The Responsibilities of Stud Dog Ownership

By William Given

If you have a champion dog of superior quality that you wish to offer at stud, it comes with heavy responsibilities. There are four areas of responsibility that you must acknowledge, they are: a responsibility to the dog fancy in general, to your breed in particular, to your dog, and to any bitch that you breed.

To the Fancy

The responsibility to the fancy should be obvious to all involved in the sport of purebred dogs. I would suggest that there are simply far too many dogs being bred. Although we would all like to believe that we breed only for quality puppies and that it is the commercial breeder who is causing the problem of canine overpopulation, the fact remains that no dog should be bred, regardless of quality, if you do not have a reason to believe that a suitable home will be found for each and every puppy born in a litter, in my opinion. This is an even more ethical dilemma when you own the stud dog. It is very easy to rationalize that it is the owner of the bitch who has the responsibility of finding the ideal home for each puppy where it will thrive and reach its full potential. If the bitch’s owner is a novice and has no idea on earth of how to screen prospective puppy purchasers, no facilities to hold puppies or properly care for them until good buyers are identified, the responsibility falls upon you. In my opinion, you must teach, coach and counsel, helping where you can. It may mean handling some of the telephone calls if advertisements have been run, or offering the use of crates or caring for part of the litter yourself if some of the pups must be held longer. In any case, the owner of the bitch should be made aware of the potential problems, especially if your breed is one that holds a place in the bottom half of the breed popularity charts, and you should give some thought to them as well before conducting the breeding.

To Your Breed

Your responsibility to your breed is closely tied to that of the sport. Here are a few questions to consider. Do you want to see the puppies sired by your dog advertised at a bargain basement price because the owner of the bitch cannot find buyers? Would you like to hear of them being surrendered at the municipal animal shelter in six months because the buyers were not being given enough information on what to expect or because the buyer was not properly screened? Do you want your breed to start showing up with specimens that are almost unrecognizable as purebreds of diminished quality ten years from now. Stud dog owners are responsible for a some of these problems. Some of them do not set the same high standards for the bitches that they accept for stud service as they do for their own breeding bitches.

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Posted by Alex on Aug 24 2016. Filed under Current Articles, Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.