In all of this talk about outcrosses, I should put a caveat here. Do not assume that all outcrosses are intelligent. Any outcross that introduces bad genes into the line that weren’t there before is a stupid outcross.
Consider my late mutt, the “golden boxer.”
This dog came from a line of goldens that really didn’t have early death from cancer as part of their genetic disorders. Cancer did exist, but for a show line of goldens, her dam was a healthy dog.
Her sire was a brindle boxer belonging to the neighbors. He was a sneak of all sneaks. He would even sneak into areas in people’s houses to mate the bitches. This was in a very rural area, where there is no leash law.
The puppies that were born to this mating were all black. Some had a bronze tinge to the coat.
As a dog she was a good dog. She was not as easily trained as a retriever, but she wasn’t as stubborn as a boxer. She was moderately dog aggressive, but nothing like the dog aggression seen in some boxers. She could learn to get along with other dogs, but it took her some time to get used to them.
She was undocked, and her tail was long and whip-like. She would wag this tail very hard, often in a recumbent position. On my parents’ hardwood floors this sounded like a hammer banging on the floor.
She had no retrieving instinct (her mother didn’t either). She had too much muscle and bone to swim efficiently.
She was useless as a retriever.
One thing she was good at, though, was skunk hunting. The only dog I’ve ever had that loved to kill skunks. It didn’t matter if she got sprayed down with skunk musk, she would attack any skunk she saw.
If you hated skunks for some reason, she would have been a useful skunk hound.
She was euthanized last March after a short bout with osteosarcoma. None of our goldens ever got this cancer, but her father’s line of boxers carried this gene.
If she had been used as an intelligent outcross, she would have introduced that gene into her progeny, and it would have been a bad move. Goldens are one of the breeds that gets osteosarcoma, and they don’t need boxer genes that double up on those cancers.
Interestingly, I got this dog for free. Today, this is a designer breed that sells for several hundred or more dollars. I had a unique dog, because she was a black one. Most of the designer golden boxers I’ve seen are derived frm fawn boxers and are either fawn or brindle in color.
Every time I see a modern boxer, I always wonder “why”? Here is this deformed head stuck on a very nice dog body. There would be a really nice breed if it had a more normal muzzle and jaw.
We have had one skunk encounter. A youngster dug under the dog yard fence, and my alpha male carried it into the garage where he attempted to kill it. It scratched his muzzle, he dropped it, and the rest was history in spite of gallons of white vinegar. I swear when it rains ( 3 years later) I can still smell eau de skunk.
In spite of her failure to live up to either side of her parentage and her skunk killing propensity, was she a good family companion?
Yes. She was always with us. She was a lot like Farley Mowat’s Dog Who Wouldn’t Be, just not as clever as Mutt.
She would just stay with you all the time. She loved little girls for some reason. She would run off if little girls were around. And that’s the only thing she did that was wrong, except that she didn’t like strange female dogs around.
As a personal dog, she was excellent. I miss her greatly. I was trying to convey rationality in that post, but the truth is I always miss my dogs when they cross the Rainbow Bridge. She may not have been my first choice among dogs, but she was a good dog for her purpose.
Her body was strange. You can’t see in the photo, but she had the blocky show golden body type with the Boxer’s heavy muscles. She looked like a small black horse.
.
She was also something like Jock of the Bushveld, which was my favorite biography of a dog when I was a child. (Fourth Grade as I do remember).
That film isn’t bad, but its ending is very Marley and Me.
I like it better, though, I prefer films about dogs living the South African bush to films about stupid people who can’t care for a retriever properly.
I’m thinking of an old girlfriend’s Staffy/boxer accidental-cross. Personality of a Staffy (boisterous, friendly, overenthusiastic, ridiculous amounts of energy) but with a more boxer-shaped body (i.e. could run faster than all the other Staffies down at the dog park). Didn’t get along with other dogs *except* Staffies.
I’ve not seen many staffies to get a comparison. I do know that their American cousins (which are often banned) are very much like that.
Boxers can be boisterous but nothing like the bull and terrier breeds.
Staffies are a variety of bull terrier, but they’re perfectly nice dogs if they’re brought up properly. But very boisterous. Like bright children with waaaay too much energy!
The best dogs are like bright children with too much energy, IMHO.
Nonsense! Let me get my mom’s “stitch and bitch” group together (they’ll serve as an appropriately menopausal coven to form a breed club) and we’ll call it “HRH Royal Triple Champion Skunk hound.” A rare, but ancient (and thus important and better) breed honored by the Vikings for their skunk hunting prowess. By including royalty and championships in the breed name, all the dogs will be thought to be excellent, no need to actually earn any titles.
With a few more clever outcrosses I’m sure we can even make the dogs LOOK like a skunk. Form follows function and all. We will write in our breed history (predated to 1850) that said skunk markings are crucial to the breed to trick skunks into complacency, mistaking approaching dogs for potential mates. We will also insert a paragraph into a revisionist history middle school textbook about Lewis and Clark using a skunk hound to survive on skunks when they were near death.
We’ll also say that their coats have special anti-skunk spray properties. Never mind that they don’t, no one will “work” these dogs to test this out anyway.
What should we sell the puppies for, $1200 or $1500?
[…] a good example of an unplanned outbreeding depression–my “golden boxer.” This dog was a terrible guard dog, as one would expect from a golden. However, she was a […]