Last Updated on Friday, 11 November 2011 21:37

Purchasing a puppy is a very serious matter. No matter where you will be buying a Golden (and not a Golden) - here or from another breeder - read this post. It will help you with your purchase.   

 We've already talked about the importance of parents' clearances on hips, elbows, eyes and hearts. Hip dysplasia, elbow dysplasia, various eye problems and heart disease are very common inherited health issues in Golden Retrievers for which there are screening examinations. GRCA recommends breeders perform standard health screening tests for these on their breeding stock. 

All puppies are cute - but DON'T BUY A HEARTACHE! Confirm, confirm, confirm. When you pick up your puppy, ask to see the original documents for the litter parents. The breeder should be able to provide the original documents from OFA and CERF for at least the Dam - in our case, where we do not own the Sire, we will provide you with Leia's original documents and Sire's copies. 

"History" of OFA certifications (grandparents, great-grandparents, etc.) doesn't count. Sire & Dam of your puppy must be certified. Not uncle, or brother, or grandma, or someone else.

You can also go to http://www.offa.org and check out the results for both Leia and Mr DJ.

Here are the links for you:

Leia clearances 

Mr DJ clearances

Why is this important? In our age of photo-editing software, anyone can fake out any certificate, and email you anything you want.

I am not tooting my own horn, but stating the facts.

We’ve done all our health exams, they were costly, time-consuming, nerve-wrecking and required extensive traveling. If Leia didn’t pass any of her tests, I would spay her immediately and start treatment for whatever she failed – it could’ve been heart, eyes, hip or elbow joints! Can you imagine vet bills for those? One hip replacement costs around $6000. Sounds very expensive. Do you want to take a chance? And how about seeing a suffering dog with hip dysplasia? (Pictures from internet search) Poor dogs!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Luckily, Leia passed everything with great results! And your puppy will get good hips and good elbows, because the dogs we clear for breeding are absolutely healthy.

Most (read 80%) of those who breed do not do those tests. Look at Pennsylvania puppies (no offense, PA, but you are a puppy mill state). Yes, they are cheaper - $850 for a puppy. You can even get one for $350. BUT… Well, you know the “but” part – no one ever checked if the Dam’s hip joints are falling out of the sockets, or if she has heart murmur, or if she is half-way blind… Why bother? The pups are so cute! All puppies are cute, but they will grow up eventually. 

 Obviously, if they are stuck in a dirty crate, that's a bad sign. When you get out of there, call Animal Control. Safely confined by a playpen in a clean, well-lit, warm part of the room inside the breeder's house - NOT in a garage, a tiny laundry room, or narrow hallway, or something like that! - is perfectly fine. Pups and Mom should be in a place with people. Look at this pictures I pulled off the internet:

I find these conditions absolutely unacceptable. Straw? Wood shavings? I guess this way the poop from 10 puppies is less visible. But it's still there. On puppies bellies, paws, etc. I don't need to draw you a picture. But that's only one part. How about just normal humane approach? I would totally lose it if my Leia had to spend a night in a place like that. Would you buy a $2000 puppy from these people? If yes, then you are crazy. Spend your 2 thousand at a psychiatrist. It's a joke) Well, actually not. While garage seems like a perfect spot for a litter of pups (easier to clean floors, etc.), the real deal is this: it's too cold there in winter, it's too hot there in summer, there's not much interaction with humans, it's dusty there, there's oil, antifreeze and other chemical spots on the floor. When the garage is chosen as a place for pups, it means only one thing - "I can let them make a mess and I won't have to worry about my carpets and smell".

Now, think about it - if you don't have to worry about puppies making a mess, you can let them go on "messy" for longer time, meaning all that mess going to get on their paws, bellies, etc. When the breeder have pups inside, you bet the breeder will clean everything immediately. Yes, everyone likes clean floors and nice smelling carpet, and no stench in the air, so yes, we will be cleaning non-stop. But this tells you that your puppy have never had his place dirty, wet, in unsanitary conditions. Right? Right. Smart breeder will not worry about the carpet too much, because he/she will use protective floor mats that hold the liquids. But - seeing puppies constantly, the breeder (a good one!) will always clean up the mess right away.

I have two special full size mink blankets for Leia and her pups. When Leia is whelping, we have her in her whelping spot on top of many bath towels, and we have a stack of them right next to us, just in case - to dry out puppies, etc. Not some old dirty pile of fabric. Clean usable normal towels. When she is done whelping, we take all those towels and throw them away, and put down a nice mink blanket, that is thick, warm and comfortable. Why mink blankets? Because comforters with stuffing inside can be dangerous for pups. So, while the pups are with me, every morning I take the blanket they've been sleeping on, stick it into the laundry, and put down the second blanket. In the evening, I take the one they've been using during daytime, stick it in the laundry, and change it with the clean, dry, nice-smelling blanket # 1.

Another thing to consider: when I read “raised under foot”, it gives me shivers. Why? Because I personally know that tiny babies running around the house, roaming on their own – is not a good thing! Chewing on wires (Leia chewed up my laptop power cord the first day she appeared in our family – luckily, it wasn’t plugged), getting into the way of adult humans and – what’s mostly scary – kids! Kids slam doors, run without looking, do things without thinking, drop things, spill things, and so on… (I sound like Dr Seuss here)... Therefore, our puppies, after weaning, are confined to a large 20 x 25 feet room that we use quite often, but in the way that we don't interfere with the babies. They see us, we see them, we give them scratches, kisses, etc. every time we pass by. They get their attention, socialization, noises, sounds, smells, new experiences, etc., but in a safe way. This way – we surely see what’s going on in there at any point, but we have no chance of accidentally stepping on a puppy or flipping him over, or dropping something on a little guy. Will a breeder tell you that he stepped on a baby’s paw and the puppy needed medical attention when he was 4 weeks? No. I am all for not allowing that to happen to begin with.

Puppies raised on a farm with cows and horses. Be careful! Cows and horses may have internal parasites that are extremely dangerous for dogs.

Puppies raised on newspapers... Oh, you are going to have all the newspapers in your house soaking wet with dog pee long after the pup comes from your breeder.

Curling tails. Yes, you’ve noticed I mentioned it several times throughout the website. Well, you want a Golden, right? You don’t want a mix. If you want a mix, skip this paragraph. Remember for the rest of your life: Golden tail never ever ever ever curls over the back. No matter if the dog is excited, or hunting, or in its prey-drive, or happy, or just hyper – it never rolls over the back of a Golden. If it does, the dog is not a Golden, which tells you that the quality of the breeding was very questionable. Why would someone intentionally breed a dog with a fault? AKC registration doesn’t mean quality, it means “recorded pedigree”. Tail structure is one of the distinguished features in many breeds, such as German Shepherds, St Bernards, Goldens, and others (unless specified by standard, of course, like Eskimos, or Chow-chows, for instance). Many dogs have been disqualified just because of the curling tail. It is a sure way to tell if you are being cheated. Maybe just unknowingly, which means the breeder has no idea about the breed standard and you shouldn’t buy a dog from them to begin with. Click on a picture to view larger photo.

EXAMPLES of POORLY BRED GOLDEN RETRIEVER TAIL:

EXAMPLES OF WELL BRED GOLDEN RETRIEVER TAIL:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Be careful with breeders who only sell pups on limited registration. Yes, I know, you've heard otherwise. Well, so, it's okey for them to breed, and not okey for anyone else? Wrong answer. We have allowed to monopolize DOGS and turned dog sport, companionship and breeding beautiful canines into a business in this country. It shouldn't be done like this.

What is breeding? What is it done for? Breeding a dog should be done with the purpose of improving the gene pool, improving the breed, right? But how can you improve the breed if all your offsprings are spayed/neutered? There is no improvement whatsoever. There is no progress, because your puppy with its supposedly breed-improving features will not be able to produce even better breed-improving offsprings. Know this fundamental truth of canine world: the value of a breeder raises proportionally to the number of champions he bred. It doesn't make sense if a breeder won't consider selling one of his pups with full registration to the right people. That's first.

Second, if a breeder breeds only with limited registration, he doesn't have to really worry about things like curling tails, high-sitting ears, light-color pigmentation (not to be confused with American Golden pink nose in cold seasons) and so on... He doesn't have to worry that a judge at a confirmation show will disqualify the dog, he doesn't have to produce dogs up to the Breed Standard. The dog has limited registration - no official will ever say anything! So he can throw two dogs in and wait for pups to arrive...

Another reason the breeder sells with limited registration only is prevention of competition because they are afraid to lose their piece of the pie (read - money). Well, first of all, breeding for money is just another subject. Second, I do not understand that. I truly believe if you breed with careful considerations and devotion, if you do it right and as a result, you have excellent puppies, no competition is a threat to you or your breeding program. This comes directly from point one. Look at Dewmist kennels in Europe, Moondust (we're proud offsings of), and so on. If breeder allows full registration, it means that he cares of what features he breeds and that he strives for perfection. The better the puppies - the higher are the chances for them to become Champions, breeder's value in a canine world raises dramatically, and that's when people know that his puppies are top-notch. What competition? I can't wait to add to our website a page that says "Bred by Us" with a list of Champions! Looking forward to it!

Be careful with English Cream Goldens that are advertised as "show-quality". Have you noticed that there are absolutely no AKC champions among English Cream Goldens? I have, and I spent a lot of time researching this "phenomenon". I always wondered: how come breeders import these beautiful Goldens and never show them off? Well, first, once again - they only imported them to make money. Honestly. Look at this obsession with English Cream! Soon there will be no golden Goldens left at all. Second, no one had any intentions of showing them, and the third...

Here is the answer for you: well, first, English Cream Golden Retrievers are heavily penalized at the AKC dog shows because they have a coat which is way too light for the AKC Standard and because English Creams don’t comply with height requirements (they are shorter than American Goldens), and this requirement is especially tough on girls! English Cream girls are so… tiny! When I saw English Cream golden girls for the first time, I thought they were young pups! That’s how tiny they are – full grown females!

But because I am planning on showing, I started researching, and while doing that, I started asking myself   - “Why are there absolutely no English Cream champions in the USA?” Well, I surely found out, and my wish for such a puppy disappeared the second I received the news. I let the breeder know that I do not want the puppy. Yes, the pup was cute and everything, but why would I want a dog that I am not going to be able to show? It takes a lot to get to an international dog show where they are acceptable. That’s the bad thing for English Creams: they can only count on something in International Dog Shows. Such events don’t happen very often in the USA since AKC isn't even a member of FCI and usually require quite a travel (abroad, mostly). In addition, such dog shows are based on invitations only and have strict selective admission. And most dogs must start showing from local kennel clubs. What is this - failure to launch? Why would I do this to myself intentionally?

The thing I am trying to say is that you, as a consumer, should be able to make an informed decision! International shows are hard to get into, and for most of them (I mean REAL dog shows, not something like ContKC or IABCA shows, the ones with good reputation and the ones where you actually compete) you’ve got to have some titles before you can get to an International Dog Show. Yes, the dog is pretty, but there’s plenty of other breeds that has almost-white color as a standard.

Second, many English Cream breeders think that being beautiful and in demand is all what counts, have no intentions to show their dog and don't even bother to get health clearances. Why would they? They already have buyers lined up through the door due to this “fashion-obsession”. That’s what I call a rip-off.