In general
In dog breeding you have to take into consideration many things. Editing only one specific feature should be avoided.

Breeds I have are rare both to us in Finland and in the rest of the word, so the breeding becomes even more difficult. It is harder to eliminate dogs out from the breeding program by show success, as show titles do not inherit themselves. You have to think what faults you see bad and less bad in the dogs you use for breeding.

Even if we here in Finland have only about 250 Peruvian Hairless Dogs (year 2004), of which only about a third are in my breeding plan, I have still been able to keep my dogs blood relation percent in zero (0%), even though a few exceptions. I have been breeding Peruvian Hairless Dogs from year 1998 and this is when I have to face the moment when I have to raise the blood relations percentage in my dogs. My goal is, however, to keep it under 6% if only possible.

The breeding of this breed becomes even more difficult, as all the dogs around the world are of the same bloodlines as my dogs. When researching pedigrees I have noticed that even in the sixth generation, most of the old European Peruvians are even very closely related to each other. One thing that makes breeding more difficult yet, is that the breeders of this breed are separated into two groups. The gene pool for breeding becomes even smaller.

The Peruvian is a relatively new breed in Finland and the amount of dogs here is very small. This is why my main target now is to widen the gene pool. Not as much producing puppies that are like each other or producing puppies that will do well in shows.
After having a big enough gene pool I can start with breeding fully the kind of Peruvians as I see them. This will still take years but I have come to the conclusion that slowly and steady is good

Successful breeding usually does not occur with the first litter, it is temporary. Only when you can produce successful dogs from one generation to another you can talk about success as a breeder. It is not enough that you have a few top dogs; the aim has to be balanced litters both as puppies and as adults.

My own goals

Here are a few of the things I try to achieve with the Peruvian Hairless Dog

Behavior/temperament
I have been trying to breed better behavior/temperament for my dogs. A little more courage, even though I like a Peruvian who has preserved his timidness. I think this feature should be preserved, but it can be edited a little to make it easier to live with the dog.

Body
I feel it is important in my breeding to look at the dog's body. It should not become too heavy as I think the Peruvian is strong as a Greyhound but still petite and light looking.

Head
The head should not be too heavy or wide. I like the long and narrow head.

Ears
Ears should be naturally up, not artificially taped. My goal is to at some point use only dogs with naturally erect ears (without taping). That way I can have genetically natural erect ears with all my dogs.

Size
I try to keep the size of my dogs the same so that I use in my breeding as much dogs whose parents and grandparents are about the same size.

My experience at the moment of making dogs bigger or smaller is that the normal breeding rules are not valid with the Peruvian Hairless Dog. The size does not get smaller by using dogs that are related with each other, nor does it get bigger by using non-related dogs. The size, in my point of view, is affected by the genetical inheritage. By looking at this, you can find the dogs that inherit the big or small size. The mediums come on their own. By using a dog for breeding you have to look at how it inherits different sizes.

American Hairless Terrier

As a breed, the AHT is new for me also, so my goals have not yet had their right shape. I do, however, have a few goals already.

Behavior/temperament: The behavior of the AHT should be kept as open and social as it generally is at this moment with the AHT's here in Finland. It is good luck that we got this well temperamented dogs to Finland!

General appearance: I think the AHT should be a strong little dog. You should be able to see the strongness in the dogs’ bones and muscles.

I think the AHT could have slightly more angulation in the back and better looseness in the front. It is hard to evaluate what kind of AHT's we will have in the future. I have my own vision of this breed that is hard yet to explain, but time will show if I will achieve my vision of the AHT.

I try however, to follow the breeding programme by the land of origin and to preserve the AHT the way many of the breeders there would like it.

Kennel Bay's Bushyfur
Translation: Minna Sten