Jay - My mutt story and results, thanks for your service!

I will be brief with my story. We had to say goodbye to our loyal lab/Dalmatian mix after 17 years of companionship. This was in April of 2006. Of course we were just very sad. We did not know if another dog would come into our lives. We figured when the time was right it would happen.

About 6 weeks later, I was working in Houston at a house. This little fella comes climbing out of the storm ditch and wags his tail at me. He was clearly a stray and needed a home. After a short stay at the vet, he came home. He is the most wonderful and grateful dog. Truly a blessing to us.

The vet said he was a lab mix. Come to find out....

• Level 2: Chow Chow
• Level 3: Lhasa Apso
• Level 4: Chinese Shar-Pei

I named him Jay after the street where he was found.

Thanks again,
Ryan
Houston, Texas

Chloe Elizabeth

Hi!

And thanks so much for your great service - we're delighted!

We adopted Chloe when a friend moved out of the country. He'd adopted Chloe a couple years earlier, and everyone, even the vets, thought she was a lab-akita mix. Since she has absolutely no interest in retrieving, we thought that couldn't be right... When she showed an aggressive streak against other dogs, we thought maybe something more aggressive? But - wow! Level 3: Newfoundland, and then Level 4's and 5's in 4 toy breeds, with a little Basset Hound and Siberian Husky for good measure. Amazing! I call her the Newfietoy now. We're all giggling at the thought of a mixed-toy breed Basset Hound falling for a Newfie-Husky mix. Maybe her aggression is from an over-confident little Westie in her heritage?

Chloe is 24 inches at the shoulder, and 45 inches from nose to the base of her 15 inch long tail. She weighs in at 62 lbs, and has had the ACLs repaired in both knees. She's a big girl, and an absolute sweetheart who has never met a human she didn't love on first sight, but is not known for playing well with other dogs. She is very territorial and protective, but would love to play with our cat.

Thanks again letting us learn a little more about our girl Chloe!

Molly and Chris

Elvis

Many thanks to the Dicksons. Elvis is one lucky pup!



We were curious when we first got Elvis in December as to what exactly he was mixed with. We knew he was primarily German Shepherd because of all the dominant appearance characteristics. When I came across happydogdna.com I was excited. I would finally get answers. I ordered it and it came in quickly with easy directions. I followed them then popped it in the mail. It seemed so quick when the results came in and I was actually quite surprised. I have attached a photo of our Elvis and here are his results. And as of around a month ago. He was 10 months old at just shy of 60 pounds.

• Level 2: German Shepherd
• Level 4: Akita
• Level 5: Afghan Hound
• Level 5: Chinese Shar-Pei.

Wow What a truly unique mix. I must say it is helpful to know a dog's breeds. Elvis is going to be 1 year old on the 4th of July 2009. Last month he was diagnosed with hip dysplasia. It is very common in German Shepherds. We caught it extremely early, due to my motherly paranoia with my furbaby. He is being treated for it and seems to be doing great. Some people feel a free dog shouldn't cost much. I feel no matter how much they cost initially they are family and it doesn't matter what they cost. I rescued Elvis for free and he will be our four legged furry son until the day the good Lord takes him home. Thank you so much happydogdna.com we are extremely appreciative.

Elvis' MOM and DAD
The Dicksons

Marshall

The following letter is the first note we received from Marshall's owner after she received his test results:

We recently adopted Marshall from a Golden Retriever rescue group. He was a stray and there was no history on him. He has a wonderful temperment and is very gentle, playful, and intelligent. He loves his belly rubs and doesn't like to be too far away from us. We were sure he was at least 50% golden retriever and everyone he meets comments on what a beautiful golden he is and asks what else he is mixed with. After so many questions from others, and because we were curious as well, we got his DNA tested. We expected to see some type of herding breed since he does try to herd his human brother and sister (ages 9 and 6 ). We also suspected husky or shepherd since his tail is SO thick and fluffy. We were in no way prepared to find out that he has NO golden in him at all. Everyone who knows him was shocked. Here are his results:

• Level 2 : English Springer Spaniel
• Level 4: Bull Terrier, Italian Greyhound, Miniature Pinscher, Shetland Sheepdog, Siberian Husky

Often when a customer receives results that show their dog is made up of a half-dozen or more breeds, we explain to them that when there are that many breeds at such low levels, the dominant characteristics of the detected breeds are often not evident. However, when we received the photo of Marshall who looked so much like a Golden Retriever, we had to dig a little deeper. We asked the lab to re-run Marshall's DNA just to be certain that the test was performed properly and the results were accurate. The second analysis revealed the same results except that Italian Greyhound fell below the threshold of reportable levels.

We shared this with Marshall's owner who had the following reply:

Thanks for the info and thanks for asking them to rerun the test. I am satisfied.. I guess it's true you never know what a dog is going to look like when all the DNA combine from the different breeds. He must get his size from the Husky DNA because he is very big. We went through a golden rescue group for temperament because we have two young children. Thankfully, he is a great dog. I guess this is a good lesson for us and the rescue groups and it explains why we didn't see some of the golden personality traits we expected when we got him. You have a great service and we have shared your website info with many of our friends.

Sincerely,
Susan

Dexter

Hi,

I adopted my dog Dexter from the Humane Society in February and since the first day we have wondered what he was (so have the people at the dog parks). He is a beautiful red dog with bright gold eyes that make him stand out from most other dogs. So we decided to get his DNA tested. We were quite surprised to see that he was. Here are two pictures of him.

• Level 2: English Setter
• Level 3: English Springer Spaniel
• Level 4: Bull Terrier

Katie

Thanks for the great photos of such a handsome guy!

Letter From An Impressed Vet

Biopet Vet Lab received this letter from a veterinarian who used the DNA Breed Identification Test on one of her dogs that was of a known breed. She was mighty impressed with the results:

Dear Dr. Jones,

You gave me a free DNA kit to use on my dog when I spoke to you at your booth at NAVC in FL last Jan and I promised to report. (I am skeptical about the value of these tests because I have heard reports from people with mixed breeds getting results that seem completely wacky based on what the owner knows about the dog, or the dog's obvious physical characteristics, or the probability of certain rare-ish breeds running around loose to procreate). Anyway, I am glad to report that your test did correctly identify my dog Jif as purebred border collie. She has a 10 generation pedigree so I would have been QUITE skeptical if your analysis found an aberrant breed in her DNA, but it did not. It is also interesting to note that while I presume your border collie data bank is drawn from US border collies, her father and both maternal grandparents were imported (from Scotland and Australia, respectively) but that did not put off your analysis. Now if I had handy a dog of mixed but absolutely known parentage I would try the test out on that.

Doctor from Florida, PhD DVM

(we didn't include the good doctor's name for privacy reasons)

Zoe

We were so amazed when we received the results of the DNA test on my daughter’s dog, Zoe. She is a rescue dog that we got from a local shelter. They told us that they knew the mother was an Australian Shepherd. We had many people try to guess for a very long time as to what Zoe was. She is a very funny dog and had some interesting characteristics. We had a lot of laughs when we got the results back. It is also helped us and our vet to understand where some of her health problems came from. We are very glad that we had her tested!

• Level 3: Chinese Shar Pei, German Shepherd
• Level 4: Boxer, Mastiff
• Level 5: Labrador Retriever, Pekingese, Poodle

The Smith’s – Crystal, Barr and Abby