How do you get papers on a rescue dog?

I have seen some talk that there is a test to determine what breed a dog is, presumably used on mixed breeds. It's the kind of test that just made me go "Um, why?" To me, it's something useless to spend your money on (if you own a mixed breed.) Anyway, it's not anything that is going to make your dog registerable. The legitimate national organizations (AKC, Cdn KC, etc) need much more than that.

Everyone thinks they have the best dog you could ever have. And that sure doesn't make them worthy of breeding! The problem is that you have no idea if your dog is a genetic fluke. He might pass his own health tests for eg but have siblings/parents/ancestors who didn't or who couldn't. In other words, he can still carry a whole host of problems (both health and temperament) of which you have no knowledge. In this day and age, we owe more to the puppies we produce and to the people who buy them. We should take every precaution in order to breed the best. We should be breeding with complete knowledge of the family tree (pedigree). We have states out there that have puppy lemon laws - you can literally be held fiscally responsible these days if you produce and sell problem puppies. In your situation, you'd be fully responsible because you would be breeding your dog without important information needed to prevent problems.

puppy lemon laws? what's that?

Puppy Lemon Laws protect buyers that end up with problems in the dogs they have bought.

In addition to what everybody else said, you would want to know his lineage to make sure you aren't inbreeding him to a cousin or something, which increases the chances of genetic faults and diseases showing up in the pups.

You CAN get a very limited kind of registration with the AKC, by taking a frontal photo and side photo of your dog along with stating the suspected breed. If they deem that your dog "appears" to be purebred, you can get very limitd registration upon showing them proof of neuter/spay. This does not allow you to show, but it does allow you compete your dog in AKC field events as the breed it looks like.

We toyed with the idea of doing this with our shepherd, but she ended up being stolen before we got the chance.

I can't find the original AKC page that detailed the process, but here is a link to a pit rescue that kind of explains it if you are interested.

http://www.workingpitbull.com/Rescuesports.html

you can get your dog an ILP and take him to compete in some AKC sponsored events to get a feel for showing and see if it is for you. This is what I reccomend for new people to the dog world. Showing is a lot of work and money and not for everyone. This is a good way to learn to handle your pet in events and can be more fun then showing too.
Here is the site to get info on getting your JRT an ilp and not worrying about linage or papers other then these
http://www.akc.org/index.cfm?nav_area=homepage

I am glad you decided not to breed him. If you did get his ILP for AKC he would be a PRT. And you would only be able to show him in agility, obedience, rally, and earthdog (I think PRT can?) I'm not sure how you go about getting an ILP because I have dogs bred into AKC (not sure how to explain it cause pedigree is just a paper that says your dogs parents 4 lines back so a mix could have a pedigree)

Did we lose her?

It's also not that accurate right now. A friend sent in a DNA sample from her dog, but did NOT send in the photo they requested. IE no cheating and sending her results based on the dogs phenotype. The dog looks like a Malinois and is probably some sort of Malinois and/or GSD mix.

The DNA test came back that the main breed in the dog was Bernese Mountain Dog :yikes:

They are supposed to be adding more breeds to the list, and maybe later it will be more accurate, but we'll see.