By Helen BriggsScience Correspondent
Getty ImagesFlat faces bred into bulldogs can cause “a lifetime of suffering” and vets are urging people not to buy one.
Bulldogs have twice the health risk of other dogs, according to a study.
Urgent action is needed to reform the breed and stop the UK joining the list of countries where the dog is banned, say experts at the Royal Veterinary College.
They want people to stop buying English bulldogs and two other popular breeds – the French bulldog and the pug – until the breeding issues are addressed.
They are also calling on the public to stop ‘promoting’ the dog on social media by posting and liking the photos.
The bulldog has grown in popularity over the past decade.
The breed, also known as the English or British Bulldog, has earned comparisons to Winston Churchill for its cute face and has historically been seen as a symbol of courage and endurance.
A fashion for increasingly extreme features such as flat faces, wrinkled skin and squat bodies has made the breed prone to health complaints, raising welfare concerns.
With their large bulging eyes and flat faces, the dogs are undeniably “cute”, said Dr Dan O’Neill of the Royal Veterinary College, one of the study’s authors, but their extreme body shape after years of selective breeding reproduction has become theirs. degradation.
Getty Images“For breeds like English Bulldogs where many dogs still have extreme conformations (dog structure and appearance) with poor innate health, the public has a huge role to play in demanding dogs with moderate and healthier conformations,” he said.
“Until then, prospective owners should stop and think before buying a flat-faced dog.”
The English Bulldog was once a muscular and athletic breed, but over the years it has become a popular pet, with a tendency towards a short skull, prominent jaw, folds of skin and a squat build.
The public can play an important role in driving change by not posting photos of dogs on social media or liking posts, thereby “inadvertently promoting” them, Dr O’Neill said.
But he admitted the bulldog’s “apparent” popularity is understandable, given the psychological effect they have on us. With their big heads, big eyes and docile temperament, they remind us of babies, triggering our feeding instincts.
“We interpret it as dogs being cute and that’s completely understandable and, in fact, very difficult to combat as a human,” he said.
“What we think is cute on the outside, if you live life as that dog, it’s anything but cute. It’s, in many cases, a life of suffering.”
Bulldog breeding is already banned in many countries and, according to a working group of veterinary experts and welfare groups, including the Royal Veterinary College, the same could happen here if nothing is done.
Owners who already have one should look out for health issues such as eye problems, difficulty breathing and skin fold infections and seek veterinary advice if they are concerned, they say.
Veterinary historian Dr Alison Skipper, of King’s College London, said many of the diseases linked to body shape had been known to breeders for more than a century. Responsible breeding, with health as a priority, could “improve the welfare of this popular and iconic breed”, he said.
And The Kennel Club said a ban risked driving the problem underground.
“We urgently want to see people choosing dogs not just because they like the way they look, which is often driven by celebrity and social media, but to find breeders who use the health tools available and breed a non-exaggerated dog, which is where the health. first, as described in the breed standard,” said spokesman Bill Lambert.
The study, published in the journal Canine Medicine and Genetics, compared the health of thousands of English bulldogs kept as pets with that of other dog breeds. He found that English bulldogs were twice as likely to develop one or more disorders in a single year than other dogs.
The most common health complaints were skin fold infections (38 times more likely than in other dogs), an eye disorder known as cherry eye (26 times more likely), protruding lower jaw (24 times more likely) and respiratory problems (19 times more likely).
A recent study by the same group found that pugs are also at high risk of health complaints.
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