And the Beat Goes On

A number of years ago, I sold a beautiful F1B Labradoodle male to a lady in Florida who was just getting her own breeding program up and running. Several years later, she bought an F1 female from me. Neither of them was a parti, but most of my stuff has parti in the background. And here's Lucy, one of the pups those two dogs produced, obviously proof that the parti is still in progress!

I don't have a clue who the Chihuahua is!

JB's pups
I know many of you have been thinking about it, but someone asked about the effect of moving the pups from Virginia to Tennessee at any early age. (Thanks, Stephanie, for giving me the opportunity to get my thoughts together!)

I am of the opinion that puppies need to stay with their litter for much longer than most of them normally get to... that's where they learn to be dogs. So often with "hypo-allergenic" breeds/mixes, pups go into situations where there are no other dogs and never learn dog etiquette. I really don't have room (or the inclination) to add a mama with young pups to my zoo right now, so waiting for them to not NEED Kate is the only way I could do this. JB's pups are being weaned the same way mine are... they're allowed to eat as much dry kibble as they want while their mom comes and goes as much as she wants. Actually, JB has an advantage as she has only 2 other dogs in the house and can fix the puppy pen so Kate can get in and out at will. Here, poor Cotton is
either locked in or locked out because I don't want any of my "rescues" venturing in with the pups and possibly hurting them. Once JB's pups are obviously getting their nourishment from dog food rather than mom, they'll come here. (There are a couple reliable signs that pups are weaned... mom's milk starts to dry up AND she stops cleaning up after them.) I have a number of "puppy sitters," male and female, who will be all too happy to adopt these 5 and give them all the "parental" guidance, comfort and protection Kate would. Like many breeders, JB lets her pups go to their new homes around 10 weeks (which is about 3 weeks longer than she kept them before she met me!) so they will be pretty much on her usual schedule. Because the whole litter will be together the whole time, none of them should be traumatized by the
move.

For those of you familiar with most of my dogs, my main puppy sitters are Shadow (the standard Poodle,) Ravin (my 100 pound "retired" Lab lady) and Brogue (who just happens to be granddad to JB's pups as well as dad to Cotton's.) A couple of the "rescues" who are actually now long term residents, are also pup-friendly... like Mija (the 12+ year old Chihuahua) and Ennis (the Malti-Poo guy who likes pups best when they are the same size he is.) Lotus (now my only Shar-Pei) snarls and growls at them and none of them is ever the least intimidated because they know she doesn't mean it.