Yorky Structure

It's very common to find ads saying "Quality" pups/dogs for sale. However, quality can be excellent and quality can be poor.
What really determines quality?
Sometimes, you have to do your very own assignment to help you judge if you are really getting an excellent bred puppy/dog. Redmarks, or the number of champions in a pedigree, are nothing if the actual dog/pup possesses the "bad genes" (non conforming or unhealthy).

The factors determining the quality would be:
1. Health
2. Conformation (Type, Substance, Soundness)
3. Pedigree (important if you plan to breed and to check for inbreedings which can be dangerous if done by inexperienced breeders or done several times).
Amongst the three, conformation is the hardest to fully understand. The breed standard is a great start to learn about breed conformation. It describes the perfect Yorkshire Terrier (which is really non existent) and it is the goal for breed improvement and breed protection. You'll be surprised to learn that an ideal Yorkie of a breeder is different from another breeder. The variations happen because each breeder has his or her own preferred qualities (which still conforms to the standards if the breeder breeds for improvement).
Soundness is an aspect not fully explained in the Breed Standard, Soundness is about how the dog is put together--as an art and a science. The canine art involves the type, the form, proportion or simply, the aesthetic aspect of the dog. Since art is subjective, this causes the variations mentioned earlier about the ideal dog in mind of breeders. Canine science involves structure, health, and substance. Science is objective and very important for the over all functionality of the dog. Unfortunately, structural soundness is often overlooked.
Anyway, to help you out with some basics on understanding structural soundness, I've made some illustrations. :)
*Puppies can be evaluated starting around 8 weeks for structure (to see which one is promising or not). However, you can not determine right away if a pup is of show quality until it reaches adulthood or at least 1 year old.

*the illustrations adapted for the Yorkshire Terrier breed belongs to http://strictlyYT.blogspot.com

*Pat Hastings is the author of "Tricks of the Trade"