hi advice please i have today recieved my bitch tess hip score results which are 5-7 . i believe the current bms is 13 but on the bva website it states that dogs that are going to be used for breeding should be well below the current bms , also the dog that i was going to use as a stud dog hip score also recieved today is 8-7 which is above the bms so all you experianced breeders please advise on if i should breed my bitch at all . use the dog that i had chosen or find a stud dog with very low hip score . 

Hi Angie

Yes the breed average is around 14 but that takes in to account a high proportion of show type cockers. Hip scores are a bit of a 'sore point' with some people thinking that they are not worth doing because the method of inheritance is not understood. I'd say if you can test for it then do so. We had our bitch scored and got 4:4 which we are more than happy with. Sometimes though if you score the dog at quite a late stage (i.e 3 years) the result will not be totally accurate due to wear and tear.

There are a number of other threads on this topic posted here too. If she were mine I would try to do some research in to the lines you are intending to breed togeether and see if there is a consensus of what the progeny might be like.

Our next litter will be from a scored sire, no question about that. Would you be so kind as to reveal who you were going to use stud wise (PM me if you prefer).

All the best

Jackie