Just wondering about people's experiences of this. I know the perceived wisdom is not to mate extremes of size as just extremes will be produced but I wondered if people had tried it and found this to be the case or otherwise?

I have a really nice young dog but he is undeniably tall, and I have had an enquiry from a bitch owner whose bitch is at the lower end of the breed standard. Otherwise they are a really nice match, similar in type, lovely temps etc, etc

I'd appreciate people's thoughts :)

What would be your reasons for breeding? If you boy is tall for the breed standard then I would not use him. You say that they are a nice match, have they had all the health tests necessary for the breed?

Thank you for your response, Lynneb, but it's not strictly relevant is it and doesn't answer my question?

The perfect dog has yet to be born, all dogs have faults. He is a lovely specimen of the breed, really well made and a super mover with an outstanding temperament and excellent health test results. Other reputable and knowledgeable breeders have approached me re using him. He excels where the breed has some issues at the moment. I would not mate him to a big bitch but I am quite happy that he has enough virtues to justify his use. Both dogs have very good EBVs.

I've seen a litter where the stud was very large and the bitch on the smaller size... Both were very nice winning RCC's respectively but neither were the correct height. The old saying two wrongs don't make a right loosly applies as all the puppies in the resulting litter were eaither too tall or too short and none were the correct height.

I have also seen a stud with a large head used on a smaller bitch and she ended up having a c section as her pelvis wasn't wide enough to pass the puppies.

So some breeds it can be quite dangerous for the bitch, I don't know what breed you have so you would need to make your own informed judgment as to the suitability.

Thank you for your response, Lynneb, but it's not strictly relevant is it and doesn't answer my question?

Any responses re breeding are relevant IMO so hopefully people will not make mistakes.

I would not mate a small bitch to a tall dog -too much potential for oversized pups making it difficult to give birth. I have however just done the opposite mating. I have a very tall bitch who was always planned to be mated this season, and for various reasons the original choice of stud dog had to be changed. Ended up using a dog four inches shorter than the bitch. There certainly were several problems getting the mating done, that's for sure! It remains to be seen what the outcome is. On paper -extremely interesting indeed. The mating was done above all for the outstanding characters of the parents. (Obviously also both have good health test results, sire is an import and CC winner, dam has her faults in looks but her mother in turn is a fairly major show winner, as were both her parents etc). It should be noted that the tall bitch is from a complete outcross mating (working lines x show lines) and her mother is much smaller than she is (correct size) so it's not a case of mating a tall bitch from all tall lines to a small dog from all small lines. I would not have done the mating had I not known very well what is behind the bitch. Fingers crossed it will be a case of correct sizes -what with 75 % of the pedigree coming from dogs not oversized, hopefully we will at least get some. Any ending up as big as mum are no problem as this is a litter with both working and show lines and I have both working and show homes lined up. But it will be a new experience for me, for sure.

But otherwise, this bitch in question from taller lines mated to correct sized lines, the litter she was born in (I did not breed her, bought her in -bred her mother however) ended up with most pups the looks and size of the father, and a smaller number the size and looks of the mother -nothing really in between.

That was my understanding that you wil get some the size of Mum, some the size of Dad not something in the middle. The mating might be problematical as has been said.
In my breed there is a supposed to be a couple of inches on the breed standard difference but in reality in the ring there is a much wider variation and certainly smaller bitches can be very popular when it comes to winning!

The same logic must apply to humans as I had thought is goes back further than just the father and mother which determines size.

Surely you would have to look at the further generations and see the different sizes that have been produced and even then the possible combinations would mean It would be very difficult to accurately predict what sizes any progeny would be ?

I am using the human example I am one of three sisters (same mother and father , or so I was told ) and the sizes of subsequent sisters increased with me being significant taller than my first sister (6 inches).

So I have also seen it said many times that mating a larger dog to a smaller bitch can be problematic and can I understand why but what would people determine are the safest limits that this would apply to as some people have said in some breeds there seems to be a wider acceptable size difference ?