Ok after years of showing and breeding ive never had to ask this question but do need your professional opinions  on this.2 years ago i imported a beautiful girl,id wanted for years to get a pup from these lines and feel honored to own her.She has sweetest nature,such a softy but is incredibly nervous with strangers although once she has the chance to get to know them she is lovely.she is my dog and i have noticed she has far more confidence when i am there but we could not show her,she was just too shy.she has not got a nasty bone in her body.I will be gutted if i cant breed her but my concern is will the pups be nervous like her.when its just me my husband and children in the house she is just fine,certainly not bold like some of the others but not nervy like she is when someone else enters the house.Opinions appreciated

Personally I would not. I have a breed that can be very nervous and I have had bitches spayed that just weren't confident enough (away from home), and would not breed from a bitch I could not show.  Certainly in my breed I have found that temperament is far more genetic than anything else. If the dog is born with good temperament, then it will come right with work even if it has a bad experience or isn't socialised well initially. Otherwise you can have a good dog and do absolutely everything right with socialisation etc and it won't make a difference. I have seen plenty of examples of this in my own dogs and dogs that I have bred. So I put temperament first now when breeding and everything else second, and I have bought in a dog and a bitch due to the temperament of them alone. The bitch has many faults in the way she looks -but has been shown many times even so, my son learnt handling with her. The dog is beautiful. I will breed from the bitch with a dog that throws exactly the qualities what she needs to improve on, and if the pups aren't good enough to win CCs, then hopefully the next generation after will be. I find it MUCH easier to fix looks than temperament.

I have two imported dogs that both were imported at 11 months of age, both had been kennelled and not received an awful lot of socialisation. Both were very nervous to start with, one did not even dare to take food from your hand or even eat from a bowl if you were anywhere near him, but both are now totally bombproof as the right temperament was there deep down in the genes. It only took a few weeks to get them right.

Someone, who has been breeding labradors for over fifty years, told me that temperament is the most difficult thing to breed out if it gets into your lines. You may as well stop and start again with fresh lines.

Reading at your post I see your bitch was imported two years ago. It might be worth considering if her insecurity could have been acquired by being not properly socialised. Or maybe she is a breed which could easily be unsettled by the change of home. How long did you have to wait to get her until she could come to you and was there any reason she might not be as temperamentally bold as you hoped for? Having been in the same situation myself I realised my puppy was kept on a part of a bunch due to be exported and they were not picked up and cuddled enough in the temperamentally formative months.She had not been exposed to being actually handled by strangers or met dogs other than her mother. If I had been able to get my puppy at 8 weeks I'm sure her temperament would have been very different.

Please do not breed from nervous (poor) temperament.

I am speaking as an owner of a dog, who, many years ago, was bred from a nervous b#tch.  My girl too had a nervous temperament for all her 15-year life, and so did others in the litter as many of us kept in touch over years. 

Now, this was many years ago, and I have since had many other dogs of the same breed, from sound temperament, and although they all have differing personalities, NONE of them are shy or nervous. 

I would strongly advise against it. 

What a dilemma for you. I have been in the same boat. I got a bitch which had spent the majority of her puppyhood in kennels and was very nervous. When I first saw her she hid behind a sofa. I took her on and she improved greatly but was never really happy with strangers around. I mated her to my dog who had a rock solid temperament. Unfortunately the nervous temperament came through to some degree in a few of the puppies. So mum and the two pups I kept were neutered. I will never make allowances for untypical temperament again. A hard lesson learned.

So - to answer your question - no, I would not breed from your bitch, sad though it is.

Unfortunately the chances are high that she will pass this onto at least some of her puppies.   You could risk using a dog with a strong temperament, and from a line of similar but personally frustrating as it is, it would be a lottery, and depending on the strength of the gene pool here, perhaps not work risking.   Your decision of course, but especially in breeds that should not be shy (?) I wouldn't.   If you go ahead, you may be looking at running on the puppies for some weeks, to be able to properly assess those who have picked up this fault, and it is a fault after all, and those you might risk keeping, breeding again to a male with a good temperament.

Just to add that some dogs hate the show-ring, but may not necessarily have a 'bad temperament'.   Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Have you been back to the breeder of your bitch to discuss this issue with her?   It helps to know what previous generations were like - problems can skip a generation after all.   Just thinking outside the box - did anything happen that might have caused her problem now - being imported, shipped too young, might just have affected her??   Or even run on, and not socialised as others going to a pet home might have been?

Reading at your post I see your bitch was imported two years ago. It might be worth considering if her insecurity could have been acquired by being not properly socialised.

See my post. I imported dogs twice at 11 months of age, kennel dogs, not much if any socialising done. Very nervous when arrived but as the good temperament was in the genes, within weeks both were bombproof. The second was first shown a month after arriving, and after 3 months my 14 year old son did junior handling with him!

On the other hand I have a 6 year old dog and bitch that WERE socialised properly and that never have come right. It's in the genes.

I don't know anything about breeding, but even if the nervous temperament is due to inadequate socialisation, even if you do all the right things with the litter isn't there a chance they could pick up nervousness from mum?

There is a long term study, going on 20 years now, into the inheritability of nervousness in dogs using Pointers.
Even when puppies bred from nervous lines were removed at birth from the dam and fostered with " normal" Pointers, they still developed into nervous dogs, despite extensive socialisation.

as a pet owner not a breeder I made mistake of buying a pup from a litter with a nervous mom.  I figured she was just shy as got new pups as saw the brother of the bitch-and he was lovely. 
Now i do love my dog-and wouldn't be without her but I will never buy a pup from a nervous mum again as despite rearing her the same way I did my other dog (same breed) with puppy socialisation classes, training classes, fun times with other dogs, kind gentle methods  etc she is now even worse then she was a youngster. to extent I now do muzzle her in public as if she panics I fear what might happen. Its a crushing disappointment. I used to take my old dog everywhere- my girl now I have to really think about every place I can take her as to whether she will cope . I am certain that if she is put under too much pressure she will bite someone-and shes a large dog so it would not be a minor event.
to me temperament is the first thing on list in a dog- doesn't matter how handsome, how healthy- if temprament not good its all for nothing.

In my experience Temperament is THE most readily inherited trait..... for good or ill.
I love knowing that my loving, sweet natured girls will almost certainly produce their like.

I have also been involved with importing a puppy at 9 weeks who served 6 months quarantine and was bomb proof and shown within days of release.

I have also known other quarantined dogs of my breed with rock solid temperaments even though they spedt their formative months in kennels.

I would; not breed from a nervous temperament.

Most pups will go to pet homes and all homes even those who choose to show want a well rounded companion, which a nervous dog is not.

I have personally found that character is strongly inherited with knowing so many related dogs who do not live together or rarely fi ever meeting having the same character traits.  In humans too, my son having only met my ex twice in his life when already semi adult had a lot of his character traits and mannerisms, to (too me) a shocking extent.

> In my experience Temperament is THE most readily inherited trait..... for good or ill.

When you think about it - temperament was the FIRST thing ever selected for - and selected against - in dogs.... long before anyone was interested in colour, coat or shape. Or even function, really.