Stud Fees
Fees for use of stud are low; there owners have no trade union, so it is hard to know what can be done about the matter.
The dog with nothing to offer the breed is put at stud. The work does not come in, and the fee is cut and cut. The successful kennel must hold out for the correct fee and teach those proposing to breed that it pays to use a good sire because the quality of the puppies produced and their selling price.
Any dog whose stud fee is lower than those of the rest of his breed should be, whatever his qualifications, viewed with suspicion.
Puppy prices have increased so much; while some breeds the stud fee have remained constant. In a breed where numerically small litters are usual, the stud fee should be equal to the price of the puppy, but where litters of five and over are usual, the top dogs in the breed should demand one and half times the price of a puppy as there fee.
A custom of trade exist whereby owners of stud dogs agree to accept the first choice from a litter in lieu of a fee. Even when dealing with the closest of friends, such agreement should be put down in writing and signed over a stamp by the owner of the bitch.
It is also customary for a free service to be offered if the bitch fails to conceive; again, put the matter on a correct basis. This should also be put in writing, together with any special relevant conditions. For example, the owner of the stud dog cannot give a free service if the dog had died or left his possession, though of course there may be another suitable stud dog available in the kennel.
Douglas Appleton (The Dog Business Book)
Choice of a stud dog
In dealing with the choice or selection of stud dogs to use, I am going to ignore the really detailed study necessary to further the aims of the long established kennel, which can, and does, use unknown dogs to try to impose certain characteristics of a particular strain.
Too much thought and too much trying to be clever is often the cause of the wrong dog being used.
At the onset the choice can be narrowed considerably. To do this use only champion stud dogs. To do so enormously improves your chances of breeding good animals. Imported stud dogs must be assessed on individual merits.
Please do not misunderstand me and think I am going on record saying that dogs without titles cannot, and do not, sire a good stock. They can, and do, but restrict their use to occasions when you have time and money to experiment. The great cattle breeders never consider using an inferior sire. What is a good policy for them must be good for the dog breeder. Let me quote from Everett Millais, who spent much time and money experimenting with dog breeding in the 1890’s.
“A pedigree animal is not an animal which has a pedigree, for as pedigree it may be that of the greatest mongrel with the vastest extent of blue blood, but a pedigree animal is one who by his pedigree shows that he has been inbred enormously without any deterioration of quality; and the value of a pedigree animal, whether dog, pig, sheep, horse, or bull, in fact that in comparison with a non inbred animal it has the power of impressing on its progeny its own form and external characteristics which no animal has to such extent if it is not bred on these lines
Why do people use pedigree bulls in preference to others? Why do people go for thoroughbreds, pedigreed stud dogs, etc…?
It is because their stock is improved in the direction of the sire, not on that of the dam, and with these facts before us, which I might largely add to, we have standing proofs that the dictum that the sire generally determines the form and external characteristics is not open to modification excepting in the case of mongrels, where it is impossible to form any opinion as to the results”
The same holds good today.
If you wish to seek support for my advice, sit down with a few Championship Show catalogues and work out the percentage of Challenge Certificate winners that are sired by champions. It always adds up to a very high one. Now look at the registration details in the Kennel Club Gazette and you will find that only a very small percentage of the stock registered is by a Champion sire. These facts prove my point very clearly, and as the fee of a champion stud cost only few thousand rupees more than a dog without title, it is fool hardy not to follow the form.
Do not be afraid to send your bitch long distance to get the services of the best sires. Neither must you adopt a short sighted policy and refuse a good stud dog because you don’t like his owner.
A shy, nervous stud, or one that is reluctant to mate his bitches, should never be used: such dogs tend to produce stock with the same trait.
Some bitches are difficult to get mated and can be served by one dog and not by another. Time can be saved, therefore, if you go to a kennel where there are more than one stud dog available. If several dogs are available in the one kennel, unless you have a strong preference for a certain sire, accept the stud dog owner’s advice. Remember it is greatly to the owner’s advantage that his stud should produce the best possible stick. There are, available at stud, dogs who the result of a lifetime’s experience and hard work, and these are available for reasonable sums, so it is not worth while keeping your own stud dog unless he is completely outstanding and going to be kept fully employed.
Finally, it is not worthwhile to keep and advertise a dog at public stud, with all the problems of visiting bitches, unless you can be sure of his having a minimum of fifteen (15) bitches a year.
Douglas Appleton (The Dog Business Book)
Guarantees
A living animal is difficult to guarantee but the dog breeders should be prepared to take more responsibility that they do for their products. Those kennels which feel confident and really back there stock they sell enhance their reputation considerably.
We have to consider the seen and unseen qualities of the adult or puppy. The greatest risk lies in the health of the young puppy, but this can be covered by the sales insurance scheme. Adult animals can also be warranted this way.
The sales of something defined as a ‘brood bitch’ or ‘stud dog’ implies a full responsibility by the vendor that the animals in fact produce , and should they fail to do so through no fault of the buyer then he is fully entitled to some recompense.
Likewise, the sale of an adult gun dog or hound as a worker implies that the gun dog will do his job and is not gun shy or faulty in any other way, also hounds should be willing to participate in the joys of the chase.
The above instances are clear cut and nine but the most unscrupulous would wish to evade their responsibilities. The smaller kennels quite often operate on a narrow margin and are undercapitalized. They may sell an animal in good faith for a fair sum, this money, probably eagerly awaited, goes to the current liabilities. Then perhaps genuine snags arise and while, at heart, the vendor would like to reimburse the buyer he may not have the resources. What then is to be done? The only solution is perfect frankness, and settlement of the matter as soon as possible.
The greatest problem arise with the quality of puppies on two counts. A genuinely good puppy is sold as a pet and goes to its new home where some member of the family objects to it, or it proves too much work for the house wife. What happens so frequently then is that the buyer, instead of being frank, faults the puppy in every possible way in order to secure its return to the vendor. No sensible kennel owner can, once a puppy has been sold and gone away from the kennel to the outside world, where it may have been in contact with infection, possible accept its return. There are cases where the buyer has genuine reasons for suddenly being unable to keep the puppy, but the still the problem of infection exists.
Many puppies are bought and sold after been advertised as:”up to show standards”, “certain winner”. Those buying puppies with such a label should get just what is implied by these phrases clearly set out. Will the dog win at Sanction, Limited or Open Shows? This being specified, the vendor should be prepared to face his responsibilities. After all, he has set himself up as an authority by making the statement, but, he will say, no one can guarantee how the puppy will develop. Well then, why is he making such a claim?
Feeding, rearing and conditioning have an enormous effect on the qualities of stock; a puppy reared one way can become a Champion, reared another way it is useless. Some things however can be clearly assessed: among them are the shoulder placement, ear placement, coat texture. Quite a lot of head and eye qualities, and many other points, can be forecast by someone well experienced. It is on such points that the vendor should be prepared to back his judgment and share the loss with the buyer.
When a botch puppy is sold as a show prospect, and through no fault of the buyer she fails to fulfill early promise, it balances things a little if the vendor offers a free service to a good stud dog. With a dog puppy it is harder, but it would not be unreasonable for a replacement to be offered at 50 percent of the normal cost.
Every genuine kennel must be prepared to back its own judgment on quality to clients.
Douglas Appleton (The Dog Business Book)
Naming the Business or Kennel
Good, apt names to fit your kennels and your dogs are important because they attract people to kennels and dogs. I could give many examples, but through this volume I want to avoid references to the specific kennels. I could quote many shining examples and many that are deplorably dull, but to avoid been charged with boosting my friends and damning my enemies, it is better that I should omit mentioning names.
Your kennel name and dogs’ names should mean something and should not be lightly chosen. The Kennel Club will, on the correct for – “Application for the registration of Prefix/ affix” – and on the payment of a fee, grant applications for approved prefix or affixes which can constitute part of a dog’s name and which ‘cannot be used for registration by any other than the person who, for the time being is entitled under a subsisting grant of Committee’. An annual maintenance fee is payable for a prefix or affix, but lifelong use of it may be granted, if you have held it for number of years, by paying a compounding fee. Such payment, of course, will show a considerable saving in money over a period of years.
Anyone who plans to breed several litters, and expects to do so for a few years, should apply for a prefix at the outset. It can happen that with the beginners’ luck a flyer is bred in the first litter. If your kennel name is not on this one, valuable publicity is lost.
When selecting a prefix, the names of countries, large towns, or titles, a letter or number, or an adjective or noun appropriate to the name of the dog is not permissible. The Kennel Club calendar and Stud Book, which is published annually, list all the words in use for this purpose, and it will save time if, before you select and apply for a word, you buy or borrow this book and check that the word you want or one very like it, is not already in use.
Made up words can be very good, as are those with a family, local or topical connections. If you propose to breed hounds, a prefix such as mandarin would not be very apt, nor would a name with a South American Flavor be appropriate if you are breeding Finnish Spitz or Schnauzers.
If you select a prefix to fix a greed you begin to work with for example, an Eastern name for Salukis, and then you add Mastiff to your kennel, it is best to apply for a separate prefix to use with the next breed. Alternatively, if at the outset you consider the possibility of keeping several breeds later on, choose a word with a wide application.
When registering a dog, you are always asked for a selection of names, for no two dogs can have the same name; also, prefix and name must never add up to more than twenty four letters.
In selecting the names you want after the prefix, the choice is much wider, but again they should apt. For example, a traditional name such as Ranter or Workman is far better for hound than hunts by scent than something like Mama’s Babe or Oriental Star.
With a little ingenuity common English names can be spelled somewhat in the way of the language of the country of origin – thus, for an Afghan, Kim could be spelled Khymm.
If you are breeding a number of litters you can name the alphabetically with “A” for your first litter, “B” for the second litter and so on. Variations of this system are to name each litter from a different set of story book characters, or choose a color for each litter – as Yellow Hammer, Yellow Coat, Yellow Banner. Thought and ingebuity can provide many amusing, suitable and more sealable combinations. A journey to a Dog Show can often be shortened if you are in company with a friend and play at inventing names for a future litter.
(Douglas Appleton, The Dog Business Book)
Eukanuba/ Ckc 100th Championship show, best in show winner
Bagatelle Master Rodolf, Miniature Dachshund (smooth coat), imp UK
