THE ULTIMATE GSD! - Page 7

Susie, this is my last post on this subject, I have bred, trained, and owned and sold dogs for police service for over forty years. I have done sport trialing from 1980 to 2010. I even have a police service dog that will be honored by the GSDCA at their 100 year ceremony later this year. I have trained many many GSL dogs and for 6 years was a member of Sch club that was primarily made up of GSL. So I know the type of dogs that make PSD, 40 years ago, 30 years ago, 20 years ago, and I still consult for police training academy. I have had extensive conversations with Mr Flinks, who I would say is an expert about sport dogs and police dogs.
I KNOW the type of dog it takes to become a solid police dog( and only unknowledgable people think it is characterized by man eater....that's so 50's), but I can assure you that it is the exception GSL that would make the grade,( especially in America where there are many GSL dogs available to police if they could make the grade), and a vast difference between the core traits in nerve, hardness , resilience and fighting drive in the Showlines and the workinglines. ( especially Czech and Czech/West). And it goes much much deeper than how they were raised, or prepared for.
So though I really believe you believe what you wrote, I find it hard to override having worked many many GSL dogs and countless working dogs for police and in sport. There are general differences, doesn't make either one good or bad, but genetically very different dogs.

Susie, nordreihn-westfalia you live in have their own breedingprogram for policedogs since 1987, and they breed malinois that supply about 50% of the dog they need. Breedingprogramms for military/police in other countries also uses malinois or working GSDs and I guess it´s a reason for that beyond only environmental differences between work and show. I agree totally with gustav here, if a dog is a good policedog it would also do well in sport, even if some good policedogs may not have the ideal mentality for delivering full points in both obedience and protection according to the rules. The dogs that are more the middle of the road type of dog you said would probably not do well either in sport or policework, I guess that´s why you seldom see them in that type of work, but this doesn´t mean they are preymonsters or "maneaters" either, a good policedog must have the drives required, but it doesn´t mean they are unstable or extreme preydrive is all that counts.

Gustav - so at least we do have one thing in common - we both started training within the seventies, and we both do love German Shepherds that are able to work
Johan, I was in Stukenbrock for the first time in the early eighties, I´m pretty aware what´s going on in Northrhein Westphalia.
I´m not conform with your sentence " The dogs that are more the middle of the road type of dog you said would probably not do well either in sport or policework, I guess that´s why you seldom see them in that type of work, but this doesn´t mean they are preymonsters or "maneaters" either, a good policedog must have the drives required, but it doesn´t mean they are unstable or extreme preydrive is all that counts. "
The dogs "that are more the middle of the road type of dog" raised and trained well are able to do almost everything you want, where as a lot of the dogs used for police protection and street work ( I´m not talking about detection or dual purpose dogs here ! ) not are the kind of dog described in the breed standard. I am glad that while working for the police these dogs do find their niche where they  are able to do a good job.
The German Shepherd was not " designed " to become a protection dog only, the breed was "designed" for versability, the breed doesn´t need to be the best in something special, but  good in everything. There are great varieties of temperaments and characters in every single litter, there are pets, sport dogs, and there are "real" dogs - and than there are the new owners going to form them in either way.
I don´t know why people always talk about the Malinois, if ( and I do believe so ) this breed is better in IPO or better in policework than the German Shepherd, so why not? I don´t want to own a Malinois out of working lines, drives me crazy. some of my friends while hunting for points and dreaming about the next championship bought them a couple of years ago, after a while they were glad to buy a German Shepherd again...they thought it´s better to be second best than become crazy...

Back to the topic: For me the ultimate GSD is a well rounded, clear headed, strong, healthy, well educated dog, able to protect me and my property, its outlook should be within the written standard of the SV, I have no need for 300 points, no need for a VA rating, no matter if this dog is coming out of workingline or showline parents.

The breedstandard describes a workingdog, with hardness, courage and fightingdrive, the dualpurpose policedog I think is the best example of a versatile dog who should be both able to protect and use the nose for search and tracking. So yes, I think we can say the breedstandard calls for a dog that should function not only as a pet or for show/sport only. At least I haven´t seen many of todays showline dogs able to compete with the best workingdogs in different form of dogsports or common in service, hence there seems to be more middle of the road dogs in that group, hardly a controversial opinion I suppose. I doubt you can train a more mediocre dog who lacks too much drive to get far in dogsport, or take a dog with much preydrive but who lacks for example courage or hardness and make it an ideal policedog. The dogs who has a strong genetic components of courage,hardness and the rest the breedstandrad describes when it comes to workingability isn´t middle of the road dogs in my opinion. I don´t want a malinois either, but I guess there is a reason the malinois is common if a workingdog is wanted, and if you want a GSD that should fit the breedstandard for workingability then breeding on more middle of the road dogs will not get you far.

Good post Johan