A Yorkshire mill dog and a Mediterranean companion
The Yorkiechon crosses a Yorkshire Terrier with a Bichon Frise, and the two sides of it come from opposite ends of Europe and opposite ends of dog work.
The Yorkshire Terrier is an industrial dog. It was put together in the mill towns of Yorkshire and Lancashire in the middle of the nineteenth century, largely by Scottish weavers who had come south for work and brought their small terriers with them — the Paisley, the Clydesdale and the Skye are the names usually given. The job was rats, in the mills and the mines, and the dog had to be small enough to go where a person could not. A dog called Huddersfield Ben, born in 1865, is the sire behind the modern breed. Within a generation the same terrier had moved out of the mill and onto a Victorian lady’s lap, which is a fair summary of how quickly people worked out what else it was good at.
The Bichon Frise came the other way. It belongs to the old barbichon family of white Mediterranean companion dogs, the same group behind the Maltese and the Bolognese. It travelled the Spanish and Italian trade routes with sailors, spent a long stretch as a court favourite in Spain and France, and when court fashion moved on it turned up in the street and the circus, where a talent for learning tricks kept it employed. Centuries of being bred purely for company left a dog whose default setting is cheerful and sociable.
Cross the two and you get a small dog with the Bichon’s appetite for company and the terrier’s spark. Which side leads depends on the puppy, which is why people who like this cross pick an individual rather than a description.
Size, coat and colour
A Yorkshire Terrier is tiny — around seven to eight inches at the shoulder and up to seven pounds. A Bichon Frise is a good deal more substantial at nine and a half to eleven and a half inches and twelve to eighteen pounds. A Yorkiechon usually lands between the two, somewhere around nine to twelve inches and six to twelve pounds, and exactly where depends on the individual cross. Ask what the sire and dam finished at while you are standing in front of a puppy. It is the most useful number there is, and our staff can pull it up for you.
The build is compact and neat, with a rounded head, dark round eyes and a bright, interested expression. Ears sit either upright like the Yorkie’s or drop and disappear into the coat like the Bichon’s, and a fair few puppies carry one of each for a few weeks while they make up their minds.
The coat is soft and ranges from a loose wave to a light curl — longer and fuller than a Yorkie’s flat silk, less densely powder-puff than a Bichon’s. Colour opens right up: cream, white, gold, apricot, tan, black and tan, silver and parti-colour all turn up, sometimes in the same litter. Puppies born dark very often lighten as the adult coat comes through, so the colour at eight weeks is not the final answer.
Temperament and the household
A Yorkiechon is a small dog with a large social life. Most of them greet visitors as though they had personally invited them, get on with other dogs, and would rather be in the room where the people are than anywhere else in the house.
They are confident, which is the terrier coming through, and affectionate, which is the Bichon. The combination makes a dog that will spend the morning trotting after you from room to room and the evening pressed into the corner of the sofa, and it means a Yorkiechon is good company on an errand, at a café table or in the passenger seat.
They keep an eye on the front door and they will tell you about the mail carrier. Most owners settle it into a routine — a couple of barks, then come to me for a treat — and it becomes a small ritual the dog is visibly pleased with.
With children they are willing and fond of the attention, and they do best with kids who will sit on the floor and let the dog come to them. Give the dog a bed or a crate that stays its own and it will take itself off there when the house gets loud, which is a habit worth encouraging from the first week.
The coat as a weekly routine
Both parent coats hold onto their hair rather than dropping it, and a Yorkiechon does the same, which keeps the floors clear and puts the work into the brush. A slicker and a comb three or four times a week, worked in layers right down to the skin, is the whole job. The comb after the brush is what tells you whether you got there.
Do the fine hair first: behind the ears, under the collar, in the armpits and on the back of the legs. Ten minutes with a brush is ten minutes with the dog, and most of them go boneless partway through.
Most owners settle into a groomer’s appointment every six to eight weeks. Long and flowing with a topknot is one option and it looks lovely. A short all-over puppy trim with the face left round is the other, and in a warm climate it is what most people end up choosing. Either one is a proper style rather than a compromise.
A pale coat looks its best with a wipe around the eyes and muzzle with a damp cloth in the morning. Ears get wiped out when you groom. Nails every few weeks — you will hear them on a hard floor when they are ready. Teeth brushed as a matter of routine, and started early, because a puppy who decides the toothbrush is a game becomes an adult who stands still for it.
Training, and a day with one
Both parents are quick and both work for food, so short reward-based sessions get you a long way. Three minutes before dinner and two more while the kettle boils will build a sit, a down, a recall and a settle on a mat inside a few weeks. Pay well and stop while the dog still wants another go.
The most useful decision you can make is to train this dog the way you would train one that weighed sixty pounds. Four feet on the floor when greeting people, walking on a loose lead rather than being carried, settling on a mat while you eat. Small dogs are allowed a great deal simply because it is so easy to allow it, and the ones who learn the same rules as everyone else are much nicer company.
Housetraining runs on a schedule rather than a signal — small dog, short intervals. Go out with the puppy so you can reward the right thing in the right place, and think in months rather than weeks.
Then trick training, which suits this cross enormously; the Bichon side has genuine circus history behind it. Spin, paw, roll over and go-to-bed all come quickly, and a Yorkiechon will keep offering the routine long after the audience has moved on.
The day itself is easy. A walk in the cool part of the morning at a pace that allows for sniffing, a nap in a patch of sun near whoever is home, five minutes of brain work in the afternoon, a second walk when it cools off, and then the sofa.
Coming to meet the Yorkiechon puppies
Small fluffy puppies all look much the same in a photograph, and in this cross the differences that matter — coat texture, ear set, adult size, and how much terrier there is in the attitude — are things you read with a puppy in your hands.
Our Yorkiechon puppies come from our network of licensed breeders, and our team can tell you what a particular puppy’s parents were and what they finished at. We have a store in Orlando and one in Nashville, and you are welcome to sit on the floor with a puppy before deciding anything. Find directions and hours, and ask about financing while you are here. Every puppy here goes home with its vet records, its vaccination history and a health warranty, and our team will walk you through what those cover.