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Originally Posted by Elle  There is a misconception that there is value is akc stock. While that may be true years ago this is no longer the case. One can have purebred akc pets with the registration papers yet still have a yorkshire that looks like a different breed. Look for the right pedigree, its more important than the rest. How can you do this without trusting the breeder? |
Elle -- you make such an excellent point and I am afraid I have had personal experience with that. My first yorkie, Maggie, was AKC registered but she was so far from standard! The more she grew the more off-standard she was. I was so excited to finally be getting a yorkie and she was such a cute puppy, I did not use my common sense. My heart ruled the moment and home I came with a very sweet funny-looking yorkie. I would not even have minded if that was all there was, unfortunately she also had health problems. She was just poorly bred from a local breeder that I later found out raised the dogs in a concrete building without AC in FL! I got her second hand, from a lady that said her health made it imposible to care for Maggie, but later I wondered if she was trying to get out from under a dog that looked nowhere near what she wanted. I learned though and got much more particular next go around. Since then, I think I have gotten some very good pups that do look like the Yorkshire Terrier I spent so many years waiting to get!
Just looking on our own YT -- there are every imaginable variation of yorkies! Some fox-like, some teddybears, some without proper colors, some with curly hair, some with coarse hair. My Maggie was short, squat, curly, narrow set eyes, and a smooshed-in face. All cute and lovable but some so far from what a yorkie should look like. Some have strayed a very long way from the genetic pool established long ago.
I think purposely mixing breeds is one of the big culprits too! Mixed litters usually have one or two that look pretty much like a yorkie. I wonder how many of those wind up getting papers from the non-AKC registries and then someone breeds them. The puppies from those matings may look like yorkies but straying even further from the standard. I wonder too how many litters are born of multiple sires or at least the wrong sire and then the puppies, if they look enough like a yorkie, are registered. Sometimes when too many off colors show up, I think some are trying to pass them off as Parti-colors. I have seen such a huge variation n the quality of Parti-Color yorkies. Some do look yorkie in all respects but color, but others look like someone got in the woodpile!! I have seen on this forum someone with a limited registration saying they had bred their dog! If someone admits that here, how many are doing it!???? Some of those were put on Limited registration to prevent them from passing on undesireable looks or traits. But people will screw with the system and there goes the standard. I just do not understand. I think sometimes people will do it illegally even when it may be harder that way!
I do not know what the answer is other than to require more DNA testing. But that too needs to be improvd so that the results are more reliable and tell more details.