revstockton
New member
I'm interested in breeding but I can't wrap my head around the flow of dogs. I used to breed ducks and it was all so simple, I just ate the ones that didn't meet my standards. With dogs that isn't really an option. Pretty much all of what I am thinking about applies to males, but I'm going to focus on the female side of the equation.
Let's say that I had a breeding female. If she has 3 litters of 6 dogs each, that is 18 total puppies that she will produce. On average, 9 will be female, and 9 will be male. In order to sustain the dog population one of her daughters needs to become a breeding female. Since the human population is growing, the dog population needs to keep up. So my female should produce a daughter for me to keep breeding from, and a daughter for another breeder to breed from. The other 7 females would be spayed before they reproduce. This is all on average of course, an exceptional dam might produce several daughters that go on to have litters of their own, while many others will have all of their daughters get spayed.
So out of the 9 female puppies that are born, what is the path that one of them takes to joining the next generation of my breeding program? Obviously it starts with not selling the puppies that look promising. I see a lot of information about screening for bone structure that can't happen until two years old, plus there are other factors (personality, etc...) that might not show up initially. What percentage of promising puppies end up breeding? What happens to the females that I don't end up breeding? I don't want to end up with too many dogs.
I see breeder websites where people have like 6 females and 2 males. What happens to the neutered prospects? Does these breeders also have half a dozen neutered dogs hanging around?
Let's say that I had a breeding female. If she has 3 litters of 6 dogs each, that is 18 total puppies that she will produce. On average, 9 will be female, and 9 will be male. In order to sustain the dog population one of her daughters needs to become a breeding female. Since the human population is growing, the dog population needs to keep up. So my female should produce a daughter for me to keep breeding from, and a daughter for another breeder to breed from. The other 7 females would be spayed before they reproduce. This is all on average of course, an exceptional dam might produce several daughters that go on to have litters of their own, while many others will have all of their daughters get spayed.
So out of the 9 female puppies that are born, what is the path that one of them takes to joining the next generation of my breeding program? Obviously it starts with not selling the puppies that look promising. I see a lot of information about screening for bone structure that can't happen until two years old, plus there are other factors (personality, etc...) that might not show up initially. What percentage of promising puppies end up breeding? What happens to the females that I don't end up breeding? I don't want to end up with too many dogs.
I see breeder websites where people have like 6 females and 2 males. What happens to the neutered prospects? Does these breeders also have half a dozen neutered dogs hanging around?