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What Breed Is the Doggy in the Window?

Sep 17, 2009

An article in the Wall Street Journal looks at companies that will test your dog's DNA to tell you what breed it is. A dog, called Parrot, gave cheek swabs and a blood sample to four different companies, that charged between $60 and $125. Each company gave back different breed as contributing to Parrot's ancestry, ranging from Italian greyhound to Staffordshire terrier to bull terrier and with maybe a small percentage of bichon frise. "And therein lies the limits of dog DNA testing. Still a relatively new field, canine genetics is an inexact science," writer Paula Szuchman says. She adds, "Still, nearly $400 later, when people on the street pass us and ask what kind of dog Parrot is, our answer hasn't changed: 'Who knows?'"

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