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Jodielass
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Back on point.. you can sell a pup on Limited Register and upgrade it if its of sufficient quality. I'd like to think that buyers might be able to change their minds, go on to show their "pets" and perhaps take the plunge and become breeders.

And this is exactly my story and I would not stop others from doing the same.

I also do not begrudge people who desex their puppies before they go when they are popular Puppy farm breeds.

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Each time I register a litter, they are all on Limited except for the ones that I intend to keep. I dont actively look for buyers that will show my pups, so when I do the registrations, I just take account of what I want to keep and LR the rest.

However, a few times now I have had people approach me for a puppy and express an interest in showing. In my current litter, I put 2 girls and 2 boys on MR and the rest on LR. But before the pups had even left home I had to transfer 1 extra boy and girl to MR. I placed a boy with another breeder that had had no luck getting her bitch in whelp, he's a lovely boy and no problem with me transferring him. I also had someone that I have known for 20 years tell me that he "may" show his girl (although I doubt that he really will, but I also know that he will put her through our Breed Improvement schemes), so another transfer from LR to MR. :)

We are mentoring a new young couple with one of the boys, they have commenced show training and are very keen at this stage. We are also mentoring (and are now very good friends with) a new exhibitor in Victoria that has a girl from one of our previous litters, she recently got her breeder's prefix and will Breed Survey her girl later this year - together we are looking for the right stud dog for next year. She took a puppy from this latest litter to show too! :thumbsup:

I try very hard to remember how I got into the breed and breeding, from an Obedience background with a good (but not outstanding) bitch, that was encouraged to show, go through the breed improvement schemes and then breed, by experienced breeders that brought me "into the fold". When I find people that I think are serious about my breed and not talking about breeding just to "make some money since I paid so much for my dog" or "so the kids can see a litter born", I will try to "bring them into the fold", mentor them as I have been mentored for 25 odd years, encourage and guide them and hopefully, help them enjoy the show ring and insulate them from some of the nastiness in showing dogs.

Sometimes you just have to take a risk on people if you want to ensure the future of your breed.

And none of this precludes me from putting the other pet pups onto the LR. :D

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Sometimes you just have to take a risk on people if you want to ensure the future of your breed.

And none of this precludes me from putting the other pet pups onto the LR. :D

:thumbsup:

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To me, the registration that the dog is placed on is part of the terms of sale that you negotiate with the breeder. If you think you want to show or breed, ask for a mains registration. Tell the breeder what you want to do with the puppy and agree on the terms, or walk away. I think the elitest label can be applied to some aspects of the puppy market, but on this issue I think it is the breeder's call.

I have had a pet quality Lab on the limited register, which was fine with me at the time because I got her as a pet. My German Shepherd boy came as mains registered, even though the breeder knew I planned to desex him. Would have been fine for him to be on limited, because the only showing I wanted to do with him was obedience trialing.

My new girl is a potential show quality pup on the main register, and I plan to show her. If she can earn some reasonable show wins, and if she has the working ability I hope for, I might decide to breed her at maturity. But only if she can contribute better offspring and positively add to the small gene pool for the breed. And I'll take the breeder's advice on whether breeding her is a good idea. Otherwise she'll be a fabulous pet. So some breeders do help the next generation of breeders, but they are few and far between.

No breeder has a crystal ball at 8 weeks, and for most puppy buyers it is safer to put on limited and change later if there is reason to. And nothing about the registers will stop the next ByB from producing substandard pups from any two dogs.

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To me, the registration that the dog is placed on is part of the terms of sale that you negotiate with the breeder. If you think you want to show or breed, ask for a mains registration. Tell the breeder what you want to do with the puppy and agree on the terms, or walk away. I think the elitest label can be applied to some aspects of the puppy market, but on this issue I think it is the breeder's call.

I have had a pet quality Lab on the limited register, which was fine with me at the time because I got her as a pet. My German Shepherd boy came as mains registered, even though the breeder knew I planned to desex him. Would have been fine for him to be on limited, because the only showing I wanted to do with him was obedience trialing.

My new girl is a potential show quality pup on the main register, and I plan to show her. If she can earn some reasonable show wins, and if she has the working ability I hope for, I might decide to breed her at maturity. But only if she can contribute better offspring and positively add to the small gene pool for the breed. And I'll take the breeder's advice on whether breeding her is a good idea. Otherwise she'll be a fabulous pet. So some breeders do help the next generation of breeders, but they are few and far between.

No breeder has a crystal ball at 8 weeks, and for most puppy buyers it is safer to put on limited and change later if there is reason to. And nothing about the registers will stop the next ByB from producing substandard pups from any two dogs.

Of course is breeders calling which registration they using is not the problem, the problem for my opinion is the breeder giving people perception that rules of the ANKC is for pet dog goes on limited registration and perception unless for breeding and the showing main registration is not accepted. People have telled me this ruling they hear from the breeder which is a load of bull and is wrong for my opinion for the puppy buyer to believe this because is not the rule for registration is the rule on that breeders head only and they needing to be honest and tell the puppy buyer is how they do it, is not what is requiring by ANKC rulings so that people can making choice if they accept conditions of the sale or go to another breeder who telling less bull. Some breeders not even explain about the registration and the limited registration turning up from the postman and then finding out about the main and limited registration is different when is too late on the purchasing dealings to negotiation.

Joe

Edited by JoeK
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More devil's advocacy . . .

Pedigree dog ownership will continue to decline as breeders become more exclusive in placing main register dogs. In olden days, there wasn't much objection to someone who had a good, though not show quality, dog decided to have a litter and place pups with friends and neighbours. Now this is viewed as sinful. Personally, I don't like the way many breed standards are interpreted in the show ring, and I've seen a lot of desexed pets that I wouldn't mind having a pup from. That is 'plain' and 'average' individuals may be just as good as 'extreme' individuals who win in shows. If you remove the 'plain' from the breeding pool, you may be cutting out the very part of the gene pool that would allow recovery from such things as inability to whelp naturally, high incidence of entropian, or unhealthy skin.

To me, pedigree means simply that the lineage is known. [/b]Not that the lineage is all individuals who could win a beauty show. (Health tests are another issue . . . but these are not generally done before the decision of 'main' or 'limited'.

This. We just don't understand enough about genetics at this stage to take these chances and reduce the gene pool even further...

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Playing devil's advocate..........

As people have said, what makes a good dog is somewhat a personal opinion. If it was not discussed at length at the time of purchase (please bear that in mind) when I buy a pup, and it turns out a nice dog, great at its job (being a pet), good conformation, no health issues BUT is on the limited register, why should the breeder get to say I can't have a litter from my dog. I would like a pup, a couple of my friends would like a pup so I can get homes for them all. I would like to mate it to a pedigree and register the pups. I am asking the dog's breeder for advice for a sire.I am being reasonable in all my requests.

If the breeder IN THEIR OPINION doesn't think "it's good enough" to be on the main register and refuses to change it, are you not encouraging me to say "nuts to the lot of you, I will mate it to the unregisterd dog down the road!"

Pedigree dog breeding is the ONLY animal where the original breeder gets to dictate the use of the animal after its purchase. I suspect it is actually on dodgy legal ground as the dog is a possession, legally, of the owner and unless there is a signed contract stipulating no breeding I suspect you cannot refuse to change the register status of the dog. I also wonder even if there is a written contract that a good lawyer couldn't challenge it on the grounds that noone can know at 8 weeks old what the dog will turn into. Just a thought.

You make a great case to just desex the pups prior to placing them, which of course is not in the pups best interests.

BTW not every dog is sold on desexing agreement because the breeder feels the dog is not good enough to be bred, in fact if I had to guess, more times than not, that is not the reason.

For example not all breeders believe that just because someone might make a good owner of one of their dogs, that they would also make a good breeder of one of their dogs. In fact most people I know would make terrible dog breeders, some because they are far more interested in expressing and testing their rights then doing the right thing, others may not be good breeders of my dogs for other reasons.

As the breeder I believe it is my 'right' and more importantly my 'obligation' to decide if breeding is a potential option for that puppy going into that home. If that does not suit the buyer there are heaps of other dogs they can buy and breed if they want. No one is making them buy my pup.

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The problem as I see it is that some breeders have a flat ban on selling or providing dogs for breeding purposes. End result is the line dies out with the breeder. How that is protecting the interests of the breed for the future defeats me.

Who says a breeder has to breed only to protect the future of the breed, as evidence by producing dogs to be bred in the future?

I just can't see that because a person breeds a litter, that they then have an obligation to suppy some of those pups to the stud book for others to make future generations of the dogs from.

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More devil's advocacy . . .

Pedigree dog ownership will continue to decline as breeders become more exclusive in placing main register dogs. In olden days, there wasn't much objection to someone who had a good, though not show quality, dog decided to have a litter and place pups with friends and neighbours. Now this is viewed as sinful. Personally, I don't like the way many breed standards are interpreted in the show ring, and I've seen a lot of desexed pets that I wouldn't mind having a pup from. That is 'plain' and 'average' individuals may be just as good as 'extreme' individuals who win in shows. If you remove the 'plain' from the breeding pool, you may be cutting out the very part of the gene pool that would allow recovery from such things as inability to whelp naturally, high incidence of entropian, or unhealthy skin.

To me, pedigree means simply that the lineage is known. [/b]Not that the lineage is all individuals who could win a beauty show. (Health tests are another issue . . . but these are not generally done before the decision of 'main' or 'limited'.

This. We just don't understand enough about genetics at this stage to take these chances and reduce the gene pool even further...

There are more than a few issues in the above.

Pedigree dog ownership is in decline and I do think that restricting breeding by many breeders to only show homes is part of that problem but by no means the only reason for the decline. I also think that dog showing is in delcine and that we may see an end to this acvivity in the next 10-15 years, but that does not mean the end of purebred dogs.

I agree that we need to keep as many dogs as possible in the gene pool, but selling dogs for breeding purposes to owners with no back ground in dogs or breeding is not the way to keep more genes around. Current breeding practices are doing more harm if you ask me. In one breed I fillow 3 DNA tests in about 8 years have lead to about 30% of the dogs being removed in one or 2 generations from the gene pool because they are carriers of a disease we can now fully control with DNA testing. That is a shocking loss of genes for no good reason and even done knowing it is not in the best interest of the breed. Saving the the gene pool needs to start with the current breeders if you ask me, not pet buyers.

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The dog in question is a lab. There is no shortage of pedigreed labs in Australia. Hardly a breed in decline.

If you are referring to the comments about keeping dogs in the gene pool,

While it is true that some breeds are over bred, when speaking of gene pools it really needs to based on science. Numbers are important for several reasons. One is COI. The more genes we have the more options there are in avoiding disease and increasing selection options. Even siblings have the potential to offer very different genes to the next generations, so from a breeding point of view the show champion may not have as much to offer the next generation as the non show champion sibling.

I have no idea what the average COI is for labs but current thinking would say the breed average should be below 6% for 10 generations. Nor do I know the population divides for working vs show vs pet bloodlines. Also need to figure in the numbers of carriers and affected dogs for any diseases in the population (HD and ED come to mind). But as a general rule of thumb, more dogs is always better for the gene pool.

BTW it is usually felt that the minimum number to keep a breed going is about 500 pups a year entering the breeding pool (meaning in this case ANKC main register). The more related these dogs (higher COI) then the more dogs you would need to offset this.

At 100 pups or less a per year it is felt the breed is seriously endangered and needs immediate and active support.

Edited by shortstep
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