Nora was born in
August 2011 and appeared perfectly normal. She grew
well and was the largest bitch in the litter. At around
9-10 weeks of age she became slightly lame on a foreleg,
we thought she had done something silly while playing
and would be fine in a day or two.
This was not to be and Nora went to the vet.
X rays were taken and it seemed that she had something
similar to UAP in both elbows.Her ribcage was quite
deformed causing the heart & lungs to be elongated
and somewhat compressed. She underwent surgery at Fitzpatricks
and spent nearly 3 months with very restricted exercise.
The general consensus seems to be that she suffers from
a birth defect, cause unknown.
Nora embraces life and joins in with whatever is going
on in the household. In due course she will be neutered
but remains here with us for as long as she has a good
quality of life.
The
BRACCANZA policy towards good health
Firstly,
I would like to say that before we even bred our first litter,
health was uppermost in my mind. I wanted to stay close
to the Italian breed standard while taking the minimum risk
of causing or perpetuating any health problem in the breed.
One of the biggest difficulties here in the UK is trying
to get in new bloodlines for the Bracco. Although we only
breed a litter occasionally and would not expect more than
2 litters from a bitch we try to find a male outside of
the UK for at least one of these matings to bring in new
bloodlines to the UK genepool.
As the years have gone on and by keeping records in the
UK it starts to appear that some breeding lines may have
problems, although probably through no fault of their own.
All
dogs registered with the UK Kennel Club have screening result
details recorded in the breed record supplement issued quarterly
by the KC. This places results in the public domain and
can be checked by anyone. This is not the case worldwide
where results of these tests may often be between the owner
and their country’s KC making responsible breeding
even harder.
It
is incredibly difficult to check back through most of the
Italian lines for potential problems as the Italian breeders
do not, generally, have health checks carried out on their
dogs. HD and even more so ED can go unnoticed in the movement
of some dogs and only screening can definitely rule out
possible problems.
All
BRACCANZA brood bitches are now screened for Hip Dysplasia
(HD), Elbow Dysplasia (ED) and hold a current clear eye
certificate. All sires which are considered to cover our
bitches will have as many of these tests done as are available
in the country they live in. All puppies will go to their
new homes with copies of the parents test results as well
as general information.
While
we do our utmost to ensure that all dogs and bitches in
our breeding programme are HD & ED free it is not a
100% guarantee of producing a perfectly healthy puppy. We
can only do our best to achieve this and should any problem
occur during the life of the dog we will work with the owner
and vet to find the best possible solution.
As
from 2009 the Bracco Italiano Society has begun an in depth
health survey with results available to all BIS members
and also on the website.
www.bracco-italiano.co.uk
 |
An
Opportunity not to be missed |
|
Bracchi
in this country are in the early stages of numbers growing
and therefore this is a perfect time to start taking tests
and keeping records. This would lay the foundations for
tracing any health problems within the breed for the future.
Please consider having your dog tested wherever it came
from, we need as full a coverage of the breed as possible.
The AHT (Animal Health Trust) has offered to take, test
& store results of all tested Bracchi for a minimal
fee of £5 per dog. This is simple to do yourself at
home and only involves swabbing the mouth with a long cotton
bud before returning the sample to the AHT.
Kits are available from Cristiana Hill at philip.hill50@ntlworld.com
