Hi

I am looking for a breeder who will have labrador puppies available from August, preferable chocolate brown to go to a loving family home.  Please email lynne.kearney@cancer.org.

I live in Surrey but would be willing to travel.

Many Thanks
Lynne

Hi Lynne, the best thing to do, I think, would be to ring up the secretary of your nearest Labrador breed club. Details of the breed clubs can be found on the Kennel Club website. www.the-kennel-club.org.uk  once there click on breed standards, then gundog group, then Labrador Retriever. At the bottom of the standard is a list of all the breed clubs.

I have no doubt that somewhere you will find a good Labrador of the colour you want, however there are a enormous amount of people breeding the chocolate colour simpy because it is popular among the pet buying public. These people are only interested in the money that can be made, and are breeding poor specimens due to lack of care and knowledge in their breeding programmes.

Can I encourage you to ask every breeder you contact for a look at the up to date eye test certificates for both parents. The sire's certificate may well be a copy as he might not live at the same place. The certificate should indicate that the parents are unaffected by any of the listed eye conditions. In addition, also ask to see the hip score certificates, the breed mean score for Labradors is 15, as of 10/01/05. Both parents should have scores ideally under 15. Hip scores are calculated from 0-53 on each hip, and are given like this 11/9 or 7/5.One figure for left and one for right. Adding the two figures together gives the score, the lower the score the better.

I do hope you find a well bred healthy puppy soon. There are some knowledgable Labrador people here on Champdogs, so please think about joining us, it's free to register and you could talk alot more about Labs and dogs in general.

You might be wondering why you need to consern yourself with hip scores and eye tests, when you want a puppy just to love. Well what you should be looking for is the healthiest puppy you can find, so you can love it for a long and healthy, happy lifetime. Not risking a short and painful life when you can do something to possibly avoid that.

Dawn R.