Most popular size of Shelties?

[Laurelin]

The breed is so young, even good breeders get throwbacks. My tiny little 18 lb sheltie had a near 30 lb littermate.

There is almost as much variation in papillons too. I know papillons ranging from 3 lbs to 22 lbs. We brought our last sheltie to a pap meetup and several of the papillons were actually bigger than he was.

 

[BarbV]

Don't blame it on the age of the breed. Blame it on the fact that size is polygenetic. It's not just one simple gene that determines size. It's several genes, plus some more, plus outside influence. We also add nutrition and gender into that equation, and it's a crap shoot.

We know that given identical sets of genes, a male dog will grow 1 inch taller than a female dog. So really, any bitch over 15 1/8 inches tall is the genetic equivalent of an oversized male, so do we remove them from our breeding programs as well? How about a 13 7/8 inch male, that is equivalent to a 12 7/8 inch bitch?

Removing over/undersized dogs from a breeding program in no way guarantees only having insize dogs. It's way more complicated than that. And quite frankly, size (and to some extent, color) is the last thing we should worry about. How about we produce healthy, physically and mentally sound, happy dogs that look like Shelties? How about producing dogs with good fronts who can run agility into their teenage years? How about producing dogs that can actually work a farm?

I think it says a lot about our breed that we can complain about size as a major thing. That means we aren't complaining about bloat (big dogs), or seizures (Poodles, BCs), or cancer (goldens), or breathing problems (all the squishy face dogs), or major skeletal issues.

But we should not cause these problems by removing so many genes from our limited gene pool based on something as arbitrary as size.

I agree with you that overall health is obviously of primary concern. Unfortunately, Shelties are not immune from their own congenital diseases either; and those should be first on the list to breed out.

That being said, the thread was on Sheltie size. So I was only addressing that topic. I'm by no means an expert - in fact, I know practically nothing about it, except what my common sense tells me. If you look at photos of Shelties from a mere 50 years ago, they look alot different then they do today - compare those to a breed that has been around for several hundreds of years (e.g. King Charles Spaniels) who look pretty much the same today as then.

This tells me that Shelties are still evolving as a breed. And that is why we have a Sheltie Standard to that breeders have something to aspire to. Is it the correct standard? I cannot say, but to me it seems right:

A mid-size dog, adaptable to his environment, highly motivated, intelligent, excellent companion dog, etc.

If you allow a bigger spread in size, you might as well have a Collie or a Papillion instead. They are similar in temperments.

As you say, a small dam can produce a litter of oversized pups; and vice-versa....there is still alot of unpredictability in the breed, and I think that's because of its immaturity. The only thing that seems to breed true in Shelties is temperment.

Like I said, I'm no expert - my comments are based on observational data only - so I'm anxious to hear from more people who actually breed.

 

[JigiBean]

My Jigi is in size, She is 15 and half inches.

 

[Sackett]

Everett was the runt, and he showed it at 7 weeks. He is now 20 lbs and yea-high. I prefer the smaller shelties and will always see if the breeder has a runt.

 

[chase's dad]

Chase was picked out of a litter of 7 for 2 reasons. First was the color and second was the size. He was the runt of the litter and I like the smaller size so he was our man. Now with that said we found a "very small" Lab puppy years ago on the median of a hwy. After a year this tiny puppy was 92lbs....

 

[granite]

Two of my shelties are oversized, but only just oversized. Sasha is in-size at just under 14". The "official" measurement of Newton at the Companion Dog school using a wicket put him at 13", but as the measurer was an elderly lady having difficulty bending I'm not sure that its a perfect test. He was at 12.5" when I got him at 15 months old, but he was also severely underweight at that time. I hope that with gaining weight and muscling out a good bit that he did gain some size. Zoey is going to be very small, right now she seems to be growing some leg so we'll see where she ends up. She's currently at 9.5"

I will say that the smaller size shelties are easier to have in my lap. Emma and Figaro knock the breath out of me when they pounce and I have to limit them to one at a time in my lap. I have had Sasha, Newton, and Zoey in my lap all at the same time without feeling smothered.

 

[mbfrench]

All 3 of these pups here are well in size.At one time,I think we all thought Jasper would take after his mom & dad,but he ended up smaller than Trapp. He settled in his shoulders,and actually shrunk a bit.So now he is a good 1" shorter than his half brother.Weight wise,they are still 1lb differance,Trapp weighing in at 21#,Jasper 20#,Mia 16#

Mia is the smallest,only topping out at 14".She is done growing.I like them on the smaller size,as it makes it really fun to have them all cuddled next to you!