To breed or not to breed

Several people have asked if we intend to breed from Maya and my reply is always that the jury’s out and it’s something we would not rush into.

I have never had a bitch have puppies, so this would be new ground for me, though we so wanted Maggie to have pups as we intended to keep one.
Photo April 2018. Maggie with her toys aka babies.

We had a chat with our vet and he said to be careful what we mated her with because she was quite small, so a cocker spaniel or sprocker would probably be a good match.
She never really showed an interest whether she was in season or not, and finding a nice ‘daddy’ was not as easy as one might think. I could hardly go up to someone with a tape measure and ask to measure their dog! One guy we did meet casually had a lovely cocker spaniel but he was adamant he was not going to let his dog ‘do that’ so that kinda hit any potential mating on the head.

By the time we found a suitable Daddy, and knew the owner pretty well, the dog was more interested in his football, and Maggie was about 7, so a little old. Had something happened, it was unsure whether we would have let her go through the pregnancy because of her age, but it was a decision we never had to make.

When we were on the boat and she was 11, she lusted after Hugo, a young black cockapoo and she was in his face from all directions, tartily waving her back end under his nose, but he just wasn’t interested. I think that was a blessing actually.

Now we have Maya, a full pedigree GSD and the option is there.
Photo July 2022.

We are lucky in that our trainer is a GSD breeder and I have asked him if we could call on his expertise should we decide to mate her. It wouldn’t be until she was at least two, so we have some time for her to calm down into adulthood instead of large puppyhood.
It’s not just finding a suitable sire though, but also finding homes for the pups, especially if it’s likely to be a large litter.  She is a large dog, and there are a lot of things to consider about the people taking on a puppy that is not going to stay small for long. We knew she would be big and are convinced that every time she stretches, she grows an inch or two.
It’s a big responsibility and one we would look into very carefully.
Would we keep one? Possibly, but we would be older, and maybe not so mobile as we are now (which is getting less to be honest), plus there is the matter of space here.
However, someone has already asked if they could have one of her pups……… and she was only 7 months old then!
We shall see……………………..

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