witten is 4 months old!

[SkunkOnTheFly]

well...time sure flies! we have had witten about 2 months now. we were on a 3 days of no accidents but he pooped in the house today. besides that he is doing perfect on recall and hes pretty good at paw, down, off and sit. hes a little bundle of energy. hes no a big cuddler like my other dogs, he loves being scratched and pet but at the end of the night he will take a spot on the floor over the bed. he always looks so sad though...breaks my heart. oh..and my husband did NOT want him...at all. but that is him and our 3 furbabies together on the couch he is now 'daddy' and will sneak love when he thinks im not looking. hahah.

[Chan]

What a cutie pie! The glowing eyes and fang photo is my favorite

[B Point]

Haha...Dogs look happy....the human, not so much. Good looking pup.

[Gideon's girl]

Witten is lookin' good! Nice pictures!

[RemsMom]

What a cute puppy! I love the photo of all the dogs on the sofa. Children and dogs are the same in that they want to "dog pile" on dad.

[SkunkOnTheFly]

We have a 3 1/2 yr old and I don't know where she was in that pic because she is usually piled on him too lol! An thanks everyone...he is such a little ham. We are working on the begging and stealing food from our daughter. He will eat until he throws up if we let him and if we limit his food an measure it he acts like he's starving. He's wormed. I'm chalking it up to puppy gluten like we dealt with with out other two dogs.

[SkunkOnTheFly]

If a bc is registered do they have lines that are better than others,etc? Like horses? I mean I guess some llines are better haha but how does it work in the dog world with pedigree in working lines???

[simba]

It's actually really like horses- some are bred for work, they're bred at different levels (so one dog might be 'my working dog by my neighbour's working dog' and one might be 'this trialling champion matched with another suitable trialling champion'.)

 

Some people don't breed for work at all, and it's generally considered that they're doing a Bad Thing because they're breeding for random stuff (like appearance) the breed was never intended for. It's a breed with a work/behaviour standard rather than an appearance standard. So breeding for 'pretty dogs that don't work' is like if you took, say, pitbulls and decided that they're fine dogs but they should be long-haired and look like greyhounds. But worse 'cause it would affect ability and temperament rather than just appearance.

 

Working ability is to a great extent inheritable (which is why there's a breed in the first place) but not predictably so like coat colour, so you need to work every generation if you don't want to lose it. Otherwise you could be breeding from a dog who will pass on something bad, and not know it. So you could have great dogs in a pedigree two or three generations back, but still a poorly-bred dog.

 

I am the wrong person to attempt to explain this though, I don't know much about it. You probably know a lot more than what I've explained here- I'm not trying to patronise you, if so, and I'm sorry!

[Mom of Mya]

Great looking photos and dogs. I wonder if he eats too much because maybe he is worried he won't get enough with the other dogs, just a thought. My husband did not have anything to do with our american eskimo at first either but he ended up so attached to that dog when we lost him my husband actually cried and moped around for over a week. It devastated him to look his old man. They like to act tough but I think most are just teddy bears in disguise LOL!!

[SkunkOnTheFly]

oh no simba! lol...i know a tiny bit ABOUT horse pedigree but ask me about lines and i couldnt tell you much except for certain lines ive read about or one i owned. my boy's momma was a pet and they said his dad was a worker. i havent got his papers yet as they were waiting until all the pups sold the send them in.

 

lol and yes, my husband tries to act tough and wants to fuss and complain but at the end of the day they are all his babies. he could have really stopped me if he rreeeaalllyy wanted from buying Wit..but he didnt. though it would have been a rough battle! lol

[GentleLake]

It's like with AKC. The stud book (i.e. registry) is just a recording of the pedigree. ABCA registration doesn't guarantee working ability any more than an ACK registration guarantees a dog will be show quality or even healthy (e.g. free of genetic defects).

 

Working bred means the pups are bred from proven working stock ad will thus have a greater chance of inheriting the working ability themselves.

 

All border collies come from "working lines" since they were originally bred exclusively for working ability. But if the parents haven't actually worked livestock (IOW they haven't actually been proven to have working ability), then the pups are not working bred. Lots of people breed dogs who's ancestors haven't worked livestock for several generations, but they still refer to them as from working lines because a grandparents or great-grandparents worked. But it's just a marketing tool to dupe people who don't know any better.

 

When you start breeding away from true working ability for sports or pets or show, very quickly you start loosing the fragile genetics that keep the breed a working breed.