If you are considering breeding, male or female, you have the option of getting a breeding quality puppy from one of my litters or possibly a puppy I import from Europe. Breeding males of exceptionally high quality are always in short supply. I am always hopeful one or two puppy buyers from each litter will agree to the breeding terms of my contract.

I do an evaluation of the physical structure of the puppies in a litter at age 8 weeks. I evaluate the puppies’ physical structure for compliance with the FCI Standard for our breed (http://brushdale.com/Small-Munsterlander-Pointers/fci-standard.pdf). In basic terms, it determines how well-put-together the puppy is. The better structured a dog is, the easier it is for him to do his work and therefore the better he will be at it. Also, he will not tire prematurely, has less chance of injury and will not suffer premature break down as he ages. The breeding puppies are selected by me and go to the breeders. The remaining puppies are selected in "Pick Order." Although breeders don’t have a choice of puppies (except male or female), they get one of the best-structured puppies in the litter. Since these are working dogs being bred for endurance in the field, good structure is extremely important. That said, all dogs have deficiencies in their structure – there is no such thing as a perfectly structured dog. A breeder’s goal is to improve upon the structure of the bitch – the puppies should be better than their mother. Improvement is the goal, but even more important is to not produce puppies with more or worse deficiencies, which is what will happen if you pair dogs with the same deficiencies. If both parents have bad hips or shoulders, their puppies will have twice the number of genes for bad hips or shoulders than either parent has. 

In exchange for getting one of the best structured puppies in the litter, the breeders agree to (1) test their puppy in NAVHDA prior to age 24 months; (2) have their puppy’s hips x-rayed and rated by OFA or PENN-HIP by age 24 months; and (3) have their puppy’s conformation evaluated and rated between age 18-24 months. For (3), you can either join the SMCA and go through their breeding approval process, in which case they have volunteers trained in doing conformation evaluations who will evaluate your dog (usually via photos); or you can take the dog to an International Conformation Show sponsored by IABCA and have professional judges evaluate your dog’s conformation and rate him according to the international rating scale. I prefer you go to an IABCA show because the dog is seen in person, the judges lay hands on the dog to feel for structural strengths/weaknesses, and a big part of the evaluation is done while the dog is moving. A dog might look great in a photo, but when it moves you can see there are structural problems. The SMCA knows they should be doing in-person conformation evaluations, but their members are spread all over the US and they don’t have enough volunteers to get dogs seen by even one conformation judge, let alone three.

I co-own many very nice imported studs and I assist many owners of terrific Brush Dale studs with getting their dogs bred through an informal network I founded called the Small Munsterlander Breeders Network. If you decide to change your Reservation to get a breeding female/male, let me know, because it will change your spot in the Pick Order.