Crossbreeding - in Finland

★ See the most recent information on crossbreeding in Finland below! ★

Background: 2013-'14 v.

Instructions For Implementing And Monitoring Crosses Between Breeds

(approved by the Finnish Kennel Club board 22.11.2013. Valid from 1.1.2014)

The Finnish Kennel Club (FKK) presents their goals (below), which also explain the motivation behind the program. It is important to note that the FKK has a strong history and well-developed program of monitoring and evaluating health and performance with each breed club reporting on conditions in their dogs. This forms the foundation for a considered and controlled approach to including cross-breeding in genetic strategies.

"Goals: what is lacking: why are breed crosses needed?

• Improving or restoring working traits
• Decreasing the incidence of breed-specific genetic problems in health, behaviour and/or
• reproduction traits
• A harmful mutation allele has been fixed in the breed: bringing back a normal allele into the breed
• Improving the health in a breed with exaggerated conformation traits
• Improving general fitness in the breed (decreasing the incidence of immunological problems)

Breed crosses are primarily intended for breeds which lack the necessary genetic variance needed in
breeding against important traits.

The application should include an analysis of the situation of the breed. The analysis should clearly show the
need for crossbreeding. The breed-specific breeding strategy (JTO) of the breed may form the basis of the
analysis."

Also See  Katariina Mäki's FKC Blog post: More on crossbreeding in Finland