What is it? I understand it to be wrong,but could you tell me exactly what it is?

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Opinions are like ar$eholes,everyone has got one.
I will say what I think, Like it or lump it.
Im too old to beat about the bush!

Line breeding is inbreeding. Line breeding is a term coined by breeders to describe inbreeding of close relatives but not parent/offspring or full siblings, however it is still inbreeding.
This is done to "set type" ie so that all animals produced look like each other.

So for instance if your sister is tall with dark hair, you can breed your sister to a tall dark haired cousin that looks a bit like your sister, then the offspring are likely to be tall and dark haired, if any are small and fair haired you avoid them and only breed the tall dark haired ones to perhaps another cousin or to their tall dark haired grandfather or their tall dark haired uncle. The more times you breed tall related dark haired people together the more likely you are to have tall dark haired offspring, until you find that just about all are tall and dark haired.
You have thus "set" the tall dark haired "type".

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Lauren

Don't Shop Adopt! - Stop Puppy Farming

Battery Farmed Dogs Campaign (Puppy Farming)

I am NOT recommending this site or the title of the article - I am simply posting the link because it has some clear examples on there of the different types of breeding from tight inbreeding through to complete outcrosses

The Myth of Canine 'Incest' | Absolut Bullmarket French Bulldogs

Interestingly, this doesn't happen in Labs - you cannot breed for a specific shade - some have done so with moderate success - but overall, you can't breed for 'dark chocolate' labradors or 'fox red shade' labradors.

Yes, you can breed for a type, and outcrosses will often 'breed to type' - in terms of conformation - and you can breed for colour - and in chocolate Labs, this is an area the PF have cashed in on far too much, resulting in the poor reputation chocolate Labs have in many quarters

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What you need to know before buying a Labrador puppy

Fox Red Labradors are the same e/e genotype as Ruby Cavaliers, and Red Irish Setters. This deep shade has been bred for in these breeds, and therefore it could be accomplished in Labradors IF that was an aim. The locus that sets the depth of color has been postulated as an 'intensifier' locus, but has not yet been identified. Even without it, though, in the two breeds mentioned breeders have been able to accomplish the intensity of color fairly consistently.

In regards to the shade of brown in Chocolates, Sheila Schmutz has already identified the b's', b'd', and b'c' recessive alleles on the Brown locus, which each have their different shades. The shades could be bred for.

More on that is on her page linked here - http://homepage.usask.ca/~schmutz/dogbrown.html

You are very correct in pointing out that it is many that are unscrupulous that will be jumping on this first. My young neice and her new husband currently own a 6 months old 'pale chocolate' labrador pup (to see him I believe he is dilute as well - lilac altogether), which suffers from a high strung temperament, an underbite, and severe separation anxiety and skin issues. It is a good thing he is much loved.

CC

Holly1, your understanding of it being wrong is a bit simplistic, line breeding has been used to breed many animals for as long as we've domesticated them. Line breeding used as a tool to breed can be done very effectively, but it has also been used, along with inbreeding in the past, to the detriment of some breeds. So just because some unscrupulous breeders have made poor breeding decisions using this method, it doesn't mean the method itself is wrong. Hope that makes sense.

CC, I think what Swarthy's saying, and I'd agree, is sticking two paler chocolates together, or two fox reds/dark yellows, won't necessarily give you all pale chocolates, or all fox reds/dark yellows necessarily, the resultant pups won't be exactly the same shade, some may be as pale, or dark etc. It's a bit like the myth that I've heard a couple of times, that to get chocolate Labs you mate a black and a yellow together, it's amazing what people believe. I think I'd agree you'd need to test to see exactly what you've got and then using another tested dog, you could breed for a specific shade, but it would be more breeding for a range of shades, if that makes sense??

And doing that with the genetic knowledge would most certainly reduce the gene pool further and is personally not a route I would like to go down - we don't breed fox red pups, we breed yellow pups -some of whom, may be fox-red - I do appreciate you could test for the 'Dd' locus - but chocolates can and do change so dramatically in terms of colouring from birth to adulthood - so someone buying a 'nice light choccie puppy' could still find themselves with a nice dark pup as an adult

Having just posted on another thread about colour combinations, I had forgotten about the 'Yellow/black' mix to produce chocolate

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What you need to know before buying a Labrador puppy

I know of one couple who did actually advertise chocolate pups from a black x yellow mating, they were incredibly surprised that none of the pups were either chocolate, or even yellow

Could I just ask a question about Labs?
20 years ago,I never heard of a chocolate lab.Is it golden and black mixed?

So inbreeding/line breeding is accepted under what generation gap?

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Opinions are like ar$eholes,everyone has got one.
I will say what I think, Like it or lump it.
Im too old to beat about the bush!

Sorry,just re read the bit about the labs!

__________________
Opinions are like ar$eholes,everyone has got one.
I will say what I think, Like it or lump it.
Im too old to beat about the bush!

The first Labradors that were imported to this country, were actually called St John's Dogs, and they came from Newfoundland. The original two colours were brown and black, although brown, for whatever reason, became undesireable, and they were generally drowned at birth, in the bad old days. Other breed types were used to develop the Labrador retriever, this was many years before the KC even existed, or pedigree dogs, and dogs were bred to 'type' for a particular pupose. It's thought that the introduction of hounds into the mix, produced yellow dogs, and that's where the three colours come from