Julio Roca de La Cocha

Julio Roca

Julio has been sent from Argentina, straight from the La Cocha Kennel. As I wanted to use this dog as stud I made a full X-Rays check-up when fully grown, around the age of 3 yo. Even though Julio supposedly come from a – totally guaranteed – dysplasia free bloodline, and showing no mayor problems during his development, the exams showed an extremely serious dysplasia condition affecting both hips and elbows.

I explicitly required a promising pup to be eventually used as stud for a breeding program. Julio came with a fake date of birth on his medical papers in order to be shipped under age. The pup was only 10 weeks old instead of the minimum age required by the international law of 4 months for international shipment.The pedegree was sent by mail only months later, showing the actual date of birth, ecc… To be able to fly so early Julio had to be injected with all the medical treatments required by the law within just a few days. This meant: a double shot of polyvalent vaccine, rabies shot (that should only by injected from the age of 3 months), deworming, ecc.. Being subjected to such an invasive medical treatment and shipped overseas at a very early age brought severe distress to the pup as well as a severe skin condition that looks months to be fixed.

Julio also collapsed, for no clear reason, while resting at home. After a medical checking we came to the conclusions that his condition might have been related to heart issues.

Doing some research, checking dogs involved in the breeding process, obverserving pups of a couple of litters from Julio, with different bitches (both bitches were shipped by La Cocha), I started having serious concern about the quality of Julio’s bloodline. From each litter I had one massive pup while the others were barely fitting the breed’s standard, and showing lots of faults. The lager pups later showed Great Dane feautures, like extremely size and body conformation, severe dysplasia was also found on several pups. I later found out that at least one stud might had white Great Dane blood in it. When asking to La Cocha owners about this dubt they couldn’t prove or guarantee that white Great Dane were involved in the breeding, that basically means they couldn’t guarantee for dogs involved in the breeding process. According to specialist, when messing up with a wrong stud or bitch you’ll end up with problems for several generations to come, before eventually being able to track down the problem.

After contacting La Cocha Kennel I have been told that it was a very unlucky case, but I never got to see X-Rays of his parents, proof of the actual blood line, no guarantees on dogs involved on this specific bloodline, some studs and bitches were not from La Cocha kennel but from other breeders, ecc..