great post, i cant count the amount of times people would ask me is your dog a teacup...lord i have seen so many sellers on craigslist post them as micro tea cups...i think they will say anything 2 sell. Love your post!

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Thanks for resurrecting this thread...I'd not seen it before!

I can only say that it p's me off as well when people ask me if LeStat is a 'teacup chihauhau, considering he's not even a pure chi, simply because he's so small. Much the same as whe people call him a jakahauhau....for gods sake he's a very small chihauhau x jack russell terrier not a 'teacup' anything or a jakahauhau either!

I agree with one or two posts, I've not read all the way through yet, saying how delicate they can be as well. Also how scary it is to realise how small your pup is going to be, he's around 2lbs 8ozs-2lbs 15ozs depending on his eating habits, he lives with a rottweiller and two other dog who are both bigger than him although still in the 'toy' bracket.
We have to prevent ay playing with LeStat just in case they get too rough....we even have to stop the damned cats playing with him as they have sent him reeling across the floor before now! It looks hilarious but we're frightened he could get hurt.
We expected him to be around 10lbs, adult weight, when I bought him for my daugher so him being so small came as a big surprise and in fact scared my daughter so much she actually asked us to have him back when he was a year old!

I'd never choose to have such a small dog again, I didn't choose to have him be so small, it gets me down how some breeders exploit the poor things.

Hmm, my Twiggy is 2 pounds, 14 oz and she gets around on three legs and she plays with any other dog she likes. Right now she plays with Delilah, a little under 6 pounds and Babushka, the puppy and Billy, 6 pounds. She even plays tug-a-war with Marmalade and Isis, 13 and 18 pounds respectively, and holds her own. They are tougher than you think. She lets them know if they are getting too much, she is the diva of the pack. She even tries to keep up with all of them when they are outside doing zoomies. She doesn't like the lab/pit mix much, so she doesn't play with him, but she does bark at him as he leaves the dog room. She is fearless.

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Thank you Jan for the wonderful siggy!

I agree Pam my Holly is still under a pound but she holds her ground to my 12 lb chi and my 13 and 15 pound cats lol..

LeStat will 'hold his ground' but we are worried that the bigger dogs will hurt him when they play roughly among themselves.

If they play 'just' with LeStat it's not so bad but we don't allow more than one to have a playtime with him at any one time and we do make sure it doesn't get too rough.
I think as we have never had such a small dog before, even though I've owned, rescued and cared for dogs for well over 30 years, we worry about him being hurt and would rather prevent it than cope with the aftermath.
None of my other dogs would purposefully hurt him but they run around like loonies at times and a 9 stone rottweiller running down the stairs chasing a jrt could easily kill LeStat if he fell over him! The jrt is sturdy enough to cope with the rottie but I doubt LeStat is!
Saxon, the rottie, will lay down and allow LeStat to play with his head or chew on his ears, he even pulls at his jowls, we don't allow him to 'play' with him as such though.
They go in the garden together, supervised, to do their toileting but again they don't run around or jump about.

We're probably being too protective but it's taken so long to stop worrying about him not eating I think it's going to take a good bit longer to let them play together.
We even worry when the cats do get to play with him because they bowl him across the floor!

I get so tired of ppl telling storys of their mom's teacup or their grandma standard size. I want to pull out my hair when they look at me like I'm so dumb for not knowing about the different types of chi's. I think I will Photo copy your post and hand it out to ppl.

It worked. I am really tired of boutique breeds and breeders. All these "oodle" dogs . . . and teacups for runts. Oh, I think little Chis are adorable, too, but bad breeders hold them up as something special when they're just little, little tykes.

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Usually with some sort of issues as well!

Be it temperament or eating there's usually something that 'makes' them so small!