DNA

So I've been wanting to have Tilly's DNA tested forever....well, at least since Jes told me she had Peyton's done (which I guess was just in January, but it seems like forever ago). Anyway, I never got around to it. It isn't super expensive, but I could never justify spending $60 I really didn't have on my dog's DNA so it didn't get done...Until my birthday this year. For my birthday, I told my family the only thing I wanted was this DNA testing kit. You can buy the kits at PetSmart, you do a cheek swab at home, mail it in and wait for the results. It's a very simple system. Back to my story...my fabulous siblings gave me this DNA kit for my birthday and I of course immediately performed a series of cheek swabs on Tilly (you have to do two for accuracy) and mailed it in. Then the waiting began. They say it takes two weeks to process. I put it in the mail the day after my birthday and waited. I gave them a day or two to get it and a day or two to get it back to me, but by this week, I was anxious. Plus people kept asking me if I had it yet. Like I wasn't going to tell everyone the second I got it?!? I was starting to worry I wrote my address wrong, or they couldn't read my handwriting, plus there was no real way to track it or verify that they'd received it. The simplicity of the system left some holes in the "what if something goes wrong" area of this product. Well, fear not because the results did in fact arrive on Thursday.As I opened that big white envelope, I was more excited than the day I received my acceptance letter into Ball State University so many years ago. OK, that was a joke. I mean I'm sure I was excited, but I don't think I was surprised. I didn't apply anywhere else and assumed I would get in with no problem. I was mostly looking forward to my dorm assignment, but I digress. I was very excited. I don't know what I wanted it to say. The shelter told me they thought she was a Beagle/Golden Retriever mix so we've been operating on that assumption to some degree ever since. I had created a story in which Tilly's mother was a beagle/golden mix and her owners gave Tilly and her siblings away to their friends, one of whom was Tilly's original owner. These people quickly realized they could not handle Tilly because they had small children and as we all know, Tilly's a bit of a handful. Nobody ever really knew what her dad was, but ever since I've had her (she was about 3 1/2 months old when I brought her home) we have been speculating. We have gone through the full gamut of possibilities....from Weimaraner to Greyhound to random breeds we've only seen in dog books. Tilly weighs about 40 pounds and stands about 2 1/2 feet tall. She's a very pretty dog, but has a small head and a bigger body. She is blond, which we credited the Golden Retriever with. She is a super sweet puppy, and doesn't know a stranger. She's good with kids and other dogs. She's also ridiculously energetic, which garnered her the nickname Crazy Dog from my dad. She never wears out, and she's insanely fast. She has a long tail and medium sized floppy ears. She has speckled white front legs and white accents on her chest, face, feet, tail and belly, and he has light colored eyes. I like to joke (especially when my hair is really blond) that she looks like me. Sorry for the overly-detailed description. I know most of you have met her, and those that haven't can see her in the picture right there, but these are the qualities that we have used to decide what she is. OK, moving on. You know I have the results and I haven't shared them yet. I know you are just dying to hear what from what bloodline it is that Tilly descends. Will she be a Slytherin or a Hufflepuff or could she be a Gryffindor?? (Sorry, I'm just really excited to see Hogwarts at Universal in Florida)

The results already, right? They categorize their findings in five different levels. Each level represents a range in percents that each breed composes in your dog. For example a level 4 is 10-19% and a level 1 is 75% or more. Well it turns out that Tilly had a level 1 breed in her. This means that she must have had one purebred parent. Who knew? I thought she was mutt to the core and we might find 10 different breeds. She then had a second breed come in at a level 4 (which in her case I'm calling 15% so the numbers add up right) and a level 5 come in at 10%. Miss Tilly Jane is 75% Brittany Spaniel. That surprised be because it is not a breed we talk about often, but one my mom and I had thrown around at one point. If you look at these pictures (http://www.google.com/images?um=1&hl=en&rlz=1C1CHMZ_enUS372US379&tbs=isch:1&sa=1&q=brittany+spaniel&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai==), you can see she looks a lot like a Brittany Spaniel especially in the face. The next most prominent breed was Golden Retriever. This one was much less surprising since we'd thought it all along and she's blond like a golden. Brittany Spaniels are almost always brown and white. (maybe always, but I don't want to start making statements I can't back up). And finally, Tilly is about 10% Labrador Retriever. That's not a breed we've ever really mentioned, but it's not shocking...a little boring maybe, but definitely not shocking. Now probably the most interesting thing about these results is the fact that my beagle mix dog doesn't have any beagle in her at all! Regardless of the results, I am very happy to finally know where my sweet pup came from.