# Agility breeding vs confirmation



## LibertyME (Jan 6, 2007)

There are proportions and angles that can be observed in an 56 day old puppy (+/- 3 days) - that translate to an adult dog. Pat Hasting is well respected and has books/seminars that explain what to look for and why it is important. Her puppy puzzle presentation is really interesting.

http://www.dogfolk.com/


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## kgiff (Jul 21, 2008)

Admittedly I do not know enough about breeding, structure, conformation, etc. so what I did was find a good breeder who was very knowledgeable, came with great recommendations, and trusted her to evaluate and place the best puppy with me for what I wanted to do. Yeah, I think regardless there is a bit of risk, but I'm hoping doing my homework is going to pay off. So far he's showing a ton of potential, but we've got a ways to go to see how he turns out. :crossfing


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## Pointgold (Jun 6, 2007)

Breeders successfully breed for specific traits all the time - in regards to both conformation and performance. I, as with most breeders, have others evaluate our litters for a broader perspective, and temperament/aptitude testing is done on each litter.

Really knowing the bloodlines you are working with plays an important part - which is why linebreeding is so often done. With total outcrosses, you can never be sure what you will get, and there can be much inconsistency within an individual litter. When I do an outcross, it is with two fairly heavily linebred dogs, who although completely unrelated, are phenotypically similar.


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## Golden Leo (Dec 3, 2008)

I like what you said for horse breeding, that's the way it should be all breeding but unfortunatley there are too many breeders that concentrate on one thing and forget all about others. I always say that comfirmation is base for all dogs, of course with temper and health and every breeder should keep that in balance as much as he can.
Puppy with 8 weeks looks the way he's going to look when he grows up, and moves also. Confirmation is best to tell when dog moves- then you can't hide too long body, open angles, sloppy back. After 8 weeks they start to grow all ways. There are awful periods- with too long back, too short legs, too long legs, with no angles, tiny head, too big head.... I bought puppy for shows and breeding, he's now 7 months and every other week I'm afraid he'll look terrible. Now he has faze apperaing and disappearing rear angulatgion. It is horrible, one week he has amazing angles, the other one he is baaaad.... Every time they disappear I call his breeder - oh, no they are gone again! She laughes and says - hide camera and don't look at him until 9-10 months. He plays with my nerves...
If you know confirmation on adult dogs, you can easily see it on 8 week puppies. I was always afraid of looking at puppies but it is the same as with adults... Good luck!


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## Bender (Dec 30, 2008)

Conformation is a big part of a performance dog IMO. 

I would look for a breeder who does both, or has CH's in the background of the breeding if not one of the parents at least. It's hard to find breeders sometimes who do both, it seems that the performance people stick to performance sires and the conformation people stick to conformation. 

Look for a breeder who does both themselves, they likely would not only be breeding for performance dogs with good structure, but have the experience with their lines and so on to know what to pick. I find a lot of conformation only dogs (in background) don't have the drive, and the performance bred dogs sometimes have very poor structure. In general anyway - not starting any wars here. 
Lana


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## AmbikaGR (Dec 31, 2007)

LibertyME gave a FANTASTIC resource in Pat Hastings. But unfortunately that does not tell you the whole story in my opinion. What you need is the "WHOLE" picture. I will do my best to keep my thought succinct but some times I can ramble. And in this post I will talk only conformation and leave temperment testing out of the equation completely.
With the Puppy Puzzle, Pat Hastings evaluation method, you are normally comparing pups in a litter against each othe trying to pick out the best of the litter, in my opinion. 
First it helps to be dealing with lines that a breeder is familiar with and has an idea how they will work together when bred to each other. Just like in horses just because you breed the two best structural specimens together does not mean you will end up with better. As you said genetics are a crap shoot. This is why many long time breeders "line breed" as a norm. By breeding back on dogs you know have in the past produced what you want you can give yourself a better chance of predicting what you will produce. Now no breeder will breed exclusively back on the same dogs as this will end up cause too thight a line. What several have explained to me over the years is the they will breed two or three generation on those said dogs then go outside that line for one generation then the next generation will return to being bred back on the same dogs. This is how a breeder establishes a "style" that become synonymous with their kennel name. This is one reason that people line up to be on waiting lists for these breeders.
Okay now back to evaluating pups for what you are looking for. 
If the generations behind the parents of a litter have not fit the "style" you are looking for, chances are the pup when it grows up will not be what you wanted. And of course when you are talking about a "performance" dog temperment & biddability are just as important than conformation. And finding breeders who have been able to accomplish a relatively predictabile success rate in getting it "ALL" right is not impossible but does take work and patience on the part of the person looking for that pup also.


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## Pointgold (Jun 6, 2007)

AmbikaGR said:


> What several have explained to me over the years is the they will breed two or three generation on those said dogs then go outside that line for one generation then the next generation will return to being bred back on the same dogs. This is how a breeder establishes a "style" that become synonymous with their kennel name. This is one reason that people line up to be on waiting lists for these breeders.
> 
> 
> > Yes, this is what I stated - the "outside dogs" are generally linebred themselves, on an entirely different line than you have been working with, but conformationally similar - or, that you know to be prepotent in an area that you need.


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