Education, Oh how great it is!
When I first started really getting serious about raising, breeding, and eventually whelping a litter of Aussies. I thought to myself, "Oh this will be easy!"......Uh wrong!
When most people look at a dog they will judge two ways.
1st judgement will be based on looks, whether the dog looks good or Bad! this is the most comon.
The 2nd judgement is usually from a breeder stand point on the basis of, "Is this dog of breed standard". regardless of how the dog looks. Is his temperment good, is he sound inside and out. Dogs come in all shapes and sizes and ugly to you may be beautiful to someone else, and vice versa.
Knowing your Aussie inside is just as important as knowing him from the outside.
First lets talk about the 3 types of breeding.
Inbreeding- ie; daddy bred to daughter or mother to son
Line breeding- ie; granddaughter to grandfather you get it :)
Out breeding- ie; no relationship top & bottom.
Let's talk about the first!
Inbreeding, why do it in the first place? Won't there be deformities or squirrely temperments? In heavy inbreeding, yes! But for first time inbreeders your litter may be just fine. I know several well known breeders who have inbreed a time or two, in order to keep a very specific trait, and came out smelling like roses. And some who have done this with not so good results. However, I would not attempt as there are just to many variables for me. :)
Linebreeding, why do this? Linebreeding is actually a very common practice amoungst show breeders and working dog breeders. Occasionally you will come across a line of dogs that are just acceptional and keeping the trait is key to there program. So when looking to breed they will breed to a dog that is unrelated and a product of that litter will then be breed back to the original stock. Or they will bred a grand or great grandmother/father to a grand or great grand daughter/son. Sometimes a 4th generation dog will be bred back to a 1st generation to keep the cycle going, all the while maintain enough unrelated dogs to not cause any issue. I have two line bred dogs that you can see show up in the 3rd and 4th generations.
Outbreeding-why do this? Outbreeding is the most common type of breeding. Two completely unrelated dogs whelp a litter. However not just any two dogs need to be bred. Breeding is not just to have a litter to let your kids experience life. Life is all around us in God's beautiful creation! Puppies are a commitment that will take up all of your time for 2,3,maybe even 4 months, if you are left over with puppies. Money, money, money is all you spend making sure you have put everything you can into rearing a healthy litter. Next comes time, time, time, and more time. When you pick your puppy up from me or any other good breeder. He/she will be very socialized and have had lots of time spent with them everyday of there life. Even in the womb they were getting petted from all the belly rubs we give our momma's. If you ever had a baby you can sympathize with a baby kicking around.
Image poor Annie had 11 puppies one time :s .
Bettering the breed is always key to a successful litter.
When pairing two dogs up for a breeding we have a goal in mind.
For example, if I want a good possibility of getting a show puppy out of a litter I breed my best two show prospects.
If I want an atheltic litter I breed my best two atheletes.
If I want a mix of the two I breed my best athelete to my best show dog.
Next and viably most important is genetics. Scary word but I will explain it in laymans terms as the greek form of it is, well greek :)
Ok lets face it most everyone wants a blue merle, primarily because it is a beautiful and unique looking dog, and rightfully so they are, but don't pick on color alone Aussie's are beautiful no matter what the coat color or pattern is.
So lets talk about all the colors.
There are Black Tris, Blue Merles, Red Tris, and Red Merles.
Now comes the question,"How do you get all these colors in a litter?"
Lets say I want a litter with only red puppies, tri and merles.
So I get a black tri dog and a red merle, and "poof" all the puppies are red. Wrong!
The black coloring is dominant over red. A black dog can "carry" the red gene but a red dog cannot "carry" the black gene.
Crazy I know!
So if I wanted an all red litter with tris and merles I would have to bred a Red tri to a Red Merle.
Now although I know what colors I will get, there is NO WAY to pick how many tris or merles I want. It's up to God to decide what happens.
Now lets say I have A Black Tri male who has the red factoring gene, meaning one of his parents was a red dog. And I bred him to a blue merle female who also carried the red factoring gene. Then I know my litter would/could carry all four colors. Black Tri, Blue Merle, Red Tri, & Red Merle.
Now lets say the daddy, A Black Tri, wasn't red factored, but the mother was. Now our litter will only be Black Tri's and Blue Merles, and the percentage of puppies that could possibly carry the red factoring gene is reduce to 25%. Low odds huh!
Now lets say you breed a Black Tri male(not red factored) to a Red merle female. Your litter will only be Blue Merle and Black tris, but this time all your puppies will be red factored.
And lastly if you breed a Red Tri male to a red merle female you would only get reds, no blacks.
Now lets look at coat patterns.
You can breed for an only tri litter by breeding two tri dogs, but do not breed for an only merle litter.
Merle to Merle breedings are very dangerous.
the merling gene is dominant over solid, just like the black gene is dominant over the red gene. Double Merle pups are born when both of the parents are merle. It doesn't matter what color merle, how much merle the parents have, how little (or how much) white trim, what breed they are, or even that the parents are the same breed. Statistically, 25% of the pups from two merle parents will be Double Merles.
Double Merle puppies will be blind AND deaf, OR just blind, OR just deaf. Sadly some breeders will cull these puppies. Such a terrible thing to do in my eyes. Part of being a responsible breeder is to make sure you are breeding with each puppy in mind. Breeding a litter solely to get "The perfect" merle is hogwash. Theoretically why have a litter of 4 merle to merle puppies and have to kill one of them because of the double merle pattern. Such a shame some would even consider.
Check out this website for more information
This website is very informative, yet sad at the same time to see all the double merle Aussies out there due to the lack of not researching double merle breeding or knowingly letting it happen.
I hope this helps you understand some more things about Aussies underneath the hair and outward beauty.