Why start this project?

The Jack Russell Terrier, which originated in Britain, has been registered by the FCI only since 2001. A few countries has registered these dogs earlier, for instance Australia and Holland. In the past few years the JRT has turned into a popular show breed in Finland and many breeders have imported breeding stock from the countries where the breed has been bred for good looks. The result has been not only beautiful dogs being bred but also some lines becoming very common quite rapidly as the majority of imports are related to each other. The situation seems to be the same in other European FCI countries.

This wouldn't be a problem unless, at the same time as certain lines become more common, other lines fall by the wayside and disappear. The imported dogs, already related to each other, have been bred rapidly and so the large number of dogs seems safe. But when you look at their pedigrees it becomes clear that there's no safety in numbers. The genetic diversity doesn't increase by breeding a lot of dogs using just a few lines. It decreases.

The JRT fortunately still has an open register and breed assessments in Finland, so compared to many other breeds it's easy to introduce new genetic material. At the moment it's a fairly simple task to ensure that the JRT breed stays viable within the confines of the Kennel Club register. All JRT enthusiasts have a once in a lifetime opportunity to ensure that the breed will have enough genetic material for the coming generations of breeders. As a new breed we have the opportunity to avoid the mistakes that have been made when developing and breeding other breeds. This generation of breeders have the possibility to base their breeding on the scientific facts of population genetics, which was unavailable some decades ago.

Fortunately there are still a few countries where there's still a wide variety of JRTs both in numbers and genetic diversity. To ensure we have a healthy breed in the future we all have to ensure that as many unrelated dogs as possible are registered now. In the country of origin, the UK, the breed is still without official status and there are several thousand JRT:s there who are not as narrowly related as the show Jack Russells.

Many breeds have come to the end of the road because the population has become too closely related or has been developed from too small a population. Inbreeding is an unavoidable consequence and causes problems, like increased occurences of hereditary disease, decreased fertility and immune deficiencies. When there are no more unrelated dogs within the breed, you either have to inbreed or resort to crossing different breeds. The Jack Russell Terrier still has a huge untapped gene pool that we want to preserve.