Health

 At the Mongrel kennels we breed only from healthy and sound dogs and from the ones who have a good temperament. Temperament is the most important thing for us. Life in todays society can be very hectic even to our dogs which makes it even more important to add that value in your breeding program. A Heeler should be happy and alert and love both children and grown ups. Children are often very popular because a Lancashire Heeler is a fast learner and they soon know that where the children are, there is something going on!

 Also all breeders have a breed standard to abide by. It tells us more detailed what a Lancashire Heeler should look like, what the various characteristics are that make a heeler.

The breed standard also grants the fact that a Lancashire Heeler is built correctly to cope with the work it once was made to do. A correctly built dog means a working dog.

 The Lancashire Heeler is a very healthy dog. You understand that when you contact the insurance companies and find out that it has been placed in group 1, the group with the healthiest breeds!

 There are however some eye problems that a heeler could have. These eye diseases are monitored in our breed by the fact that we have breeding stock eyetested on an annual basis and we also conduct litter screening. When testing the puppies we look for something called CEA, Collie eye, and for the adults we primarily look for signs of lensluxation. This mostly affects dog aged 2-6 years.

 

Please read more about these eye conditions on the SLHK (the Swedish Lancashire Heeler Club) web page: www.lancashireheeler.se

 At the Mongrel kennels we have bred almost 130 Lancashire Heelers and the percentage of affected animals is approx. 2 %...

 

All our breeding stock have their knees /patellas checked. It is not a significant problem in the breed but we have had a few cases in Sweden .

 It is not easy to be a breeder of Lancashire Heeler while the gene pool is small, so it is really important to study pedigrees and bloodlines.

 The Mongrel kennels cooperates with the two most winning and most experienced kennels in the UK : kennel Doddsline and Mr Norman Johnston (he has bred heelers for 50 years), and Hotpot kennels and Ms Kay Critchlow (see links). We have chosen this cooperation because we want to broaden the genepool and to continue breeding sound, healthy, beautiful and wonderful Lancashire Heelers!