I had held off submitting this last year but now that I see they are breeding and selling pups from Summer, I felt it right to post this for awareness. I am concerned with the ethics of a breeder who is knowingly further breeding a dog that has in fact produced offspring with severe hip dysplasia. Below is the original I was going to post...
Make sure you read and understand the details of the contract! We purchased 2 puppies from Shawna from different litters in Sep/Oct '23. The pups are absolutely adorable, good demeanor and intelligent. The black tri is Harvey and he's a little mischievous and gets into things but is a really good dog. The red merle is Knox (named after the Buffalo Bill's Dawson Knox) and has an awesome personality and a deep voiced bark.
After about 6 months (Apr '24), we noticed that Knox was favoring his right back leg and was doing 'bunny hops'. We took him to our vet to find out that they thought he had a severe case of hip dysplasia, which is quite unusual in small breed dogs. We contacted Shawna immediately about it and she responded in 2 days stating that she's never had this happen before, but its unpredictable and she can only do her due diligence.
We had stated that we wanted to keep him and she offered $500 back if we wanted to keep him. So, we made an appt with Cornell University to have him evaluated...and we had to wait until Aug '24 to get into the specialist.
The doctor at Cornell stated that Knox has genetic Hip Dysplasia on both sides, with the right side being very bad...the left is probably good enough to let it be. The doctor also advised we contact the breeder and make sure the parents do not breed together again (Sire is Jager, Dame is Summer). We forwarded the report to Shawna and did not hear back from her after reaching out several times until mid-October.
We fell in love with Knox and didn't want him to suffer, nor be taken from our lives...we decided that we are going ahead with the surgery. So, we did some research, got some legal advice and asked Shawna to reimburse us up to the cost of the puppy for medical expenses due to this genetic defect...as seems typical for reputable breeders and quite frankly fair to us as we're going to incur many $1000's above to help this wonderful animal. Shawna refused and said the only way we could get our money back was if we returned the dog to her as per the contract. I asked what would happen to him if I returned him, and that if she didn't answer I assume he would be put down immediately...no answer there.
Well, we're going ahead with the surgery despite any help from Shawna. I asked her to reconsider her position on this and show some compassion for the dog and situation, but she is taking a hard line on the contractual words...and that's where we stand today. We were willing to take on the lion share of the expenses but she got us with the contact technicalities. We're still going to do good by Knox and provide him with the best life we can. His surgery is scheduled for late Dec '24.
Added 7/5/2025 - copy of the contract with parents listed as proof/evidence. And an update that Knox is doing absolutely great with his titanium hardware, our bank account is about $12k lighter, and he and Harvey are awesome little pups! read more