We’re getting a puppy!

I was just telling my readers at Tricia’s Musings that we’re going to be putting a small dent in our checking account later this week when we buy a new puppy!

I’m so excited!

We’re going to drive out of town on Friday evening to go and see a couple who breed Labrador Retrievers. If all goes well we’ll be coming home with an exactly 11 week old puppy. The pups were born on September 7th, one day after my own birthday. If we do get one of the pups it won’t be hard for me to remember it’s birthday, we’ll celebrate together.

At this time the breeder has five pups. I think three are black and two are yellow. I haven’t decided if I have a preference of the dogs sex or color yet. My husband doesn’t have a preference right now either. We’ve decided that we’ll go and see the pups, hopefully we’ll still have a choice between the five as I don’t know if there are any other people heading out to that farm this week to pick up a pup, and we’ll see which one responds to use best and which one we like best. Hopefully we’ll both want the same one!

Yesterday evening, while we were still deciding if we’d drive out to where the pups are, we went to the Toronto Humane Society to look at the dogs waiting to be adopted. As I said in my post on Tricia’s Musings we’d originally thought about rescuing a dog in need of a new home, but the majority of dogs in rescues are older and I truly wanted the puppy experience. Still, we looked at all the dogs at the Humane society and I was right – most are between 7 and 12 years of age and many have behavioral problems as well as health problems. I’m not opposed to caring for an animal with problems, I’ve done it for years with reptiles, but with my own current health problems I think it would be best to have a healthy yet energetic new pet.

There was one 11 month old German Shepherd mix at the Humane Society that I did stop to consider adopting. He was so cute!

The Lab pup rules though. I sure hope we are happy with the conditions at the farm where they are currently living. The couple who has the pups breeds their dogs as a hobby and their dogs are registered with the Canadian Kennel Club and their pups will be too.

If you have a Labrador Retriever I’d love to hear your experiences, especially the puppy stage ones!