Cockapoo health screening

[50but17inside]

Please can someone knowledgable advise me?

How old does a puppy need to be before you can cheek swab them for genetic health screening?

Puppy’s mum has screened clear for recessive traits. My o level biology isn’t enough here - does that mean puppy cannot inherit disease as would need genes from both parents to do so?

I haven’t seen dad’s certificates yet - hopefully today - but am just wondering what our options are if it transpires dad hasn’t actually been health screened through a lab

If my memory serves me right you need to have inherited both recessive genes from both parents to inherit the condition.

As mum is free of the genes your puppy won't inherit the condition. However if dad had the gene the puppy 'might' (I can't remember the exact percentage here) inherit the gene. This would only be an issue if you wanted to breed from your puppy later on.

If mum is "clear" on DNA tests that are recommended for the breed ( Spaniel / Poodle) your puppy will be fine.

If mum is a "carrier" then dad needs to be clear.

If both are carrier for the same condition, walk away because puppy has a high chance of getting it.
Recommended health tests for each breed can be found on KC website.

Aha thank you. Does this generally mean that when you buy an f1b cockapoo, as long as mum (cockapoo) is clear for PRA, vW etc then that’s enough? If the poodle dad has never been tested then we don’t need to insist puppy is individually screened?

We certainly wouldn’t be looking at breeding, we just want to give ourselves best chance of a healthy puppy

If the mum is homozygous unaffected she has no bad genes to pass on to the pup, so Dad's status is unimportant as these are recessive genes so the pup would need two genes to be affected. If you don't want to breed from your pup this is sufficient.
F1b pups still have a lot of variation in size, hair coat and more particularly personality. Is your breeder selecting for personality and tracking traits. Sadly we are seeing and increasing number of cockerpoos with very serious resource guarding and aggression issues. The problems do seem to be more in the lighter colours.

Thank you Lonecat that’s really helpful. Yes absolutely aware of potential RG problem and have learned strategies with previous dogs to manage it if it proves an issue