The American Beagler Forum

I have never thought of making a cross like this before, never in my mind I would line breed until I got this female. I like her a lot, yes she has faults but very few that I can deal with. The male I am going to cross her with is very explosive and I've seen him do some remarkable stuff in the past. Seen this 13 inch male run down a healthy swamp rabbit. This male is the fastest hound I ever saw. I understand with line breeding you can double up on some bad traits, but for you all out there that has done it, what did you get both positive and negative.


Thank you

I will chime in on this one. You are probably going to get a bunch of diffirent answers on this one, mostly because it will have worked out great for some, others, not so much. Main reason it works/ doesnt work is that some lines can take it, some can"t. Some lines have more faults back behind them than others. Some traits that are recessive are more apt to come out on a close line breed. Truth is, your just gonna have to try it and see what happens. If it works, it will work again. I just dont know if I would take the chance unless I was in the position to keep all the pups and evaluate them all for myself. Whichever you decide, good luck

I would like to know more about this male Casey!

No more than any of us get to see others dogs run, picking a line or a pup that will grow up to be what you want is impossible.

Best to save your money and go try out a dog and get one like you want and be done with it. The dog you bought and are satisfied with is the line you like best. Go by the dog, not the breeding or line.

Who cares if it is out of Backtrack Sally and Garbage Can Mike? I sure wouldn't if it did what I wanted and needed to make me happy.

You need a working knowledge of the ancestors of the cross your fixing to make. You need to know the parents , grandparents, and great grands to know if any faults exist that you do not like. Now on the other hand 1/2 sibling cross is inbreeding to some and line breeding to others either way it is a good cross and will usually produce what you are looking for. I for one like line-breeding and inbreeding not real fond of out-crossing but necessary sometimes. I like this cross I have two sisters here and there brother with the same dam but different sire I would not hesitate to breed them but for now 3 beagles is enough for me. I also have the option to breed my females to the sire of my male pup which would be a good line breeding. My male is line-bred on FC Elks Creek Blue Babe.

Ole Mule wrote:You need a working knowledge of the ancestors of the cross your fixing to make. You need to know the parents , grandparents, and great grands to know if any faults exist that you do not like. Now on the other hand 1/2 sibling cross is inbreeding to some and line breeding to others either way it is a good cross and will usually produce what you are looking for. I for one like line-breeding and inbreeding not real fond of out-crossing but necessary sometimes. I like this cross I have two sisters here and there brother with the same dam but different sire I would not hesitate to breed them but for now 3 beagles is enough for me. I also have the option to breed my females to the sire of my male pup which would be a good line breeding. My male is line-bred on FC Elks Creek Blue Babe.

I do know the ancestors.

Alabama John wrote:I would like to know more about this male Casey!

No more than any of us get to see others dogs run, picking a line or a pup that will grow up to be what you want is impossible.

Best to save your money and go try out a dog and get one like you want and be done with it. The dog you bought and are satisfied with is the line you like best. Go by the dog, not the breeding or line.

Who cares if it is out of Backtrack Sally and Garbage Can Mike? I sure wouldn't if it did what I wanted and needed to make me happy.

SO your saying to judge a whole line of dogs off one dog john? I couldn't disagree with you more if i'm reading the right. Example: I bought a heavy indian hills bred male a few years back. If I was to judge the whole line off of that turd eatin mouthy trash runnin POS then every single Indian hills bred dog should have been culled including major and everyone knows that is crazy. I would NEVER judge a whole line off of one single dog within that line as your just setting your self up for failure if you do in my opinion!
Back to the original question Casey I would get ahold of someone who has done a bunch of line breeding and see what kind of results they are seeing. I would bet they are getting some really nice ones but I also would think they are culling pretty hard to keep the junk out. jmo

Alabama John wrote:I would like to know more about this male Casey!

No more than any of us get to see others dogs run, picking a line or a pup that will grow up to be what you want is impossible.

Best to save your money and go try out a dog and get one like you want and be done with it. The dog you bought and are satisfied with is the line you like best. Go by the dog, not the breeding or line.

Who cares if it is out of Backtrack Sally and Garbage Can Mike? I sure wouldn't if it did what I wanted and needed to make me happy.

I understood Johns post to say pick the dog not the bloodline that meets YOUR fancy. Once you pick that dog then evidently the bloodline behind that dog is what you like. Doesn't mean YOU will like every dog from that bloodline as every breeding is a spin of the wheel as to what male genes will line up with what female genes. Ole mother nature is a hard one to figure out and I have yet to see anyone do so to be able to reproduce likeness with consistency, EXCEPT by cloning. IMHO line breeding stacks some of the cards YOU like a little deeper in the pile but it also stacks some YOU may not like deeper as well. A good example is of twins they came from the same/same everything but may be totally different. That's just two, how many from a same/same litter of 6 are the same /same? My guess is few. How many can actually trace their own ancestry back very far until the paperwork is gone let alone dogs we have owned for a few generations? What I understood John to say is it's all
about YOUR liking of the individual dog and not the family from which that individual came from because ole Backtrack Sally and Garbage Can Mike may very well produce Numeral UNO in YOUR eyes.

I have bred 1/2 siblings 4 times. 3 times they worked out well and turned into exactly what i was wanting. the other time it was just fair dogs that i didnt think came close to the parents standards.
i know or owned the parents and grand parents. of all these crosses. i think knowing the line behind these crosses are more important then the cross it self. i know of a few guys making this cross but not knowing anything behind one side of the cross. the out come doesnt seem to work out for them more often then not. im not a pro by any means. but i stuck to the basic line breeding crosses and have not gone to close with mother/son or father/daughter crosses.
I should add that i always keep at least 2 pups from a cross, male and female. once i decide which one will be kept, i breed the next 1/2 sibling cross.
the best cross i have found are back to grandparents or great uncles/aunts. but that might be the line im working with in.

Casey Harner wrote:I do know the ancestors.

If you like what you see I say go for it.

I wouldn't hesitate to make a half brother sister cross. All of my dogs are linebred to begin with and a few years ago I made a full brother sister cross, they were littermates. Everyone I talked to said it was too close and it was a bad idea. The male and female were my best two dogs so I did it against everyones advice. I kept and started all the puppies. I got three males and two females. I sold one male whose legs were a little on the short side for me which is not typical of my line so I sold him to a guy and never heard back from the guy again. The other two males I started. One of the males was outstanding and I sold him to a guy I know and I have breeding rights on him. The third male was decent, but since the brother was outstanding, and I was tight on kennel space I gave hime away as a pet. I was desperate to free up kennel space and I regret not running him more. I started both females. Both of the females showed a lot of talent. One of them is exceptional, she is the best dog I have bred since her parents were born. The other one showed great line running talent but didn't stick at her checks and would lose the rabbit so I gave her away as a pet. So out of the four I started, two were outstanding, and two are house pets.

Diesel x Singer is the littermate cross.

A second litter I bred Diesel to Dora, a half brother sister cross. I got one male and three females. I started them all. The male turned out real good and I sold him to someone I know cheap and retained breeding rights. One female didn't stick at her checks and would quickly lose the rabbit, I gave her away as a pet. The second female never really started, she would jump in with other dogs for 50 to 100 yards of a chase and then quit and come back. She is also a pet now. The third female is doing really well and is a keeper.

I also made another cross a year ago. I took the male from the Diesel x Dora cross and bred him to Singer who is Diesels littermate sister. Diesel, Singer, and Dora are all out of the same mother Bonnie so I made a triple Bonnie cross. Only had three females. One of them turned out to be to loose at the checks and loved to fight. She is a pet now. The second one has tons of desire, but is too loose working for me and I gave her to a guy to try out. The third one is doing extremely well and can solo a rabbit for hours and has been real good right from the first day she started.

I have made some real tight matings and they have worked well. I'm at the point where I need an outcross now.

It's not too close and it's not a bad mating if it works. You just have to start them all and be willing to cull or give away as pets the ones that don't make the cut.

It not line breeding casey its inbreeding

Line-breeding is essentially in-breeding to a lesser degree. There is a fine line between in-breeding and line-breeding some see it one way and some see it another I do not see any reason not to breed dogs the way one wants to, if you think it will give you what you want go for. In-breeding also promotes an increase in prepotency, which is the ability of an individual to consistently pass on its characteristics. This prepotency results from the increase in homozygosity. Since an inbred individual will have more homozygous gene pairs than a non-inbred individual, there are fewer possible gene combinations for the sperm or egg cells. As a result, the offspring should be more similar to each other. Line-breeding is probably the best known use of in-breeding. Line-breeding is an attempt to maintain a high relationship to some outstanding ancestor while keeping the in-breeding COI as low as possible.

I try to target in the range of 9% - 14% COI..
I think this range allows you to lock in desirable traits without running the risks of health defects..
I'm not saying that going higher than 14% COI is a bad thing at all,because I've done it with good results,I just think staying in that 9-14% range you can lock in traits and not have to worry about the possibility of health risks..
I'm a fan of linebreeding/Inbreeding, If you feel good about the cross then I wouldn't hesitate on breeding half brother/sister.

"Out of the last 30sum Kentucky Derby Winners only 2 of them didn't have atleast one common ancestor in their 4 generation pedigree..
So all but 2 were linebred,The majority of them had 2-3 common ancestors in their 4 gen ped."

How do you calculate COI?

hard on a check wrote:I try to target in the range of 9% - 14% COI.. I think this range allows you to lock in desirable traits without running the risks of health defects.
I'm a fan of linebreeding/Inbreeding, If you feel good about the cross then I wouldn't hesitate on breeding half brother/sister. "

Half Brother to Half Sister is 12.5% COI that is an acceptable percent.