Hi, can someone explain hip scores to me please, as in what is good and what is bad. I know I have read it before somewhere on this forum but I can't find it. Thanks.
jane

What is good and what is bad all depends on the Breed you are interested in. Different breeds have differing upper limits as to what the KC recommends :-)

Is that a Lab in your avatar?

Lol no its a cairn but it was the lab that I was asking about really. Have been looking at lots of labs and there are so many how on earth do people decide which are good breeders.
jane

Basically, the lower the score the better. The perfect score is 0:0 (which added together gives a total of 0) and the worst is 53:53, giving a total score of 106. The KC recommends that labradors shouldn't be used for breeding if their total score is more than 14.

Hi hip score in Labrador's are bad over about 16 set by the BVA. Going higher start the risk of problems. This doesn't mean you see your dog walking badly straight away. if you get results that when you add up the two hip score together get say 40 then your got problems to worry about so lowerer the score the better. you must add both hips together to get your hip score, no say one is 7 and one is 9 so you score isn't  7 and 9, no your score is 16 infact. which is okay. so looking for very low single figure numbers are best 3/3 e.g = 6 which is very low risk, wish is alot better.

Hope this helps to understand how to work out what you want to know.

Thank you JG and Tipper it is all much clearer now.
jane

Personally, if I were looking at Lab breeders, I'd want to see more than just good hip scoring parents, I'd want at least one parent to have been elbow scored(although it isn't a heavily used scheme, there are plenty that do this as well as hips ;-) ) this is fast becoming more of a problem in my view than hips at the moment, and I also would want one parent to be at least Optigen tested clear of GPRA alongside the general yearly eye certificate which both parents should have.

As well as the above, I'd be looking at what the parents have achieved, whether that be show awards or working awards, depending on what your fancy is ;-) , bearing in mind that the Show breeders generally have broader heavier dogs than the Breeders who like to work their dogs.......although some manage both :-D

Obviously, there are some "hobby" breeders who will fit your requirements nicely too :-)

If you need ANY help, feel free to pm me :-)

Don't forget a dog having a good hipscore doesn't mean that it throws good hipscores in it's offspring, but yeah, especially in Labs you would want to go for a low hipscoring dog and see what his parents, grandparents are also.

It is best if the scores are alike or only about 2 points different, i.e. in a score of 14 (7 right & 7 left) would be ok but 1 right and 15 left would not because the left hip would have a score that is too high and if the right were the same the score would be 30. Think this particularly applies if the overall score is high and with one side very much worse than the other because the weight would shift to the less effected side.

Agree it is important to look at the scores back at least 3 and if possible 5 generations, also important, if you can source the information, to see the sort of scores a sire is passing to his offspring.

However careful you are you can still have a pup that will appear from a line of low scores that has a totally unacceptable high score. On the other hand continuing to select the dam and sire with great care is the only way to gradually bring the mean score for a particular breed down.

The dog with a high score, even on one hip, is carrying the potential to pass the faulty construction on and IMO more care should be taken to assess each side separately from the overall score. Of course, in breeds with small numbers this is not always possible.