I am sure this has been asked before but what sort of research into your dogs pedigree should you do before you have a litter?

Is it enough to know a parent or grandparent was/is a Champion?
Do you really need to know what colour the gt.grandparetns were?
What about Temprament of dogs going back 4 generations?
What about litter brother and sister not shown are they to breed standard?
Is the price and locality of the stud dog an important issue?
What health check scores is the dog or bitch?
Do they compliment your bitch or does that not matter?
Is the bitch you mate your stud dog to "good enough"
Just wondering?

I would contact very respected experinced breeder/s who may have stud dogs available send your pedigree with a picure and ask for their advice you will find they will probably be happy to share their vast knowledge with you.
Contact your  breed club ask them for info on breeding and possible membership.
When I got my first Labrador  (1982)I knew nothing about them,I was at obedience training with My GSD and took her along as well a man came up to me and said I should speak to someone in the breed as my labrador was very nice I contacted the person he reccomended who was a lovely man he advised me  and was always there for odd bits of advice and I used his fabulous dog who was a well known dog at the time. the litter was very nice Sadly the man has died now but the advice he gave me   will never forget I now pass on to others some very old fashioned ways but tried and true.
Experience and knowledge  is a wonderful thing and should be shared.

It is a sad fact that if you ask someone what they are looking for in a house they will come out with 101 answers but if you ask them what they are looking for in a Labrador puppy the answer is simply, "A Chocolate one."

First of all, when looking for a stud dog, I think you need to know what faults your own bitch possesses. No dog is perfect and any stud dog you use should be aimed as improving on those faults. It may well be that after an honest appraisal you may feel that the best course of action would be to buy in rather than breed anyway. In my case, as Anna's coat, whilst not that bad, could be better.

If we then decide to continue with our plans to breed then it must mean that we believe the faults our bitch possesses are trivial enough to risk them reoccurring, that health wise our bitch is sound and that it's temperament is unimpeachable.

Now comes the questions we need to answer. What are we hoping to produce? In my case that would be a better working Labrador. Yellow in colour, sound temperament, good nose, biddable and at the same time looking like a Labrador and not a whippet.

Next question, Am I going to line breed or outcross? A study of the pedigree will show that Anna is about as much of an outcross as is possible in the breed these days so for this litter I'm going to go for line breeding as possibly the easiest option for achieving what I want. So to achieve this I'm going to look at decendants of ancestors in her pedigree.

So now to the dog. Yes, distance does enter into it but what is distance? To me, possibly 150 mile radius, others would have different ideas on that. Our perception of distance is governed by how far we regularly drive.

My next move would be to make a shortlist of all dogs that carry the traits on my "Wish List". Good worker, soft mouth, good temperament, good looker, carrying the yellow coat gene and of course, good in the area of my Anna's weakness, coat.

I will now have a list of dogs that I'm interested in so now I can set about researching them. Firstly I'll need, if I haven't already got them, their pedigrees.

I'll want to watch them work. Possibly at working rests or field trials. Chat to people whose opinion I respect (But of course the decision must be mine at the end of the day.) I'll want to touch them, look at them, decide if I really want to live with a dog like this. Some dogs may have all the right attributes but somehow still not "Gel" with me. This will have eliminated some dogs from the list

Now I start to look deeper into the pedigrees. What's behind these dogs. What were their hip scores and elbows if they have been done. (Unfortunately because elbow scoring is relatively new in the UK not that many have been scored yet so I may have to talk to people to see what I can find out!) Eye testing is also very important to check back on. With late forming cataracts in Labradors the dog I'm looking at may well not be old enough for them to show even if he has them in his genes so the results of his ancestors could give me a clue!

By now I've eliminated most of my short list so now comes the time to take into account that nebulous thing, the heart. One of these dogs will figuratively speaking "leap out at me" and that will be the one. If none do then I'll carry on looking! I'm in no rush because I'm going to have to live with this puppy for the next ten to fifteen years.

Regards, John

I think both Mattie, John, and Kazz have given such good advice. How many requests do we have for lab puppies on this forum, and choc ones at that - the answer is more than any other breed.

I was exhausted reading John's post, but it is a realistic account of what one has to do if you are really serious about breeding.

Sorry Patricia, I do tend to write books ;) What I'm trying to say is that there should always be a plan behind a mating. But why waste some of the keys on the keyboard when you can, with a little thought use 'em all!

Best wishes, John

I agree with John 100% in that nobody should be looking for a stud dog without being being totally honest with themselves regarding the bitch they are going to breed. Unless you are fully aware of the bitches strengths and weaknesses there is no point in going any further. Health and temperement has to be a priority - at least 99% of the offspring (like it or not) will not go into the show ring or be worked. My main aim is to breed puppies which will outshine all the attributes of both parents, so the dog must compliment the bitch, both physically and "pedigree" wise. Many top winners have come from parents who were not Champions themselves, so this doesn't come in to it, nor does distance or cost (unless the cost is totally unreallistic, when I would wonder why). Another consideration I would take into account - being as how mine is not a numerically large breed, is that I would not want to use the "fashionable" stud, if possible, thus narrowing an already small gene pool.