And the reality is, these greeders count on 99% of us being suckers and fools for their sales pitches and promises and fairy-tale pictures at some point in our lives. Most of us fall for their promises of dreams-come-true because we just don't know any better and, really, how could we? Unless we are raised by or know someone who is very dog-savvy and knows the horrors and problems associated with creating "permanent puppies", tiny toy dogs and so on, we're all apt to be sucked in by these unscrupulous breeders and websites until we somehow learn what is so wrong about that type of breeder and the puppies they sell. Sure, some of them are healthy and don't have problems but Google searches will show you that a great many of the dogs they breed do have many, many conformation, health and temperament problems.

Buying from one of those breeders really casts no aspersions on any of their clients who usually don't and can't know any better and that is what is so sad. So many of us don't even know we should ask questions or even what to ask when we start out young buying a dog or buy a toy dog for the first time. And those breeders of tinies and designer dogs cater to our ignorance of the whole subject and as young people and first-time toy dog buyers, who just automatically or inherently knows not to believe some of those website claims?

Hoping the former or recent clients of greeders/brokers don't think any of our remarks about who buys from them are directed personally at them but rather understand that our comments are saved for the greeders and their knowing that all of us at one time in life are novice dog buyers and are often suckers and fools for their and other equally glowing sales pitches. And knowing that is what gives them power over the new buyer. I know - I've bought tiny, toy dogs and other pie-in-the sky products of all kinds - magic ovens "that do it all" but barely toast, blenders that blend supposedly w/out jamming up and stopping mid-blend, wildly expensive wrinkle-reducing creams that doesn't work, firming make-up that doesn't firm, expensive video cameras that work just until the warranty is up, phony all-inclusive vacation packages that cover "all expenses from flights, suites, activities and all meals", and oh, more than a few exercise machines and devices that claim to make exercise "easy". Everybody falls for a few sales pitches at one time or another in our lives, particularly when we want so hard to believe. I've been a big sucker for a good sales pitch more than a time or two and want to help others that might be thinking of doing business with breeders of tinies or so-called designed dogs, "permanent puppies", outlandish promises of toy mixed-breed dogs,etc., hoping others on here doing research or just casually reading won't fall for their attractive spiels when and if they decide to get a toy dog.

Ah, close enough.

:thumbup::thumbup::thumbup:

You are so right. Greeders take advantage of the fact that good purebred breeding is something that the general public is totally ignorant of. The world of good purebred breeding is a very small one. They don't advertize on fancy fake websites or in most classified ads. If they are really good they generally have waiting lists for their pups.
Anyone interested in finding a good, quality purebred puppy can find one, but it takes some patience and the willingness to seek out the proper channels to learn about them. Most people just see what they think they want and want it instantly.
You don't have to want a show dog to get a good representative of the breed. It just takes some common sense and the willingness to learn and then patiently wait for your baby to be born.

A word or three-score about "when" health problems can show up.

CT - can show up in early puppyhood, or anytime there-after. Sometimes as a result of improper collar use, and or intubation during surgery.

LP - looseness at the knees can be seen at even 8wks old. Note I said looseness and not even calling it Grade 1. At this age puppy is too young to properly assess the knees. In Europe finally grading is done after 2yrs old - maybe even closer to 3yrs old.
Loose knees can resolve, with a)intelligent exercises and b) safe practices of which there are many and c) joint supplements. And or some combination of both.
A book can be written about the exercises and the safe practices.

LIVER sHUNT LS: Can show up in a young puppy - recommended BATS testing at 16wks and 6months. Can show up later on in life, secondary to some other problem - for example bladder stones.

Hyperuricosuria - another condition that is genetic and can show up and often doesn't show up until after 5 years old (males predisposed to more serious concerns here).

Thyroid problems - May not show up in early life prior to one year old, and may show up after de-sexing, 2-3-4-5 years later.

Allergy problems: Do not usually show up until after one year old

PRA and or Cataracts - Can show up anytime up to 6 yrs old.

And the list goes on.

SO OP: at 15 wks old your puppy is healthy so far. Until you reach at least mile marker of 5 years old, you won't really know for sure.

The myth of Mixed breeds being healthier than purebreds
 

Until the public can see, widescreen mixed breed testing, that is available for all pure-breds, then for me it is just a myth.

One of my little projects for this summer, is to video-tape dogs out in public who have obvious movement problems. It is astounding to me, that when I watch dogs move, (I just seem to do that naturally) out in public, how many of them move so very poorly.

Another caveat, that just because you mix a supposed hyp0-allergenic dog with another breed that is not hypoallergenic, that the coat will always be of the hypo-allergenic type. I say BALDERDASH to that assumption.

Now let us say you breed a Maltese with a Yorkshire Terrier, both these breeds have high incidence of LS. Do you really think you are lowering the chances of LS free pups? Again I say BALDERDASH.

And it truly ASTOUNDS me why anyone would pay high prices for a mix!

The marketing hype in this case, is so pervasive that the public has bought into the myth.

I remember my husband spending several hours over several days with a co-worker, who wanted a pup, for his young tween girl. They went through all the reasons for purebreds, looked at several breeds. Yada Yada. The next thing hubby hears, that co-worker bought a Labradoodle or some such, for his daughter; cost was $1200:eek: For a mixed breed dog. Sigh.........

This is really good to know!

gemy you obviously dont know anything about genetics no offense

I think offence is being now taken by many of us on here - how rude.

Also, by the way, Bitdefender is blocking, apparently, multiple viruses on my computer, every time I click onto one of your posts.....

One of my biggest pet peeves is someone who knows they are going to offend someone by what they say, but included "no offense" in the statement.

And this statement coming from you, with what you have previously said, you obviously don't know what you are talking about. But of course, you probably won't see this or respond to me, since it seems like you must have me on ignore, bc YOU WON'T EVER ANSWER MY QUESTION!

I'm beginning to think you must be the breeder herself. Who else would defend those practices so adamantly? And insult one of our most respected and knowledgable breeders here?

The was EXTREMELY rude! You have no idea how much this lovely women knows and it is a whole lot more then you for sure! The truth can hurt but she is telling the truth!! Look it up do research you will find all of what she says is very true!

:thumbup::thumbup::thumbup:

Amy? Might I suggest that instead of insulting a well known & very knowledgeable participant of our community, you actually do something constructive for yourself like go see other parts of YT?

LoL Now you are being silly, you started with zero credibility, seemed to mellow and leave yourself open to responses and feedback...and then you insult Gemy like this. This is one of those responses that do not dignify a response. Amy your out of the ball park now....now you "sound" totally ridiculous, just as when you first started responding.

Gemy needs no reassurance, we know how well she knows genetics....

How would you know what she knows about genetics? How can you possibly be in a position to evaluate her knowledge base on the subject? I find your comment offensive and wrong. Worse, it seems vindictive. Have you read her posts about genetics on recent and old threads - about that very subject of genetics? Her posts on genetics permeate this forum. She's continually impressed me out of my socks with her insight over the years and, just recently, her informed and complicated, intricate questions to a member of YT who is a working geneticist and the manner in which she knowledgeably discussed various aspects of genetics with him and others was awe-inspiring! From reading her posts on the subject, she knows far more about the subject than a great many breeders - I would hasten to say - than MOST.

But her insight and scholarship isn't limited to genetics. She can ably address almost any subject about dogs with an incredible degree of knowledge, wisdom and experience. Gemy is like a dog encyclopedia!

And had you asked her to help you understand anything about mix-breed toy dogs before you went shopping, she would have knocked herself out helping you learn all you wanted to know on the subject. And no doubt, knowing her, she still would.

Before making statements of this kind about very respected and more-than-helpful longtime members of YorkieTalk who are here constantly advocating only for the good of dogs and working as hard as they possibly can to help their existence in the world, you need to think long and hard about why in the world you would want to say such a thing to anyone - let alone one of the brightest and best we have here. Your statement only belittles you and makes you look small, spiteful, rude and so very uninformed. I'm angry with you for saying what you did, but more than that, I'm disgusted with your ugly attitude toward such a lovely, longtime advocate for dogs everywhere. You revealed so much about yourself today in that statement to Gemy.

You may not have meant this to be offensive, but it was difficult for me to read. After having Yorkies in my life for over thirty years, and countless other dogs throughout my lifetime, I still learn so much at YT. One of the people I have learned an immense amount from is Gemy. She has spent years helping to educate in both of her breeds, is chair of the education committee in Canada for BRTs, and has such a deep and profound respect for the welfare of all dogs. She studies health, attends seminars, is so well versed about genetics, movement, health issues, and responsible breeding. Her character is impeccable. She has earned our deep respect here and certainly my love. I have my little girl because of Gemy and my other dear friend.

I know it hurts to hear all of these things that are written here. You love your baby, and I understand why. She is really precious. I bet she is worth any amount of money to you. But that doesn't mean that we can condone someone trying to breed without carefully studying their dogs, knowing the genetics behind them to try to breed out the faults and health problems, and doing health testing on the sire and dam and carefully checking out their babies. I love my breeder, and I would be very protective of her, too. She earned my respect because she puts her heart and soul into breeding, she produces healthy babies, is extensively involved in showing for conformation and obedience, and she stands behind her pups. She socialized her dogs, loves them, trains them, and really exercises them. They also live part of her family and live the active life that every dog should. I know a couple of other people who have her dogs, so I am not only sharing my experience with her. I know many people who have purchased hybrid dogs, and they are special dogs, too. You just don't know what personality traits you will have, what they will end up looking like, or even how big they'll be. Most importantly, you don't know much about health. I love all dogs, but I am so in love with Yorkies. I made sure to go to someone who is highly respected in her field so that I would have a happy, healthy, well socialized dog who looks like the image of a Yorkie in my mind. I don't think anyone here is saying anything bad about your little girl. We just always question people who are not breeding for the right reasons.

If you stick around, you will learn a lot and understand the passion and compassion behind the people in YT. You will also learn quite a bit from Gemy. She is a wealth of knowledge about dogs, and she is a very caring person with a very giving nature.

Chair of the education committee for Canada for BRT's? Even more impressed with Gemy than I was before. She's quite something.

I'm bowing out on this thread. It's very obvious she is only here to push our buttons. Nothing constructive to add, only disagreeing with proven facts, insulting members, and promoting and backing cross breeding. Why is she even here?

Yes. Just this past spring she did a presentation to teach judges about them. Hundreds of hours of work produced what sounded like an amazing presentation and a wonderful questioning afterwards. If the Power Point presentation that saw is an indication, it must have been incredible. She is a true educator, so well spoken, highly intelligent and educated, and she has such a warm and giving heart that is always willing to help and share her expertise. Gemy is also very humble and willing to look at all sides, so that she can come to an informed decision. She is what I call a true lifelong learner. Gemy also helps to share her knowledge in the Yorakie world, as well.

SHes not a biologist! Every doctor ive met says mixed breeds are better health wise and my research...im not talking about breeders and how they breed bad lines because you can breed a bad line in a pure breed and mixed breed...however mixed breeds have lesser health issues its proven...breeders that r saying its soo wrong to breed mixed breeds is because they want people to continue buying pure breeds! what would akc do if mixed breeds where suddenly what people wanted... for people that r soo intelligent your closing your eyes!

Try doing research and not just listening to one vet because you and the vet you talked to are wrong. This whole post is full of crap that's untrue I encourage you to do your research because you sound extremely uneducated like to a sad extent. Don't do battle with knowledgeable people without doing research its just not very smart and makes me feel so sad that you think you know it all and are unwilling to learn when in fact you know very little about these topics of which you speak. I will keep you in my prayers.

WOW SERIOUSLY !!! You sure are one piece of work. The things I could say about what you are trying convince everyone of. Well most people have it figured out anyway's.

JUST WOW !!!

WOW YOUR the one with closed eye's. !!!!!!!

I have my views and Believe in them. The fact that no one hear can have a debate on anything just proves how one tracked minded you all are. Trying to convince me of something i do not agree with is by far manipulative. I approve of mixed breeding. Period.

But you have no facts to back it up! You know what else that means you approve in right? Why buy a mutt from a breeder who is over pricing them when you can get one from a shelter and save it from death? No good breeder breeds mutts so you have a risk of health problems either way.

A biologist studies living organisms and their mechanisms for working in certain environments. A geneticist is a biologist who studies genetics, the science of genes, heredity and variation of organisms. I believe I'd rather have a person with a knowledge of genetics, heredity and variations over biology any day trying to predict the best pairings of dogs to determine health and conformation. And someone with a healthy understanding of genes and heredity and variations in breeding is truly best qualified to speak about how to choose and predict the qualities of puppies of a particular breeding of two dogs over someone who knows veterinary medicine, unless that vet sub-specialize in genetics in dog breeding.

Many vets don't have a good understanding of the genetics of breeding dogs that a breeder does and if you hang around here, you will come to understand that. I've seen so many posts on YT of teacup breeders who have actually stated that their vet told them their tiny female was fine to breed to any tiny male and apparently never counseled against the unsafe aspects of breeding a female weighing under 5 lbs. or genetic probability of outcomes of the puppies at all. Never spoke to it! I've seen so many other posts about unwise advice supposedly passed on by vets - and received enough of my own by more than one vet out of his depth, to know that vets aren't always wiser than breeders who are well-versed in the genetics of dog breeding.

Any unwise statement by a "doctor" or vet that goes against acceptable current, conventional wisdom that a breeder of a long, healthy, happy line of purebred dogs, each pairing health-tested for possible inheritable medical conditions and judged acceptable for breeding with another dog based on a planned genetic map for probable outcomes in the plan of correcting faults and perpetuating strong points in the puppies; and prefers mixing breeds and assumes those puppies will be healthier - is silly because it's unproven. Until you provide the credible "proof" you are talking about and proof in such volume as to override current conventional wisdom or there are a substantial amount of credible studies to prove what you say the vets/doctors said about mixed breeds having healthier pups, I think we'd all be wiser to stick to the puppies of the kind of purebred, health-tested and carefully planned breeding outlined above that consistently produces healthy dogs.

yorkietalkjilly you can have a plan for mixed breeding too

by the way you cant be geneticist without being a biologist first.

You have no idea who or what the people on this board are.