Want my male Lab to have a son

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Our working lines black Lab is a bit of a stunner and from very good lines. He also has the best character ever. I'd love him to breed simply to continue his line and have a pup of his, but it seems that the 'stud' thing is very tied up professionally in terms of anyone who might want him to father a litter.

he is a kennel club boy but in order to have official offspring
you need to have the elbows/hips score xrays which means general anaesthetic, which I don't want to put him through, even though the risk is minimal.

I'm not looking at it from a money point of view and understand why people with similar female dogs might well be - it's not a cheap or effortless thing to do - so I'm really looking for someone who thinks along similar lines... is this unrealistic?

Black labs are great and I can understand you wanting a pup from yours -especially if he is a special one.

However - labs are prone serious trouble with hips/elbows/eyes. These are not small matters. They are really miserable problems -leading to a shorter life, time on pain-killers and much suffering.

I've had one who was unlucky (despite careful breeding) and hit the results of a past duff gene-pool. I'm now very very keen to see these genes gone!

(We all suffered. His life was far too short and I grieve for him still.)

The problems have been bred-in easily because they don't show up at breeding age.

Yes - the tests are risky but unchecked breeding is not a risk worth taking.

I don't doubt that you will find someone who wants to breed from their "pet bitch" which is likewise not hip or elbow scored. It is quite an irresponsible attitude to have, particularly in a breed such as yours which does not have a limited gene pool. It is really only in the numerically small breeds where unproven, pet dogs can have a role in breeding programmes and they should always be fully health tested.

Could you not just get a dog that is from the same bloodlines, rather than breeding your own dog? Surely if he is from "good lines" then it would be fairly easy to find a sibling or half sibling that has been hip and elbow scored and is being bred.

We were told that we could breed from our bitch puppy but we don't plan to. Ours is a numerically small breed with waiting lists for puppies. She is from excellent bloodlines and has a beautiful temperament, but this, for us, is not enough reason to breed a litter when there are thousands of dogs in rescue.

Yes. Completely unrealistic. Everyone thinks their dog is stunning and perfect and should be bred from - and everyone is wrong. Breeders keep back specific pups to breed from, or to use as studs, because of specific reasons.

He can be Kennel Club registered - but unless you have the right paperwork, the progeny won't be able to be KC registered. To get that paperwork, you need the breeder you bought the pup from to agree to it - and I guarantee they won't.

Hip/Elbow scores is the absolute bare minimum you should be getting done with a lab. I'd want eye tests, DNA tests etc etc. Those are expensive.

No ethical breeder with a bitch will use your dog as a stud for pups - good breeders talk to each other and vet prospective stud dogs and breeding bitches carefully - which means you'll end up with a tonne of unhealthy, defective, puppies that end up in rescue centres because the only people who will buy from the bitches breeder will be the sort of people good breeders have said 'hell no' to and they'll 100% be the sort of people who shouldn't have, and can't cope with, a labrador.

With very few exceptions, that don't apply to labradors, and outside of the Assured Breeder Scheme, there is no requirement to x-ray and hip/elbow score in order to KC register the resultant puppies.

It is, of course the right and ethical thing to do (along with other relevant health testing - for labradors this would also include the BVA eye scheme, for example, and I think there are also some DNA swab or blood tests recommended).

As lovely as he sounds nice labradors are ten a penny and he is unlikely to be sought out for breeding without the full gamut of health testing and also having proven himself in some way - for a working line lab this would naturally be in field trials or similar.

You don't have to have general anaesthetic to have X-rays done , he can be conscious or even mildly sedated assuming that he will behave and let the vet or whoever's taking the images touch him .
I wouldn't have a hope in hell with my dog but I know someone who regularly takes their boy for student vets to practice on with scanning various organs as he's so laid back and well behaved , literally just lays still !

Everyones black labrador is stunning and they want to breed from them.

But dont do it!

It is expensive your dog will have to be sedated to have the health tests. If you are considering doing it without the health tests then you are not fit to breed or own any dog!

Enjoy your dog but do not breed from him.

Get him to the highest levels in working tests or field trials or the best in his sport and see if anyone approaches you to stud him - They wont!!

They absolutely do need a general anaesthetic (which is safer than sedation anyway) the x rays have to be spot on so they have to be completely still

So you don't want to put him through testing but happy for a bitch to go through a pregnancy? How odd..
And ridiculous...
Who yearns for their ddog to have a ds??

In reply to @1984winston, can't reply to your comment as it's my comment if that makes sense .
I'm not sure where you are in the country but my breeder & several others I know use southerncanineimaging , they have a fabulous reputation and a waiting list - they don't use anaesthetic , only sedation 😊 . They have an almost perfect success rate of getting the required images.

It can definitely be done under sedation, this is particularly relevant with giant breeds which often tend to react badly to anaesthesia.

I'm not anti-breeding, but really, a working line dog shouldn't be bred unless it has, at minimum, been proven in work. If you work him, and want to breed him, you need to get some working tests and field trials under your belt.

(I would have liked to have bred one of my bitches, but her hip scores weren't quite as good as I had hoped, plus I didn't get her into work - partly due to COVID - until she was three, coming up to four, and DH and I had agreed to spay her.)

There are enough dogs

I wouldn't buy a lab without hips and elbows rested. You may attract the wrong sort of bitch owner and puppy owner.

Don't do this. It's basically backyard breeding and completely unacceptable.

This.

No advice but I've thought the same about my male golden retriever.

Best dog I've ever had and I would only want another golden if it was his. Or if cloning could happen soon that would work 🤔

This. Honestly, you need to get over yourself and you need for offspring from your dog. These tests exist for a reason. You would be grossly irresponsible to pursue this without the proper testing.

I get it, I love my dogs and would have a carbon copy of all of them if I could. A couple of points though:
I wouldn't buy a pup if it's parents hadn't been hip scored.
I have gun dogs, and would only buy another gun dog from proven working stock. Likewise I won't buy a lap pet from working lines. Good working lines isn't really good enough for me, I'm looking for at least 4th generation proven working lines. Remember that working lines can often be a bit more highly wired than pet or show lines, which is probably why many HPR and Working Cockers live in kennels rather than on sofas. Just watched my two gun dogs trying to recreate wall of death on my sofas and living room wall, to prove a point!

I've had a few people ask me if they can have a puppy from one of my 2 bitches. The answer is always no. Just because they could have puppies is not a good enough reason for them to do so, even though both are kennel club registered and have a good pedigree.

There is something very weird in wanting your dog to have a "son".

Full gamut of health tests is the bare minimum from a stud. From workong lines he should have worked to prove himself otherwise what the point of the 'working' bit? If you dont have these you will be scraping the barrel for bitches.

Everyone thinks their dog is perfect, please just enjoy your dog and either commit and upskill or leave it to the knowledgeable to breed, there are enough dogs.

Being KC registered doesn’t mean anything though (unclear in your post if you realise that - sorry if you do). Unless you get a waiver from the endorsement that a (responsible) breeder will have put on your dogs then any pups your dogs have won’t be able to be KC registered?

Most breeders won’t waive the endorsements either. In over twenty years and six litters, I’ve only waived it once. I know breeders who have been breeding for 40+ years who have never waived an endorsement.

But tbf even if you do… OP (and probably lots of other posters tbf) definitely doesn’t realise that.

There are labs everywhere. Loads of them with horrible painful hips and elbows because people ‘thought along the same lines’ and didn’t health test.

Your happy to produce puppies to that may have shortened painful lives full of surgeries and medication but don’t want to risk your dog one GA? Seems pretty selfish. Your not interested in money but what about the heartbreak you may put on the families of the puppies because you didn’t do a simple test.

Testing is there to reduce the risk of horrible conditions being passed to the offspring, it’s there for a reason. You will almost certainly be able to find someone else who can’t be bothered willing to use your dog but why would you want to? If he’s so good do it properly and find a nice equally tested bitch to use.

Agree. A dog is a pet not a child.

I would not consider a Labrador puppy whose parents (both of them) had not had the available range of health and genetic testing. The consequences of not doing so can be devastating. My previous Lab went blind at five from PRA, which there wasn't a DNA test for when I got him, merely an eye examination. He died at nearly sixteen so spent over two thirds of his life blind.