man i keep meaning to make a long post about identifying and finding a good breeder 😅 you might get a longer answer here when i’ve taken my adderall, but for now – a really great place to start is the breed club website for your chosen breed! so if you type like “chihuahua breed club” into DuckDuckGo, the chihuahua club of america will pop up. there are also sometimes regional clubs specific to your area
generally speaking these websites will have a database of breeders who are actively involved in the breed and typically at least competing with their dogs in conformation shows
these websites also often have information on the health concerns common to the breed, which can then inform you when you’re looking at breeders in the future (e.g. does the breeder do applicable health tests for x? have they ever had issues with y in their lines? etc.)
What does differentiate responsible breeders from backyard/irresponsible ones? I’m thinking about getting a dog soon (possibly a shelter one, but tbh I’m on the fence because I don’t think I could handle a dog that has secret trauma/needs an experienced owner) and would like to know more about how to choose a good one!
honestly if you want my take? there are really two key principles that all else follows:
any responsible dog breeder should be breeding for a clear purpose, in order to improve their breed of choice or else to improve dogs overall
any responsible breeder is responsible for the physical and psychological wellbeing of the dogs they produce, from the day they’re conceived until the day they die
manifestations of the principles:
health testing. shitty breeders are sneaky about this - they’ll get a dog DNA test done and call their dogs health tested, while that’s better than literally nothing, it’s not enough.
familiarize yourself with the health issues that are more likely to affect your breed of choice (you can often find a page on the breed club website about this subject) and avoid breeders that are not doing the recommended test for that breed.
if you go to someone who breeds mixed breed dogs (which is a yellow flag in and of itself - it’s possible to do responsibly, but that’s often not the case), they should be doing the health testing for the breeds involved in the cross
breeding for health in general: very closely related, but a responsible breeder should be producing dogs who are minimally likely to live in pain or discomfort, even if there is no relevant test available. for example, there is no test for epilepsy in border collies, but it is a heritable condition. a responsible border collie breeder should avoid breeding dogs from lines known to be affected by epilepsy.
similarly, if you are interested in any brachycephalic breed, you should learn what characteristics predispose a dog to developing BOAS and have some very frank conversations with breeders about what they are doing to produce unaffected or minimally affected dogs.
proving their dogs. almost everyone thinks their dog is a good dog. in my opinion, what you want is a breeder who is actively having their dogs evaluated by other people. this circles back to having a clear purpose - essentially, would other knowledgeable people agree that your breeding dogs are appropriate for your purpose?
or, in other words: how does it benefit the breed, or dogs on the whole, for you to make more of this dog? what’s so special about this specific dog? can anyone verify that claim besides you?
one way to do this is to title your dogs in some sort of canine performance arena through an organization like the American Kennel Club, United Kennel Club, Canine Performance Events, etc. that might include dog sports like agility, flyball, obedience, and fastCAT. it might include things like herding trials for herding breeds, field trials for retrievers, or barn hunt for terriers.
another might be if the dog is actively in some kind of working role - i.e. working on a farm moving cattle or working in search and rescue. (i would be wary of people claiming to be breeding service dogs but that’s a tangent outside the scope of this post.)
there are several controversies here, but to review a couple:
1. conformation shows are a popular way to prove dogs. these are the kind of dog shows you see on TV at Thanksgiving, where dogs are compared to an ideal breed standard and evaluated based on how closely they fit the standard.
i am sort of iffy on whether this is absolutely the best way to prove the quality of a dog and have some beefs with conformation showing - but a lot of breed standards do have practical healthy-related things written into them, conformation shows force you to have your dog evaluated by other people, and a dog who tolerates a stranger grabbing him by the testicles probably has an above-average temperament compared to other dogs.
and in many breeds, conformation is really the only way people are commonly proving those dogs. imo it’s a green flag but perhaps not the greenest of flags in and of itself
2. there’s a line of rhetoric now that goes something like this: “being a companion is a legitimate purpose (and in fact, the most common purpose for pet dogs), so there’s no need to prove dogs bred for companionship in any way.”
i agree that being a companion is a legitimate purpose. i disagree that there’s no need to prove those dogs. “i think bella is real nice and pretty” is not a compelling justification for breeding a dog.
i don’t think every dog needs to be or should be a titled agility champion, but even companion breed dogs can earn obedience or conformation titles (i.e., be able to basically behave themselves around other people and dogs), or earn their Canine Good Citizen if they’re AKC registered, or log hours as a therapy dog with an organization like TDI or Pet Partners.
literally any external verification that your dog’s parents are not a nightmare shitshow is ideal, basically
3. i do think there are occasional exceptions to this, but again outside the scope of this post and not super relevant to most pet owners. moving on
taking back any dog they produced that needs to be rehomed. responsible breeders will typically contractually require that their puppy buyers return the dog if they are not able to keep it. a responsible breeder will do everything within their power to ensure that no dog they produced ends up in a shelter.
early socialization and puppy training. a puppy’s critical window of social development starts around 3 weeks and tapers off after 12 weeks or so. this means that the majority of the time your puppy spends learning how the world works and how they should react to it is spent with the breeder.
it is crucial that your breeder understands what a huge responsibility they have to getting those puppies off to a good start behaviorally. great breeders will often start working on things like housebreaking/crate training/grooming/riding in cars and introducing things like loud noises and potentially startling stimuli while the puppy is with them.
be wary of breeders who don’t understand that socialization includes much, much more than interacting with humans. mediocre breeders will often claim that theyre socializing their puppies by letting their kids play with them and having them around the house - which is better than nothing, but you can do better.
puppy culture and avidog are two structured systems for socializing puppies that are maybe slightly overhyped - and a lot of BYBs claim to be using puppy culture in particular - but in general they’re a good sign that your breeder is doing something deliberate and intentional with regards to puppy socialization and development.
behavioral issues are one of the top reasons that dogs end up in shelters, and early prevention begins with the breeder.
being a resource to puppy buyers. don’t take your breeder’s word as gospel or mistake them for a vet/trainer (if they’re not a vet or a trainer), but you are - ideally - signing up for a 15 year relationship with your breeder.
i mean, you could take the puppy and run, but in an ideal world, it’s in your best interest to maintain a relationship. (and it will make a responsible breeder very happy to know how their pup is doing!).
avoid a breeder who wants to take your money and fuck off. a great breeder is someone who will be happy to text you back if you ask for tips on housebreaking or crate training, or somebody watching the literature on spay/neuter timelines enough to be worth asking about it, because they’re invested in their dogs.
think: do you want to give your money to this person? are they someone you’d want to talk to? if your puppy ends up with a catastrophic congenital health issue, will it make you extra miserable to have to talk to this person about it?
no pyramid schemes. avoid anyone shilling NuVet. it’s a pyramid scheme/MLM and nasty, nasty backyard breeders like to make their health contracts contingent on you feeding your dog NuVet forever. run, don’t walk.
no outdated ideology. dominance theory is dead. avoid any breeder who would advocate for “alpha rolling” a puppy or who recommends trainers in the vein of cesar millan (“the dog whisperer”).
hang on im going to add a couple more things but tumblr says i hit character limit lol
no color breeding/fad breeding. i do admittedly think people get a little bit over the top about this one. we all get dogs in part because we think they’re cute and find them aesthetically pleasing, and a preference in and of itself is not a problem.
the issue essentially comes when a breeder starts breeding for color or other aesthetic characteristics in a way that conflicts with directive #1: breeding for a clear purpose to better the breed/better dogs on the whole
if someone is breeding for color as a primary goal, it is very likely that they are compromising in other places that matter more - like health and temperament.
right now merle dogs are very trendy, and there are many unscrupulous breeders crossing in other breeds to introduce the merle gene to breeds that do not historically have that gene. this is not in the best interest of puppy buyers, who will receive a less predictable dog - and if any of those people are actually completing health testing for both breeds, i will eat a dick on facebook live with grandma and all the world watching
no breeding babies. dogs should be at least 2 before being bred, and some common health clearances cannot be completed before that age.
focusing on one or a couple of breeds. breeding a bunch of different breeds is generally a red flag for a puppy mill (and do you really think they’re improving all those breeds?)
screening potential puppy buyers. a breeder who will sell a puppy to anyone with a credit card does not have their dogs’ best interest at heart. setting dogs up for a life of physical and psychological wellbeing means taking every step possible to ensure that your puppy will be a good fit for their new family.
gooddog.com is not a guarantee of anything. bums me out because i had a lot of high hopes for the platform, but the bar is incredibly low. it’s not a bad place to start a search, but you have to do the legwork checking out all the above issues.
finally, a few things commonly listed as red flags (that i don’t consider to be red flags necessarily):
breeding mixed breed dogs. all dogs should be bred with clarity of purpose. any breeder crossing breeds should be upfront about what they’re doing and why they’re doing it. (do not trust anyone claiming that they are making a ‘hypoallergenic’ dog by crossing it with a poodle - doodle coats are notoriously high maintenance and are not guaranteed to be 'hypoallergenic.’)
there are some very cool projects out there aiming to create new breeds to fill a niche not being adequately met by existing breeds. there are some thoughtful outcross projects aiming to tackle health issues in a breed with the goal of breeding back to the standard (see LUA/low uric acid dalmatians for an example). and many dog sports people will strategically mix breeds in pursuit of making a better sports dog.
imo all of these things are fine. haphazardly slapping together random mixes to sell as expensive 'designer breeds’…not so much.
breeding back to back litters. this can be a thoughtful practice in the dam’s best interest health-wise. i’ve listened to some very interesting podcasts by vets on the subject and am completely blanking on the rationale (whoops). being bred on every single heat cycle is an eyebrow raiser, but two litters in a row not necessarily.
breeding multiple litters in a year. it’s amazing to me how people can complain about small breeds being endangered, yet turn around and claim that breeding two litters a year is suspect. having a ton of puppies on the ground at a time is an eyebrow raiser - is the breeder really working with each and every puppy every single day? but three litters in one year does not, in my opinion, make someone a backyard breeder in and of itself.
listing puppies on websites like craigslist or puppies.com. a yellow flag for sure, but let’s be real: the average pet owner does not know what a responsible breeder looks like and they’re not scouring the breed club website looking for recommendations. at some point, responsible breeders are going to have to start meeting people in the middle and accepting that less dog savvy people can still make perfectly good pet homes.
selling puppies indiscriminately on craigslist or puppyfind or anywhere else will always be a red flag, though, and if you’re not super dog savvy, just avoiding these platforms altogether is probably in your best interest.
i’m probably forgetting something obvious and all of these opinions are subject to change but thats all i’ve got for now okie dokie bye
Please have a moment of silence for the people who were killed instead of freed when news of emancipation finally reached the furthest corners of the american south.
have another moment for the ledgers, catalogs, and records that were burned and the homes that were destroyed to hide the presence of very much alive and still enslaved people on dozens of plantations and homesteads across the south for decades after emancipation.
and have a third moment for those who were hunted and killed while fleeing the south to find safety across the border, overseas, in the north and to the west.
black people. light a candle, write a note to those who have passed telling them what you have achieved in spite of the racist and intolerant conditions of this world, feel the warmth of the flame under your hand, say a prayer of rememberance if you are religious, place the note under the candle, and then blow it out.
if you have children, sit them down and tell them anything you know about the life of oldest black person you’ve ever met. it doesn’t have to be your own family. tell them what you know about what life was like for us in the days, years, decades after emancipation. if you don’t know much, look it up and learn about it together.
This is Juneteenth.
white people CAN interact with this post. share it, spread it.
A leopard seal waking up from a nap with it’s own version of bed head.It’s warm body has melted the ice it was sleeping on, wetting down it’s fur on one side.
Source: National Geographic’s Instagram page @natgeo
“There is also on record a story concerning a dog named Piper who belonged to a Mr. Ainsley in about 1820; he was set on to a badger when eight months old, and from that time until he was fourteen years old was constantly at work more or less with badgers, foxes, foulmarts, otters and other vermin. He drew a badger after he was fourteen years old when he was toothless and nearly blind after several other terriers had failed.” - Harold Warnes on the Bedlington Terrier, 1932
wanna hear a wild story? my brother’s history professor is closing in on 80 and basically lives at the university. one night my brother visited him for a meeting, and it came up that my brother was gonna be performing as a court jester at the castle the following day. and his professor busts out: “ah, that reminds me of my youth!”
he then proceeded to tell the tale of when he and his friends went backpacking to greece back in their early 20s. then one day they found themselves completely penniless. so they decided that the only reasonable thing to do was to set up acrobatic shows in skimpy outfits on the beach at day, and then drink up the money at night.
after a week or so they gained some traction, and a gang of young greek men walked up to them like “hey y’all are cool as hell, can we join y’all for drinks tonight?” and my brother’s professor was like “of course! y’all have to wear these revealing outfits and do somersaults with us tho” and the greek gang said “sounds dope. y’all are invited to live with us for however long y’all want.”
anyhow, they proceeded to live like this for the better part of 3 months, doing shows, drinking, and sleeping at the greek gang’s apartment. but after a while they decided enough was enough, and said thank you for everything, but we’re going back to sweden now. and the greeks said “sure! love y’all have a safe trip xx”
half a year later my brother’s professor gets contacted by the greek police. they ask him about the months they spent in greece, and then informs him that their greek friends have been convicted of serial homicide and robbery. that the group of young greek men had joined up with several tourist groups for several years “for drinks”, and then killed and robbed them all, terrorising the beach city for several years. with one exception, of course, because “this one group of swedish acrobats in slutty strongman suits were just ‘so damn nice’”.
and that’s the story of how one swedish history university professor survived sharing a flat with a group of serial killers for several months by performing acrobatics in slutty outfits on the beach. moral of the story? be kind of heart, thicc of ass.
ALT
