LOW-PRICED DOGS

Just as a high-priced dog does not mean you are getting a better animal, neither is a low-priced dog necessarily a bargain. It is fair to surmise that a breeder must be cutting corners if she is selling puppies at below the going rate. A responsible breeder spends time and money to do genetic testing to eliminate the risk of congenital defects being passed along from his breeding stock—it is expensive and time-consuming to protect the next generation. So if puppies are priced below market value, that breeder cannot be spending what she needs to in testing a puppy’s parents.

If you need one reason to buy a purebred puppy from a private breeder, it is for honest genetic testing. BYBs generally do not know much about the importance of genetic testing, much less make it a rule to do so. A pet store may claim that the breeder/supplier of the puppy has paperwork “proving” that the puppy’s parents are genetically clear of defects, but one would be naive to think that in wholesale breeding operations with upward of 1,000 dogs, every breeding pair has honestly been x-rayed and otherwise tested, or that documentation cannot be easily forged, copied, etc. Forgive the cynicism, and my apologies to the one-in-a-million backyard or wholesale breeder who genuinely has followed testing guidelines, but this book has to be the “watchdog” for the all the dogs and owners out there.

Copyright © Tracie Hotchner – Originally appeared in The Dog Bible: Everything Your Dog Wants You to Know by Tracie Hotchner