Hello,

I have two lovely West Highland Terrier dogs which are Kennel Club Registered.

I have been researching breeding for some time now as I would love the opportunity to use my dogs not only to breed but to continue their family chain, but am finding this very difficult.

I have approached the Kennel Club and the terrier society but not had much success.

I do not show my dogs, does this really matter?

Any help on this subject would be greaty appreciated.

You can email me at kathy@cinesite.co.uk.

Thanks very much

Kathy Wise

In short, yes it does matter if you show them. Breeders who are interested in improving the breed and producing typical high quality pups will want to use the best available Stud dogs to their bitches. They will only be able to do this if they can see what the dog is like, how he stacks up against others, and how his pups turn out (so this means showing).

Unfortunately there are plenty of Westies, KC registered and not that have been bred with no consideration for the breed standard, health or temperament, and a lot of them bare little resemblance to a typical WHW, other than being white.

Your dogs may be super examples, or they may just be nice little dogs with little quality. Unless you have experience in evaluting the good and bad points of a dog against the breed standard, your are unlikely to know which they are.

Hi Kathy, ive e mailed you privately with some advice, there is an eye problem under investigation in westies just now, so I would recommend you get them eye tested, to make sure everything is o.k. before you even think of breeding them.