Fair hips question.

[KCGoldens]

Our neighbor has been looking for a golden. He has found an upcoming litter from a breeder. The dogs are very expensive. On their clearances both parents are rated with F for fair hips and many other dogs in the pedigree are fair, with a few goods, and no excellents.
They want my advice, which I am not knowledgeable enough to give on this. My opinion, they could have problems, keep on looking. Is that the right advice to give, or should they be ok? :204

[GoldenLady1]

I would want to know more about what the parents of the litter in question have produced so far, if anything. From what I've seen and been told by longtime breeders, that can make more of a difference in your chances of getting a sound puppy than the actual ratings of the parents. Case in point: I once got a Golden from an OFA Excellent father and an OFA Good mother, and he has mild dysplasia. The breeder used that Excellent male quite a bit for breeding, and yet I found out afterwards that she had a lot of hip problems in her lines. On the other hand, I have heard of Fair-Fair combinations producing entire litters of OFA Goods.

I would suggest that your neighbour contact the breeder and ask more questions about what those particular dogs have produced; hopefully the breeder will be honest and tell them the goods. If the parents are on k9data (www.k9data.com), (http://www.k9data.com),) which is a registry for Goldens, their offspring that are also in the database can be looked up, and their OFA records, if not also on the database, can be searched at the OFA website, www.offa.org. (http://www.offa.org.)

[Swampcollie]

The Answer is, It depends.

What activities does your neighbow plan to include the dog in? Agility, or field work, I would probably want better conformation in the hips.

A Fair rating is still NOT dysplastic, and the dogs hips fall within the normal range for the breed. What about everything else in the dog's pedigree? Elbows, eyes, heart, longevity, allergies, etc?

What is the breeding on the litter? Comformation, Field, Obedience?

I wouldn't dismiss the litter based solely on the hip rating (it would raise a question in my mind) but if there were any other issues as well, I would look elsewhere for a puppy.

Your friend should get references from the Breeder on previous litters and CHECK them.

[KCGoldens]

Thanks everyone. I printed off everyones responses so he would have some more ideas of what to ask. I hope he finds a nice sound puppy for his family. :)

Everyone who sees me out walking my goldens wants one. :204
It must be because goldens are Grreat. :)