Vizsla health testing

I am doing this post so that you can learn about health testing for the Hungarian Vizsla.

Health tests are usually set out as a recommendation by the Royal Kennel club.  But it does not mean you have to do them to have a registered puppy. Their are 4 health tests that the Royal kennel club set out as a recommendation to do before you breed from your dog and they are:

• Glaucoma testing
• BVA yearly eye exam by specialist vet. 
• Hip scoring
• Elbow scoring. 

So to the first question.  

If we do these exams will it totally guarantee your puppy will not get those health issues in life?  The answer is a big NO. Sorry I wish it was not the case, but it's true.  So why is this?

​

Because genetics do not work in the way we would like them too.  

Most elbow or hip dysplasia is evident around 5 months of age.  For some it is later.  But you would not know this on an 8 week old puppy.  

Remember over exercise of your baby puppy can really damage joints so be very careful what you do.  

What causes it? Several factors.  

• Injury
• Over exercise too early.
• Incorrect diet
• Early castration or spaying. 
• Inherited.  100's of genes are at play to cause it.

Can it be prevented ? Generally no, except if you have over exercised your puppy or given incorrect diet, or you have done early castration or spaying, or the dogs had an injury.  But if its true inherited their is nothing that could have been done to stop it.  Because it was bad luck all those genes came together. 

So why hip and elbow score?  Because the thoughts are that if you continue to breed through dogs which have excellent scores, then the offspring should follow suit.  The more dogs scored in the gene pool would suggest the elimination of hip and elbow dysplasia.  However we have been doing this for 30 years. We hip scored our Weimaraner's when others were not doing it.  Same with Vizsla. 
The hope is that with hundreds of good scores in the pedigree you will continue to get good scores in the offspring.  So this is why it's done. But it's no guarantee. 

The Kennel club set out a breed average score and this means they take all the dogs done at the UK BVA scoring and take the average best score.  But it's probably very incorrect at the moment as most dogs are done in Australia.  

So why are dogs being done in Australia?
During Covid the UK BVA slipped up, and stopped scoring dogs. Then when they came back to it the back log was so long, that breeders like ourselves could not wait for months at a time for a result.  The Australian scheme was identical, and did a turn around of 2 days, plus was less money.  So we went there, as did most of the UK.  Gradually however breeders are going back to the bva scoring system, but we have not.  We decided to stick with Australia because they are still quicker and little cheaper.  Not a lot but little and every little helps.  

But it does not end at those tests.  Because we have available now private companies offering breeders health tests by DNA testing dogs to check for genetic diseases.  Breeders who truly want to get on board and eliminate those health issues will do the testing.   The majority however are not doing the testing.   We've always based our pricing of puppies on the amount of tests we do on the parents, because it can save a small fortune in the end at vets with some of these horrible diseases. 
But not all breeders can afford the testing.  Most puppies that come from parents of little testing may not be priced as much as those that have.  But its a drop in the ocean because you truly do get what your paying for.  But check the breeder as we see some pricing puppies at £2600 and hardly any health testing has been done.  So it's up to you to find value for money.  Value is lots of health testing done for your money paid. 

How to DNA tests work ?

Well sadly I wish we had DNA markers for lots more health issues, but there are NO DNA MARKERS in may other Vizsla health issues! SO WE CAN NOT DO THEM AS THEY DO NOT EXISIT.

You would hope that dna markers would have become more available for Vip, Epilepsy above any other health test.  But because if we take Epilepsy as an example, we are unsure if it's as simple as one gene from each parent is the cause, or its multiple genes, making it polygenic. Or if it's not hereditary at all.  But good news is there is some research going on now.  But it may not be to gain a genetic DNA marker, it maybe just to understand whats going on with the dogs. 

So going back to the tests that are available what do we do?

We do a variety of health tests, and I base it on when people call me looking for dogs and may of lost a dog to a health issue its usually means its in the UK breed.  I get a number of people ringing me up saying Ive lost a dog to ECLE do you test for it as our breeder did not. I can say yes we do. 

• ECLE
• DD
• DM
• CA
• HUU
• EIC
• LH
• FF

I found recently some other tests are now available.  So Im going to look at them and see if they are going to benefit our Vizsla team. 
Some of our bitches have not been tested and the reason is both of their parents we owned and we have the test results for those parents as they are hereditary CLEAR of those genetic diseases. Which is great.  So I have kept back the paperwork from those parents in a file so I can show you. 

I take no offence when someone asks to see all the paperwork on a visit.  I welcome it!  

So how do you avoid having health issues if theirs no health testing.  Well it's blooming hard I can tell you. We breed by avoidance.  So for example if we put two parents together and ended up with a health problem we would not mate them together again. But we would not exclude them from the gene pool as we would use a different bloodline on the mum.  Or dad depending how it worked.  So it's called breeding by avoidance.  If it happened again to the same mum, or dad, then we would retire her/him out.   Because a dog maybe a carrier and not effected, and all you have to do is find a different bloodline.  Of course there is no guarantee that dog also would not carry it. Because thats life. 

In raw 1970'a DNA TEST FOR A BREED CAME OUT.  The breed clubs said do not use any carrier, or affected dog. Only breed clears.  They eliminated practically the whole genetic gene pool, ending up with a few bloodlines left.  Then suddenly they had Epilepsy, suddenly they had Addisons, and so on.  The breed ended up far more unhealthy.  They had to reverse what they said.  So carriers can be mated to clears because none of the puppies will be affected.  But it's down to the breeder then to health test their puppy they kept, and do the same thing again.

You do not breed CARRIER to CARRIER. or EFFECTED TO EFFECTED. 

Also remember these DNA tests are what we call TOOLS for breeding.  Tools for us not you.  Because we use them to avoid inherited diseases.   What better way really to help our lovely breed. 

I can promise you I am trying my best as a human placed on this earth to help our lovely breed.  I take each breeding mindfully and do the best with what I have.  I import dogs to help genetic diversity. I import semen to help. I use compete outcrosses where I can.  Everything we do is to help our dogs future gene pools.  If we produce something we are very sorry and we do endeavour to work around issues.  I remember stopping a Weimaraner line years ago due to producing two litters of entropion. I stopped another line where I saw aggression.  I am mindful and I change things where I can.  

We have to recognise that we are only human, we do our best. It does not always work, but at least we have tried.  Where our dogs are concerned we do far more health tests than anyone else I know.  Well I know one other breeder and she's my dearest friend.   I love her because we are on the same page. xx