To Louise DDB:

> The majority of breeders and owners do not care about hipscores

That's a little unfair. There have now been more than 1000 DDB hipscored which will put them in the first division of the KC's next set of published tables.  Not bad considering what a short time they've been able to be registered here.

It's a shame the breed has become so popular so soon, that kind of rise nearly always brings undesirable effects (rescue, BYBs etc), but they are lovely dogs with superb loyalty to their owners. I hope the breed will recover from the popularity explosion and settle down to being just a regular breed without the unwanted effects of having grown so quickly. They really are great companions and, to my eye, have such impressive looks too.

> The majority of breeders and owners do not care about hipscores

i also have two dogues, one being a retired show girl who we rehomed and one being a puppy, most breeders that i have come across strive for good health tests in their breedings and more and more it is the BYB's and those "just breeding for the pet homes" with no intention of keeping anything from the litter to show or work themselves that won't hipscore, elbow score or health test. There are also some who go above and beyond with eye testing, heart testing, hip and elbows scoring their dogues.

We as a family chose the DDB as a breed as we had German shepards but our last one who died aged 17 hit us hard. after much thought we decided to changed breeds but still wanted a large/giant breed. we just saw a picture of a Dogue and instantly feel in love. After much research and searching we found our boy Chester then after a year decided to rehome a older female from the same breeder. Can never resist the wrinkly ginger faces :)

The rest is history and cannot see ourselves having another breed as we have well and truely fell in love with the slobbery ginger giants who there are never two alike. their loyalty to their owners is overwelming and always want to be with you. Now more and more litters are being bred purely for ££ and not to improve the breed, we just hope the popularity moves on

Mine  English springer spaniel, she  can  be  very  norty but love  her to  bits since my  old   xbreed was PTS 31/1/2010

I got my love of poodles from my parents who had a toy when I was born.
I have just got my own pup and don't plan on being without one ever again !

When I was questioning owners not many even know what hipscoring is. It's not on there list of priorities, but the breed attracts the wrong sort. The ones that don't consider suitablity of the breed are often the type. Money distance is top of the list. its not unfair at all its true. Some of the show breeders score but yet not all. I don't consider them to be bad breeders if they don't. Some breeders don't believe in that breeding from low.scoring dogs will reduce the chance of producing a high scoring dog. That its just a lottery. The breed is great but in a state.

Louise I was just picking up on what you said about hipscoring. I think I'm right in saying that only about 5% of KC registered DDB are hipscored, but that doesn't make them particularly worse than a great many breeds. In fact I think the take-up is better than many - especially in such a short time.

I quite agree about the proportion of unsuitable owners. I'm afraid it's what happens when a breed catches the public imagination this way. That's why there's such a rescue problem. Such a shame.