About Us Coming Soon The seven stage apprenticeship for breeders. The Beginner:....Doing everything wrong. Buying wrong. Feeding wrong. The Learner:.....Who now realize they have started badly and while still keeping their original mistake, have now learned better and are doing their best to set out on the right path. The Novice:......Who have corrected their mistakes and are starting to win and are beginning to be known and recognized by other breeders and exhibitors. The Everlasting Novice: These are always nice people with an equally charming dog. To them, dogs are a pleasant and interesting hobby. The Middle-Range Breeder: This is the largest section of all. This is the average breeder who is definitely one of us. Recognized as reliable, breeding decent litters, rearing the puppies properly, with a good eye for a dog and the facilities to keep the odd stud dog and a nice bitch or two. These are the backbone of any breed and are indispensable because they supply the majority of the average puppies for sale; serve their own area with a decent stud dog and form the mass of ringsiders. These breeders are members of various breed clubs and support all activities. Being dead keen exhibitors they try their best to be an asset and a credit to their breed. The Good Breeder: This is a rarer category because these breeders have realized something the middle rangers have not. That is that there is a definite thing called a good dog and that a decent dog is not quite good enough. The good breeder is always ready to learn and has taken the trouble to find out most of the advanced points, such as what constitutes a good lay of shoulder or a good length of hock and where other virtues may be found. The good breeder knows what a good head feels and looks like; what constitutes good expression and understands structure with an eye to the dog's use as a herding animal. The good breeder has nice stock and has learned how to use it to best advantage. He may still depend on other people's studs to try and improve each litter, but has learned that the title of 'Champion' does not automatically mean the dog carrying this title is necessarily the best for his purpose. The good breeder is trying to improve all the time and will sell a bitch or dog that the middle ranger would have stuck to, realizing that either he has better in his kennel or that these good dogs are not quite good enough. These are the breeders that supply the middle rangers with better stock when they themselves wish to raise their standards. The good breeder has nearly always had ten years or more experience with dogs and is recognized as such The Top Breeder:...This is a very difficult category to define, although we all know them. There will be about 20 of them at any given time. They go on, seemingly forever, always able to produce a good one, always with quality finished dogs, these usually having failings rather than faults, and give nothing away in type, style, make and shape. Usually they have been at the top for many years and have a strain of their own, readily recognized as being of a distinct and individual type. They never seem to disappear and very few breeders join their ranks. They are often than not internationally known names and if we get two new top breeders in ten years who are really going to last and have an influence on the breed, than we are lucky. To reach the level of "good ordinary middle range breeders" you must have done your homework, been breeding at least three years, have bred your first three litters and have discovered and recovered from any initial mistakes you made. Now you are in that vast reservoir of breeders that go to make the breed. This reservoir is fed from below by the novices. It is easy to get into, almost inevitable, if you are seriously interested in dogs and have the opportunity to make it a major hobby. It is very difficult to get out of the middle-range and many never do. The first question is, can you keep on with it? You have to able to keep at least five or six dogs to be able to breed two or three litters a year and run on a couple of puppies from each litter, at least until you can see which is the best for you to keep. You have to have the room, a fair area of land and good neighbors. A keen and compatible mate is useful and you must somehow contrive never to forget your children. How to get out of the middle-range and move to becoming a good breeder is the next question. Many never succeed. There are many reasons why they fail. One of the first problems comes from how they moved up to the middle-range in the first place. As novices, they may have fixed any initial mistakes in their buying. We all start out with a pet we will have for the next ten years. Then they will have gone to a good kennel and bought a decent bitch or puppy or two. It must be remembered that neither the good breeder nor the top breeder will sell their very best bitch or puppy. So the novice will start with a decent dog/bitch with some "if" that caused the breeder to sell it. So now the middle-ranger has a kennel of original, loved mistakes, a decent bitch or two, or maybe two or three youngsters from earlier buys. Now we come to the first disadvantage - any pup he breeds will be judged against his own collection of dogs. Those that are worse will be sold. Anything better will stand out, but those 'much of a muchnesses' will often be kept as well. Thus he will clone his own mediocrity. The average standard of the kennel will improve slowly, if at all. The plateau ( the kennel norm) will be fair to average, and, when these puppies get into the show ring they will still be fair to average, because all the other middle-rangers will have stock of exactly the same standard. The good breeders plateau will be at a much higher level. The stock in their kennels will be judged against a higher standard and anything not up to scratch will be sold. If the middle-ranger can somehow recognize this and raise the plateau, he is on his way to being a better breeder. The second obstacle to the middle-breeder is the ringside - his fellow middle-range competitors. The ringsiders who have some knowledge but not a lot of experience will go for the obvious choice from the ringside:- the nicely balanced, well presented, good showman, and will nearly always judge on outward appearance, because they can not do much else from where they are standing. They can not "go into" the dogs, which is what the judge must do, and he isn't much of a judge unless he does go thoroughly into his dogs. What the ringside can't know is that the judge may find that the popular choice doesn't stand "looking into". But the judge finds that the top breeders dog in the same class does not fall to pieces under his hands, so up goes the top breeder's dog, and down goes the ringside choice. The ringside agree amongst themselves that 'once again wrong has triumphed and a name has won and that there is no honesty or justice in the game. This is a very big obstacle because the middle-ranger can find an excuse for his own loss. Instead of looking at his dog and judging it against the top dogs, he agrees with the ringside that 'names' win because of influence. Many middle-rangers fail on the next obstacle of 'ignorance'. They have not learned from their homework, studied the breed and what it was bred for, looked at the old photos and tread what the old-timers said. They have not bothered to learn anatomy, not even the little bit one requires to judge a dog. They have, as learners, learned from and listened to learners and they do not know their stuff. They do not know the standard and will perpetuate myths about what a dog should have or what it should be, often erroneously. Often they blindly follow the word of the cult leader they admire. If the winner is not of that breeding, it is worthless. They look, but they do not appreciate a good dog wherever it is found. This is where many middle-rangers get stuck. If they do not 'get on', it is because they get a small judging assignment at a match. Then the eyes of the blind MAY get opened. They may come to realize the vast difference between a an average dog and a good dog. If they can take advantage of this experience, they are on the right track. However, there seems to be a lot of middle-rangers who can learn nothing from handling a good dog. They can always find faults but never bother to learn outright virtues. They will stay owning decent, average dogs, just above the mediocre level, having few faults but no great virtues. The last big obstacle for the breeder trying to rise from the middle-range is that he gets cluttered up with stock. He can't get rid of his original mistakes. He loves them. He can't part with his first 'home-bred' for sentimental reasons. He keeps two each from his first litters, breeds annually and wants another litter from his foundation bitch. Then he thinks it is time to keep a stud dog. Before he knows it he is cluttered up with 15 dogs. His neighbors, spouse and friends are complaining and the work becomes overpowering. It is important to know what and how to sell to keep yourself going with room to improve. Through the years the number of middle-rangers seems to stay the same. They always make up the largest group of breeders. Few seem to graduate into the good breeder category. Some advance because they raise the plateau of their own kennel. Most fail to get ahead for a number of reasons. They have a useful bitch and want to improve on her, so they consider the top champions as the ladder to which to take her. Somehow the 'newish' breeder will have a vague idea that to mate to the top dog somehow puts their bitch into a top category. They will seldom consider using anything else, even if this dog does not suit the bitch. The champion sired pups are easier to sell. However, the suitability of this mating is rarely questioned. The middle-ranger does not yet have a string of his own. That is, a very advanced string and is really only found amongst the best and oldest breeders Using a champion dog that ties in with your btiches pedigree is an excellent way of grading up, providing you know the inherent dangers in the line you are collecting. Many breeders are not even this logical. They breed to the big winner of the day or to the dog that is promoted the most. As soon as he becomes the dog of the day, every middle-range breeder send their bitch to him. His type doesn't matter. He is the top dog and he gets the bitches. Using the dog of the day will probably grade your norm up slowly and every little bit helps, until the day you want to breed from the progeny. Then you find that almost every dog and bitch in the country are either by him or one of his grandchildren. It then becomes the problem to find a dog they can use. For the middle-range breeder to get higher, he must study his own stock and must look at the various dogs in the ring. He must have a perfect clear picture in his mind of exactly what he wants. To grade up into the good breeder ranks, you have to think for yourself, rather than let judges or other handlers /breeders do it for you. Once you do this, and start getting the dogs you want, you can grade up a lot quicker because you are breeding stock from stock YOU have improved. Thus the dog you select to help you improve will be almost sure to produce at least one puppy you will like, not just accept. And at last you are on the way up...   OMERTA The Breeder's Code of Silence What do most modern-day breeders and the Mafia have in common? What a strange question, you may say. It is, sadly though, a very real commonality. The answer is simply what Padgett, a well-known geneticist refers to as the “Code of Silence” for breeders and perhaps more commonly discussed as “omerta” for the Costa Nostra. Both are deadly silences. It’s easy to understand the reasons for the conspiracy of silence when it refers to criminals, but what reasons can a breeder possibly have for maintaining “omerta”?   The reason most often given for not sharing genetic information is the fear of being made the object of a “witch hunt.” It lies much deeper though. It begins with ownership and the human need to see what one owns as being the best. Remember the “keeping up with the Jones” mentality? Everyone wants the very best and the accolade of owning the best. Admitting that what one owns or has bred may have faults is difficult for most people. Also at fault is the huge financial and emotional investment that breeders have in their dogs. Discovering that there may be defects in the sires and dams that breeders have so much of themselves invested in becomes frightening and causes many to refuse to even contemplate that their dogs may possess defective genes. Egos and fear of being labeled “poor breeders” are ultimately the reasons for breeders maintaining this detrimental code of silence.   Even more dangerous than the Code of Silence though is the refusal to contemplate defective genes may exist within a breeding program and be present for generations, quietly meshing through many bloodlines before manifesting itself. Could it be possible that dogs which appear healthy can actually be spreading dangerous, sometimes lethal genes throughout the breed community until finally two healthy, but gene-defective carriers combine to produce that first tell-tale affected offspring? Of course it is and time and again the geneticists tell us how this is possible.   Simplistically, breeders cannot see defective genes and what they don’t see must not exist. Therefore using that logic, all the untested dogs must be as beautifully healthy inside as they are structurally beautiful outside. If only that logic were true! Unfortunately, far more emphasis is placed upon structural and superficial beauty simply because it is something that is easily seen, acknowledged and obtained. It’s also something without any “unnecessary” financial investments. One doesn’t need to pay for x-rays or blood tests or specialists’ knowledge in order to evaluate how a dog conforms to a physical standard.  The real danger, though, comes not from those dogs who are tested, but from those breeders who keep their heads in the sand and refuse to believe that their dogs could be less than 'perfect'. We can begin to fix that which we reveal, but that which remains hidden is a threat to the future. But here omerta, that “Code of Silence” is very evident. Not only do these breeders hold fast to the belief that their dogs are untainted by defective genes, structural defects or temperament problems, but they also believe that no dog that they choose to bring into their breeding program through mating with their dogs could possibly be carriers either. After all, they only “breed to the best,” and of course, that best just has to be perfect.   Now the truly criminal act occurs. These breeders are quite often very successful in the show ring; their dogs are thought to be the best – after all, they have ribbons and placing and titles to prove how worthy their dogs are!  Because of their show ring success, they are seen as breed authorities, people that newcomers to the breed trust for knowledge and information. And the information these newcomers get is that there are no genetic problems to be concerned with, no need to do that “expensive testing when the dogs are all healthy.” Even more disastrous to the breed’s future is that these breeders’ attitudes begin to prevail. The newcomers see the success of these breeders’ dogs and buy them. The newcomers then have a financial and emotional investment to protect which begins to spread this attitude, with predictable results. Soon, because these breeders are the “powers” within the breed (quite often judges, people selected to discuss the breed at seminars, breeders who command respective prices for puppies and stud fees, breeders seen winning), they use this “power” to ensure that it becomes unethical to discuss any defects, in either health or temperament, found in any of the pedigrees of their sires, dams or progeny of their sires or dams. All too often one hears “I don’t dare say anything if I want to win” or “there are three lines with epilepsy (or heart or eye or pick a health problem), but you don’t need to know about them.” Of course we need to know about them, how else are we to make intelligent decisions about which dogs would best benefit the future we plan for our dogs unless we consider not only the structural beauty, but also the hidden genetics that we are attempting to also improve?  What about the breeders who openly discuss the defects found in their own dogs? Unfortunately, they are all too often labeled as “poor breeders” and their dogs said to be “defective”. They are shunned and spoken of in whispers and sneers. The very fact that these breeders are striving to share knowledge openly and to scientifically test their dogs make these breeders the subject of witch hunts by the very people who are either too cheap, too unconcerned, too egotistical, too uncaring about the future to even test their dogs, much less have the courage to honestly discuss their dogs. Instead of applauding these breeders who choose to share information, these breeders become shunned and hounded. As a result, and because human nature makes us want to be part of a group instead of outside the group, breeders begin to do what they do best – they maintain silence and lie or refuse to admit what they do know.   As more and more newcomers join a breed and inexperienced breeders and exhibitors all jump on the bandwagon of showing, owning and practicing the art of breeding, they turn to the breeders who are winning, equating winning with superior quality dogs. The breeders are, therefore, more determined to have nothing bad revealed about any of their dogs, further establishing in their minds the perfection of the dogs they breed and further increasing the financial and emotional investment that they have in perpetuating this theory. Winning in the show ring has nothing to do with genetic health. Indeed, a number of the winning dogs are carriers of genetic disorders at the least and, in some instances, are known to have genetic health disorders. While a genetic disorder itself, depending upon type and severity, should never preclude the dog from the genetic pool, it is absolutely mandatory that people be aware of any area of concern in order to breed intelligently. At the very least, the dogs that the dog is bred to must be tested and their backgrounds looked at carefully to limit the possibility of affecting more dogs or making more dogs carriers of the disorder. Yet, because the winners don’t want to be labeled as “poor breeders” and lose the accolade of being the best (as well as the possible financial loss in not being able to sell puppies or stud fees at as high a price), the “Code of Silence” becomes even more firmly embraced.   The newcomers, because they want to be accepted, avoid talking about the sires and dams that produce poorly, whether it is structure, health or temperament problems. Also, they too now have a financial and emotional investment in addition to wanting to be accepted into the “winners club.” They may even recognize trends in one or more lines in their own pedigrees, but refuse to acknowledge these trends and keep them secret for fear of being labeled.   Often, the breeders, while not openly acknowledging that there are any problems, will attempt to dilute the possibility of the disorder rearing its head by out-breeding to another totally different line. Dr. Jerold Bell, a well-known geneticist, has this to say about this method: “Repeated out-breeding to attempt to dilute detrimental recessive genes is not a desirable method of genetic disease control. Recessive genes cannot be diluted; they are either present or not. Out-breeding carriers multiples and further spreads the defective gene(s) in the gene pool. If a dog is a known carrier or has high carrier risk through pedigree analysis, it can be retired from breeding, and replaced with one or two quality offspring. Those offspring should be bred, and replaced with quality offspring of their own, with the hope of losing the defective gene.”   Unfortunately, refusing to acknowledge or test for genetic disorders doesn’t make them go away. What we can’t see still has a huge impact on the breed and continuing to breed these carriers of defective genes allows the defect to take a firmer hold in the breed. Those breeders who try very hard to breed healthy dogs and take every scientific precaution to ensure genetic health are shunned for the very passion that should be applauded; the efforts they take are trivialized at best and more often ridiculed as “unnecessary” or “fear-mongering.” As a result, these breeders work alone and, outside of their own kennel, their efforts make little impact on the breed as a whole.   Omerta can only be broken by people who have the courage, conviction and passion to ensure that the breed as a whole becomes stronger and healthier. Instead of witch hunts for those who have the heartache of dealing with the problems, the goal of applauding those with the courage and determination to speak out openly should be taken up by every breed club in every country. Awards in addition to those given to breeders who have the most winning dogs should be given to those breeders who work tirelessly to improve the breed. Prettiness and beauty doesn’t improve a breed; genetic health and the ability to live a pain-free, healthy life far surpass beauty, but are more difficult to obtain.   The cost of genetic testing is not high when one looks at the effects that refusing to test may have on the breed. Ask any knowledgeable breeder whose breed has rampant heart, blood disorder, eye or hip problems whether they blame the lack of foresight and the refusal of past breeders in making a further financial investment in the breed for the almost insurmountable problems now and the answer is predictable. In the UK, it is possible to do testing by certified specialists for hip, elbow, eye, heart, blood, immune disorders for around a total investment of less than a cost of a puppy or a stud fee. It’s possible to do far less testing, but at what cost? Will the breed suffer from heart problems in the future because a simple stethoscope test was not important at the time? Will the breed be faced with trying to eradicate blindness years from now because an eye exam was thought unwarranted? Will the descendants be filled with pain from bad hips and/or elbows because the breed moved well in the show ring and didn’t look dysplastic to the naked eye? Testing for things such as von Willebrand’s Disease (vWD) and thyroid testing (immune system) can be done inexpensively as blood tests. Granted, testing for these genetic disorders won’t guarantee that a problem won’t occur in future breedings, but testing will greatly reduce the chances of problems and that is a good place to start.  If a breeder cannot provide proof in the form of veterinarian-issued certificates or reports that genetic testing has been done, the buyer should be aware that they purchase at their own risk! Caveat emptor! Breeders may claim that their dogs have never limped or that there is no need to do any testing because the breed is healthy. Some may even claim that their veterinarians have said that genetic testing was unnecessary. Those stances are irresponsible. Once again, genes are not visible and carriers of defective genes may themselves appear healthy to the naked eye. It is only with testing that we really know whether our dogs are affected or not and only then with honest evaluation of pedigrees having tested or affected dogs that the potentiality for carriers are realized.   What can we do to break the deadly Code of Silence? The majority, if not all, breed clubs have a code of ethics that require members to breed healthy dogs. One of the places to start is with the clubs. Instead of being social institutions or “good ole boy” clubs, these breed organizations could begin upholding the very real goal of protecting the future of the breed by demanding and requiring that genetic testing be undertaken prior to breeding. Far more serious than breeding a sixteen-month old bitch is the practice of breeding without taking every possible safeguard that genetic health is a priority. Yet, in many clubs “poor breeders” are identified by the age at which they breed or the frequency in which they breed rather than the very real criteria that proof of health be mandatory. Take the emphasis off winning – how many clubs determine “breeder of the year” based on the number of progeny that wins? Are there clubs that actually require that the breeder also must show proof that they are doing all they can do to ensure the future of the breed?   We can break the silence by commending those with the courage and determination to talk about problems, share successes and knowledge instead of ostracizing them. Omerta fails if every puppy buyer and stud dog user demands that proof of genetic testing is shown. The Code of Silence fails when we realize that it is not enough to breed winning dogs or to command the highest price for puppies or to have a stud dog that is used fifty, sixty, a hundred times; we must take back the passion with which we all first embraced our breeds and passionately work with determination toward a future where the numbers of genetic disorders are reduced each year.   If those you know breed without testing, ask yourself why – is it lack of courage in perhaps finding a carrier within their breeding stock? Is it because they fear a financial loss if they test? Is it because they truly believe that their dogs couldn’t possibly be less than perfect? Is it because they fear they will lose their “top breeder” standing if they admit that there are problems that need working on? Is it because they fear that it will be harder to breed beautiful and healthy dogs? Or have they lost the passion with which they first loved the breed while they were climbing the road to winning success? Or, more sadly, is it because they really just don’t care about that which they cannot actually see?   It’s hard work and takes great courage to develop a breeding program using scientific methods and tests, but the hope of a better future should drive us all to that very commitment. The key is being able to work together without fear of whispers or silence. Omerta, the code of silence, can be broken if more of us decide that we are not going to tolerate the quiet any longer.