Buying a Westie pup Today, need advice QUICKLY!

Hi OP,

I have an unregistered Westie from an accidental litter. I did a lot of research to decide on the Breed I wanted and felt a Westie was a good fit. However, the information I had researched was all based on well-bred dogs free of problems for the most part as that is the 'type' of dog that people who make this information available produce. The Breed manuals etc. are written by people with extensive experience in 'well-bred' dogs from tried and tested lines, with only the dogs with outstanding temperament, conformation, health and genes used in breeding programs. Finding such a dog is a different matter entirely.

Rescues don't re-home Westies to homes with kids, so that option was out. I contacted the breed club in Ireland, and the IKC, both of which were absolutely no help and advised me look on advert sites and small ads in newspapers. I'm not sure which but one of these organisations gave me a number for a lady who had just registered a litter. I rang this woman who told me all sorts of wonderful things, such as they are great little dogs, happy out lazing around the house and easy to bring in the car etc. etc. a perfectly scripted marketing campaign. So then I asked her some questions and all of a sudden she was unsure of everything and eventually what I got from her was this:

She had 2 litters of pups living in a garden shed with no human contact other than getting fed and cleaned out. She couldn't be sure which pups belonged to which bitch. She is too old to deal with the mess they would make in the house and the best bit - the man said this, the man said that etc. What man? The man who was supplementing her pension, and came every so often to clean the mess in the shed, the man on whose behalf she had registered his dogs in her name, that's what man. Needless to say I never visited.

Then after many, many similar phone calls I found an advert pinned on a vet's noticeboard and that's where I got my dog. The owner had obviously put some effort into finding their own dogs from a reputable source as their bitches papers were endorsed as 'not to be bred from, progeny cannot be registered'. Whoever sold them that dog had made a determination that she was not suitable to be bred from for whatever reason. Unfortunately these people where somewhat naive, they didn't spay her because they didn't want to ruin her coat and got a second dog as 'company' for her. When their bitch went into heat with the new pup around they asked a livestock vet for advice, who said the pup was too young to breed - he was wrong. And so they had a litter of puppies that couldn't be registered. When I met their pup he was recovering form his neutering op. So based on what information I had, I chose a pup form that litter which just happened to be the one they were considering keeping for themselves. She was very well socialised and very used to their daughter, unfortunately the others didn't appear to have been given the same level of attention. I did not see any paperwork for their dogs as they did not want to show it as they were in breach of the contract with the breeder they got the bitch from and that person could have demanded the dog back from them. They were willing to hand them over to a vet to verify what they had said was true though.

I don't know the history of my dogs lines, I don't know what her pedigree is and I don't know why the bitches papers were endorsed or if she is overly inbred, but from an ethical point of view I felt satisfied that they had done their best to avoid this happening again and they accepted it shouldn't have happened in the first place.

My dog is extremely highly strung and as pup became increasingly hyperactive, to the point of crashing into walls head first just because they were in her path. People kept telling me that this was just normal Westie behavior as they are all 'stone-mad' which to me is an indication of the problems rife in the breed, this is not normal behaviour for any dog. At 18 weeks old she went into heat which the vet ruled the most likely cause of was a hormone imbalance, so she was spayed just short of 6 months old. I don't know if there may be associated repercussions with this in future, if it means she has an increased risk of certain cancers because of it or if some other non-reproductive hormone issues will crop up. I can just hope that having her spayed has limited any associated problems. She also has food allergies which contributed to the craziness, it took a year and half of trial and error, and error, and more error to find a diet that was suitable for her. She can't have any food that contains chicken or chicken by products which is 99% of dog foods on the market as most non-chicken foods contain 'poultry fat'. She has bad reactions to her vaccinations, certain wormers and it's almost impossible to find appropriate dog treats. I've tried her on a raw diet - it didn't work, I've tried her on a home cooked diet - but I can't guarantee that I can get the balance of nutrients right by doing this. It's a never-ending dog food saga. She is two years old now so I try to avoid all of the common ingredients that cause allergies as problems sometimes only show up later on in the dogs life. Thankfully the only apparent effect so far has been hyperactivity/vomiting/constipation/bloating/diarrhoea when she occasionally gets her teeth on something she shouldn't have. She has had no scratching or skin problems but that doesn't mean they won't manifest later. She gets regular vet check-ups to make sure no other problems are turning up but I expect they will as she gets older. Either way the cost will be no issue, whatever she needs will be paid for.

To my detriment, for some reason it never occurred to me to look into breeders in Northern Ireland, possibly because the Irish breed club also covers NI and no-one had advised me that the NI club was the best route or indeed that it even had a separate breed club. In all honesty, although I had considered health implications along with ethical issues, and was fully aware that there were risks with a dog with unknown background, I under-estimated just how mentally exhausting the whole thing would be and in terms of Westie heath problems my dog's have been extremely minor so far. I wouldn't do it again to be honest, and at the time I was completely sure that a pup from an accidental litter was the best option available to me at the time given what my experience with the IKC and breed club had led me to. If I were to run into the same problems again trying to find a dog, I'd be going back to square one and considering a different breed.

Thankfully, you have had the benefit of being given all this information in advance, so are in a much better position than I was. I'm glad you started your thread today and not tomorrow with the opening post saying - I have just bought a Westie puppy, how can I register him/her.