATINEAU, who occurs five times in what's left of SPOOK's pedigree, along with two occurrences of KOBE's half-brother KOSKO OF GATINEAU. There's yet more to it than that in SPOOK's pedigree, but that's more than enough. Believe it or not, some people are "linebreeding" on SPOOK, now! There's no limit to human stupidity, I guess.
You tell me that's not inbreeding? Well, go tell it to the Marines, because the sailors will never believe you! That was how Earl F. Norris structured his breeding programme from the year dot. Linebreed heavily to the best male leader, then linebreed on his son or his grandson, and so on down the line. He started with CHINOOK'S ALLADIN OF ALYESKA, then it was CH. BONZO OF ANADYR, then Al. NICOLAI of A., then Al. ASTRO of A., then Al. NICOLAI of A. II and so ad infinitum. I wonder what the inbreeding coefficient looks like for contemporary Anadyrs! Much higher than our "inbred" Seppalas I'll bet.
We cannot avoid linebreeding to a certain extent in Seppalas. It's more or less a forced situation due to the narrowness of the breeding lines laid down during the 1920s, the 1930s, the 1960s and '70s, the 1980s… it has always been like that in Seppala strain. Just study some Wheeler and McFaul pedigrees; it's not hard to see where the concentrations fall. We can't avoid repeating on BEOWULF, on BARON/MOKKA, on HANK these days, any more than we can avoid repeating on the VODKA III/ZARINA III mating. But for heaven's sake, let's don't let it end up with Seppalas all having SPOOK-type pedigrees!
By the way -- KODIAK'S LAYLA and KODIAK'S LILY, common in "percentage-Seppala" pedigrees now, were linebred on SPOOK OF WHITE WATER LAKE -- their double grandsire!
Main Seppala Bloodlines
THIS TOPIC FOLLOWS on what I just touched upon in the last one. There are certain clearly-defined bloodlines within pure Seppala lineage. It's a good idea to learn what these are so that when you look at a pedigree it has a little more meaning than just a whole pile of Seppala and Sepp-Alta names.
First and foremost has to be the ABB group: UELEN'S ALI, UELEN'S BARON OF SEPP-ALTA, UELEN'S BEOWULF OF SEPP-ALTA. Progeny of SURGUT OF MARKOVO out of HELEN OF MARKOVO, these three sleddogs collectively constitute from 25 to 55 percent of contemporary Markovo Seppalas' pedigree ancestry! BARON almost always comes linked with MOKKA OF MARKOVO; the BARON/MOKKA progeny group are a pedigree theme in their own right. ATTILA OF SEPP-ALTA, ALMA OF SEPP-ALTA, S-A ATHENA OF MARKOVO, and UELEN'S EBONY OF SEPP-ALTA are the most common of the BARON/MOKKA group.
ASH OF MARKOVO (by NUTOK OF MARKOVO out of ROBIN OF MARKOVO, bred by Curt Stuckey) is sometimes identified as another pillar. More realistically, the pillar is actually HERCULES OF SEPP-ALTA (the son of ASH out of BARON/MOKKA daughter ALMA), along with his female littermates HOLLY and HAZEL, neither of whom is nearly as important as their big brother "HANK." Otherwise, ASH is mostly found in combination with mixed-lineage stock. (He was bred to KODIAK'S LILY to produce BANSHEE and KOMET'S BUFFIE; also to LAIKA SHADOW II to produce ROCKY OF ALTA. ASH was also bred to two other Markovo-Seppala females, but their progeny did not have much influence, other than OREO who turns up occasionally.) But "HANK" is unquestionably a major pillar of Seppala breeding.
In fact, if I had to name the three major influences of the breed, I'd probably say BEOWULF, HANK and the BARON/MOKKA group. On the female side, another NUTOK OF MARKOVO progeny, POWDER OF MARKOVO, has had a great deal of influence. POWDER had litters at both River View and Sepp-Alta kennels. At one time we had four POWDER progeny in the kennel -- we called them "the POWDER people." She seemed to throw progeny that were serious workers with a temperament that was pure pet. All our Powder people wound up as house dogs sooner or later!
By the year 2006 it had become obvious that there is now a fourth permanent major influence in Seppalas. That would be the Siberia import sire SHAKAL IZ SOLOVYEV and his brother SHAPOCHKA IZ SOLOVYEV. These two littermates will assume over time an importance probably equal to that of KREE VANKA or HERCULES OF SEPP-ALTA, adding a new tail-male lineage and a very distinct new genetic influence.
One other group deserves mention, the MINTO OF SEPPINEAU x ZEITA OF MARKOVO progeny, DYNAMIKOS RUBY, D. BADGER OF WINDIGO, D. DOKKY OF SEPP-ALTA, all bred by George Mentis (Dynamikos Kennels) of Minot, North Dakota.
Other minor groupings could be identified, but I think the above pretty well touches the major background influences in a present-day four or five-generation pedigree. More recently, one could mention the Sepp-Alta "N" litter, NARLY, NESTLY, NORDE, NUGGET and others by HERCULES OF SEPP-ALTA out of UELEN'S ALI, with one more of the same breeding out of a different litter, PETER OF SEPP-ALTA. Also I think the BEOWULF/POWDER bunch will probably become in time an influence on the order of BARON/MOKKA. In our own kennel the HANK/DREAMA progeny and the XPACE/SPRITE progeny are turning out to be major influences, along with the offspring of SHAKAL IZ SOLOVYEV.
It's a good idea to learn how to read and analyse pedigrees in order to keep all these relationships straight.
Mating and Whelping
THE USUAL DOG-BREEDING BOOKS will help you somewhat with these operations, so I'll just touch on points peculiar to Seppalas. The females often seem to have leisurely heat cycles. If you've read the books and expect your bitches to mate promptly on day nine after the first appearance of oestrus blood and to "take" from that first mating, you are in for some frustration! Quite often they won't do it until around day 12 or 13, and then continue mating until day 18 or 19. (But don't try to make this into an invariable rule, either; the dogs have read neither the dog-breeding books nor this website!)
We find that generally the stud dogs quickly learn to appreciate our help in restraining bitches during matings and will soon prefer to work in close cooperation with us. Exceptions occur, though: just this spring two bashful canine lovers who just wouldn't seem to get down to business tiptoed off to a far corner of the exercise yard while Isa and I were sitting on the bench chatting, and quickly mated in utter silence! Amazingly, the female never let out even a tiny peep (most will scream loudly during the first minute or two of the tie, if only to announce their triumph to the rest of the kennel). I suddenly stopped daydreaming and said to Isa, "Where are the dogs?" We found them off in the corner, tied, standing there quietly, looking smug. (Seppalas love to make you look like a fool!) This couple was also aberrant in that they mated only on that one day, at noon and at nine p.m., and then were totally uninterested the next day. (But then, she didn't take, either!) Generally speaking, Seppalas will continue to mate for the better part of a week; there is little reason not to let them do so, particularly since females sometimes fail to conceive from the first couple of matings.
It goes without saying that matings should be supervised! Anything can happen in the absence of supervision, little of it good. A stud dog can be severely injured if a bitch panics when the tie starts to hurt, flips over on her back and starts clawing wildly. And if you are right there when the mating occurs, there is no excuse for failing to take a photograph of the mated pair once the tie is firm and they have settled down a bit. "Photographic proof of mating" disposes of many doubts and anxieties in the minds of those who weren't there and gives to the validity of your pedigrees. They also demonstrate beyond reasonable doubt that YOU KNOW which male mated which bitch. (I know at least one large, very productive "Seppala" kennel where that question looms large.) Photographic proof of mating ought to be a requirement for litter registrations in any reputable canine registry.
Seppala whelpings are usually trouble-free; the bitches' natural
maternal instincts are strong. The overwhelming majority are really great
mothers. I don't believe in leaving bitches to whelp under the back
porch by themselves, though; if there should be a problem we want to know about it
before it reaches the point of threatening the mother's life, and believe me
when I say there is plenty that can go wrong. Seppalas
are often leisurely with their whelpings; it can take six or eight
hours sometimes. Pups need to be kept dry and relatively warm, but
don't overheat Seppala puppies! Their little coats insulate them
pretty well right from day one.
Here I regrettably must recount the story of the
imbecile in Quebec who "wasn't sure" his Seppala bitch was pregnant though he
thought maybe she was. He left her in her wooden doghouse in subzero
winter weather, went out one morning and found her cuddling a litter of
frozen puppies. This idiot had the nerve to tell people that he thought his bitch
"wasn't a very good mother"! A doghouse with no insulation and an open door
is NOT the equivalent of the deep earthen den a bitch would dig for herself;
newborns might survive even in winter in such a den, but above ground they
have no chance; they are born SOPPING WET and nothing their mother could do
would prevent their death from hypothermia, as neonates have no ability to
regulate their body temperature. People like that guy should not even have
dogs.
It helps the pups nurse if you place a folded wool blanket or a fleece pad in the whelping box for the first week or ten days. The traditional newspapers are cold, hard for newborns to navigate on, and unnecessary since their mother will keep every thing very clean for at least the first two weeks. With a blanket or a pad the little ones have no difficulty staying close to their mother and moving around the whelping box; with newspapers they have no traction. We use a sturdy cardboard box for whelping now, rather than a permanent wooden whelping box; the cardboard box gets tossed out when the litter is four weeks old; that way there's no risk of contamination for the next litter. One thing you must do for new sleddog whelps: REMOVE THE REAR DEWCLAWS IF THEY HAVE THEM, that is not optional, as they are too vulnerable to injury. Removing front dewclaws is optional; the practice is declining these days. Dewclawing should be done 24 to 48 hours after birth. (Good styptic powder is essential to control bleeding.)
The only care nestling puppies require that their mother can't give
them is to be weighed daily on an accurate kitchen scale. This is just to
monitor their health and their mother's milk supply -- any problems
in a litter will show up immediately via a break in the growth rate, which
is linear for the first four weeks in a healthy litter. Make darn
sure that the mother gets enough to eat and copious quantities of water.
Nursing mothers will eat three times or more their normal rations and
will drink, drink, drink. It's up to you to see that they get everything
they need, so they have enough milk to keep those pups growing well.
We no longer force the weaning process as many people do. We introduce
the pups to solid food between three and four weeks of age and
supplement mother's milk with sloppy rich gruel from four weeks, but
let the mother decide when she wants to wean them. Many Seppala
mothers want to nurse their litters until they no longer have any
flow of milk. We let them do so, and we keep pups with their dams
until the dams decide they no longer need to have much to do with
them. At five weeks the pups are ready to go outside no matter how
cold it might be, as long as they have a snug, well-strawed house to
sleep in. Let their mother stay with them most of the time, but give
her some time away from the litter, too. It's much better psychologically
for both the pups and their dam if weaning is natural and gradual.
She is quite capable of deciding for herself when and how to wean her
litter; you do not need to separate them forcibly.
My very wolfy Solovyev-line Spanish import bitch
Collen refused to leave her pups alone for any length of time even when
they were eight weeks old. When
weaning time came, she began regurgitating her meals for them -- even
though I was feeding them abundantly -- and a couple of times she stole
large chunks of meat from the bucket beside the cutting table, and pushed
her plunder against the wire of the puppy pen so they could get at it!
It is wonderful to see this kind of full-blown maternal instinct in a
sleddog bitch. When we finally moved Collen's growing pups outside,
she would dig under the wire or attack the chainlink with her jaws to
get at her puppies. For Collen, weaning did not mean separation!
