Author Topic: Acral Mutilation Syndrome - 'New' inherited disease in working type cockers  (Read 5838 times)

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Offline Emilyoliver

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Not sure how many of you are aware of this condition (I've not seen anything on here - apologies if I missed it?)  It has been discussed on a number of fora recently as it seems to be rearing its ugly head in more dogs.  Here is a link to the lab who DNA tests for the condition with a bit of info - http://www.antagene.com/en/ams-acral-mutilation-syndrome-english-cocker-spaniel

It's only been found in working types as yet (but with mixing of types it could spread).  Not many dogs have yet been tested, and some carrier/affected status dogs can be found on the Cocker Spaniel Pedigree Database - http://www.cockerspanieldatabase.info.

Discussions can be read on the gundog training forum, as well as Facebook groups including 'Fully health tested working gundogs' and 'Health tested cocker spaniel litters and breeders'.  I believe the Cocker spaniel club has acknowledged the requirement to test for it in working type cockers (although not totally sure about this).

It is s horrible and incurable, progressive condition and the more awareness about it the better so that hopefully it can be stopped before it becomes more prevalent.
Michelle, Emily and Ollie

Offline Jane S

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We have mentioned it on here I think - I definitely added it to the list of genetic tests available a while ago anyway. The details about the test has been added to the Health page of the Cocker Spaniel Club for information (in the same way that information about AN has been added since a test is available) but the Club is not "requiring" dogs to be tested. I believe the Cocker Breed Council may be asking the Kennel Club to add this condition to their database (in the same way FN & prcd-PRA is) which means that the results of tested dogs will be attached to their registration (and possibly that ABS members will be required to test for AMS too). I've read a few online discussions about AMS and they remind me a bit of the time in the 80s when the control scheme for FN was first introduced - back then there were also well-established breeders who hadn't experienced the condition or claimed it wasn't hereditary or didn't exist. AMS may not be a common condition but that doesn't mean it should be ignored - recessive genes have a way of spreading quite quickly especially if well-known stud dogs turn out to be carriers.
Jane

Offline sueneil

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News of Antagene test for this condition in both Dog World and Our Dogs this week

Offline Jane S

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Thanks Sue. Also to update the previous post, the AMS test has now been added to the KC's list of recognised tests for Cockers so that test results will now be recorded on the registration system.
Jane

Offline Helen

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Had an interesting chat with a vet who was taking bloods for AMS at a recent working test.  He said that the test has been in place for years and AMS is already known in Springer Spaniels - it has got into cockers via cross breeding.

A good example of how cross breeding sometimes doesn't produce healthy hybrids, just more health issues - in this case a horrendous condition  :-\
helen & jarvis x


Offline MIN

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Followed a story about this on a Working Cocker Spaniel forum. Most distressing and horrific at the damage they can cause themselves.
the poor dog had to be PTS   Heartbreaking :'(
Run free and fly high my beautiful Gemma
2011 - 2023 

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Offline daw

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Had an interesting chat with a vet who was taking bloods for AMS at a recent working test.  He said that the test has been in place for years and AMS is already known in Springer Spaniels - it has got into cockers via cross breeding.

A good example of how cross breeding sometimes doesn't produce healthy hybrids, just more health issues - in this case a horrendous condition  :-\

This is very puzzling since there appears to be no scientific basis for your vet's assertion. Could you find the reference he cites, please? Or is he finding case histories of sprockers suffering from this in the literature which I have not? Once again point me in that direction please. Certainly this autosomal-recessive genetic disorder occurs is several populations (Spaniels, Springer, Cocker, French, German Short-haired and English Pointers among others). The incidents of it in the working cocker population is easy to explain- it is much more inbred than the show strain and therefore lack of genetic diversity inevitably brings together recessive genes in the matings. To say it has 'got in' via Springer spaniel crosses seems to defy current genetic theory. Certainly springer and cocker spaniels were once a single population. Then they split making two smaller gene pools. Both will have carried a whole variety of genes good and bad and AMS would have been one of them. Then over successive generations line breeding (in breeding) further depleted available genes as a whole. This is a known mechanism which is horrifically at work in numerous pedigree dog breeds. Out breeding is the solution not the cause! 

Offline Emilyoliver

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Daw - it is well known (but undocumented) that there are 'sprockers' registered as working type Cockers. In fact I'd say I very likely have one. He neither looks cockery and doesn't hunt like one either. He is very very springerish indeed. He has a red 'all cocker' pedigree and low coi (<10). So I would agree that and may well have entered the gene pool much more recently than many might think. Add to that sprockers in breeding lines further back as well. Names such as 'snake' are said to be indicators. Have a read about trialling cocker breeding (not only the scientific stuff), there's some very interesting info on development of the type. Yes, inbreeding can be linked to various 'ills', but is not to blame for every one. Interestingly, many of the carriers have been more 'unusual' colours. So perhaps something else at play?
Michelle, Emily and Ollie

Offline daw

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No no I didn't and wouldn't say inbreeding was the cause of 'every ill' (mutations take place in some matings, some of which will be harmful though of course only inbreeding in the next generations will mean this is expressed and an animal comes along suffering in a new way- this is yet another problem with line breeding!) but since the thread is about AMS my information in my previous post remains accurate.

Your observation re colour is interesting- I think I've read somewhere on this forum that a study could find no link between the colour gene and other attributes. However on the mutation subject there is a colour (I think black with brindle legs- I've seen only two pups ever) that is produced by mutation at the moment of conception by some chemical process I'm yet to get to grips with and can never be passed on. The more I study dog genetics the more fascinated I become in it.     

Offline Emilyoliver

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No link between colour and temperament I think. Not ill- health. Spotting in dalmations, merle colouring in collies and dappling in dachsies tells enough of a sad story of colour genetics and health.

As for Springers bringing ams into cocker gene pool, line breeding wouldn't be necessary if separate lines both carried the gene? No line breeding requirèd to facilitate its spread through separate lines to then 'meet up' later on and manifest.  'Oddly' it doesn't appear to have surfaced in some of the older established heavily line bred lines...
Michelle, Emily and Ollie

Offline daw

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As for Springers bringing ams into cocker gene pool, line breeding wouldn't be necessary if separate lines both carried the gene?

But this would only be true if there was no mechanism called 'gene flow'. So what the springer line brings to the mix in a sprocker  (even in terms of harmful recessives) will have been subject to change. Therefore it is going to be a doubling up of the cocker gene in a 'pure bred' that is much more likely to be responsible for the disease being observed in an individual dog than any theoretical springer allele that has been part of the genetic changes in its discrete population. Similarly AMS in a 'pure bred' springer will work in the same manner.