Your A Pet Breeder and You Decided to Show

I hope this post gives pet breeders a look at both sides of the fence and a better understanding on what it may take for your program to succeed in the show world.

So, you have been breeding for numerous years, and you have decided you have an AWESOME line of health tested adult dachshunds, and now you want to show. Surprise, in your search for those superior pet puppies you forgot to buy lines with chamionship pedigrees OR, YOU JUST COULDN'T AFFORD THEM, now where does that leave you. You need to contact some show breeders and seek some knowledge and experience in that department. Surprise, you have been called a "PUPPY MILL" because of your breeding practices. Your in shock, but I've done everything - HEALTHY ADULTS, HEALTH CLEARANCES, GOOD DIET, PUPPY PACKS, REGULAR VET VISTS, ETC....

I truly DO NOT believe calling anyone a puppy mill enhances anyones breeding program or helps to better it. I truly wish more show individuals were willing to help share their experiences and knowledge with others. That being said, you must find a show individual willing to work with the program you have and help you towards your goal. You may need to make ALOT of calls.

You must understand a show breeders frame of mind when you call them. They have worked just as hard on their show program as you have worked on your pet program. They have a reputation with their peers they need to maintain. They must feel comfortable enough with your program to help you in your adventure into the show world. They must feel you are willing to enhance your program with their knowledge and maybe even incorporate some of their lines with yours to better your offsprings conformation (usually the problem in most pet lines). You also need to understand that when they decide to help, they may take some heat for helping or selling to you.

Also, understand your program is being judged by the pictures, videos and pedigrees on your web site. If you have videos of dogs that do not have the conformation of the breed standard and your pedigrees have lineage history of very few champions and nothing in the first 2 generations, you are already up against a challenge. The majority of show breeders will not be able to understand why you want to breed what you have in your program now. So, where is your COMPETITIVE show dog going to come from. Yes, you can show your dogs, but will they be competitive or just fillers in the ring. If your O.K. with being a filler, go out there and have fun and learn while you make new friends and better your program from the ground up, learn what to look for, what to breed for, make your lines soar with improvements and feel AWESOME about the offspring. Learn to ignore rude remarks, e-mails and post you have read on forums about your program. You are there to learn and you really only desire the friendship of the ones willing to teach.

You must realize that there is good and bad in both the show world and the pet world. Unfortunately, the rotten apples make the whole batch appear bad in both worlds. Seek out the good in both worlds and you will have FUN.

Things you (not your dog) will be judged on when you decide to seek a reputable& friendly show menator:

selling your puppies without spay/neuter contracts
selling puppies as having show potential when you do not show and do not have your litters evaluated
breeding parents with known health issues (eye issues, back issues, immune system issues, patella issues, etc...)
selling puppies as breeders to your peers that are not worthy of the standard.
being able to taking your offspring back at any time & assisting in re-homing - this is too insure that your puppies are not contributing to the already overwhelming problem.
doing health & genetic testing

Things your dogs will be judged on:

Their Pedigrees
Their Conformation
Their Temperment

Just because your dog looks like a dachshund does not mean that it's structurally correct for the ring.

Books & Videos to refer to:

The puppy puzzle, showing for begginers, breeding better dogs, structure & movement,

This post is meant to be informative & helpful, please feel free to add any helpful advice for all of us to share

Remember when you are starting from pet lines, expect to put years of breeding improvements into your lines before you develop that champion or if you like instant results, seek out a good show breeder willing to sell you a pick puppy to compete with. Remember you don't want left overs from a show litter - even show litters produce pet pups

Good Luck and feel free to call if you need help getting started. If you e-mail expect great delays in replies I stay on the phone most of the time 512-799-6084

Just to add to this, I was told to look at the dogs on someone's site, ask them about their goals and do your best to evaluate their honesty in those goals. I was also told to look at who a breeder sells to, and how they advertise their puppies.

If there are a lot of pet quality puppies on your site, and you're not willing to spay/neuter and place them, taking a chance on starting over, you can't expect a reputable show breeder to take a chance on you, either. And if that show breeder takes a chance on you, and you end up breeding their lines to everything with four feet, it's not your reputation that takes a hit-it's theirs. You always see people advertising puppies on their sites with "(pick kennel name here) lines". Imagine you've worked for 20, 30 or 40 years to breed quality dachshunds and make your lines, and then you see your kennel name used to advertise poor quality puppies on some random site-that's the horror show that reputable breeders try desperately to avoid. I had a specific understanding with the new owner of the puppy I sold to a show home, that the buyer was not to use the kennel names (particularly on the stud's side) in advertising, ever. It's one thing to post a pedigree or the puppies parents names, quite another to pimp someone else's name in advertising your puppies and I won't tolerate that. I don't want to be the one to muddy up someone else's name if I made an error in judgement

Things I look for: Does this person consistently have the same fault throughout their stock? In other words, are they kennel blind to a particular physical fault? If all the dogs that they own have poor rear angulation, for example. Which kind of tells me that they think that rear is correct-which tells me they don't know how to evaluate a dog's conformation. If the faults are more varied and they have a cogent plan (this stud dog I bought to correct my laybacks) then they likely have a plan and are working to improve their stock. Nobody expects people to have perfect dogs-there's no such thing. But that's no excuse to have poor dogs either-every dog has faults, but when you're getting 8-10 major faults on one dog, that dog probably shouldn't be bred-even for the pet market.

I seriously look at where someone's dogs are ending up-do they consistently sell dogs to the people who breed pets? Because even if MY puppy isn't going to a place like that, if their offspring are, it's no better a situation, is it? That eliminates some breeders that would surprise you, too-including some that show regularly, with big names.

I look at a willingness to show. It's not the be all, end all, but if you at least attend shows regularly for just a year, you learn SO much about what a well built dog looks like. Heck, you don't even need to show up at the dachshund ring-watching all of the breeds in the ring gives you a much better eye for a balanced, structurally sound dog. There's a weimeraner in my conformation class right now - I don't much much about weims, but I do know flat feet, and poor structure now and this just isn't a very nice dog. His owner is a new exhibitor and you can just tell, he was suckered by somebody. Making it worse, there's an absolutely beautiful weimeraner bitch in the same class, and the difference is obvious. I'm only going to shows every few months now-I haven't shown myself since I took a friends dog in the ring over the summer-but that's like a refresher course every time I go. At first it was just confusing, I had no idea what was going on, all the dogs looked great, I had no idea why a judge would choose one over the other. Now, most of the time, I can see what a particular judge is looking for (even if that means he's looking for a specific handler ) and why this dog won over that one.

AWESOME post with some great insight, Thank you for sharing....