Quote:
Originally Posted by Dragonlady
The pup has black and pink marbled gums and a pink tongue. The vet has seen him twice and she thinks she sees different physical characteristics than the Humane Societys version of events! 
Can you define "robust"? How many individuals are we talking about? I have been unable to find any test that has every possible breed, although a few have upward of 200. In this case, I would look for one heavily weighted toward large breeds (pup is 14.5 lbs at 8 weeks!) since I don't think there were many tiny breeds involved in this beast.
Thanks for your advice! |
Well that is hard to say because it partly depends on the markers they are using to determine breed. For instance one of the things I do is forensic analysis on salmon. We developed a test which will tell us what Pacific salmon species we are looking at in our test sample. We had to run standards of all possible species including closely related trout species and analyzed a few hundred/species for our baseline. We were looking at a gene that varied little within a species but a lot between species. That took a lot of standardizing before we could present that sort of evidence in court. It is actually much easier and in my opinion a better use if your question is parentage. In your case you have a mutt which likely did not come from two purebred individuals but rather were mutts themselves so you likely have multiple breeds contributing to the genetics of your pup. If they are looking at a number of loci you may very well have a confusing mix of genotypes which may well include breeds not listed in the test.
Sorry I can't be more helpful but I don't have enough information regarding the tests to be any more specific but I think it might work better when you are testing an individual that is being sold as purebred and there is a question about that or when you are testing for particular parents. Good luck, I am sure that the pup is keeping you hopping regardless of breed
. And while I might very well be wrong about this I think I would tend to lean towards the vet assessment, likely over the next few months things will start firming up your feelings about the mix as he loses his generic puppy look and developing his adult coat and body.