Cockapoo breeder

[BurnedToast]

Can anyone recommend a cockapoo breeder? We're in sw London but dont mind travelling. We're looking for a black or tuxedo cockapoo puppy from the end of August. Thank you.

But there are regulations in regards to purebreds from reputable breeders. How many litters a bitch can have, screening, health tests. There are standards that you can quite easily check to make sure the breeders are adhering to them.

You can’t even tell if you’re funding a puppy farm half the time, they will move the bitches and pups to a family member or friend’s house for viewings. So you go in thinking it’s amazing and what a lovely life they have and that evening they’re back to their original hellish life.

I have witnessed the despicable practices first hand, which is why I am so against people buying ‘breeds’ for perceived traits that are never guaranteed and looks alone. It cannot be regulated, animals suffer and die every day for the wants of humans.

A mutt may be healthier than a pedigree. But a cross breed may inherit the worst health problems from both sides.
That depends what the 'worst health problems' are. If they are recessives carried by only one of the two breeds used in the cross - something like Collie Eye Anomaly, say, which is carried by a handful of breeds - the puppies might be carriers but they won't be affected. And a mutt will be much less likely to be affected by health problems resulting from extreme anatomy: a pug x JRT will almost certainly have better breathing than your average 100% pug.

One reason that health tests are such a thing with pedigree dogs is precisely because they are pedigree dogs: they are highly inter-related and so genetic nasties that would have only rarely popped up have become endemic in some breeds due to, for example, the overuse of popular sires.

I'm struggling to see that if you have a pet dog, do all the health checks on both sire and dam, want a puppy out of your bitch and breed from it, doing everything right from feeding them correctly, to using the vet if necessary, to having a number of people who want a pup out of your bitch, you are doing anything particularly terrible.
Well, precisely. And I know pet owners who have done all of this with the exception of health tests on the dam, because the health problems they were concerned about were primarily recessives and the sires were tested clear.

People are going to get puppies from somewhere. They can get them from a puppy farm, or they can get them from show or working breeders, or they can get them from people who breed their pets. If you're buying a puppy, you need to do due diligence on the breeder, whoever that breeder is or claims to be. I wouldn't buy from anyone without first checking the COI of the litter: show litters can have terrifyingly high COIs. You need to be alert to the signs of a puppy farm (including renting a house as a front). If you're satisfied on that score, ask more questions. If it's first generation cross of two breeds with dodgy hips, ask to see test results. And so on.

Nobody is saying that it's okay to sling two dogs together and see the ££££ signs. But it's not a sin to breed your pet if you do it sensibly.

You can’t even tell if you’re funding a puppy farm half the time, they will move the bitches and pups to a family member or friend’s house for viewings.
That's why I made FB friends with our bitch's breeder. There he was, on his feed, working the dam, meeting up with people who had puppies from his previous litter, and generally looking like a caring owner.

He even did a home check. He's stayed in touch.

@GrumpyMiddleAgedWoman and that’s great! I’ve never said that all crossbreed owners are terrible.

My point is that by people continuing to want these dogs it drives a market for unscrupulous breeders. That is the base of most of the issues people have with doodles and flat-faces. It’s not that some people are very conscientious in the purchase of their dog, it’s that so many people aren’t educated about the horrors that go on within breeding fashionable dogs.

So whilst you did everything right, how many puppies, bitches and dogs died for everyone who didn’t do that? That’s my point. Unnecessary deaths so we can have cute/‘hypoallergenic’ dogs.

My other issue with funding 'cute' dogs just because they are perceived to look like teddy bears or are fashionable, is owners are worryingly unprepared for the reality of owning these dogs. By going for looks they aren't prepared for the amount of time that needs to be spent with a dog like this and do little to no research to what training etc needs to be done.

Being crosses it is very difficult to determine what the dog will even be like. At least with pedigrees you have a breed history of what you can reasonably expect when buying a puppy.

But I agree 100%, funding these dogs being bred is just bad news for the welfare of these dogs and its upsettingly the animals that end up suffering because of it.

He wasn't breeding crosses. I was given the pedigree names of sire and dam and looked up the COI before I committed us.

You can argue that any demand for puppies drives poor breeding practices. What are people supposed to do who want a dog? The rescue supply would run dry pretty quickly if no puppies were bred at all.

I asked this on another thread

Can anyone tell me the point of these X breeds? If it’s not for speed and agility is this purely for looks?
If you have 2 similar dogs what is the point of X breeding them really and risk them having a strange coat or other slightly mis matching features
If you want a dog that doesn’t shed there are dogs you can get without breeding it into them
Not shedding is a fairly common one, I have a non shed dog and I do prefer that element

Can anyone tell me the point of these X breeds? If it’s not for speed and agility is this purely for looks?
Yes. Looks, a lot of money, and the myth of the 'perfect family dog'.

Well, labradoodles were originally bred in Australia for a Hawaiian woman who requested a hypoallergenic dog for her husband as he was blind and allergic to the labradors.

The original breeder had to use a PR company to get anyone to take any notice of them as no one wanted cross-breeds. Unfortunately the PR firm was too good and the breeder says now he deeply regrets it now due to the shitty breeding standard by lots.

And so this is where the big interest in cross-breeds basically came from.

I do laugh at the idea of a cockapoo being the 'perfect family dog', it really is all about looks.

Pookie - that’s what I don’t get. Particularly the cockerpoo. As they DO look just like a mini poodle. Plus cocker spaniels and poodles are also quite similar in characteristics and ‘purpose’ I think. Apart from the fact that the lovely cockers I know don’t seem to have an off switch

I have a X breed and although I really love him, he is a pointless X breed 😂

I honestly think the cockerpoo ought to be recognised as a new breed and brought within the same framework as other breeds. It's here to stay so the sooner something is done to protect the dogs, the better.

I know the KC has (many) flaws but at least they provide some way to track breeders, lineage and provide advice on the best health tests for potential breeding dogs.

The cockerpoo is here to stay and deserves the same protection as other breeds now - even if that protection is also woefully inadequate. Right now, they are a bad breeders wet dream - hugely popular but with little oversight from any external body on how they are bred. It leaves them vulnerable and an attractive target for poor breeding practices.

I also am hugely sceptical that this perfect family breed also just happens to contain the right mix for massive litter sizes. How convenient for rubbish breeders.

fwiw whether a dog is bred by a hobbyist or full time breeder, they deserve the same care and attention. So for all the family pet breeders, that means a sound foundation knowledge of genetics, potential genetics faults in the parent breed(s), full health testing, full lifetime support, lifetime commitment to take the dog back for any reason, good knowledge about the socialisation/learning stages of a puppy, good knowledge about dog behaviour and training to advise the owners, carefull selection of mates (i.e. not just putting two dogs together because they are the ones you own) and so on.

If hobby breeders can provide all that, then all is well. The page on why NOT to breed from the Doodle Trust is also bang on. Not many people can offer to take back one or more dogs from a past litter, some of which may well have developed behaviour or medical problems that caused them to be handed back etc.

If there is one single piece of advice on how to choose a breeder, it's not to go by recommendations from pet people who have similar breeds. They will love their dog and likely blind to their faults as well as struggle to accept their own breeder was less than perfect. I've lost count of the times on here someone has posted a name or website of a "great breeder" that has sent shivers down by spine when I saw it so it's clear there are very wide variations on judging a breeder.

Have an objective and strict list of things you would expect to see in a good breeder and don't stop looking until one ticks all that list.

The problem with 'will always take the dog back for any reason' is that, with the best will in the world, that isn't always possible. People die. They split up and move house. They get old. Their finances change. This can happen to breeders as well as owners.

For this reason, if I ever breed a litter, I'll be saying 'I will always help you re-home your dog, so come straight to me in the first instance.' I might be able to take a dog back, but I won't be put in the position of making promises I might not be able to keep.

@GrumpyMiddleAgedWoman, I must challenge your assertion that if people didn't breed dogs the supply of dogs would 'dry up'.

This simply isn't true. I have a rescue charity and work with countless rescues here and abroad who deal daily with an avalanche of abandoned puppies; the best thing that can happen to them in this unkind world is for them to be put down.

Just because the scale of dog abandonment and neglect is not immediately apparent in this country does not mean that dogs are not being abandoned at an escalating rate.

If everyone who wanted a dog adopted a rescue perhaps you might be right but we are so far from this state of affairs - as recent posts on here requesting info about designer 'tuxedo' dogs chosen because they match someone's hair or car interior will attest.

Please educate yourself about dog rescue before posting glib assertions to justify your desire to dabble in breeding your dog for fun or profit.

@SunnyInGrimsby you are absolutely right. The stream of abandoned dogs and unwanted puppies is endless, and the UK is overpopulated with dogs. The fact that most rescues won't offer a puppy to a home where it will be left alone 10 hrs a day is seen as a good reason buy one instead.

Yes, that's right.
Our lives in the UK are so disconnected from animals - in the past strays roamed the streets and neglect was more visible - but today abuse is generally behind closed doors, dogs are cooped up and problems are totally the responsibility of over worked and under funded rescues.
Just because this is not visible doesn't mean things haven't reached catastrophic proportions.
And meanwhile my rescue friends in Greece are constantly dealing with streams of unwanted puppies, dogs run over or poisoned or incarcerate in concrete pens for years with no respite.
I'm sad that so many people in this country have no idea of the plight of animals in Romania, Spain and Greece etc etc.

Stick to your guns OP. We have a toy poodle who I love dearly, but is a neurotic, stubborn Mummy's boy! I have 3 friends with cockerpoos and 2 friends with Cavapoos and every single one of them is a smashing, healthy laid back family pet!

(I still wouldn't part with his royal highness though:-)

Newbie: I’m after some advice on a subject I know nothing about. I am not a dog owner.

MN: We are all experiences dog owners. Bad idea. List of valid reasons.

Newbie: Ignore all reasoning. Argue the toss. Flounce.

MN: sigh not again...

Except not a single one of these "experienced dog owners" is a cockerpoo owner.....

Pretty much!

I'm sure cockapoos with the right training and hard work can be lovely. Unfortunately most owners don't even consider the difficulty of training and just think 'oh, that would be cute'.

Except not a single one of these "experienced dog owners" is a cockerpoo owner.....*

Well yes, for reasons stated above...

Yep. All this advice falls on deaf ears unfortunately. They aren't easy dogs and need much more work than people realise. There are far better breeds if you are after a family dog.

Hello Op,
There are loads of cockerpoos where I live- they all come from Raffles in Cheshire. I’ve only heard good things about them so far, but not sure if they do specific colours to order.

However, the dog walker woman in the village says that it’s better to get in touch with cockerpoo rescue- apparently loads of puppies are rejected once they get older and they don’t look quite like how the owner anticipated. Apparently some look a bit too cockery and have flat coats that need too much grooming, so the owners give them up 😨, it’s so tragic.