The Functional Breeding Podcast

Today I'm talking with the researchers who recently published a paper that's been getting a lot of social media buzz. The paper's title is "The doodle dilemma: How the physical health of ‘Designer-crossbreed’ Cockapoo, Labradoodle and Cavapoo dogs’ compares to their purebred progenitor breeds." This interview was a big party featuring Gina Bryson, the first author on the paper, as well as two rese...

This week you get just me (Jessica Perry Hekman) talking at you! I'm talking about the coefficient of inbreeding (COI), a measurement of genetic diversity that's commonly mentioned in discussions of individual and breed health. I talk about what it is, how to interpret it, how to get the measurement done for your own dog(s), why we care about it, and give the take-home messages from some papers wi...

I will have new content for you all soon - but for now, enjoy one from the archives! -- Jane Lindquist is the founder and owner of Puppy Culture, a widely used educational resource for raising and socializing puppies. She herself breeds and competes with bull terriers. As it turns out, she is very thoughtful when it comes to how to apply science to the raising of puppies. We had a wide ranging con...

This episode I welcome back Mary Peaslee, MD, MPH, to talk about a breeder's perspective on all the advice Dr Dan O'Neill gave us in his recent episode on how to approach disorder testing. Mary works in population health and brings that perspective to her breeding practice. So what does all this stuff look like in the real world? How can breeders focus on the future health of the dog population th...

We have a flipped episode this week with Sarah Stremming of Cog Dog Radio interviewing me. We're talking about the new paper out of the Dog Aging Project, "Lifetime Prevalence of Owner-Reported Medical Conditions in the 25 Most Common Dog Breeds in the Dog Aging Project Pack." There's been a lot of buzz on social media about this paper and we wanted to dig in to its findings. For those who saw our...

There's a lot going on behind the scenes of the Functional Dog Collaborative and I have a lot of plans for upcoming podcast episodes. I also have had a bunch of people say they can't record this summer and so it may be a few weeks until I get the next episode out. So here's some stuff to tide you over - explanation of what's going on and what episode topics I have coming up! (If you want to sugges...

Last episode I talked with Dr. Dan O'Neill, a veterinary epidemiologist who studies canine disorders that have an inherited component - what the rest of us might call "genetic diseases." During that interview he mentioned that he didn't think disorder testing - what most of us call health testing - has been workinig to improve canine health. I cut that section because I felt we needed to go into a...

Dan O'Neill, MVB, PhD, FRCVS is a veterinary epidemiologist who studies canine disorders that have an inherited component - what the rest of us might call "genetic diseases." He is the author of more than 95 papers, mostly on the prevalence and risk factors of disorders in dogs based on data drawn from VetCompass, the large scale veterinary database and research tool that he co-leads. Dan was awar...

Danika Bannasch, DVM, PhD returns to the podcast to talk about the Dalmatian Outcross Project. Danika's laboratory found the genetic mutation that was targeted in this outcross, and she had a front row seat to the project's path to acceptance by the AKC and the Dalmatian Club of America. She is also herself a past breeder of Dalmatians. Danika walks us through the genetic, social, and practical im...

Danika Bannasch, DVM, PhD is the owner of Pint, the famous UC Davis football tee retrieving dog. She also happens to run a genetics lab, also at UC Davis, where she studies the genetics of inherited diseases in dogs and other animals. She is known for her work associating genetic variants with a variety of traits including coat color and skull shape. On this episode we're talking about a genetic m...

Lisa Gunter, PhD, CBCC-KA is an Assistant Professor at Virginia Tech in the School of Animal Sciences and directs the Laboratory for Animal Behavior and Welfare. Lisa’s research explores the behavior and welfare of companion animals, specifically our interactions with them, as it relates to animal sheltering, behavioral issues, and training. Lisa combines a love of research with hands-on dog train...

Carolyn Kelly is a registered nurse with over 30 years of experience in human health including in labor and delivery, and in mental health. She also holds a Masters Degree in Nursing Leadership. She runs a mixed breed companion dog program, Old Mission Retrievers. Erica Pytlovany, KPA CTP, is an experienced behavioral consultant at WOOFS! Dog Training Center in Virginia. She runs the Boson Dog Pro...

This week I'm talking to Drs Claire Wade and Sophie Liu about their paper on genetic diversity in the Doberman breed. Dr Claire Wade is the Chair of Computational Biology and Animal Genetics at the University of Sydney, where she studies canine behavioral genetics. Dr Sophie Liu  is a veterinarian specializing in behavior and the founder of the Doberman Diversity Project, about which she's spoken...

I've wanted to interview Lisa Wagner about her breeding program for a while now. I keep hearing about the great work she is doing to address health issues in her French bulldogs, and I was so enthusiastic to get a chance to ask her for more details. Lisa is a CKC registered breeder. Her breeding program is called Of Autumn, and you can most easily reach her on Facebook.

This episode is jointly released through the Functional Breeding Podcast and Cog Dog Radio, which is hosted by Sarah Stremming. Sarah is an internationally known dog behavior consultant with a special niche working with sports dogs. She consults at The Cognitive Canine, teaches online courses on dog behavior, and hosts the Cog Dog Radio Podcast. I sat down with Sarah to talk about the recent news...

This episode, Ji Khalsa is interviewing me, Jessica Hekman, DVM, PhD. I'm a veterinarian turned behavioral geneticist turned teacher and founder of the Functional Dog Collaborative, or FDC. I graduated from Tufts Veterinary School in 2012 with a dual veterinary and master's degree, which was on stress in hospitalized dogs. I completed a veterinary shelter medicine specialty internship at Maddie's...

This week we have Laura Sharkey and Carolyn Kelly back on the podcast. They are the co-founders of the Copilot Pet Dog Breeding Cooperative, and I always love to talk to them because of their fascinating insights into breeding dogs to be really good pets. We're talking about social media culture and how we love it and hate it - and how all of us love dogs and have the same goals even if we have su...

This week we have Ji Khalsa back on the podcast. Ji is the founder of Midwoofery, a highly respected science-based educational resource for responsible dog breeders. She has a Masters degree in Microbiology and Biochemistry from Arizona State University, including independent studies in the link between canine genetics and behavior. She has decades of experience in breeding, including working dogs...

This week we welcome back Dr. Alison Skipper to talk about the history of breed registries. Dr. Skipper is a veterinarian and historian at the Royal Veterinary College, London. She has an interest in the history of the health and welfare of purebred dogs. She works as a veterinarian at Crufts, has been on Kennel Club committees, and is very involved in the purebred dog world. Her perspective on th...

This episode is jointly released through the Functional Breeding Podcast and Cog Dog Radio, which is hosted by Sarah Stremming. Sarah is an internationally known dog behavior consultant with a special niche working with sports dogs. She consults at The Cognitive Canine, teaches online courses on dog behavior, and hosts the Cog Dog Radio Podcast. I sat down with Sarah to talk about fear periods - d...

Carolyn Kelly is a registered nurse with over 30 years of experience in human health including in labor and delivery, and in mental health where she witnessed the power that animal assisted interventions can play in the healing process. She holds a Masters Degree in Nursing Leadership and runs a small mixed breed companion dog program, Old Mission Retrievers. Along with Laura Sharkey, Carolyn head...

This is the second part of my epic interview with Mary Peaslee about hip testing. As I said in part one, I highly value Mary's insights about hip testing for a whole bunch of reasons. She's a medical doctor with an additional master's in public health, specializing in preventive medicine, so she has extensive training in understanding screening tests just like the kinds of tests we do for hip heal...

This episode I'm talking to Mary Peaslee about hip testing. I highly value Mary's insights about hip testing for a whole bunch of reasons. She's a medical doctor with an additional master's in public health, specializing in preventive medicine, so she has extensive training in understanding screening tests just like the kinds of tests we do for hip health. As for her dog cred, she has been breedin...

Dr Alison Skipper is a veterinarian and historian at the Royal Veterinary College, London. She has a particular interest in the health and history of brachycephalic dogs, and has authored multiple peer-reviewed articles about the subject. She works as a veterinarian at Crufts, has been on Kennel Club committees, and is very involved in the purebred dog world. I very much respect her nuanced approa...

This week we have Ji Khalsa back on the podcast to talk about her highly regarded breeder educational resource, Midwoofery. Ji has a solid science background herself and has built a science-based curriculum (and we'll talk about what that means). Ji and I talk about how Midwoofery came to be, how it works, what courses she has, and what to expect from a course. We also explore how Midwoofery fits...