Yeah, I think it reeeeaaally depends on the lines. My breeder has said she knows all the way up to her dogs grandparents and it would be very hard for my dog to get past 5lbs. There just has never been one in the lines. However, she is 3 lbs now and she is only 12 and a half weeks. She hasn't grown since her 10th week though.

I dunno. I will tell you in a year! :)

Same Here!
 

OMGsh, I am going crazy!

My little furbaby Napoleon is 11 weeks and he weighs 4.4 lbs. I am not sure if that is because he is growing quickly or because he eats so much. I work during the day so I leave a bowl of food and water out for him and today I didn't go to work and I still left that bowl out for him. 2 hours later I come into the kitchen and that food bowl is licked clean!
I also just bought a $180 Juicy Couture Carrier and I thought he would stop growing but now it looks like I will never be able to use it :(

I am looking at the Breeder Contract right now and it says the mom and dad's names but not the weight. I hope he isnt going to be a big boy. Luckily, his half sister (same daddy, different mommy) lives next door! isnt that a coincidence! and she is probably around 6 lbs. I would love it for my yorkie to be only 6 or 7 lbs, but at the rate he is growing I wouldnt be surprised if he weighed in at 25 lbs.

Don't worry!!!

He won't get past 12 lbs...I mean, I never heard of a Yorkie that did...plus, he could just be a fast grower. My baby Malibu was 3 lbs at 10 weeks and now she is 14 weeks and she is still 3lbs...he might stop growing quicker than other Yorkies. My breeder said my malibu should be around 4 or 5 lbs. Maybe yours will actually be around 6 or 7 lbs. Oh, and Juicy carriers can carry up to 16 lbs if they are the large size! :)

You cannot determine the size of a Yorkie sometimes. My Buddy was 3.5lbs at 14wks and the vet said he will probably reach 10lbs. I was shooked! We 'll today at 2 he is 13.5 and full of mischief and never stops making me laugh. Just more to love. I had no idea that a Yorkie could reach that weight. Glad to hear there are so many other ones out there.

WOW! I would have guessed no more than 7. Was he sickly as a baby? How much did his parents weigh?

You'd be surprised. We've got a handful of Teapot Yorkies here at YT! And they are still ever bit as cute as the so called "teacups". Or should I say thimble yorkies! LOL

Mueiyinter - How funny "teapot Yorkies"!!! I got a chuckle from that one!Just more to love!:p
Julie

First of all I am sorry you are going through this stress. I can however relate! When I got Lexie she weighed almost 2lbs at 12 weeks. The breeder said she would be under 5lbs full grown so I picked her trusting he was being truthful (I have many problems with this breeder now) anyway I took her home and her growth rate remained the same for almost 2 months so I believed she would be tiny. After that her growth rate increased rapidly. When She hit 6lbs and had huge paws I continuously contacted the breeder who said that would be her max size. (Boy was I a fool). He got mad and acted confused and insulted when I said my vet told me she would be huge for a yorkie when full grown saying they lied and she would be tiny guaranteed. Well by 9 months she hit the 8lb mark. Every time I called him he said that is odd...I never had any other clients call and complain about their puppies getting bigger than 5lbs. He said all puppies and dogs from him stayed under 5lbs. (The problem here is that he never asked who the puppy was or who was calling. He never remembered me...so his saying he had never received a size complaint was bogus! I called many times.) I wouldn't trade Lexie for anything in the world but I would never trust that man because he is a liar!!! I hope your experience is nothing like that!!! My advice to anyone...never buy from a Georgia yorkie breeder named Justin who has www.familyyorkies.com! because I later found out from 2 other people that their yorkies turned out bigger than Lexie! 1 hit 18lbs and another his 22lbs. Extremely large for yorkies. I know that it is possible for purebred yorkies to oddly occasionally get larger...Lexie did...but That is not expected when you go to purchase a yorkie you are told will remain under 5lbs! I suppose there is no size guarantee!!! I mean if you had seen a tiny 2lb 12 week old Lexie would you have guessed she would get as big as 9lbs and still growing (and not at all overweight)??? Anyway I wish you luck and I'm sure you love your baby! :-) Contact your breeder and ask if it is possible to get a partial refund on your baby if she gets over the guaranteed price. I would tell anyone to get a size guarantee and an option for partial refund if the size reaches over that because I should have done that and I know what to look for now. I will research the breeder though from what I hear it is safer to buy from someone on here or someone suggested by people on here! Good luck hun! I wish you and your new baby the absolute best!!! :-)
~Tru
Ps if anyone visite the site I wanted to add none of the yorkies I saw there liiked anything like the photos on the site! As a matter of a fact there were similar photos on the site when I went and all of the puppies looked different making me think he was using fake pictures. I know this means so little when I did buy her but she was beautiful. All the same I just wanted people to know the pictures are misleading too!

First of all any good breeder will tell you that they don't guarantee weight of the puppies. They can give you an estimate weight but that is all it is, a guess, but some puppies get bigger for no explained reason even if all the other dogs in the pedigree line were all small. I don't think it was wise that he guaranteed the pup's weight and obviously it shows that by your pup's and other customer's puppies weight...

QUOTE: (About the breeder) ... "If you have something in writing, you may be able to hold her to it......"
-------------------------------------

Why would anyone want to do this? Don't we all know that a breeder can't guarantee a puppy's adult weight. Certainly, a breeder can made an educated guess and be close to correct most of the time.....but there are always exceptions - and we have seen a lot of them.

I think expecting a breeder to guarantee a puppy's weight - is not fair, in itself. And then - if your pup gets larger than the breeder thought - are you going to take it back (after you have had it several months)....of course not.

Or - would you expect part of your money back? This isn't fair either.

All things being equal - usually a pup will be close to the size of its parents -- but certainly not 100% of the time.

We need a "be fair to breeder's week." (And I'm not a breeder - I'm a neutered/spayed pet owner.)


Carol Jean

Yeah, I would never hold it against the breeder if Malibu got bigger than 5 lbs, i would also lover her just as much as ever (which is a lot) and of course I would never trade her or return her. The thing is, as much as big Yorkies are as cute as little ones, the breed standard today is 3-7 lbs, and a lot of people, including myself, get Yorkies in part for that size attribute. I didn't want a dog that is over 7 lbs. Nothing to do with not liking them - I grew up with a German Shepherd, a Great Dane and a Chow, I love ALL dogs - but I am very small and carrying around anything bigger than 5 lbs would be a hassle. My apartment is very small, so proportions being how they are, cleaning up after a dog over 7 lbs, bathing a dog over 7lbs, feeding a dog over 7lbs...everything is just not how I expected it. And I don't think it's foolish of me to have believed that my puppy would be under 5 lbs as an adult as the breeder told me, and I don't think it's foolish to have thought that there are relatively very few Yorkies over 7 lbs. I have 5 friends who have Yorkies, all under 5 lbs, I have seen many Yorkies, all under 7 lbs...and here in this forum I feel like it is a forum of Silky Terriers (which are great dogs btw). People get so defensive when I say that I really hope my Malibu doesn't grow past 5 lbs as if I was a "Yorkies-over-7lbs-hater". I just feel like, I read about Yorkies, about the breed standard, I researched many sites about Yorkies, I took a test to see what breed was right for me, size was a factor and I paid for a dog that would not grow past 5 lbs. She is 3.4 lbs now at 15 weeks. Maybe she will stop growing at 6 months. She was 1.5lbs at 8 weeks. Who knows! I just really hope she stays small. It's a big reason Yorkies were tested to be the right dogs for me in this phase of my life.

To Malibu's mom -

My new baby girl, Kelsey, seems like her weight is mirroring Malibus.
She was 1lb 8 oz at 9 weeks and is now 3 lbs. 1 oz at 16 weeks.

Mine seems a lot bigger than my 4 1/2 pound and almost 4 pound Yorkie were at that age so I am expecting her to be around 5 or 6 pounds at maturity.

That's great size! Malibu is 16 weeks now..and 3.8 lbs!!! I am soooo terrified! The vet says she should be about 5 lbs. I dunno though. The size chart doesn't say that at all!!! faaaaar from it. But she does ave TINY paws and TINy legs! maybe she is just a fast grower...

I don't know what to tell you on the weight. Scampers weighed 2.5 pounds at 12 weeks and 3.2 pounds at 16 weeks. He also has tiny paws and legs, although he has alot of hair. Today he is 5.2 at 5 months and the vet said that he will be over 10 pounds which is hard to believe. He was growing slowly at first and then started growing fast and now he is once again slowed down on growing. I guess I won't know until he his an adult. I'll keep my fingers crossed....:)

I am a bit confused, why are you terrified? because of her size? I bought a "tiny" Yorkie with little or no knowledge of what I was doing.. my "tiny" boy now weighs 12 1/2 pounds. He is the CUTEST thing in the world! He is a Yorkie, through and through, but he is just a handful! I am very happy with him, he is SO MUCH FUN!

I would be really surprised if he gets to be 10 pounds, I'm thinking in the 6 pound range, 7 tops!

I am sure your dog IS fun and that he IS cute, but I did not buy a 12 pound dog. I bought a supposedly 5 pound dog. So, it's like paying for bon jovi tickets and having aerosmith perform instead. I mean, I love both bands, but I wanted to see Bon Jovi. It's hard for me to understand how there are so many "Yorkies" whose standard weight is 3 to 7 lbs that are way over that range. I didn't want a dog that was bigger than 5 lbs. I have had huge dogs, and I loved them to death, but I wanted a 5 pound dog. I know there are no guarantees when you buy a dog, but I thought I would just happen to be in that group of people who pay for a 5 lb dog and get a 5 lb or under dog. And she is already 4 lbs! At 4 months! So how can she possibly stay small? That's why I am terrified. Because she is going to be more like a silky terrier. And I paid a lot of money for a Yorkie...not a silky.

my kirby weighs 8lbs and his mother was 6lbs and father was 5lbs.....you just never know

Stewie was a tad bit over 3lbs @ 16 weeks and now he is almost 9lbs.

I understand what you're saying, but don't bring up Silky's. Just because a Yorkie is over 7lbs doesn't mean they are a Silky. They are a completely different breed.

Yep I hate when people compare big yorkies to silkys too. That has been done to my Chachi who is 10 lbs. I also have a female that was supposed to be a small yorkie like 3 lbs. I paid extra for her because she was supposed to be a small yorkie. She was extremely small when I got her only 12 ounces. She is 6 lbs. So you never really know on weight. It can go either way. There are people on here that had a puppy that seemed large and it quit growing and turns out small.

If you think that then you are not aware of the background of a silky terrier. In fact, the silky terriers are a cross between the Australian terrier and the Yorshire terrier, and therefore they are quite silimar to Yorkies. So similar in fact that many people have them mistaken, and quite a number of people have been misled into thinking they are buying a pure bread Yorkie when they are actually buying a Yorkie with a silky's background in them. Silkies are 8 to 11 lbs (standard size that is), so I think it is very reasonable for me to say that I feel as though Yorkies that are greater than 7 lbs are more like silkies. Their temperament is much the same. The main difference is the size and coat color. Silkies are more often silver. Anyhow, it is often less expensive to get a silky, and what I am saying is that for the money we pay for Yorkies, when they grow past 7 lbs, it is as if we had gotten a really expensive silky terrier. Really. I am sorry that people get offended. But there is a very obvious reason why Yorkies greater than 7 lbs are often confused with silkies. It is because they are very alike, except for the silky's greater size.

Did you but your puppy from a local breeder? Maybe you can visit other puppies of hers that are now adults for a comparison. Now, I know that is not my policy or belief-I mean that you can compare one litter to another and have some idea about how they will look as adults. But, some people do say that they think you can tell by doing that.
BYBers, puppy millers and CBers have long been known to use a Silky female and a tiny Yorkie stud to get more puppies with fewer problems and less expensive whelping. Still is done every day by the dishonest people. BUT, an unsuspecting buyer might buy and breed and not know about the difference til their puppies turn out to be huge..That is where your research and knowledge and references can help out..

Good point, Silkies are very close to Yorkies. Here's some pics - Yorkies, no Silkies - I think many could be fooled.

I think if these pics were posted under the heading is my dog a purebred Yorkie?, the answer would most often be yes.

To me, there is a big difference between yorkies and silkies. A bigger yorkie does not look like a silky unless it was bred with a silky. Silkies have have wedge shaped head, longer muzzle flatter skull, ears stand erect on the top of the head, they are longer in body than tall at the shoulders and are sturdy and well muscled.

Yorkies on the otherhand have heavier coats, shorter muzzles and a dome shaped head, ears are erect but tend to flare to the sit a bit and the ear base is larger than a silky, they are as tall as they are long like a square or box, their features are overall more daintefied and fragile than the sturdy muscular silky. Just looking at the face alone you should be able to tell the difference.

So to say a yorkie looks like a silky just because of it size is not fair. Yorkies use to be alot bigger and now the size is 7 pounds or under. Nonetheless, their are still yorkies out there that have genes for bigger yorkies, I think we will always have that due to puppy mills and such.
I am not trying to be critize, I just think there is a big difference between yorkies and silkies other than just weight.:)

Here is a picture of silkies and yorkies. The first three are silkies the last two are yorkies.

These are yorkies

yes, these two groups do have a difference because they are both groups of optimum silkies and optimum Yorkies, and that (and I don't mean to offend anyone, please) is not the case with many of the Yorkies here. From the pics I have seen, some Yorkies here look not too similar to the Yorkies in these pics. that's what leads me to think that some of these may not be 100% Yorkies. Even if they have the characteristics physically of a Yorkie, because of their size, it is very possible that they were mixed with silkies in the past. I really don't think that the decades or even centuries ago when Yorkies were larger (although when i research that it never really confirms anything) could bring back these genes. If my puppy turns out to be bigger than 7 lbs, I am gonna try to somehow confirm her Yorkie breed. Although she comes with great confirmationa and pedigree, I just really don't believe that Yorkies should be bigger than 7 lbs. Unless they overeat, lol. that's just my opinion though.

One thing to keep in mind, the weight charts and "doubling weight at 12 weeks" is ONLY a guideline. I have YET to have a dog mature to what the charts and the doubling said they would...both under and over.

Weight at maturity has so many factors associated with it. Some lines mature quicker than others, I've had dogs stop growing completely by 8 months, and one that continued growing til 18 months. The best way to "guestimate" the size of your pup at maturity IMHO is to look at the bone structure and size of the parents and grandparents, and any aunts and uncles you can, and their rate of maturity, and it will give you an IDEA. Especially small yorkies don't always come from small parents, and especially large ones don't always come from large parents. There are lots of factors all rolled into each puppy that gives that puppy it's own special size. One of my girls mother always produces a little one, a 7 lber, and usually a 4-5 lb in the middle, but behind her is a VERY large yorkie, and several very small ones, so unless your breeder is very consistent in one particular size, all of the parents and grandparents, great grand parents approximately the same size, then you kind of have a craps shoot on what size your pup is going to turn out. Look at bone structure for help with that.

I am sitting on two hopefuls right now, one is 2.75 lbs at 18 weeks, the other is 4.5 at 19 weeks. I'm PRAYING the 4.5 stops around 6.5 and the 2.75 gets to at least 4.5. (His brother and sister are both around 3.5 @ 18 weeks) Will this happen?? My crystal ball is broken right now..but I'll get back to you when they're a year old! lol

My Monkey was 3.2 lbs at 13 weeks, at 10months he is 6lbs. I feed him quality food, and the recomended portion. He is very healthy. Dont overfeed your dogs....:( keep them healthy :animal36 :aimeeyork