GSD movement in slow motion Videos

I personally haven't but there were people videoing so some may appear on the net at some time, I found the whole show really interesting especially the long coat classes.

I have to admit I wondered if anyone would pick that up ?

She was a very young pup, it would be interesting to see her as an adult,

Anyone care to comment on the structure of this dog?



Or this one?

The adults were pretty flappy in their feet too - also I have seen many puppies over the years and only 1 with wobbly hocks and hocks that sometimes touched the floor and that was a show bred GSD. It is not natural for a dog to walk like that - regardless of the age of the dog

Do you have any clips of them moving or standing normally?

Dog in first pic



Dog in 2nd pic

Yes. Just a quick one, for now. Gorgeous head lovely face. Good strong front half... But it seems to start going wrong at the "high point" of the back. Then seems week around the hip area. Even standing without the stack, or lean, it still seems to have a high point on the back.

Which dog are you referring to?

ok difficult from a picture but here goes. Dog A Good head & expression, Slightly flat wither which makes me want to feel for shoulder placement, steep croup & slightly long in hind pastern. Dog B Good head & exoression Good front topline & croup appear betterthan dog A but right rear lower leg is not at 90 degrees so this could be an optical illusion.

Yup. I would say that I am looking at 2 beautiful dogs that clearly and very sadly within a few years will be cripples.

I live next door to a beautiful GSD who looked the picture of health in every where as a young adult dog. He is now, not even in double figures, virtually a cripple. He can no longer jump into the back of my neighbours' car, his back end has collapsed and he is virtually sitting down on his hocks the whole time.

What I see in these 2 pictures are 2 lovely dogs who already are unable to stand properly on their hind legs. Those horrible sloping backs are not natural, and I cannot understand how any dog lover can think this is attractive, healthy or acceptable.

My eldest boy Tai, a registered Utonagan, although I think of him as a Mal cross because he is very mally in his looks and behaviour, is the picture of health at aged 10. He can still run like the wind, catch rabbits, squirrels, jump a cross country solid wooden spread fence from a standstill or at the run, he is as fit as the day we rescued him 5 or so years ago. He has stiffened up a bit, I suspect he is getting a bit arthritiky, but he is still an athlete. With a beautiful topline and absolutely no horrible dropped haunches - God how I hate to see that

BOTH Dogs, i'm afraid.
:-( :-(

Ok,dog 1 has not been health tested yet as has only just turned a year old.Dog no 2 is 2 yrs old,has been hip and elbow scored with very good results.Neither of these dogs walk on their hocks and are very fit and healthy.
"Crippled in a few years" I dont think so.

How on earth can you come up with such an outrageous statement , simply by looking at a couple of pics

Very well put, much more polite than what came to my head when i read that statement

Cripples in a few years is a bit of a strong statment
Having said that I cannot think of a single GSD that is fit and healthy into double figures - That would be pet/show/sport bred ones - i dont know any older working line ones
(would be very happy to see fotos of the golden oldies)

As people always seem to want to discredit peoples qualifications to talk on a subject I will say before I start here
I have never bred or owned and GSD
However I have a degree in an engineering subject and worrked for 6 years in that field - so I am qualified to talk about power and force on joints

So although it is great that GSD's are being tested for HD that is not the full picture here
and we dont fully understand HD at the moment anyways
There are working sheepdogs with very high scoring hips who are working day in day out to a old age. Are they in great pain? We cannot say 100% - but dogs are so stoic we cant say that about any dog
Also vets are now saying to exercise dogs with HD as the muscles help to stabalise the joint

Now with how we are currently breeding the GSD it is with the pelvis rotated forwards a bit so that the hind foot can reach forwards more and give the dog the supposed gaited trot
Whether this is actually needed is up for debate as the origonal dogs did not have this and other breeds doing the same job dont have this

A normally built dog when moving the point of greatest power in the back legs is just when the foot is slightly behind the hip - this means the foot driving backwards using that powerful hip muscle is driving the dog forwards
Bear in mind this is how dogs have evolved to be able to walk as well - in the not even 100 years since we decided to adapt the shape of the GSD we have only changed its shape, the muscles, ligaments etc have not evolved to be able to cope with the changes

In the tilted pelvis GSD we have tilted the pelvis forwards - this also brings forward the point where the limb would be able to put down the most power to when the hind foot is slightly infront of the hip
This means the force cannot be pushing backwards and driving the dog forwards - the only force at that point for a dog moving forwards can actually be pushing the dog upwards - and the angles we have created for the dogs this is what needs to happen - either the dog has to push up the hips as the legs are slightly longer at the point the foot is below the hip - this makes a jumpy gait, OR to keep a nice level topline the only other option for the dog is for the hocks to wobble out slightly - which is what they do

So now we have dogs who are not able to use the giant thigh muscles to propel themselves forward - most of the power is having to come from the front of the dog
This means the thigh muscle develops less well (so the hip joint is less well stabalised) and the front of the dog muscles up more

Sadly we are getting used to GSD's looking like this - and that is not right. It looks more and more normal for the dogs to have vastly curved backs
It isnt - they are dogs - and dogs are not supposed to walk like that

time will tell, but I bet you a pound to a squashy orange that I will be right.

Because that is how next door's GSD, who I have known ever since a wee puppy, looked, and now is as I describe ... a cripple ... and he is not even in double figures yet. There is a lovely man who I have known ever since we moved to our village 24 years ago who has always had GSDs. The first one I knew was the largest heavy coated GSD I have ever seen, and the gentlest. He was a gorgeous boy and he lived to some incredible age for such a huge dog, well into double figures. His top line was perfect, no slope, and he was not down on his hocks. Every GSD since this family has had has the classic sloping back and has been down on the hocks and has not lived into double figures. Each one of these dogs all looked like the dogs in the pictures here, each one ended up cripples.

Nothing outrageous there, just telling the truth.

So you know the GSDs is like he is because of his shape!
Your description sounds more like DM a desease of the spinal cord which stops messages getting through from the brain like muscular dystrophy in humans & having had a dog with this & so met many others there is no way that shape of the dog has anything to do with it. It attacks all shapes & sizes.Thank God they have rexently found a marker in the DNA which has a link to DM which is thought to possibly be linked to an auto imune problem.
I have been fortunate enough to have owned two GSDs similar in shape to those two youngsters & both had good hip scores & were jumping in & out of ny car with no problem untill they died one at 14 with cancer & the other at nearly 16 fron a torsion.

Yup ... inasmuch as every GSD I know who has what I consider to be an extraordinary sloping back and a horrible down on the hocks movement, end up as cripples. when I was a child, in the 50's and 60's, GSDs - or Alsatians as they were called then - did not have sloping backs, and their back legs were not down on the hocks.

So,you are judging my dogs on a few that youve known.
I breed German showlines and yes they have a "Gentle" sloping topline.Not extreme in angulation.NONE of them walk on their hocks.All of them fit,healthy and active,even the older ones.If i wanted something with a level topline and a leg in each corner,i would buy a coffee table.Must dash,off out for a 3hr walk with my cripples.

Well as I said I owned two who you would say were deformed but were fit & active to old age.. Can't say about my current girl who is that shape & fit & active as she is only 8 & my rescue boy who looked more like the 60's dogs has just died riddled with arthritus at 13. My bitch I owned & showed in the
50's had problems towards the end due to the length of her back though she lived to 15.
Were I still judging I would provided they moved as well as they look give the two in the photo a high grading. Hope we soon get judging where adults need survys & scores to be shown rather than just looking & judging on the day as you can tell nothing about most health problems by looks.