Gun Dog Forum

I have heard of Britannies that stand 26 inches at the shoulders. The biggest brit I have ever seen stood about 4 inches lower than that. Do such large britannies exist and does anyone have any photographs of them ? I am not wanting to buy one, I'm just very curious.

Bill T.

We have some large dogs but not sure they are that big. Sadly we have people breeding to these exceptionly large dogs because they have performed well in the field. Then if some of the pups stay within the standard they feel they did nothing that hurt the breed. But we all suffer from those very dogs when they produce oversized dogs while the buyers that do not know the background have no idea why pups they produce out of their correct sized dogs go over-sized. And these pups will show up for many generation in the future. I have a nice small female now that has some field trial breeding of oversized dogs several generations back in her pedigree. When I bred her to a small male out of smaller dogs they produced a litter that all of the males were either oversized or barely in the standard. And when you advertise your pups as Dual quality it is a major problem when they don't come close to the standard.

I could almost except this if we had a shortage of good dogs to breed to that were in the standard for the breed, but we don't. It is nothing more than breeders breeding for a single characteristic with no regard of trying to better the breed or even producing something that is close. We have many times as many Dual Champions within the Brittany breed as all of the other breeds combined and still we have those who have no concern what they are producing other than something they think they can sell that might win a trial.

In my mind it is sad.

Ezzy

I've heard that some breeders Were neutering their dogs at birth and It was producing heck of a big size brittany that were in that range 24-26'' !!!

I read exactly the same thing about neutering brit males at an early age. Some of those pups become far too tall.

I have now been informed elsewhere that a brittany male of about 25 inches made a recent appearance at a trial in France.

Bill T.

I thought that in France you couldn't enter a trial without conforming to the standard.

Neutering before the growth plates close will cause any animal to grow taller. I think they have statistics on this on horses.

The tallest I have seen for Brits is 23".

My old dog Dexter(whom has passed) was right around 26" tall at the shoulder. He was about 60 to 65 pounds He was fixed at an early age and he did have two cruciate ligament repairs. He was a great dog.
I do not have any digital photos of him.

Forest Mcpherson's dog Suemac's Carolina "Banjo is around 25 inches and intact. He is one of the better trial Brittanys in Utah. If I remember correctly, he has been shown in the American Brittany Club's mag. this past Spring.

slistoe wrote:I thought that in France you couldn't enter a trial without conforming to the standard.

I have rechecked the source of my info. The dog was 25 inches at the shoulder and weighed 62 lbs. The dog was seen at Soissons but it is not clear if it actually competed. I also do not know if it had been neutered.

Bill T.

I have seen hundreds of Brittanys and the biggest was 23". Some seem larger until you actually do a measurement