A dog's breed doesn't determine its behavior
By Jennifer Stoeckl, MAT - Dire Wolf Project CEO, Feb. 22, 2024
Or so science says.
This notion is circulating in dog circles again…
“A dog’s breed doesn’t determine its behavior.”
Underlying the entire thing is an agenda.
A sinister, sickening, and evil agenda.
And while the idea came about from a so-called genetics study, the underlying hidden purpose doesn’t have to do with science at all, but breed specific legislation.
Apparently, a 2022 genetics study involving more than 2,000 dogs, paired with 200,000 answers from Darwin’s Ark, an open-source database of owner-reported canine traits and behaviors surveys, suggests that breed alone is a poor predictor of behavior.
Do you know how they correlated those two things?
They tried to combine owner survey answers with gene identification.
According to Walter Beckwith writing for the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), “Behavioral data was analyzed across owner-reported breeds and genetically detected breed ancestries. The results of these tests, which included data from 78 breeds, identified 11 genetic loci strongly associated with behavior, though none of these were specific to breed.”
Please note the wording… it is very important.
“strongly associated with behavior”
In other words, the researchers involved in this study have NO idea which behaviors or how they are associated.
So far, only one gene has been specifically identified through DNA analysis with a particular propensity for a certain behavior.
Research has suggested a correlation between aggressive behavior and a low activity or deficiency of the MAOA enzyme, which is coded for by the MAOA gene, especially in response to environmental stressors.
This has led to it being labeled “the warrior gene”.
No other gene (or set of genes) has yet been correlated with a particular behavior.
So, for anyone to suggest that dog breeds play little to no role in significant breed-wide behavior, I have some ocean-front property in Arizona to sell you.
Now, I know I am going to upset some of you on this list.
That’s fine. I understand this is a hotly debated topic in the dog world.
But it has deep connections to how (or even if) we can significantly alter the temperament of the dogs bred within the Dire Wolf Project, especially in only 35 years.
If breeds were not capable of predictable breed-wide temperaments, then we could never hope to achieve the world’s first large breed family companion dog.
And that’s simply ridiculous.
The Russian Fox Farm experiments PROVED otherwise.
By the fourth generation, some foxes were showing a strong willingness to interact with humans, seeking attention and displaying social behaviors.
The Russian geneticists also produced a strain of highly aggressive foxes.
Little is talked about that aspect of the experiment, but their work is definitive.
All you have to do is SEE those two separate strains of foxes for yourself to know…
There absolutely is a genetic component to true aggression
and its opposite: friendliness.
Whether geneticists will find the specific genetic code to it is another matter.
They should probably fully code the foxes at the Institute of Cytology and Genetics in Novosibirsk, Russia.
I bet they’ll find it there.
Be that as it may, Walter Beckwith concluded his AAAS article this way, “Other behaviors, like aggression — a trait unfairly linked to some breeds, like pit bulls — has more to do with the environment in which a dog is raised than its genes.”
And that, my dear friends, is the sick agenda revealed in all its sinister glory.
If you want to continue to “believe the science” without doing your own thinking, that’s up to you.
However, if you want a chance to raise a true gentle giant where ethical breeders have systematically worked for 35+ years to eliminate as much of the working traits from the breed as possible then you have come to the right place.
Every dog is an individual and, of course, behavior can be shaped and molded through environmental conditioning over time, but how much time and energy do you want to put into your next dog?
Start with a great foundation.
See the gentleness of this amazing breed for yourself in our latest video.
And when you are ready for a calm, gentle, devoted dog unlike any other, apply here:
https://direwolfdogs.com/puppy-application/
Jennifer Stoeckl is the co-founder of the Dire Wolf Project, founder of the DireWolf Guardians American Dirus Dog Training Program, and owner/operator of DireWolf Dogs of Vallecito. She lives in the beautiful inland northwest among the Ponderosa pine forests with her pack of American Dirus dogs.