LoupGarouTFTs
UKC Forum Member
Registered: Jun 2003
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Posts: 345 |
As much as I respect the opinions of those individuals who have stated that TFTs come from standard-sized Smooth Fox Terriers and therefore carry genes for larger size, I have to say that TFTs are not SFTs. TFTs are a breed unto themselves, not a variety of the larger dog, so the comparison with its forerunner are not legitimate. If the Toy Fox Terrier was simply to be a smaller variety of the SFT, then it would not have the prick ears required for the breed and the dock of the tail would be substantially different. The color patterning would also be quite different, in that split faces and differently colored head and body patches might be allowed. In short, the originators of the breed apparently wanted a dog different than the original SFT and created language in the standard to reflect those differences.
I see no reason that smaller dogs cannot be "robust and healthy." It seems to me that since the origin of the breed the TFT has been a robust and healthy dog that had many uses on the farm. It was not simply a ratter; the Toy Fox Terrier was also commonly used to hunt squirrels. Go back far enough in any of the older TFT lines and you will find dogs with squirrel hunting titles and even nite hunt titles. They may have had slightly greater weight limits, but they were not held to a height standard. Somehow they managed to do all of their work with few broken bones--I imagine that the selection in those cases was natural selection, in that those who broke and those who did not work were eliminated from the gene pool through death or deliberat culling.
Unfortunately, the history of these farm dogs is shrouded in some mystery. Farmers do not often keep track of what dog is being bred to what dog in the manner that conformation breeders do. They breed for working ability and characteristics, not pedigree. Multiple-sired litters are pretty much a way of life when intact dogs run free together. There might be no proof that there is Chihuahua in the TFT lineage; however, the curled tail suggests that the Chihuahua is there. There is no proof that the MinPin is there, either, but the shorter forearm and the insufficient shoulder angle that produces hackney movement suggests that there may have been one or two or more in the mix as well. Once again, however, the current breed is not simply the sum of its parts. It is its own unique breed, no matter what dogs have been meshed to produce it. I have never seen evidence of "dwarfism related anomalies" in Toy Fox Terriers. In general, they are a healthy breed that can still function as normal dogs.
To say that the TFT must have a narrower head to make it "more functional and punishing to get rid of vermin" seems to be a reasonable argument on its face, but it does not take into account the other terrier breeds that do not have extremely narrow heads. Look at the historical Fox Terrier and the historical Scottish, Airedale, Soft Wheaten, and other breeds of terrier, none of those heads were extremely narrow in order to be "punishing." In fact, many of the gripping breeds have wider heads and shorter muzzles to proved greater deadly force. A terrier need not grip its prey for any length of time to provide the killing blow to its prey. That force is created by the "terrier shake," which is used to sever the spine of its prey as it quickly moves from one mouse or rat to the next. TFTs, like other terriers need sufficient span of head and jaw to create the force necessary to bite down on their prey and shake hard enough to kill--there is no need to crush or hold on for any length of time. For the same reason, an elegant neck can become too elegant (Dobermans with Wobblers come to mind) and prevent the terrier from being able to effectively shake its prey.
I cannot for the life of me think of a good reason for why a weight limit, which has been in place for decades, is suddenly "not the best for our breed." Previous to the creation of the AKC standard, with its unreasonably tall upper height limit of 11.5 inches, dogs that were not able to be weighed in prior to being shown were simply removed from the show ring, if not from the breeding pool. I agree that some dogs may have had food withheld prior to being shown, but that strategy can only work to a certain degree. While it might be possible to withhold food to shave a half a pound or a quarter of a pound from dogs the size of the TFT, it is not possible to withhold a substantial amount of food without the dog becoming impaired or looking unhealthy. Such a dog would not win, so there is no point continuing the practice to any great degree. I see no reason for the older and more proven standard to adjust itself to the newer standard, especially in that the height standard is not being adhered to and the size of dogs is getting ever greater. If the AKC were to require that dogs were wicketed prior to going into the ring, as UKC TFTs are required to be weighed at each and every show, it might be worth considering if the AKC were to reduce its height limit.
I think that if there had not been such a concerted effort for people to modify the AKC standard away from the UKC standard and if there had not been the change from one group to another, then the problems that we are seeing would not have occurred. We simply need to find a way to return the breed to its original style and standard by correcting failed breeding practices or we must acknowledge that the TFT is no longer the same breed that it was and that we have failed as a group to protect the identity of the breed and move on to where we have divisions that are so familiar in Labrador retrievers, English Springer Spaniels, and German Shepherd Dogs, to name a few breeds. At that point, I think we need to divide the breed into the true TFT and petition to make the diverging dogs into their own breed or start breeding them with SFTs and creating a variety of that breed. The UKC TFT, quite simply, is the original TFT and no re-visioning is needed to make a viable breed.
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Kimberly Egan
LoupGarou (mostly) Toy Fox Terriers
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12-11-2009 04:32 PM
