# Curious for Opinions



## GsdLoverr729 (Jun 20, 2010)

So I have narrowed down my choice of breeders for my next shepherd (in 2-4 years) to Von Lotta and Sequoyah shepherds. Nowww to my questionish part (notice that I do want opinions, but please do not be RUDE).  Also, wasn't sure where to put this?

So, I have decided I would like to get involved in SchH and possibly showing. I am going to use the next few years to research and learn as much as possible about doing both. I am also going to check out some local clubs.  I also plan to get the CGC  I had previously decided my next shepherd would be male, so as I thought about it I began thinking about the fact that I do not plan to neuter without medical reason (please do not focus on this and start a war people. I have never neutered my males). 
That being said, the thought crossed my mind of breeding. 
Now, I want opinions on my decision. 
IF he gets titled in SchH, passes for hips/elbows, passes for health testing, has a proper temperament and (if I do show) can do well in that as well I think I may want to stud him out to TRUSYWORTHY people. I plan on getting limited registration to begin with and explaining my plans to the breeder upfront. If he proves to be a male that would pass on good genetics in the breed, I will pay the breeder to have him/her lift the limitations. 
The terms for myself are that not only must I approve of the female, but so must yhe breeder and a third party. She will be required to be ofa, temperament tested (or have two professional references on her temperament), titled or working, of a pedigree that a more experienced breeder agrees would work well with my male's, must be health tested/checked, between two and six years of age, and must have NO direct kinship to my male. Linebreeding is possible, but there will be NO inbreeding. 

Does anyone have any opinions on what I should add or change? I would prefer answers from breeders or those who are knowledgeable enough to give me some good intell 
Thank you so much for your time guys! I know it was a long post!


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## GsdLoverr729 (Jun 20, 2010)

Also, if anyone knows a good website to go to and learn about showing, cgc or SchH I would greatly appreciate it  Google is giving me trouble.


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## Castlemaid (Jun 29, 2006)

I think that is a pretty good start. I think you also need to be a pedigree expert, and know the lines, and know what each dog in a pedigree brings into the breeding. Also start reading the old posts in the breeder sections, and the pedigree/bloodlines section as an example of what I'm talking about. When you have the insight into the lines and the dogs and what each individual dog in a pedigree bring to a mating, like how many of the breeders on here can discuss in depth, then you are getting there. 

Also give yourself more time. Achieving all you plan on achieving will take years. And when you get your first dog for training and titling, think of it as a learning dog, not a stud, otherwise, your judgement can be clouded from the beginning. Now if he turns out phenomenal, then good for you!


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## GSD Fan (Sep 20, 2010)

I am not a breeder, but I am currently being mentored in breeding siberian huskies.

I noticed you said "NO inbreeding". Do you think inbreeding is a bad thing?

In breeding is not necessarily a bad thing. Breeding a father to his daughter or breeding a son to his mother can show what's going wrong in your breeding program. It and linebreeding are a way that breeders establish their kennel or breeding program.

I believe you have a lot to learn. Then again, german shepherds might be a little different than breeding siberians. It could be that inbreeding shepherds is as not as acceptable, but I believe it is. inbreeding is breeding in general.

Also, I recommend you get a female instead of a male to show and title. Females are harder to handle with heats and whelping, but with females it's easier to build a breeding program.

Another thing that is concerning me is you have narrowed it down to a working breeder and a show line breeder. Why not narrow it down to a specific type of german shepherd?


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## JakodaCD OA (May 14, 2000)

also keep in mind, you can learn ALOT from either of those breeders , they can direct you, mentor you, give you an opinion on "if" the dog you get (after you accomplish what you want with him), would be a breeding option. 

You would also have to check to see if the dog you purchase, if on a limited registration, if the breeder would be willing to lift that for breeding purposes, of course in the future


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## martemchik (Nov 23, 2010)

Only thing I have to mention is that its not really your choice to stud when you own the male. You can post his picture all over god's green earth and if he's not worthy of studding, no one will want to. The hips/certs/titles all help prove to the bitch owner that this is a dog they want to breed with, but there are so many studs out there that its really something you have to get into 110% and spend a lot of money on your dog just to get him to a point where a good, reputable breeder will want to include your stud in their program.

I've noticed that the people willing to breed because your dog is "beautiful" or "behaves so well" aren't really the ones you want to have any ties to.


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## qbchottu (Jul 10, 2011)

I think Yuliya at von Lotta always sells her puppies on limited registration until you get a BH/hips/elbows/SG. After that she will upgrade you to full registration.


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## Castlemaid (Jun 29, 2006)

I think it's great that people who want to get into breeding start off with a stud - great way to learn about the breed and temperament as one goes along doing all the training, titling, talking to experienced people. THEN if they do have a noteworthy stud that has achieved much, then owners of worthy bitches will seek them out. That will give the new wanna-be breeder the signal that they are doing something right. As the owner of a female, people can start breeding her at any time without really understanding WHAT they are breeding.


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## qbchottu (Jul 10, 2011)

Also one kennel is showline and the other is working line? Any reason why? What is your goal? Use your answers to that question to fine-tune your search. 

IPO rules: 
United Schutzhund Clubs of America - Schutzhund Training
Leerburg | Schutzhund Rules Table of Contents

SV conformation:
**credit to Lies** google "entering dog SV show" and you will see an article written by Liesje. It's very thorough and well-written. 
SV vs AKC: The German Sieger Show and Other SV-Style Shows
Watch a SV show: 2010 SV Bundessieger Zuchtschau Nürnberg GHKL Hundinen part(1) - YouTube
sv bundessieger zuchtschau in aachen 12/14sptembre 2008 - YouTube

AKC conformation: American Kennel Club - A Beginner's Guide to Dog Shows
AKC ob: American Kennel Club - Obedience
AKC rally/agility/ob: http://www.akc.org/pdfs/events/GOCET1.pdf


Also...not to be rude, but there is more to a stud male than being conformationally sound and possessing a working ability. This business is not entirely based on merit. How well you campaign and what kind of connections you have can sometimes be more valuable in getting your stud out there than possessing actual ability. Go with a female if you want to breed. There's a very small chance that you will be able to get a stud quality male. Think about it. A male can potentially be studded till he dies at 10 years old. A female has 3-4 litters between age 2-7 and then gets retired from breeding. It's going to be a LOT harder to squeeze your male into the running when there are so many really GOOD males around already that have proven breeding ability. Remember a good dog doesn't have to necessarily produce well. Some dogs can excel in the ring or field, and be no good at producing pups, while other dogs are mediocre-looking (in terms of conformation) and produce very nice puppies. So really what I mean by all that is...by having stringent restrictions on who can use your male when you don't have an established foothold in the business means that you are probably not going to have too many females inquiring about your male. And the females who DO inquire are probably not worth your time. Now I could be completely wrong and you can get a fantastic stud male right away...but most likely that won't happen so if you are really interested in breeding, think about a female. Then YOU get to pick, you don't have to wait around to get picked  

Most of us go into something with an idealization, but after we are faced with reality, we reshape our expectations to catch up with reality. When I first started looking into working dogs, I thought I would be able to slap on a V and SchH3 on my dog no problem! Now that I'm in it...I realize just how difficult it all is and how much work breeders/handlers put into their dogs. It's not an easy road. So if I were you, I would do it for the love of the game. Do it because you love it and if breeding is in your future, it will happen. Most of us won't breed our first competition dog. Use your dog as a learning tool. You'll see what I mean when you get the dog and start competing


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## Liesje (Mar 4, 2007)

As far as the choice of breeders, they are very different lines/types so I would wonder why those two are the final choices and how you will decide between them?


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## GsdLoverr729 (Jun 20, 2010)

I chose one working and one show so that after my research on participating in SchH and shows, I will have at least one breeder for each (will not have to be dissapointed I guess). I don't really plan to become a breeder (if I do wind up doing so, I intend to take my time until I'm at LEAST midthirties, possibly a bit older so that I know what I'm doing).
I just know that I will not neuter without medical reason, so if he (in not only my eyes but the eyes of proffessionals) is a dog that would do well bred, then I MAY stud him. Again, if the breeder agrees. And of course if anyone with a worthy female shows interest.
My goal, should I breed, would be to get solid temperament, good confirmation, good health and working ability. Which is why I asked about doing SchH and shows 
I don't require being able to breed my next guy. I'm more or less curious how it would/should pan out id he is worthy of being bred. 
I definitely won't take the steps to being a true breeder until I can afford to have the right dogs, know this wonderful breed inside out, have the land for it and so on 

Edit- From what I have seen of inbreeding it is negative, however that was multiple generations of it (at least six). So I migh as well ask... What is tbe effect of inbreeding shepherds?


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## GsdLoverr729 (Jun 20, 2010)

Also- Does anyone have a link to good site for learning about the lines? I couldn't find a thread dedicated to all the lines/types and Google is turning up nadaaa.


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## martemchik (Nov 23, 2010)

GsdLoverr729 said:


> Also- Does anyone have a link to good site for learning about the lines? I couldn't find a thread dedicated to all the lines/types and Google is turning up nadaaa.


You can't learn about lines from the internet. You need to get out and see them work, see them shown, interact with them. Reading on the internet will cause you to become biased with untrue information and false generalizations. Find a GSD club or a Schutzhund club near you so that you can go and observe.


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## GsdLoverr729 (Jun 20, 2010)

I am going to do that. But it never hurts to also READ on the differences in the meantime.

In addition, not all information on the internet is false or biased. The info I was finding quite clearly was. That's why I asked for a link. I won't be able to visit a club until the weekend. I have work from 3-1. What I CAN do now is read up on SchH, showing and the lines. I honestly don't see how it can hurt to do so. If you have an aversion to that then sorry, but I would like you to respect my decision to research until I can observe. In fact I expect it. I did not post to be discouraged or get it in argument, I did so to learn


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## Liesje (Mar 4, 2007)

For me the differences between lines if we're talking west German, Czech, DDR, etc are too overgeneralized. What is more interesting is if you look at "lines" as in bloodlines coming from individual dogs or individual kennels/breeding programs that consistently produce certain traits. That's really the type of knowledge you'd be after if you're considering breeding and the best way to get it is hands on. Someone might tell me that X-dog tends to product Y-trait and I'm like "yeah, OK" but when I go watch the progeny and see that in person it can be irrefutable. I don't know that there are any sources on the Internet that offer such comprehensive information, other than individual people (some of whom are on this forum) but then you'd need to pick their brains with specifics.

Also, getting at your other thread, you need more in-depth knowledge of these pedigrees to breed well because breeding is much different than training and competing. I'm not a breeder, right now I train and compete. I have a really nice young dog that has a good temperament, good drives, several very nice qualities that make him a really nice working dog and with the right handler (probably not me!) he could easily compete at a very high level. However looking at his pedigree, he's not really that valuable as a breeding dog. He has what I consider more of an "end-user" pedigree meaning a solid combination of dogs that bring in various desirable traits without expressing too much that is undesirable, but it's hard to pair his pedigree with other lines/dogs and get anything with real purpose other than just pairing two nice, accomplished dogs.


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## Freestep (May 1, 2011)

GsdLoverr729 said:


> So, I have decided I would like to get involved in SchH and possibly showing. I am going to use the next few years to research and learn as much as possible about doing both. I am also going to check out some local clubs.  I also plan to get the CGC  I had previously decided my next shepherd would be male, so as I thought about it I began thinking about the fact that I do not plan to neuter without medical reason (please do not focus on this and start a war people. I have never neutered my males).
> That being said, the thought crossed my mind of breeding.


Everything until the last line sounds great.

Now that breeding has crossed your mind, let that thought keep going on its merry way down the road. 

Seriously. Forget all about breeding, and concentrate on raising, training, and titling your pup. Thinking about breeding now puts the cart before the horse. Go ahead and study bloodlines and learn all you can while you're raising your pup. But every time the thought of breeding comes up, or someone else brings it up, don't give the thought the light of day.

After your dog is titled and accomplished, passes all his health checks, and proven himself breedworthy... forget about breeding.

If someone with a breedworthy bitch shows interest in breeding to your male, THEN you can start thinking about it. *If* it happens. At this stage of the game, I wouldn't get too proactive about campaigning your male for breeding. You will still be too young and probably won't have enough knowledge to know what bloodlines mix and match well, and you probably won't have enough experience to spot a breedworthy female.

If you have a good mentor, I would defer all breeding decisions to them.

If you start a pup with the intent to breed him, it's going to color every thought and every thing you do with him. It will cloud your judgement and confuse your priorities. You need to keep a neutral and unbiased view, which is hard enough with a pet dog, let alone a competition dog. Enjoy the DOG, love the DOG, treat him as an individual, recognize his strengths but do not blind yourself to his weaknesses. He is your partner, your buddy, above all else. Thinking of him as a walking stud fee puts too much value on the wrong things at this stage of the game.


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## GsdLoverr729 (Jun 20, 2010)

Well the breeding is more of a fleeting thought. I don't plan on breeding him. I am just being hypothetical with the situation that he turns out to be a breedworthy dog.
Freestep- I don't openly want to breed him. I want to have fun and bond with my dog  I will be researching lines and observing them in action. But this is pretty much to expand my knowledge. I was planning on, should he turn out to be breedworthy, relying on the breeder and at least one other proffessional to teach me and make the final decision on if the female should be bred with him. So two mentors  As for stud fee, I hadn't even considered that o-o My curiosity was based simply on bettering the breed and genepool. As I said in my first post, though, he is going to be my baby regardless of that.

Also: Based on my reading (may change when I observe firsthand, but this is my current thought), I am leaning towards a WGSL  This way I can do shows, and have a dog with the drive to do SchH  Of course, this is relying on the correct breeder as well


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## Liesje (Mar 4, 2007)

My personal advice is get the dog you want to live with and train (which may or may not be the best dog you'd want for breeding) and start from there. In the end, it should really be up to *you* to make the decisions about breeding. Having mentors is a good thing but like everything else that should not substitute for valuable experience. You are the advocate for your dog. I'm just saying this because I see people being strung along or duped into doing this or that with their dogs because of what a breeder wants and in the end there are problems or the person is just being used. I don't like going to a show and asking someone about their puppies and instead of getting legitimate answers about the goals of that breeding I get, "well so-and-so breeder said we should breed X-bitch to Y-dog so we did, aren't they cute?" (and of course X-bitch was sold to them by so-and-so and Y-dog is a stud owned by so-and-so). If you breed your dog that makes YOU a breeder and fair game to hold to the same standards to which we hold other breeders. I may be going against the grain on this forum but that's how I feel about my own dogs and how I decide whether or not to breed. They're my dogs and in the end it will always be my decision and if I go forward with it, then *I* need the reasoning and experience to back it up.


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## cliffson1 (Sep 2, 2006)

It would take a minimum of 5 to 10 years, if you went out and trained , studied, and went to show/sport/working events every week to start to get a clue to the amount of information to be able to read pedigrees well enough to make informed breeding decisions. For some it takes much more, for a very few maybe less. The breed is so complex, there is so much misinformation, so many biases, so few "well rounded mentors", that make this very difficult. The breed today is so specialized that many experts only know about what they participate in. Usually show or sport. 
Take your time, raise your dog, train your dog to a significant level, get into a club or organization with GS that are doing something.....and as time goes on you will see how much there is to know, then you can start making decisions on what is good or bad, right oe wrong.
You would be surprised at how many people see something once or twice, form an opinion(usually negative..lol), then go out on internet advising others on said subjective matter when there are thousands of other examples to refute what they saw. When you haven't seen many many examples of what is being talked about, you have no idea that what they are saying is based on limited information, and in many cases not really accurate. Take your time and learn to handle and train your dog to a high level......there's a wealth of knowledge that comes with that journey.


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## martemchik (Nov 23, 2010)

GsdLoverr729 said:


> Also: Based on my reading (may change when I observe firsthand, but this is my current thought), I am leaning towards a WGSL  This way I can do shows, and have a dog with the drive to do SchH  Of course, this is relying on the correct breeder as well


This is why you have to go out and watch the dogs. You've already read, and you've already made up your mind based on a few internet websites. If you talk to people on this forum they will tell you that to really compete/excel at Schutzhund you're going to want a working line dog. Although WGSL have the drive to do Schutzhund, they don't do it the way that a working line does. Also, WGSL breeders will tell you that its pretty hard to win an AKC show with a WGSL dog.

I'm not trying to discourage you, but I don't do Schutzhund because I don't have the time to. The people I know that show, would never have time to do Schutzhund as well. I think you really need to get out there with your current dog and see the amount of time it takes to title a dog in anything, and also show the dog and compete for a championship as well.

It's really great to hear that you have such big plans, but until you realize the time commitment this will take, you can't really plan on doing one or the other.

The reason I didn't want you reading any websites is that there pretty much aren't any unbiased opinions. Without seeing the dogs and the lines in action, you'll develop the same biases. It creates the posters that come on this forum and go "I don't want a X dog because its XYZ" without ever watching the actual dog. Like it was stated, many times you get generalizations, and generalizations are pretty much prejudices, and its really bad to base your decisions on other people's opinions.

So I guess it does HURT to read in the mean time.


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