First things first: Gene has informed me that our next dog should be named Patrice, after the much maligned character on How I Met Your Mother. Considering that three dogs puts us above capacity, I assume that he will have forgotten this whim by the time we’re in the market for a new dog. (I also expect THAT to not happen for many years as Betty and Scooby are merely middle aged and have a lot of life in them).
Secondly, a month or so ago, the website Woot had a deal of the day for the Wisdom Panel Dog DNA kit. The exact item had been on my Amazon wish list for about a year but Woot’s price was about 40% cheaper than Amazon. Since we had to buy three I was eager to get it as cheaply as possible.
(And now that we know the results, I feel a little foolish about paying even the discount price. Not that swabbing your dog’s mouth doesn’t make you look like a jackass anyway, but I digress).
(#FirstWorldProblems)
Back in the day, when my Grandma M and I would talk about the dogs she would always say “And you have beagle hounds, right Elaine?” and I’d say Yes.
Anyway. The votes are in and we are zero for three in terms of “I wonder what breed the dogs are?”.
Scooby – Scooby was listed on Petfinder as a beagle mix and to look at him, I completely believed it. I was 1000% sure that the test results would say “Beagle and shepherd. Have you even looked at your dog before?”. So imagine my surprise when the results stated he’s a “Chihuahua, German Wirehaired Pointer, Pekingese, Shetland Sheepdog, Tibetan Spaniel Mix”. The best parts were the chihuahua and pekingese, which are purse dog breeds and Scooby is absolutely a 100-lb German Shepherd in the body of a 25-lb dog. He loves to tangle with big dogs.
Betty – Betty was also listed as a beagle mix, I think. To be honest, when I saw her on Petfinder I knew she was our dog and the description could have said she was a Pit bull mixed with killer bee and I still would have oohed and aahed and ponied up the $80 to bring her home. After 10-ish years of ownership, Gene and I have assumed beagle and corgi and Luis Guzman’s forehead. So again…imagine my surprise when the results say she’s a “Chow chow, Pomeranian, Rhodesian Ridgeback, Samoyed, Vizsla Mix”. In retrospect, the pomeranian and Chow Chow parts don’t surprise me as they look like exceptionally sheddy dogs but Rhodesian Ridgebacks and Vizslas are long legged and short haired. Betty is…umm, furry and longer haired and has the shortest legs and most adorable paws ever.
Sadie Pot Pie: Sadie has always been our big question mark. Even the pet rescuer we adopted her from politely dodged our breed questions with “Umm, there’s lot of things in her!”. (The question was, “We think she looks a lot like our other girl dog, who we think is Beagle and Corgi”). We’ve posited a ton of theories about Sadie’s lineage but have mostly given up (“Sure, Corgi, golden retriever. Why not?”). So once again, imagine my surprise when the results came back to reveal: Beagle and Labrador Retriever. (And a lot of other things. At least half of her lineage is still listed as “Mixed Breed”, a/k/a who knows?).
So all in all, we thought we had a bepherd, a corgle and a whatever and it turns out we have a 25 lb purse dog, a 35 lb large breed dog and a 55 lb beagle. We have the melting pot of doggies and I maintain that all three of them can out badass anything at Westminster. Genetics are amazing things.