Raising tiny dogs is not new to her. She has 25. She even built a sunroom on the back of her house for the dogs.

But having one of her dogs in the Guinness Book of World Records is new to Lana Elswick.

Elswick, of Raceland, has been breeding tiny toy longhaired Chihuahuas for 19 years.

“I don’t breed that many now,” she said. “Some are too old and some are so tiny I bottle fed them, and fell in love with them. I just don’t believe in breeding them to death or inbreeding.”

But this year, one of her tiny dogs, Boo Boo, was accepted into the Guinness Book of World Records as the world’s smallest dog in height.

“I had one before, her name was Miracle,” she said. “The vet said if she lived it would be a miracle and she did, so that’s how she got her name.”

Miracle lived 10 years, but Elswick just never thought about putting her in the Guinness Book of World records.

Raising small dogs can be a challenge, she said. Boo Boo almost died twice.

“So many little dogs get hypoglycemia,” Elswick said. “There’s a product called Pet Nutra drops and this is the stuff that brought her right back around. When you squirt this into their mouth it goes directly into their blood stream.”

Elswick had to feed her with an eyedropper every two hours for the first week before her little mouth could nurse a bottle.

“Boo was about the size of my thumb when she was born,” she said.

The tiny puppy was one year old in April and she weighs about 1 pound 4 ounces. She couldn’t be entered into the running until after she was one year old.

Elswick found out through one of her customers about the search for the smallest dog.

“A lady in Illinois that bought a puppy from me e-mailed and said she saw the little dogs on the Internet,” Elswick said. “She said she knew I had the smallest dogs.”

At an annual spring fling event in May at the Ashland-Boyd County Dog Park, she had Boo Boo measured officially.

“Terri Tomondi did the measuring,” she said. “She’s a vet tech and also a notary and could officially measure the dog.”

But, according to the rules, Elswick had to get witnesses for the measuring and a statement from the veterinarian on Boo Boo’s birth date.

She also had to have a video made.

“I didn’t send it in until June and I looked on the Internet and a dog named Dusty was named the smallest dog,” Elswick said.

But, when officials saw little Boo Boo, she was declared the smallest dog in the world in height.

On Sept. 10, Elswick got an e-mail from one of the officials at the Guinness Book of World Records telling her that Boo Boo was official and on Sept. 22, she received a certificate.

“I just kept quiet about it until recently,” she said.