Even Greener Pastures

Is the term "b i t c h" still acceptable among professional dog breeders? Can we refer to our female dogs as "our ****" on our website? It looks so wrong.

@Nikola
That`s not a bad question.  I personally prefer to limit the b*itch word to its derogatory meaning only and not use it as it pertains to dog breeding. Even though I`m not in the business, I would personally select a word that`s sort of innocuous like „the female“ of the breed, or something. But, I knew a dog breeder in the 90s, who was a friend of mine, and he always used the word b*itch to just describe his female breeding dogs all the time and he used the word like it was nothing. The word does sound a bit odd, frankly, to use even in dog breeding to me anyway. That`s why I avoid it. But, then that`s just me.

Alharacas ´ easy google search seemed to answer the question. But, I have to admit I`ve never heard the word „dam“ before regarding dogs. It´s a good question for my 90-year old mom. She likes questions like this (she `s even got weird expressions out of the 1930s I`ve never heard of, like „truck farm“. Like what is THAT?)

I`ve heard of a sire and a dam, as it relates to other animals (maybe horses?) but that´s about it.

@Alharacas

Thank you. It would have helped if I'd known the word "dam" existed. I knew it meant a thing that holds back water but wasn't aware of this meaning. Did you look it up or did you know it because you've heard people use it?

@SHL

Thanks, this was exactly my concern - that the b word doesn't sound right. My parents use the word "čuba" in Czech, it's also considered rude outside the dog context. And they also say it like it's nothing. So you've never heard anyone refer to a female dog as dam...
Yeah and what is a truck farm?

My mom told me a „truck farm“ was a farm with Equipment like Trucks on it or something. It`s an archaic expression that she`s heard of. I never had.

I feel weird about referring to a female dog used for breeding as a b*tch. It´s too strongly associated with the pejorative word for a woman.

Hence, I substitute another word (not dam) but „female“ instead. It seems easy and to-the-point. I`ve only heard „dam“ used in conjunction with „sire“ and that has to do with horses, BUT, now that I think of it, when dog breeders use genealogy charts to show dog pedigrees, my friend who raised dogs, used to point to who was the „sire“ and who was the „dam“, so I think Alharacas is right in a sense. It`s just that the word „dam“ is used in pedigree charts. Like „Okay. The sire was Sir Francis in this pedigree. Who`s the dam?“

Hope this helps.

@SHL

It is very helpful, thank you.

@Neal

Thanks, I just impressed my British friend with my knowledge of farming terminology. She didn't see that one coming!

Outdated really.  Just like most of us truck farmers.

@SHL
„Who was the b*tch over here on the chart?“
That really made me laugh.

Nikola, I'd read the word before, in old novels where they talk a lot about farming. It hadn't really occurred to me in the context of dog breeding, but it came up in the google results: "breeding b*tch... bla-bla... sire and dam...". Then I looked it up in Pons, where it says "female parent, esp. of quadrupeds", so I compared the results, to see which one's used more frequently.

Alharacas, you did a good job in researching this. I do this a lot with German words. I`ll find an unusual word, and look at LEO, and hopefully they will have it listed in their chart in the back that shows the word frequency usage. So, if a word has a very low usage number (like a 0.5 compared to a 200 on other words) I assume that`s one to make minimal use of (I think they use computer programs of newspaper articles or literature from the last several decades to see how often the word pops up). Or, if Duden says the word is veraltend, you know its frequency rating is going to be low. I`d love to hear which German words older people you know use that sound old-fashioned to you. I know older people can have a slightly different use of words. Like in this interview with Helmut Schmidt, I think from the late 90s, he was questioned about the hijacking of the Lufthansa plane from Mallorca in 1977. Notice how he he uses the verb „ersuchen“ as „request“

. (at 3:55-4:11)

I asked my German friend and others about this and was told not to use ersuchen, just to use a more common word like bitten, as this word was both old and used more in official speech.  Its word usage according to the LEO chart dropped from about a 15 in 1950 to a 4 now.

My German professor at college, a native speaker from Hamburg, used to always say „zum Exempel“ interchangeably with „zum Beispiel.“ But, when I asked my German friend about this last Summer,  she just said forget it. Nobody says „zum Exempel“. I had long given up using it knowing nobody made use of it. And the use is listed as veraltend, not entirely dead by on its linguistic death bed. Too bad because I always liked that one, because it sounded so much like English. Or, another one I liked was das Diktionär. That`s another one on its linguistic death bed. My professor used that one in class all the time too (but that was 1980 and she was 60 then), and rarely used das Wörterbuch. On the word usage chart, it ranked about 0.03 in 1950 and now barely registers in as a 0.001.  Wow. And yes, veraltend as they call it too. Another one that I`m sorry to see go. By contrast, das Wörterbuch gets a solid 2.0 on the chart. So, those charts are useful.


This word b*tch in the dog breeding business is one of those words from a specialty subject that ordinary native speakers not in the dog breeding business don`t know or hear much.  I vaguely recall hearing sire and dam, but my 1990s era recollection of the word usage had to do with pedigree charts. I never heard „dam“ referred to in a breeding female pedigree dog, but b*tch is still used. Like I said earlier, I wouldn`t use it myself, only because of its more derogatory use pertaining to women.

And you can imagine how wacko it would sound looking at a pedigree chart and asking „who`s the b*tch over here?“

I still think sire and dam sounds a lot better than the doggy`s „dad“ and „mom.“ LOL.

When I heard that, I had to hold back the laughter and wondered if the woman who said that was retarded or something. 

Truck farm, truck patch, or truck patch farming. The term isn't really used a lot these days. Farmers Markets are where truck patch farmers take their produce to sell it. Strictly speaking, a truck patch was planted to provide the farmer with the produce that he needed. Any excess would be trucked to town or to the side of the road and sold.

'Farmers Market' has the cachet that city folks like SHL find soothing to his pampered existence. SHL: "Jeeves, my man, would you kindly take the Rolls and pop by the farmers market and pick up a pound or two of those absolutely delightful organic baby beets"?

Truck farm, truck patch, or truck patch farming. The term isn't really used a lot these days. Farmers Markets are where truck patch farmers take their produce to sell it. Strictly speaking, a truck patch was planted to provide the farmer with the produce that he needed. Any excess would be trucked to town or to the side of the road and sold.

'Farmers Market' has the cachet that city folks like SHL find soothing to his pampered existence. SHL: "Jeeves, my man, would you kindly take the Rolls and pop by the farmers market and pick up a pound or two of those absolutely delightful organic baby beets"?

Pampered existence? I wish I had one. And I don`t get much thrill out of farmers markets. They block off streets which I find annoying and avoid them.

@Nikola, you may find it interesting:)
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MeOAH3oJrQJemRArmxuZYYPMB9M1cvTp/view?usp=sharing

Amazing, Sudeep you kept records of your entries on Italki!!!
@Nikola that discussion shows how Italki was before the April purge. I guess you will not find anymore this quality of exchange. It is just incredible that people like Sudeep and Sepideh (the girl from Iran who opened every day a new discussion) were banned for ever.

@Sudeep
Thank you so much. This is what I would have done in an ideal world - I would have asked people on italki. But as you said, you don't get discussions like this any more. It wouldn't surprise me if I got reported for asking such question.
How many discussions have you saved? Can we see more?

If it gets made into a movie I want to be played by Tommy Lee Jones.

@SHL

@Neal
You do cover a wide range of topics in one day.

That was great Nikola, thanks. That was Patti Page, from 1953.

I love the way she sings, „I must take a trip to California......(probably thinking „and get the h*ll out of Indiana or New York“- listen up Jerry and Neal. They knew THAT simple face even back then), knowing it`s the only half-way decent place to be if you have to be stuck in the USA.

I`d still like to ask Italki`s Alice what her words are, instead of sire and b*tch, for doggies.  I`m sure she`ll insist that it`s the doggie`s mom and dad.

Neal

And don`t forget. Dogs are better because you can`t take a gold fish for a walk. Words of wisdom. 

By the way, it sounds like you know your way around Amsterdam.....But, it`s not just there. Braunschweig had its colorful little street like that too, as I very well recall.