Unfortunately, but very scant attention was paid to the dams. This was largely from economical considerations, which led them to believing, or thinking they did merely because they wanted to, that "any old bitch with a pedigree was good enough to breed from." To bolster up their economy, they said that the pups inherited their looks from their sire and their dispositions from their dam.
Two changes have taken place in the past decade. Breeders now know that physically as well as mentally the dam is quite as important as the sire. Moreover, they have learned that individual characteristics, however marked they may appear to be, do not have the force of family traits. In other words, a short, thick headed bitch bred to the longest headed dog alive would have short headed pups, if that dog had short headed parents and grandparents. These two fundamental bits of knowledge, learned originally from the biologists, have had a big effect on breeding operations.
A logical outgrowth of the importance that has been placed on family, with the naturally lessened emphasis on the individual, has been an increased number of the devotees of line rather than in-breeding. In-breeding is beyond all doubt the strongest weapon the dog breeder has, but it is a boomerang that is very apt to come back and knock its thrower in the head. In-breeding is the breeding together of the blood of one dog—mother to son, or brother to sister. Line-breeding is the breeding together of dogs of the same general strain, comparable to second or third cousins among people.
These breeding experiments fix the good and bad points of a dog or a strain very strongly. Carried to an extreme, they result in bad constitutions, lack of gameness, and in extreme cases, in actual deformity. Such breeding demands that only the strongest and youngest dogs be mated.
In selecting a sire, one should pick out a dog of recognized breeding, whose ancestors were dogs of the type you desire. A winner and a son of winners has better chances of being a sire of winners than an unknown dog of doubtful family, but it is not always wise to rush to the latest champion. A popular bench hero is apt to be over-worked at stud. If your bitch is very young send her to an older dog and vice versa. Best results are not obtained if the dogs are over eight years old—that is a very good age limit at which to retire them from active service. A bitch may be bred at her first "heat," if she is not too young and is strong and healthy.
Most people know that a bitch comes in season, or is "in heat," fairly regularly at six months intervals, and that this is the only time when she will have any sexual connections with a dog. The terriers generally come into their first heat when eight or nine months old and are remarkable for the regularity of their periods. The first sign is a swelling of the external parts and bleeding. After a week or ten days the bleeding is followed by a thickish, white discharge. This is the time to breed her.
One service is all that is necessary—the old timers to the contrary notwithstanding. Two services were formerly given, but this is no longer done by the best breeders. The time of gestation is only sixty-three days, and the second service, two days after the first, has been suspected of destroying the effect of the former. Statistics show that there are fewer misses and just as many puppies when there is but one service, as when there are two.
The single service is obviously a great saving of the energies of the stud dog, who, if he be popular, has to make heavy demands on his vitality. One who places a dog at public stud assumes certain responsibilities,—the keeping of his dog in perfect health and attending most carefully to visiting matrons. The stud dog should have lots of exercise, all the water he wants, and an abundance of good food. Raw lean meat, chopped fine or run through a mechanical grinder, makes a fine supplementary diet, and raw eggs and a little sherry can be added to this if he becomes at all run down.
Visiting bitches must be guarded against all possible chance of a misalliance. If practical, they should be kept far off from the other kennel inmates, for quiet is something to be greatly desired for them. When they arrive, they should be given a run and drink, but do not feed them till they have quieted down a little from the excitement of the trip. The Golden Rule covers the care of these visitors like a blanket—just treat them as you would have a bitch of your own treated under the same circumstances.
When a bitch has returned to her home kennels, she should take the rest cure a day or so. After that for a month or six weeks she need be treated no differently from any of her kennel mates, save to see that she has plenty to eat and that her stomach and bowels are in perfect order.