I am looking for a border / lakeland terrier cross
I saw one a few weeks ago and fell in love but haven't been able to find a breeder.
I live in Newmarket.
with thanks
Pia
piaminch@hotmail.com

I would have thought it unlikely that anyone would have deliberately bred such a crossbreed Guest. The best plan would be to look in the rescue homes in your area. In any crossbreed you never really know which side of the cross the puppy will take after so you may never find a puppy quite like the one you have met anyway.

Regards, John

To be honest John that is quite a frequent cross in working terrier circles. The Border blood tends to calm down the Lakeland aggression and make for a more controllable working dog.

Your best bet would be to have a look in Countryman's Weekly guest or alternatively there is a very popular Working Terrier Show on August Bank Holiday Sunday and Monday at Stow cum Quy near Newmarket. It is held in conjunction with the Fenland Game Fair.  You may be able to find someone down there with the type of terrier you are looking for.

Must be one I've missed Jayne! But then, as you know, retrievers are more my line.

Best wishes, John

LOL :-D John

I only know as I do frequent working terrier shows and have a lot of people enquiring about using my boys on their lakie bitches.  In working terrier circles what they do is more important than how they look.

But it does make a change that I knew something you didn't :-D

Most know more than me Jayne, I just make more noise than most. :d

Sadly John there are people who cross them deliberately, they also include bedlingtons in a similar mix :(  According to certain working enthusiasts most of the purebred lakelands, borders and bedlingtons don't have the working ability any more :rolleyes:  Personally I think that like gundogs, there are terriers who will work well and ones that aren't interested in the same litter.

Again Dill, so few terriers are actually worked these days. And like retrievers, generations of isolation from a working environment and the inbred working knowlege is lost/watered down.

Anyone with an interest in working dogs should take the time to watch the working breeds doing their job. I had the privalege to spend a day at the CLA Game Fair a couple of weeks ago, carrying a gun on the water retrieve of one of the tests. It was an eye opener watching the way the different groups and breeds handled the retrieve. We had HPR's and Spaniels as well as retrievers working. Curlys, Flatcoats, Labs and Goldens plus a Chessie and an IWS. and every one worked in it's own distinctive way. Springers who had a fixed working distance in their mind and literally could not be pushed past this distance. Labradors who could be handled to a sixpence but had little free hunting experience. Flatcoats who obviously thought they knew better than their owner where the dummy was. All in all, a great day!

Best wishes, John

I know what you mean John :D  I've watched my bro working his weims, both willing to enter water :D and also a young man who trains his Springer and Lab regularly (working bred) they are a joy to watch and completely different in style of working.  The weims are both show bred but showed an aptitude for working which my bro was delighted with as he shoots/beats regularly.  My own dog has been trained to be safe around small animals but is very interested in rats and fox (hasn't been allowed to persue his interests tho ;) )and many of his relatives work despite being show bred.  Personally I think that these crosses are just a short cut to improving working ability, it would surely take longer to find, acquire and breed pure bred dogs with proven hunting ability, and then there are those who will never be satisfied with whichever breed and always want to add in something else (some cooks are the same :D )

Of the 28 (or is it 30) of the breeds on the KC "endangered Brish/Irish native breeds" list, 12 are terrier breeds. It is a great shame that rather than breeding and selecting puppies to work from purebred dogs, terriers are being crossed to give a "quick fix" for people who want to work them. For every purebred terrier bitch producing a litter of crossbred puppies a litter of purebred puppies is lost, further reducing the numbers in that breed. Terriers can surely be trained and bred for the job they were originally intended to do, the same as gundogs etc. Surely it is no more difficult to do this than to breed show dogs. It is of no help to any breed to intentionally reduce the gene pool available and especially so in the numerically small breeds.

Fillis I also feel that crossing terriers is a bit of a short fix, after all in all working breeds there are those with greater working drive than others, surely the way to go is to select for the good workers when breeding and accept that some of the litter will not want to work, if only the best workers were selected for breeding then things would surely improve, a bit slower than crossing but effective in the long run.

Only last week I was told that my Bedlington was a Bedlington cross when I asked why they thought that, I was told "they always cross them with whippets and lakelands"  - my reply? "so where are you going to find a bedlington to cross with something if they're all cross bred?"  As usual there was no answer :)