Helen Dorrance Ducat breeds Golden Retrievers, American Eskimo Dogs, & Whippets, sharing insights on breeding, health, and industry trends.
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Helen Dorrance
1. I live in Leander, Texas, a northwest Austin suburb. I have an eight-acre farmette where I raise mini-Nubian goats, a few burr-eating sheep, bees, and a “food forest” of fruit and nut trees. I also have a boarding kennel that ensures I get 25,000 steps a day.
I started in dogs in 1976 with Golden Retrievers. Almost two decades later I added American Eskimo Dogs (AED), a breed I previously couldn’t stand and never dreamed I would ever own. However, at the first licensed show of Travis County Kennel Club in 1994 (I was Assistant Show Chair), AEDCA was having a National Specialty the year before American Eskimo Dogs were to become an official AKC breed. I walked by, saw a cute little Toy Eskie sitting in Carolyn Jester’s lap, and ended up finding and buying a year-old Toy bitch sired by Carolyn’s dog Boots, who was the first AED Westminster winner. Although I had been breeding Golden Retrievers since 1975, I didn’t start breeding American Eskimo Dogs until 1996, and even then I had a slow start with seven years between my first two litters. In fact, I used to say that I only bred a litter when I needed another Agility dog. From my first litter of five I had the first American Eskimo Dog Master Agility Champion and didn’t breed her until she was seven years old and I wanted another Agility dog. She produced two Master Agility Champions and I then bought a couple of bitches and proceeded to show and breed AEDs in earnest.
I currently breed Golden Retrievers, American Eskimo Dogs, and Whippets under the AKC registered name of Ducat. I’m a Gold Breeder of Merit of Golden Retrievers, a Silver Breeder of Merit of American Eskimo Dogs, and a Breeder of Merit of Whippets.
2. Our Judges’ Education Committee has been trying to come up with an acronym we can use for the hallmarks of our breed. Currently, we have come up with SNOW, which stands for Nordic, Off-square, White, and Single Tracking. We are not considered a cobby breed, but are considered compact. You wouldn’t think we would have to include the word “white” as one of our hallmarks, but the Standard does say that although biscuit cream is “permissible,” pure white is “preferred.” Lately, I have seen some Eskies with more biscuit cream than I am comfortable with. It does occasionally show up as dogs get older, but it generally isn’t that common. Our breed comes in three sizes, and all three sizes are judged on the table. We have the same characteristics other Nordic breeds have: erect triangular-shaped ears, wedge-shaped head, slightly oval eyes, dark points (black to dark brown eye rims, lips, and nose), stand-off double coat (short, dense undercoat with longer guard hairs forming the outer coat), and a richly plumed tail carried loosely on the back. I think our hallmarks are more important than ever with the advent of the German Spitz into AKC.
3. There still seems to be a demand for AED puppies, but we definitely have competition from the designer dogs. I am totally perplexed by cross-bred mutts that are bred on purpose to look like what we already have. Why buy a “pomski” when we have three sizes of American Eskimo Dogs to choose from and they are certainly prettier than most mixed breeds? I don’t know of anyone who intentionally breeds AEDs to other breeds (although I’m tempted to cross my Whippets with my Eskies, call them Whiskey dogs, and sell them for $5,000 plus!), but people certainly seem to be crossing a lot of different breeds with Siberian Huskies in an effort to get dogs that look like American Eskimo Dogs!
4. I’ve always been a big fan of live cover and natural whelping. In the olden days, we had to ship our bitches to the stud dog—sometimes with the check for the stud fee taped to the top of the crate. I learned from longtime breeders how to do natural breedings and still prefer it. I have frozen semen and have done surgical inseminations, and I have shipped fresh-chilled. My stud dogs have good-sized litters when it is live cover—usually the bitch staying at my house. AIs with either fresh-chilled or frozen never seemed to work for me. Unfortunately, for the last two years I have not really had any AI work with outside stud dogs. The one surgical insemination I did, the bitch (Toy Eskie) was pregnant with a litter of three and then got pyo. I cured her of pyo, but even though she got pregnant at least twice again the puppies never lived longer than 36 to 48 hours, and the vet speculated the dam had a form of MRSA or some sort of infection she was passing on. One of the necropsied puppies was actually born with a septic abscess on its spleen and died 36 hours later. With the other AIs with different breeds, the bitches didn’t get pregnant at all.
I do progesterone tests and ultrasounds, but I don’t always find the progesterones are as reliable as a seasoned stud dog, so I still tend to breed the bitches as soon as they will stand. I rarely need c-sections—a total of three in 50 years—and pretty much believe nature knows best. I don’t believe in x-raying pregnant bitches and haven’t even found the x-rays to be reliable. My last Whippet litter was x-rayed (not my choice) and the vet who did the x-ray (and would have done the c-section, if needed) saw seven, a breeder-vet saw eight, and another vet saw nine. She had nine. I’ve only x-rayed three bitches prior to the Whippet litter. One litter I co-owned with a vet and she automatically x-rays all of her pregnant bitches. One of the puppies ended up with three different cancers at the age of 10 months. The next time, I x-rayed a co-owned bitch at the emergency clinic because the owner thought she was bloating. Turns out she had eaten a 10-pound bag of food. Once again, one of those puppies ended up with cancer at 10 months of age. We don’t x-ray pregnant women because of the potential of the fetus getting cancer (usually as a teenager), so I’m not sure why we think there are no repercussions when we x-ray other mammals. And unfortunately, even when there are repercussions, we don’t seem to make any sort of connection to the possibility it could have been x-rays during fetal development.
And, of course, I certainly do all of the parent club recommended health tests for each breed and whatever technology that entails—DNA tests, auscultations, etc. I think the different levels of the AKC Breeder of Merit are good incentives for getting people to do their parent club breed-specific health checks.
5. Unfortunately, yes. Almost everyone I encounter has a doodle—and apparently are willing to pay untold amounts for their doodle. And amazingly, these doodles just happen to be “service dogs” every time I see one at the airport. And now, Agility exhibitors are purposely crossing Border Collies with Papillons or Whippets and winning with them. But they also could just as easily win with Whippets or Papillons. There are occasional glimmers of hope, though. The other day I walked into my country vet’s office and saw what I thought looked like a Bichon puppy (but mentally figured it was probably going to be my umpteenth malti-poo). Nope. It was actually a Bichon Frise puppy.
6. A trend I have noticed in the last few years is that sickle hocks are becoming so prevalent that it seems to be endemic in some breeds, where you would be hard-pressed to find a dog that isn’t sickle-hocked. People say you can fix a rear in one generation. I think they must mean hocky rears, because you sure can’t fix sickle hocks in one generation—or surely people would be doing so. No matter what breed you have, basic anatomy says you should have four pillars of support. Many breeds no longer have that and now have hackney fronts so that they can get out of the way of their sickle hocks. Fortunately, I do not see much of that in the Non-Sporting breeds, although I feel like it is creeping into the Chinese Shar-Pei, which specifically states in their Standard that the hocks are “perpendicular to the ground.”
The other concern I have is that we now have breeds that no longer move in a breed-specific way. I was in five different states in the last five weekends and saw Aussies and Boxers that moved like Brittanies, and sickle-hocked Dobermans and Rottweilers that had absolutely no rear extension.
7. I love the National Owner-Handled Groups and the increase in Owner Handlers. I love it even more when the BOB can be in both Groups and do well in both. I like the Grand Champion title, but I really wish we could also award Select to WD and WB. There have been several times where the WD and WB may not be quite as good as BOB and BOS, but are better than all of the other specials. I would love to award them Select and extra points depending on how many specials of their sex they defeated.
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