Wobbly hinglegs in a Show Quality Pupppies - Page 5

My female's mom is a litter sister to Diamond's mom, from a litter sired by Dallas. I REALLY like the structure of the Imp Cen dogs, but, infortunately, Diamond did not move out very well on that particular day.

I'd have to go back and see who else I liked.. I though the select bitch was awful. She shied at the camera, had really weak pasterns, and wobbly hocks.

When I was shopping for my first GSD, I was visitng a well known ASL kennel to look at a litter. The breeder was a friend and knew I came from another breed with modearatelyt angluated rears. He showed me one of his pick puppies, a male with the worst looking rear I'd ever seen. Cowhocked and so angulated that he was sickled hock. A few years later I saw that same male finish his championship; he was no longer cowhocked or sickle hocked, in fact his rear was very much standard. Had I not seen it myeself, I'd not have believed it either.

puppies do not grow uniformly. one of the first changes is the rear getting ahead of the rest of the body. ears can do the same thing. How many times have some of you seen a pup and thought it would never grow into those ears, only to turn out fine as an adult.

obiviously the extreme length seen in some s/l can't be good for what the GSD is intended for, but many "wobbly" pups are not wobbly as adults.

I'm OK with a few gangly stages of growth, but I've seen a few cases of very wobbly (IMO deformed) puppies at the time of purchase (7-12) weeks and people saying "Oh it's just how they are as puppies, he'll grow out of it" and the dogs never have.  I want to see a nice, tight puppy at 8 weeks or the time of purchase (say around 7-10 weeks).  If he gets all gangly from 4-6 months or thereabouts I can deal with that but a puppy that is severely cow hocked, down on pasterns, constantly flopping over at the time of purchase....no way.

VKGSD:  ;you are absolutely correct, the old rule of thumb is if they look "OK" at 8 weeks, given they are reared properly in ALL aspects of puppy rearing without environmental screw ups, they should grow up looking like they did at 8 weeks with any luck.  I agree with you I will deal with the 4 months ganglies but I want that dog to be structurally sound at 8-10 weeks,  and after that time god only knows what awful stages they may go through but with any luck again, will come back to their original soundness.  I do however believe that their background parantage needs to be sound structurally also. 

Hutchins:  Without a doubt there were politics involved, was that BOB bitch sound,  not by my standards but again at that given moment on that day she may have had a little extra for the judge at that given second.  That is dog shows.  Did he owe any favors, probably.  That is dog shows and why we retired.  It gets old and shitty after several years but I do still enjoy seeing a beautiful moving animal from the working dogs, that being sporting, working, and herding and some hounds that can still work.  Structure is structure  and temperament is temperament.  by sound I mean  temperament/structure/health.  That to me is a sound animal.

Great days,  Nan