ICE & INDIANA vom Wildsteiger Land . Lottery game? - Page 1

ICE and INDIANA vom Wildsteiger Land - Is the purchase of a pup a lottery game? Born 07-07-2003 Both sons of SG Xenos vom Wildsteiger Land and Nanda vom Wildsteiger Land (VA6 in 2004) Hello again, you all, my daughter and I have been very pleased with your encouraging comments regarding the HD-status of our dog "Indiana vom Wildsteiger Land". We especially wish to thank Renz, ZVZW, SMR, GSD-fan, Sunshine and Carol for their moral support. We have been informed that a second dog from the same litter, "Ice vom Wildsteiger Land", also had terribly bad hips. As he suffered severely already at the age of 13 months, he has been put asleep. You, as gsd-fans, will know how much effort and love, energy and money, have been put into our dogs and their training (we refer to the comment of M.Carter on this board, quote: “They can't get those 13/14 months back not to mention all the expenses they have incurred for training, showing etc.”) and it is totally frustrating that the breeder would not even respond to our different mails asking for a little statement. We protest vigorously against this lack of communication and would like to know, if this is common practice in the homeland of the German Shepherd. We have noticed that a lot of breeders do guarantee sound hips among other things. Is it just the small (unknown?) breeders that can afford doing this, is their risk in any way smaller, or is what we have experienced the price you must pay when you travel thousands of kilometres to a world-known breeder from whom you trusted to receive an outstanding dog? Is buying a pup (from a top-breeder) merely a lottery game? Please advise. Maybe some of you do have good (better?) relationships with some of the V(A?)-dog breeders who would be willing to discuss HD-offspring and who would consider any reasonable solution of the matter, considering it must be very important for them to follow up on their pups for future breeding. (After all, is it not the hundreds of people buying their pups and training them all the way, that make the name of the breeder famous?) We would welcome information on such trustworthy breeders. Thanking you in advance for your respected comments on this topic, Jan and Lisa

Jan and Lisa, Sorry to hear about Ice and Indiana. It looks like the breeder did have their dog's hips rated before mating though. This is the unfortunate and painful problem with purchasing a young puppy. It would be wise of you to look for a older pup or young adult next time so you can have an idea of their hips rating through an xray. It sounds like Indiana could live a long life should you choose to keep him. Good Luck, Mel

Hi, Very to hear about your dog. It's terrible not only because you spend time and money but also emotional. We here in Holland have a buyer contract were these kind of things are in the contract. Example when a dog his xrays are taken ( before a year old ) and something is wrong you can get a new puppy for free from the next breeding or the breeder has to pay the half of the vet's costs this is arrangent by the VDH ( SV in Holland ) and it's a legal contract ! Maybe this is an idea for the future, and yes buying a puppy is indeed a lottery, the last one can develop as a VA and the first one can develop later on as crap. So good luck in the future Jeroen