I could tell you the names of several DM/DM dogs which are over 10 years old (one is even 14 years old) and still walk good (compared to their age)... Unfortunately the owners do not agree...
What I can do - I will travel to visit some of them in May. I can try to take some videos of them (the videos will not show the heads but the movement)...
And it is no wonder - Wolfdogs are different in this case...
Just look - DM is not a NEW illness. It has been in the "blood" of your dogs since founding of the breed because it came from German Shepherds... The DM tests are avaible for a
long time... Vets know this illness very well - many GSDs suffer from it...
It is absolutely not true. The test for research purposes is available from 2008, to 2009 from commercial laboratories, the scientific articles with all the good practice was published in 2009. You can not talk about "long time"
the articles was send from Coates staff on December 2008,
The body to verify the validity of the content published in February 2009:
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/20...97106.abstract
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/20....full.pdf+html
Why for many years there was not even one case of person who wrote about such problems by his/her dog? Why nobody wrote that Wolfdogs can have DM?
The answer is simply: because even if there are pretty many CzWs which are "carriers" and "affected"
only VERY small amount of DM/DM dogs show serious symptoms...
Dr Gandini said the test is not in use long enough to do any kind of estimate on the results. There is no certainty that the dog DM / DM develops symptoms, but there is no certainty that there are dogs DM / DM can not get sick. There are some reported cases of old dogs DM/DM without symptoms (but the official scientific publications do not mention), which are being studied. The only certainty is scientifically accepted that all dogs with genetic testing for DM with symptoms according to the official diagnostic protocol, and that were affected after the autopsy, were all DM / DM. Any other implications among the test and the development of the disease is currently under study even in races more monitored.
In the 12 years I saw hundreds of Wolfdogs. But not even one which had such problems as Forrest.
Sure that DM appears by CzWs too - but it appears when the dogs are already old (8+). And the symtoms are not so good visible... It is why the illness was "hidden" for so many years: many people, even if they saw a DM/DM dog though (because of the age of the dogs) that they walk "different" because of their age... Nobody though it can be symtom of any other "illess" than the most known: old age....
Falco is not CARRIER (N/DM). HE is
AFFECTED dog (DM). Carriers do not get ill...
But here you forgot one thing - Falco is brother of Forrest (the dog from the video). Both are DM/DM, both get ill in the (pretty) early age and by both dogs the illness develop very fast...
It doesn't mean it apply for all other "affected" dogs... It means only that exactly by this "family" there must be something in the genes what "activate" the illness... And exactly all breeding dogs from
this line must be tested.
It doesn't mean other dogs do not need to be tested. It means only that by the dogs with similar ancestors a DM test is a must...