A litter notice is the smallest unit of trust in the dog world. It is a few lines that say a litter exists, and behind those lines stands everything a small kennel does or fails to do. The sheet prints them, so the sheet should say how it reads them, and it keeps the same habit as a kennel that prints its own litter notices on its own pages.

The first lines

A notice opens with the mating. The names of the sire and the dam come first, and in the honest notices they are not just pet names. The registered names travel with them, the way the studbook keeps them, so that a reader who wants the pedigree can find it. When a kennel prints only the call names, the sheet reads the notice as news but files it as incomplete.

The date whelped comes next, and the count. A litter of miniature dachshunds runs small: two to four puppies is ordinary, five is a good litter, and a singleton is not rare in the smallest sizes. A notice that forgets the count, or the sexes, is not a bad notice; it is simply one the desk will ask about before printing.

The lines that carry weight

Registration is the line that matters most. In Sweden the puppies are registered with the SKK, the Svenska Kennelklubben, and a notice that names the registry has said something checkable. The same holds wherever the litter is born: the national studbook is the record the notice borrows its credibility from. A kennel that publishes its own dated lines has nothing to hide and a habit worth copying.

Health lines come after registration, and they deserve a careful read. Some countries insure the puppy against hidden faults; Sweden's habit of insuring a puppy for three years against dolda fel, hidden faults, is the sort of line a notice should be proud to print. A veterinary check before delivery, the vaccinations, the deworming and the identity marking all belong in the same block, and a serious notice puts them there without being asked.

What a notice cannot prove

A notice cannot prove the puppies are well. It can only prove that the kennel knows what it owes the buyer and says so. The proof lives in the visit, in the smell of the kitchen the litter grew up in, in the dam's condition and in the way the breeder answers the second question rather than the first. The sheet prints the notice, not the verdict.

The lines about the raising

The best notices say where the litter grew up. The small Swedish habit is precise on this point: puppies born in a whelping box in the bedroom, moved to the kitchen when they are old enough, raised among the household's dogs, children and cats. A notice that prints the raising is telling the reader how the socialisation was done, which is the line a buyer should read twice.

The delivery line closes the notice. Eight weeks is the floor in the countries the sheet reads, and a notice that promises earlier delivery is announcing a shortcut, whatever its tone. The serious notice states the age plainly and lets the paperwork list carry the rest.

The notice, checked

The lines above were checked against the registration habits of two national studbooks and against the litter notices of the kennels that keep them. A notice that names its registry, dates its litter and states its delivery terms is doing the job the genre was invented for. The notice that carries all these lines has earned its printing.