Why we should call time on fluffy teddy bear dogs

Cockapoos and their adorable fluffy brethren have become hugely popular – but at what cost?

When Jo Rice bought her dog Willow, it’s fair to say her acquisition was something of a cliche. Willow was a lockdown purchase, acquired seven days after Rice first thought “Maybe I’ll get a dog,” and found “on something awful like freeads.co.uk – I was ripe for being scammed”. 
“She was a lockdown crisis purchase,” laughs Rice now. “I spent a whole day researching dogs, decided I wanted one that looks like a teddy bear and then realised there were no dogs available in the whole world. I literally got into bed and said ‘Dear Lord, please may I have a puppy’ and my phone pinged.” Rice collected Willow, an ‘FI’ cavapoo whose father was a miniature poodle and mother was a Cavalier King Charles spaniel, that weekend. 
Four years later, and despite what could have been an inauspicious start, Willow has been an unqualified success. “I have never ever regretted getting her,” says Rice. “I can’t imagine life without her.” 
The rise of the “doodle dog” – hounds that, like Willow, have one poodle parent – has been unprecedented in recent years: according to the most recent, and as yet unpublished data from the research programme VetCompass, the cockapoo (poodle crossed with cocker spaniel) is now the nation’s second favourite dog by ownership (up from sixth in 2019), with cavapoos and labradoodles coming in at 17th and 18th respectively. Only the mighty labrador retriever, long beloved of Brits, is a more popular pet. 
It’s not hard to see why the doodle, of whatever combination, is irresistible, especially for those looking for a first dog: they’re cute, fluffy and look like teddy bears (lots of them, in fact, are named Teddy or Bear). Popular perception is that their mixed parentage makes them healthier and better-behaved than either of their forebears. They’re also widely thought to be hypoallergenic (although this is not actually the case for every type of doodle), which gives them appeal to a certain sort of pet owner who doesn’t fancy hair on their cushions. Ask any doodle owner what they love about their dog and they’ll inevitably spam you with pictures, before waxing lyrical about intelligence, noble character and adorability. “Our mini bernedoodle is the most magnificent dog I’ve ever seen,” says one acquaintance. “She’s smart, playful and sweet. She’s also ruined my life.” 
She is joking (I think). But it’s true that a fly has entered the doodle ointment: a recent report from the Royal Veterinary College that included data from more than 9,400 cockapoo, labradoodle and cavapoo dogs found that such so-called designer crossbreeds are in fact no healthier than their pure-bred parents. Cockapoos are three-and-a-half times more likely to have to go to the vet after eating a foreign body than a poodle; labradoodles are more at risk of suffering from allergies and alopecia than poodles, and cavapoos are more likely to throw up all over your house than a King Charles spaniel. 
To clarify: “they’re not healthier – but they’re not sicker either,” points out Dr Dan O’Neill, one of the authors of the study. But, he adds, thinking a crossbreed is going to be a healthier bet than a purebred is not the case. And there can be other issues too, especially with some doodle breeds: just witness the rise in numbers of cockapoos at rescue centres, which has grown exponentially over the past five years. 
It’s all a far cry from three decades ago, when the Royal Guide Dogs Association of Australia decided to pair a labrador with a standard poodle as a solution for a blind woman in Hawaii whose husband had allergies. Not only was the result – Sultan – an excellent guide dog, combining the working and social skills of the labrador with the intelligence and agility (and low-shedding coat) of the poodle, his siblings, once rebranded as labradoodles, were swiftly snapped up. A canine phenomenon was born. 
“It’s totally fascinating,” says Dr O’Neill – who points out that, to a degree, what Wally Conron, the inventor of the labradoodle – was doing was merely reinventing the wheel. Prior to the mid 1800s, when the concept of dog showing came about, there was no such thing as a dog breed: dogs were defined by function, be it as a retriever, a guard dog or a setting dog. In 1873 the Kennel Club was founded, its purpose to have a consistent set of rules for governing the popular new activities of dog showing and field trials, and breeds – including what particular types of dog should look like – started to be defined. “Over the last 10-15 years we’ve seen a new phenomenon, which is the designer dog – essentially the public rejecting the old, traditional breeds to ones being driven by the social perception of acceptability,” says O’Neill. “Once social media switches onto designer dogs, the public follows.” 
But every bandwagon has its downsides. The rise of the fluffy ‘poo’ dog has seen other breeds decrease dramatically in popularity: Jack Russell Terriers, for example, saw the biggest fall in popularity between 2019 and 2023, closely followed by the Staffordshire Bull Terrier and the West Highland White ‘Westie’ terrier. Even the once-invincible labrador is not as popular as it once was, although as O’Neill, who compiled the figures points out, “four years is not a long time in relation to dog breeds of which many have been around for over a century.”
Even Conron now says the labradoodle is his “life’s regret”. “I opened a Pandora’s box, “ he said in a recent interview on an ABC podcast. “I released a Frankenstein… I find that the biggest majority [of labradoodles] are either crazy or have a hereditary problem.” 
Is it true? And if so, does that mean it’s time to call time on these designer doodles?
First things first: a crossbreed is not, as the name suggests, a breed, it is a mix of two different dogs. Engineered, yes, but “purebred” no – that’s partly why “poo” dogs are not registered with the Kennel Club. “If someone wants to buy a pedigree dog [like a labrador], we can tell how big it’s going to get; the food it will need; its temperament. Crossbreeds do not have that predictability,” explains Bill Lambert, the Kennel Club’s health, welfare and breeder expert. So, while a first generation, or ‘F1’ cockapoo is a mix of spaniel and poodle, with a second or third generation ‘F2’ or F3’ cockapoo, which has bred with another cockapoo, you don’t know exactly how the traits of each breed will come out; as those in the know say, they don’t necessarily “breed true”. 
To complicate things further, there are three types of poodle – standard, miniature and toy – so while your cockapoo might have been a working cocker spaniel bred with a miniature poodle, if you then breed that dog with a cockapoo made up of a springer spaniel/toy poodle mix, you’ll get something very different again. Temperament can vary wildly for the same reasons: poodles are highly intelligent, high-energy dogs that can be quite challenging; spaniels are gun dogs that can be very vocal and are bred purely to retrieve – get the traits you don’t want and things could get tricky. 
Added to this, the popularity of the cockapoo means that many of them have been mass-farmed and often imported, which means you’re not just working with core inherited issues, but also behavioural ones due to poor socialisation as puppies; only about nine per cent of a dog’s behavioural activity is dictated by its genes and the majority comes down to socialisation and training. 
“We see a lot of temperament issues with cockapoos in particular,” says Sandra Mayoh of the York City Dog Training Club. “When they’re coming into proper adolescence the males can be quite snappy and reactive to other male dogs, and the bitches very difficult. They’re not the easiest breed.” For half a chance of success, she says, they need constant training from a puppy, plenty of exercise and proper socialisation from early on – don’t assume this is a dog you can chuck into the garden to entertain itself. She is much warmer about labradoodles, which she describes as “super dogs” (her daughter breeds them); “they’re a lot more trainable – the labrador seems to come through more strongly”. 
But, she says, an F1 labradoodle “looks like a bristly mutt with a beard, and it sheds”; they’re also more likely to suffer digestive issues and will need a grain-free food. Cavapoos, meanwhile, “are very nice, but research Cavalier King Charles spaniels and they have one of the worst health records in the book – a huge amount of heart disease” – so make sure if you want a cavapoo that you’ve done full health checks on the parents.
As well as researching health history – potential hip dysplasia in a poodle parent, for example; eye problems in a cocker spaniel – you should always make sure you meet the puppy with its mother, and it’s a good idea to ask to be put in touch with owners of previous litters, and the stud dog, to ask about temperament and any potential issues. If you’ve got two reasonably healthy parent breeds, says O’Neill, you should get a reasonably healthy puppy. 
At the end of the day, however, “a dog is a dog – a sentient being that should be able to run around, breathe properly, eat, curl up to sleep and bend around to be able to lick its backside,” says O’ Neill. “Unfortunately we’ve bred dogs who can’t do this – a French bulldog can’t bend round to lick its bum, or curl up to sleep. We’re breeding dogs that aren’t really dogs, they’re something else.” 
So maybe don’t worry too much about whatever extraordinary combination your hound supposedly is (Abracadoodle anyone?). If it looks like a dog, acts like a dog and doesn’t ruin your life, perhaps that’s good enough.