Lab Breeder Recommendations

[Westfork]

Hello Forum.

After a few years of hiatus I'm getting back into Duck/Upland hunting and am hoping for some recommendations on a good Lab Breeder.

I'm located in Eastern Washington but any part of the start will do if you have had great experience with a good breeder.

[h20hunter]

@Goldeneye

Ireland Farms comes to mind

[Woodchuck]

@CoryTDF

[kselkhunter]

PM sent

[mossyoak arrow slinger]

Morgans point ranch. 


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[Westfork]

Thanks for your help guys, I'm doing my research on your recomendations.

[follow maggie]

I got Maggie from Cougar Creek Labs in Arlington. Great dog- quiet & mellow around the house, great with kids & she was hell on birds when she was young. I’ll get another from there. 

http://www.cougarcreek-k9.com/

[Naches Sportsman]

http://www.rattlingridgelabs.com

[Happy Gilmore]

Laura Nordberg who is located in Boise area has a real nice litter on the ground right now. Look her up on Facebook or PM me for cell number.

[Commando]

Lee salmon at wind river retrievers, rattling ridge retrievers or tiger mtn pointing labs. I'd look At one of those three

[bigmacc]

LaBrook Labs, Culdesac Idaho.....

[Happy Gilmore]

I know of a nice little year+ old pup from a good breeding with a full winter and summer of training by Jim Gonia for sale for around $5K. Probably has $10K of training. Very nice disposition and sweet female. For about double the price of a good pup you could have one that is almost handling and had more birds killed for it than the average 3-4 year old hunting dog.

Ford x Chic puppy.

[Westfork]

[quote ]
 Pups
[/quote]

Thanks guys, I found a pup, male, block head, strong shoulders, big feet.

I'll have to be handling the training myself, but a damn, good looking, little pup.

[Smokepole]

I recently did a lot of scouting to find a new lab.  Ended up here & happy I did. 

https://www.duckdog.com/

[Happy Gilmore]

I recently did a lot of scouting to find a new lab.  Ended up here & happy I did. 

https://www.duckdog.com/

Diane is a great lady. Neighbors to one of my friends too.

[Crunchy]

I am a new lab owner.  Have a 10 week old silver lab.  Anything special about the silver labs other than the color?  So far she has been a good pup.  Very smart dog.

[Netminder01]

I have my 20 mo old chocolate puppy from Kingland Labs outside of Puyallup.  http://www.kingslandlabradors.com/Home.html

I've been happy with the process and attention to detail. These labs are on the smaller side; at least mine is but she's powerful, smart and birdy. We'll see how she does this year but she's all trained up for water blind retrieves.

[Happy Gilmore]

I am a new lab owner.  Have a 10 week old silver lab.  Anything special about the silver labs other than the color?  So far she has been a good pup.  Very smart dog.

As a general rule, there is no such thing as a silver lab unfortunately. Those who sell the dilute chocolates which come out in that color often experience a lot of health issues which most commonly start with food and skin allergies.

[scottcrb]

Lee salmon at wind river labs

[Westfork]

As a general rule, there is no such thing as a silver lab unfortunately. Those who sell the dilute chocolates which come out in that color often experience a lot of health issues which most commonly start with food and skin allergies.

I researched the whole silver lab controversy and din't find anything relating to health issues.

I understand the belief that labs only come in three colors, and support it, but it's just a color due to genetics.

[WRL]

Did you research Color Dilution Alopecia? Fairly common with the dilute labs.

And as Paul said, allergies can be significant in the dilute labs also.

Good luck with your puppy.

WRL

[Westfork]

Did you research Color Dilution Alopecia? Fairly common with the dilute labs.

And as Paul said, allergies can be significant in the dilute labs also.

Good luck with your puppy.

WRL

Why so much hate?

[scottcrb]

I don't think it's hate. Just want you to be educated and know what your getting yourself into. I really wanted a silver lab originally they are awesome looking . All the research just pointed to too many downsides. That being said you could end up with a totally healthy and great working dog. Best of luck to you. Either way it's a lot of work but it's fun and worth it.

[Westfork]

I don't think it's hate. Just want you to be educated and know what your getting yourself into. 

I looked into the health issues, I don't see it as common to Labs as other dog breeds.

In fact, most studies show it as fairly uncommon.

A lot of the concern seems to be more that there is resistance to wrongly colored labs than actual experience.

Life is a crap shoot anyway.

I grew up with weimaraners so I'm used to blue dogs.

[WRL]

Even though Weims are blue dogs, they rarely suffer from color dilution alopecia. Fairly common in dilute colored labs. As many as half suffer from it.

If you are happy with your purchase then great, but you did state you looked into health issues and didn't really find anything.

That other thing with most dilute Lab breeders, they don't do health testing like OFA hips/elbows/eyes or the DNA tests on common disorders like EIC/CNM/PRA/RD/OSD. Many will tell you that their dogs are "healthy" and "vet checked" but that is not the same thing as doing their due diligence to produce healthy puppies. Many dogs that "appear" healthy are ticking time bombs especially when you breed to other untested dogs.

Every purchase of a puppy is a risk, but reducing that risk with some relatively inexpensive testing is just being a good breeder.

Like I said, good luck. Not saying that sarcastically....I hope in fact you have a healthy puppy. It sucks to have something go wrong with a family member.

WRL

[Happy Gilmore]

Nobody hates your puppy. Not in the slightest. Most hate the fact silver breeders discredit facts associated with dilute x dilute breedings and the high potential for health problems. I've been around quite a few of them and I don't want owners to think I "hate" their dogs. This isn't the case. It isn't the dogs fault.

Be prepared. All which I have been around have skin allergies and food allergies. Do non-silvers have these issues? Most certainly. Just not at the frequency one would hope to have through careful breeding practices. As Lee said, nobody wants to see a pup unhealthy or has bad wishes against the pups.

Not to mention the increased price tag for a color rather than a set of parents which have been rigorously health tested to attempt to produce the healthiest pup possible. That's what you want to pay for, not a color which is a bit different from other similar dogs.