ORIGINAL: daleh
When you talk about dogs being crossed or pure bred. Here is what has happened over the last 40 years.
English Pointers have beenbred with walker hounds to make them run harder
German Shorthairs have beenbred with EP to put more bird sense, drive to them and more run
Briitanys have been bred by Setters to create a horseback dog
A Pointing Lab is a English Pointer and Lab Cross that looks like a lab all that looked like pointers were culled
The most winning Setter of all time (his dad was a Pointer)
E. Pointer's were crossed with foxhound's not walkers. I doubt that the lab was bred with an E, Pointer to make a pointing lab, not enough white shows up in the pointing lab. Maybe they were crossed between black or cho. labs and solid liver shorthairs. Bet no one will admit it! Nobody is admiting to britt's being bred to setter's either but I have seen some Britt's with a LOT of white and some damn long legs and a bit long and fine hair. And yep, GSP's were bred to E.Pointer's. Nobody want's to admit that either. You ever get a chance to look at a photo of a GSP named "Tell", imagine him with a long tail.
Now all of these crosses, if they really did happen and I don't doubt they did, created a type of dog that is,,,,,,well different than the standard and doesn't quite conform to what's expected. If cross breeding hadn't occured, all dogs would look like coyote's or wolves. But to gain anything of value is a very long and selective process.
There is another dog of questionable value which is the "dropper". A cross between the e. pointer and the e. setter. The chances of ending up with a dog that is huge running and can't take training well are very good.
I think if people would just keep doing these wonder breedings, we would eventually end up with a lot more coyote's that fetch and share lunch with their humans.