BRITISH dog lovers are flocking to buy a new wave of “hot cross” pets in which old varieties are cross-bred to produce new and exotic animals.

Breeds include the puggle, which combines the cuddly qualities of the pug with the energy of a beagle. A labradoodle puppy, a cross between a labrador and a poodle, changes hands for about £700, a £200 premium on the cost of an ordinary labrador.

Buyers of the new dogs are following a fashion set by Hollywood stars such as Sylvester Stallone and James Gandolfini, star of The Sopranos. Both actors are puggle owners. Graham Norton, the TV presenter, says he wants a labradoodle.

British owners say that choosing the new breeds allows them to hand-pick animals which combine the best qualities of traditional varieties.

“I get people calling left and right for them,” said one breeder who declined to be identified, equating them to high fashion accessories. “Basically you get the equivalent of crossing a Marc Jacobs handbag with a Louis Vuitton.”

On the internet, would-be owners offer high sums for puggles. Matthew Hall, 25, and Michelle Boswell, 24, from Redcar, Cleveland, have been searching for a month and are willing to pay as much as £600. “We first saw a picture of a puggle on the internet and instantly fell in love,” said Hall. “We don’t seem to be able to find one at the moment so we decided to place our own ‘wanted’ ad. There seems to be a real demand.”

The price does not worry them. “It does seem expensive, but it’s not a lot for the perfect dog,” said Hall.

Puggles and labradoodles — originally bred in Australia as a guide dog for blind people allergic to dog hair — are not the only popular hybrids with peculiar names. Others include the cockapoo (a cocker spaniel-poodle cross), pekeapoo (pekinese and poodle), shepadoodle (german shepherd and poodle), bullmatian (bulldog and dalmatian) and labradinger (labrador and springer spaniel).

Katherine Goodrich, from Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, recently bought a dalmatian-border collie cross for her five-year-old son. “When our jack russell died, Patrick wanted to get a dalmatian,” she said. “I was worried we wouldn’t be able to handle that, because dalmatians can be hard work and a bit scatty.”

She looked for a dalmatian cross, and the first she found was a dalmatian-border collie, known as a dollie. “He’s very big, but he’s never growled at Patrick, was easy to train and is well behaved. Having a crossbreed has allowed us to have the perfect dog for the family.”

Experts say the vogue for crossed breeds represents one of the most radical shifts in dog breeding in at least 200 years.

The Kennel Club registers more than 200,000 pedigree dogs every year. These include 203 breeds, categorised in seven groups: hounds, gundogs, terriers, utility, working, pastoral and toys. Only after popular crosses have become established, and research has been carried out into the historical background, health and temperament, will the Kennel Club recognise them as new breeds.

Most modern breeds have been developed in the past 200 years for specific needs. The doberman, for instance, was first bred around a century ago, by Louis Dobermann, a German tax collector who needed a dog to protect him on his rounds. It is thought that rottweilers, great danes, manchester terriers and greyhounds all contributed genes.

These days cross-breeding is all about having a small dog. At least half of the most popular breeds registered with the Kennel Club are small. Large dogs, such as the golden retriever and the german shepherd, are becoming less popular.

There is concern that the money to be made from fashionable cross-breeds is attracting unskilled or unscrupulous operators. Dogs Today magazine has warned of possible genetic disasters. Crossing a newfoundland and a St Bernard, for example, could generate a giant crippled by hip dysplasia, a disorder common in both breeds.

Crossing a pug and a pekinese has produced an animal with such a distorted face that its eyes kept popping out. Clarissa Baldwin, chief executive of the Dogs Trust, warned: “Dogs are not fashion accessories, they’re living beings.”

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