Dear Sirs wake up!

In Italy, the litters born from white boxers are many. Many of them are planned by amateur breeders or common privates. In the last three years, our club has looked after fourteen litters among its members.
The results are the following.

Less than 100 puppies were born, the most of them fawn or brindle. Only 13 white puppies were born, since the owners decide spontaneously, sometimes guided by our advice, for matings that do not generate white puppies. The litter with the higher number of white puppies showed the number of 5 white over 9, but we are aware that there are cases presenting a higher percentage.

The morphology of the puppies is perfect: they are colored with white spots - in accordance with the expò standards - or white, totally similar to litters born from colored boxers. In some cases, the mantle is of a rare and fine variety, with white areas fairly open and well distributed, while the chromatic imperfections, as the depigmentation of the eyelid, are rare.

As regards the health of dogs, the puppies don’t show any particular problem: there have been zero cases of deafness, even among the white puppies. From an accidental mating between a brother and a sister, four white puppies were born and, in spite of consanguinity, they didn’t show any health problem, nor deafness.

One of our Members has examined in depth the topic from a genetic point of view and her conclusion (that will be soon available in English) are that, the introduction of white subjects in reproduction seems to bring no damage to the genetic make up in terms of deafness.

Colored puppies from white boxers have the same possibility to show congenital deafness as all the others colored boxers, that is none, since the pigmentation of the head protect them. On the other hand, in white sons born from both colored or both white boxers, the possibility that congenital deafness could affect the white puppies are seldom (the risk of deafness can be even reduced by using white parents). Moreover, white puppies are generated only if the mating occurs between a white and a colored that brings in its genetic make up a dominant white character.

From the mating among one white subjects and fully colored one, only colored puppies are generated. Therefore, the white color is always an outcome related to breeders’ decision.

The Italian Boxer Club has collected data referring to tens of white boxers demonstrating a good health, with seldom cases of congenital deafness: we point out the fact that white boxers displaying genetic deafness are colored boxers’ sons. Therefore, genetic deafness in boxers is transmitted not by white subject, but by the colored ones.

Some of white boxers’sons that we are looking after are now three years old. One of them has obtained the licence awarded by the ENCI (Italian canin organization of FCI) to be employed as a“search and rescue dog”. Some others have generated sons that are identical to other colored boxers, but unfortunately they are not admitted to obtain the pedigree.

On the basis of these results, we hope that Boxer KLUB of Monaco would foster the project of readmission of white boxer in standards and reproduction. In this way, the loss of the existing genetic make up would be avoided and a more conscious use of it would be easier implemented. Nowadays, the breeders’ practice shows a large use of colored subjects with a high percentage of white in their mantle. This implies that those white puppies born in the litters have to be excluded from expòs, matings and breeding. At the same time, fully colored boxers are used less and less.

We believe that the reintroduction of white boxers in breeding would permit the use of the entire genetic make up, since the matings between white and fully colored boxers give an outcome of 100% of colored puppies with white, that is the ideal mantle.

To conclude, we hope that THE Boxer Klub will decide to admit again the white boxer in the interest of the race, without being influenced in its decision by the pressures made from those peripheral clubs not interested in changes and results in using whites reached until now because of the absence of an economic turnover.

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Articolo con traduzione in italiano

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