When we got our first wocker, we didn’t think about breeding AT ALL. We just wanted a happy little dog to live and work with. We didn’t expect that not only we but also an awful lot of our (agility) friends would be so enthusiastic about these little dogs that we couldn’t even wait for our own litter but bought a second wocker before breeding ourselves.
Before starting to breed, it took an awful lot of trips to the UK and lots of time to get informed about the breeding lines and the (health) problems that can occur in this breed. Our own bitches got checked from top to toe (see health) and after long deliberations we decided on the studs for our first two litters.
When choosing a stud we look for rather small, light – built, fast dogs with lots of drive, a good impulse control and straight legs. A lot of wcs have Chippendale feet or are too chunky (which a lot of gundog breeders prefer). Needless to say we put a great emphasis on the health of the dogs we breed with. (please read chapter “health” ) Almost all our wockers are rather small in size and some puppies end up in the “small” category in agility but of course we can’t guarantee that. However – they do very well in the medium too 😀
here a video of our dogs in the garden 😀
For us, testing our dogs means:
– X-rays on all joints and the back
– patella check
– regular checkups at the cardiologist
– regular ECVO eye tests
– genetic tests on AMS,AN,FN, pcrdPRA, EIC, PFK (We didn’t have all our dogs PFK tested because in fact it’s not a breed problem and we don’t know of even one dog who is a carrier, let alone affected.)