In the ultra-competitive world of show-dog breeding, where animals are judged strictly on their appearance and coveted blue ribbons hang in the balance, looks are everything. But what becomes of the ugly ducklings, whose recessive genes cause them to look quite different from their littermates?
To the horror of animal lovers, purebred pups that don’t make the grade are often destroyed or dumped at shelters for no reason other than having the wrong color coat. In the show ring, for instance, white boxers are considered unacceptable. Just ask Dr. Peter Kross of Rivergate Veterinary Hospital in Manhattan.
“I delivered a litter of eight boxers to a grand champion back in 1987,” the vet recalls. “One of them was white, and the breeder said, ‘We have to destroy this one.'”
Kross couldn’t believe his ears; the little female pup was in perfect health, just like her littermates.
“I told the breeder I will never destroy a puppy,” the vet says.
He offered to take the white one, whom he named Dixie.
“The breeder let the mother dog nurse Dixie for seven weeks before I took her home,” Kross remembers. “But he was so appalled that his grand champion gave birth to a white pup that he only registered seven pups, and he wouldn’t let Dixie sit in photographs.”
After a long, happy life, Dixie died two years ago. But her legacy survives: Kross -who now has three adorable white boxers named Wilhelmina, Buchanan and Laila -is New York’s most outspoken advocate for this misfit breed.
“They’ve become quite popular in Manhattan, because I’ve encouraged people to rescue them,” he explains. “Breeders will offer a reduced rate as long as you sign a form promising that you won’t breed the dog. It turns out that 30 percent of boxers are born white,” he adds. “And occasionally there is a deaf one, but I have not seen too many.”
Often, these “ugly ducklings” blossom into gorgeous swans. OK, so they’re not show quality, but they’ve definitely got star quality. Consider Miles, a large albino boxer who is famous in his Upper East Side neighborhood.
“It’s like walking a celebrity -we cannot go around the block without being stopped at least once,” says Liz Welch, who got Miles at a discount from a breeder in Florida.
“I cannot imagine anyone putting down a dog as special as this just because it’s the wrong color,” Welch says.
Obviously, that thinking runs in her family: Welch’s sister got a discount on a “pet-quality” harlequin Great Dane whose gray-and-black markings disqualified him from the show ring, too.
Apparently, New York is a town of beautiful misfits. Rhodesian Ridgebacks are known for the “zipper” of fur that runs the length of their backs. But if a Ridgeback is born without a ridge (or with white legs) he risks the same fate as the white boxer. However, the lucky ones meet happy ends -like Chili, a beautiful Ridgeless Ridgeback who was adopted six years ago by Upper East Sider Jonathan Samter.
“Everybody who knows this dog says they wish they had a dog as great and as beautiful as her,” Samter says with a smile. “And that’s the truth.”
