Quote Originally Posted by K9soul
If the dog is going to a pet home and won't be bred I guess I'd wonder what the purpose of it being mandatory is?
If you don't know what you are producing, or what afflicted the siblings of your own breeding dogs, you can't really say whether or not your dog may develop something or carry something -- and it's impossible to make a good breeding choice if you can't look back in a pedigree and say "Okay this dog was good but two of it's siblings had PRA -- he could be a carrier." Hip and elbow dysplasia aren't as big a deal to me as they are not problematic in my line or in the breed in general, but I really want eyes done.

We have recently discovered that Loki may have PRA, something that has not been found in his background because most of the dogs in his background were only tested before they were bred and not later in life when PRA would be more likely to show up on a CERF exam. As it is right now, he would likely be CERF clear -- it will probably not show up on a CERF exam until he is 6-8 years of age. This means we could breed him as a CERF clear dog and have puppies with PRA. We talked to someone who says that a couple of his relatives have some of the same symptoms, which means that they likely have it too. Since the problem is recessive, it means that both of his parents must carry it -- his mother has been bred a couple of times and his sire has been bred several times by different breeders, which means that now several people could have PRA carriers in their bloodlines now. It is extremely hard to eradicate because any dog can carry it and you will have no idea. Which is why it's important to me that people even if they don't get hips and elbows done atleast get eyes done twice...Once as a younger dog and once as an older dog. I don't see why it is so much to ask when the livelihood of an entire breed is at stake.