I would say time for a new vet. I have never heard a vet say it depends on how much you feed them. You would just end up with an undernourished dog!!!

Maggie, one of the main points of this thread was to asking what do you get when the father is the larger partner. Not dangerously but ounces. Does the dog take after it's father or mother or would be larger than both of them? That one breeder said 60% of size comes from the mother? Would that still be the case if the father is a little larger than the mother?

Regarding food...I looked at the vet when he told me that and said, "I don't want him to be hungry." This why I'm asking all the different questions in other threads. I'm trying to figure out if people with heavier dogs just let them graze and don't monitor their eating or if the dogs choose for themselves their weight and leave food even if offered to them. Our dogs will just walk away and none of them are overweight. They're all 2 years and under. We have two working class breeds and now 2 toy breeds. Then there's the neutering/spaying factor. So far the girls that have been spayed are still a healthy weight, my personal protection dog will not be neutered, I can't risk him getting lazy or indifferent, but Mr. Pooky-Bear WILL be neutered...however, I'm a little nervous about the surgery...can't think about it right now and besides that, I've gone off topic on my own thread,hehe

Back to the vet. He's the best vet in town. He'll save a dog rather than put him down and he's very practical. Believe me, I was just as shocked at that response as you were BUT it does kind of make sense. I'm just going to feed him what's recommended for his weight each month and see what happens. There's no way I'd starve or malnourish anything on purpose.

maggie, tell me more about this:
Pooky's paws are really small...he's overall much smaller than his 1/2 brother who's 8 days younger. They may have been the bigger and smallest of each litter.

At what point are you looking at the paws and have you ever measured the paw? Is there a Yorkshire book about this that I should just download?

I understand what you are asking. But there is no way to know regardless of the sizes of the parents what the pups sizes will mature to. You have to know what was behind each generation in regards to sizes. It's like Russian roulette you never know what you will get. That was what I was trying to show with the 3 litter reference. As far as the Nose , ears, and feet reference it has always been very close when I look at those features on a pup and I can get within a good range of what they will mature to as adults. my previous litter of pups 2 were big they had larger features than the other 2 pups in that litter. When I get a chance I will look through my pics of the previous litter to find some that show what I am referring to.

In regards to the food issue, I am surprised a vet would say that. If you feed a pup less it will only cause problems. Puppies need all the nutrition they get from the food they eat to develop properly. If your not feeding them the proper amounts it will cause problems with their health and developement. I am sure your vet may be the best but what he told you was wrong.

I take alot of pics of each litter of pups. I don't measure their paws or anything. When I was younger it was something I was told that you could look at a dogs paws and know that with the size you could get an idea of if the dog was going to be bigger or smaller. but that was also in reference to mixed breed pups we had looked at as children. It came back to mind when I started breeding several years ago. So far it has held true.

Seriously, are you sure you understood what he said? Could there be a language problem? This is a false statement. "Give him a little twice a day and he'll grow up small, give him a lot of food and he'll grow up big."
While it's true you don't want to over feed an adult dog, you can't over feed a puppy, if you are using a nutritious dog food and not some bad human food. If you want a dog a certain weight you should buy an adult. Personally, I'd find another vet.

Pretty clear and straight forward. I am just a little concerned that no one has mentioned the accuracy of the length of the tail to the circumference at the base of the tail, as a predeterminate factor of eventual adult size.

I forgot that! We need to see more pictures!

What is the tail factor about, how interesting!

Could you upload a few more pictures?

I thought perhaps some of you had forgotten it....we dont use it often, but it is pretty accurate....at least as accurate as some of the charts available....I have been measuring tail length/base circumference ratios for years....seems to work pretty well.

Could you put us up a "chart" on how we do this please :).

I totally forgot about the tail.

I'm not really a dog poser...does it count if his tails been a bit docked?? To funny, I went to another vet, who has pet store. I didn't tell him anything about Pooky. Just said, "I know it's a game, what do you think, how big will he be as an adult?"

He said, "Really big, he's about 1.5 months right now, just about 2 months and will be the size of a silky terrier, weighing between 8-9 kilos, (which is like 18 pounds)." lolol ya, I have real confidence in that one.

https://picasaweb.google.com/1129851...eat=directlink

Maybe if you posted some pictures of Pooky, the very knowledgeable members here could give you a better "quesstimate" of how big he will grow up to be. Maybe take some good close-up shots of his face, teeth, paws & tail. This might help you get the answers you so obviously want to know. Just a friendly suggestion. :)