#dog breeding
‼️If you choose to breed your dog, or if your dog gets pregnant and you knowingly choose to continue with the pregnancy, you need to have the money to cover for the possibility of a csection‼️
This could be a few thousand £$ in some places❗️
Some insurance policies will not cover csections ‼️ Check your policy and cover VERY CAREFULLY ❗️
All breeds can experience problems during birth or pregnancy ‼️ Dont assume your large breed dog or terrier, for example, will be fine ❗️
Your dog could need intense veterinary care if she experiences problems in pregnancy ‼️ This can often be fatal for mother and puppies ❗️
Do your research ❗️ Altered nutrition, signs of labour, additional veterinary treatment the bitch may need, timelines, how to hand rear puppies from newborn, weaning, post-whelping care ❗️
Yours sincerely,
Someone who works in a 24hr hospital and is tired
Last week we did our first blood transfusion in over a year! It was on a teeny hound puppy with anemia from fleas and hookworms. Luthien was our donor! Here she is showing off her clipped spot :)
Alas, I didn’t get permission to post pics of the pupper, but she did well between the transfusion, parasite control, and good supportive care. We’ll see her again soon for her vaccines and to continue with preventatives.
When a lab breeder is selling “rare silver labs” for $3500
Oh they also have labradoodles
For those not in the know:
“rare [color] dogs” of any breed are almost always rare for the same reason white tigers are rare (and unethical)— it’s caused by a very rare mutation and every individual with that trait is related meaning the only way to produce it is with inbreeding. If you want to produce more, you breed already inbred offspring. Many ”rare” dog breed variants have a great deal of health problems due to this.
Silver labs have a bit of a unique controversy however and that being the fact they may not be labs, many assert that they’re lab/Weimaraner crosses which is where the gray color genes come from. This on its own would not be inherently bad, but a lab and Weimaraner have very different temperaments. Further, the fact this cannot be successfully confirmed or debunked means the dogs aren’t having their pedigree tracked, so there is no selection against aggression or health problems. If you cant even prove your dogs are labs, how can you then prove that they are well bred to avoid mental and wellness issues?
Doodles tend to have a lot of the same issues as well being a common backyard breeder favorite designer breed that can sell for a high profit. If a dog costs more than $1k to adopt, there had best be piles of paperwork speaking to the responsible breeding of the animal. Anyone with a male and female dog that haven’t gotten the snip can breed puppies and claim whatever they want about them. Do your research and avoid irresponsible breeders.
THIS. I wanna elaborate a bit more cuz this shit really makes my blood boil.
Some breeders will use Embark or other DNA tests as “proof” that their “rare” color dog is purebred. Embark and other similar tests only go back a few generations so some dogs will come back as purebred, despite the fact that a color is not naturally occurring in that breed. Merle coloration is the biggest offender, because it’s flashy and people will pay more for it, but this applies to really any sort of “rare” color.
I’m gonna talk about merle because this is such a trendy coat color right now. Merle poodles, bulldogs, poms, etc are some of the most common “rare” colors I’ve seen advertised. Also keep in mind that while “doodle” isn’t a real breed, many doodles have their ancestry falsely represented. Most of the common doodle cross breeds (labs, goldens, Bernese mountain dogs, old English sheep dogs, etc do not actually come in merle).
So what does that mean? Either at some point, there was a mutation, or another breed was crossed into the breeding pool. That’s not inherently right or wrong. What IS wrong is falsely representing these animals as purebred and charging extra money because they’re a “rare” color. Any breeder that lies about this or straight up doesn’t understand is not worth giving money to. If someone really wants to argue that technically a merle poodle is still a poodle because it had one outcrossing event many generations ago, ok. Breed purists won’t like it but whatever, they can fight that out amongst themselves. This part isn’t actually the main issue(s)!
The issues are that first of all, the dog is being falsely advertised as something it’s not. That by itself is a red flag. Second, off-standard dogs are being bred. If you look at the AKC/UKC standard for poodles, for example, merle is not an accepted color. Breeding a merle poodle is like breeding a doberman born with a curly tail, or a husky with floppy ears. Why would you breed a dog that doesn’t even meet the base standard? Someone that is going to disregard the breed standard probably also doesn’t really care about health testing either.
There are breed standards that suck and definitely need to be changed for the benefit of the dog. But there’s a difference between going off standard to breed a pug or bulldog to be able to breathe better and going off standard because a breeder wants to sell a pretty dog for a bunch of money. The issue itself isn’t breeding “rare” color breeds, it’s disregarding health and ethics along side of it. If someone wants to breed merle poodles or whatever and follows rigorous health testing, breeding stock selection, etc and actually bothers to be up front about where the merle gene comes from, then ok! Again, breed purists would probably take issue, but that’s a very different discussion.
Also a lot of breeders will try to sway people by saying that it’s fine because a color is a “naturally occurring” mutation. Who cares? If the dogs are being inbred to pump out more pretty colors and temperament/health is being disregarded, it doesn’t matter whether it happened randomly or was intentionally bred in. Bad breeding is bad breeding.
TLDR: If a dog is being advertised as a “rare” color, it’s probably because it is actually off standard and you should never buy a dog from someone who can’t even be up front about that.
