I'm a bit embarassed to say, but I had a misconception that only people who want to show dogs look for top of the line breeders. Top breeders are not breeding for the purpose of creating show dogs but for the purpose of improving the dog breed. Going with a reputable breeder helps insure a healthier, happier pet, and supports the initiative to further the quality of the IG breed. While it may cost more money up front (possibly $500-$1500 more), it could save money in vet bills! Also, I'm not certain that it is even more expensive to use a reputable breeder, as many of the backyard breeders (ex. on pupfinder) were charging $2,500-3,000. I paid $2,000 for D'Oro in 2022.
How to find a reputable breeder? If you have local breeders, it's much easier to go through them than having to travel with your pup! I was fortunate to have two local breeders who are simply amazing! Holly of Silvani and Layle of Voici Italian Greyhounds were both great resources for me. I met them and their pups, which helped me verify that I wanted to pursue my own pup. Also, Layle was one of the pioneers of the genetic testing for IGs, and she told me about a newer autoimmune haplotype test that she helped develop (DLA I and II haplotype diversity analysis). Unfortunately, they both had waitlists for their pups, which is common for good breeders!
Since I wanted to get a pup soon, the best resource I found was the AKC website. The nice thing about the AKC website is that they tell you who currently has puppies availble for sale, and the puppies posted for sale on AKC also typically include the AKC names of the parents, so you can look them up on the IG breed archive (https://italiangreyhound.breedarchive.com/). You might also cross-check the AKC breeder with the Italian Greyhound Club of America Breeder Referrals . You can also use the "testmating" feature to see what the coefficient of inbreeding (COI) is for their puppies, by putting in the AKC parent names and clicking "pedigree analysis". For example, D'Oro's parents are Piccino Whispering Jack and Maplewood's to the Moon. If I testmate them and click pedigree analysis, I get a COI of 5.23% for 10 generations which met my criteria of a COI of <10% (I found that rule of thumb somewhere online). You can also see if the parents or their relatives have been successful show dogs (prefixes such as US GR CH, US CH, etc) along with photos. While you may not be interested in showing your dog, being a successful show dog is a quality check for both health and temperament. If the breeder won't share the AKC names of the parents, that's a red flag to me!
After finding candidates on AKC, step 2 was to find out if genetic testing had been done on the parents. I asked the breeders if the parents were genetic tested, and what their results were. If you have the AKC names/IDs of the parents, you may be able to find the genetic test results yourself using the Orthopedic Foundation For Animals website. The conventional genetic tests for this breed are: enamel hypoplasia, glaucoma, and PRA. Enamel hypoplasia and glaucoma are single locus recessive diseases, so as long as one parent is homozygous normal, the pups have no chance of inheriting these conditions. PRA is a bit more complicated because there are multiple loci involved, but it is also a recessive condition. For an interpretation of PRA results see: https://vgl.ucdavis.edu/test/pra-susceptibility-ig. Extra credit to breeders with DLA results!
D'Oro Cookie came from Celtic Sighthounds, but was bred by someone who was no longer in the breeding business. From the AKC site I saw that she had champions in both parental lineages, and a good COI. Her DNA is not perfect, as she is at a slight increase in risk for PRA (5x), but that was acceptable to me.
A big shout out to both Holly and Layle, who were super helpful to me in vetting possible breeders!! Holly also recommended obtaining a "show stack" for both parents to help examine structural soundness.
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