Missing Teeth – A Breeder’s Experience
By Anne Evarts, Belgian Tervuren Breeder

My father and I are winding up our annual canoe trip in the Quentico, the wilderness area of Canada above Northern Minnesota. Today we are wind bound on an island in North Bay. We can’t move until this darn wind stops! This is the perfect time to sit back and write…big thing is I’ve finished reading all my books and I can’t imagine diving into Alaska for a second time in three weeks.

I have wanted to put my thoughts on paper for some time now. My intent is to enlighten you and in being very honest, hopefully encourage other breeders to approach the problem more openly. This is something we must do if we have any intentions of improving our breed. The problem on my mind is MISSING TEETH.

This problem of missing teeth in our Belgian Tervuren breed has haunted me for several years now. In 1986 I was never prepared for the fact that my beautiful bitch of 15 months would suddenly begin losing what seemed to be her adult second premolars. Because I was a real novice at the time, I never questioned the fact that my bitch might not have full dentition as an adult dog. I thought it would be a problem far removed from us…I was wrong.

By the time my bitch was two years of age, she had lost all four of her second premolars (or what seemed to be). It seemed as though every time I looked in her mouth, she was missing another tooth. Needless to say, I was very unhappy about this. I began to search for answers.

With missing teeth aside, I was thrilled with my first Tervuren. She finished her championship too quickly and has had impressive show career. More than this, she is a quality bitch and if I made the decision to breed her, I felt we would be making a real contribution to the breed. It was a feeling shared by many respected Tervuren breeders. I made the decision to breed and set out on an experiment to substantiate the theory that my bitch’s missing teeth and later the missing teeth of her pups are simply retained baby teeth. Most importantly, all missing teeth in my bitch’s line are definitely due to genetic impact. In this breeding, I would be able to draw some conclusive facts and theories that could encourage and help other Tervuren breeders. At the time of our first breeding, we began to work very closely with Dr. Edward Eisner D.V.M. in Denver, Co. Dr Eisner is a board certified diplomat of the American Veterinary Dental College (AVDC).

Dr. Eisner convinced me that through dental X-rays taken of young puppies mouths, it was possible to diagnose at nine to ten weeks of age, which puppy would be missing which teeth. This method was foolproof! On a particular X-ray, you would be able to see clearly the adult teeth or absence of teeth. Dr. Eisner also stressed that in addressing missing teeth in any breeding program, you must begin each generation with a dog with full dentition and most importantly you must breed into a line with no missing teeth problems. If you were to do this for approximately five generations, you would solve the problem of missing teeth. It made sense to me but it also seemed a little overwhelming! Dr. Eisner also said that if you were to breed following these guidelines, a breeding would probably produce missing 2nd premolars in 50% of the litter, But of this 50% each puppy with missing teeth should have fewer missing than the dam or sire. During our first visit with Dr. Eisner, our bitch was X-rayed to study her bite, root structures, bone and gum. Conditions looked very sound and there was nothing to substantiate “shallow roots” or “soft bone”. (By the way, her bite was also graded and studied. The results were excellent. She had a tight scissors bite with proper teeth alignment and relationship except for the fact that her lower canines were not exactly centered.) Dr. Eisner spent many hours with us that afternoon. He was very interested with the problem of missing teeth in our breed. I had a short course in genetics and canine dentistry that day. We also discussed the fact that the symmetry of my bitch’s missing second premolars most definitely indicated heredity (genetic impact) due to recessive genes. He also convinced us that deciduous teeth can be retained for years if there is no adult tooth surfacing. Adult teeth will occupy the same spot as the deciduous, but will emerge slightly behind the baby teeth. Dr. Eisner continually stressed that symmetrically missing teeth is a serious hereditary problem. Certainly, if you breed missing teeth to missing teeth, it leads to more missing candidates for major health problems!

After presenting Dr. Eisner with all of the information on missing teeth behind our bitch, I went ahead with the breeding and we produced six beautiful puppies. I was ready to have the little X-rayed when they all cam down with giardia and parvo-corona. I almost lost then entire litter. They miraculously survived and as they recovered, we decided to place them that honest with all of our puppy buyers They were all aware of our problem of missing teeth behind our dentition.

It has been three and one half years since our first breeding. To this day, three of our six pups have missing second premolars (all less than our bitch). We watched baby teeth retained until some of the pups were close to two years old. In one case, the owner is certain that the retained baby tooth was an adult second premolar that was lost. We can only suggest that it was a retained baby tooth based on Dr. Eisner’s information.

We recently bred our bitch for a second time and produced four healthy pups this spring. We were able to have our litter X-rayed at ten weeks. Because we had just moved to Wisconsin, Dr. Ben Colmery assisted us with the X-rays in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He is Dr. Eisner’s colleague and is familiar with our study. It was very interesting to see the results of the X-rays. The X-rays showed an improvement on our second litter. Three puppies will have full dentition and one will have two missing upper pre-molars. I will be able to place my puppies accordingly. There will be no surprises for my puppy people in the future.

I know that some of you are thinking that missing teeth aren’t such a big deal and there are other more threatening problems affecting our breed. However, it is a very prevalent problem among Belgian Tervuren in this country. If any of you breed, it may be your problem someday. As breeders we have to address the problem honestly and intelligently. The problem of missing teeth can be dealt with. Before you ever consider breeding your bitch or dog, study your lines!! If you find that there is a problem with missing teeth in either line, take time to care…do something about it and most importantly be honest about the problem. If you can not do this then don’t’ breed. If you’re placing a litter, please inform and educate all puppy buyers. It may be true that a puppy you place will have full dentition, but if littermates have missing teeth, the possibility of this dog producing missing teeth does exist. Puppy owners deserve to know.

Personally at this point, I intend to sit back, relax, and enjoy my two litters. It will be interesting to see if the incidence of missing teeth in my second litter, correlates with the X-rays that I had taken. Time will tell. In the future, if I decide to breed any pups from my litter F1 (second) generations, (either full dentition or missing teeth) it will be interesting to see what is produced. I realize that it will take five generations of intelligent breeding to clear the problem, and the problem will never be solved if I don’t thoroughly examine the dentition and pedigree of any potential mates. When you work with any genetic problem it is never simple. It’s almost impossible to do any line breeding and therefore it’s hard to lock into that look that your really love. Whatever you decide to do, please keep in mind always the betterment of the breed. As breeders we must be able to see far into the future…we are not necessarily breeding for ourselves but for the successes of all future Tervuren owners and breeders.

FROM DR. EISNER
I commend Anne and Mike Evarts first for their openness and candor in facing the genetic problem of missing teeth in their kennel and secondly for the responsible approach of educating themselves so that they can effectively and persistently deal with their problem. To successfully and consistently breed winners one must pay attention to detail. There is more to breeding a winner who, in turn will beget winners, than meets the eye. Look closely and honestly at your breeding program. Put health before blue ribbons because it crosses the generation gap whereas a ribbon is but a snapshot in history. The genetic pattern for malocculusion in man is determined by a combination of dominate and recessive genes with incomplete penetrance. This means that a given trait may not be seen in every generation and the detail of the hereditary pattern for jaw relationships are very complex. The determination of a dog’s bite (occulusion), as well, is not governed by simple Mendelian genetics. Many genes determine the shape, size and exact location of each tooth and the shape and size of each of the facial bones in which they are seated. For practical purposes, your goal regarding the relationship between teeth and jaw in your breed/line of breeding is to always strive to breed your animal with one whose bite is an improvement and on who’s lines and sound for your target traits for no les than the previous five generations. One must be inwardly honest and ruthless in making breeding decisions. Good enough is seldom good and rarely enough. The kennel master who settles for less than the best will surely achieve that level of accomplishment.

For anyone interested, I have written a 36 page illustrated monograph titled Bites, Breath and Benevolent Breeding. It is designed to help breeders identify bite problems in potential breeding stock. If you are interested and would like a copy, they are available for $10.00 which covers the bound manuscript itself and the cost of postage and handling. If you have questions, please feel free to give me a call at (303) 757-8481. Sincerely,

Edward R Eisner DVM
Diplomate, American Veterinary
Dental College
2178 South Colorado Blvd.
Denver, CO 80222