I volunteer as the lead moderator on a Golden Retriever forum and I see post after post after post that boil down to just one thing: unrealistic expectations. Puppy buyers often have preconceived notions about… well, everything. Most of those preconceived notions are incorrect. They come from internal biases, how things used to be, misinformation found on the internet, and the image in the mind’s eye of how things should be.
Unrealistic expectations lead to disappointment, discouragement, and frustration that can result in something as extreme as a returned puppy.
“It’s the [Wait] that Kills You”
Nearly every day, I see someone asking somewhere on social media for a reputable breeder with puppies available. Not puppies coming soon, not a waitlist, but puppies available. Right now. This a classic scenario of “You can’t have your cake and eat it too.” It’s nearly impossible to find an ethical breeder (health testing, showing, the whole shebang) with puppies available right now. You can find unethical breeders with ready-to-go puppies. That’s usually fairly easy. But an ethical breeder? It’s super rare.
Although, at the time of this writing, demand for puppies is way down and many ethical breeders actually do have available puppies. However, demand this low is not normal.
What should you expect when searching for an ethically bred puppy?
You should expect to wait. Be patient. Take your time looking for a breeder and prepare to wait 6-12 months or more. I know it’s especially hard to wait if you’ve recently lost a dog. The hole they leave aches so badly, that you just want to scoop up a baby puppy and let the healing begin.
Unrealistic Expectations of Breeders
I said in a previous post that responsible breeders are not a business and you are not a consumer. Recently, I changed my mind on the breeder/buyer relationship. Breeders are not a traditional business. They don’t have inventory ready to go. You can’t customize your order. I hesitate to say that responsible breeders are not a business at all because that sets the expectation that they shouldn’t make money from their litters. They absolutely should be able to make some return on their considerable investment.
So here’s how this not-a-traditional-business-model works:
- Responsible breeders are not breeding to make a product to sell. They breed for themselves.
- You probably do not get to choose your own puppy. You don’t know them like the breeder does.
- Puppies are not customizable. They are living, breathing beings with lots of love to give, not stuffed animals. This is not Build-A-Bear.
- When a breeder only breeds one or two litters per year, they are at the whims of nature:
- Females only come in season once every 6-9 months on average.
- Gestation takes 63 days + another 56 days+ (8+ weeks) for the puppies to be ready to go home.
- ^THIS is why there is a wait most of the time to get a puppy.
- Most responsible breeders do not breed dogs for a living – many have full time jobs (it’s me, hi!) outside of their breeding not-a-traditional-business.
- Because they don’t do this full time, they are not in the business of customer service. This means:
- They are not obligated to respond to you.
- They are not obligated to send constant “product” updates to you.
- If you seem like a lot of work, you might not get a puppy. Some breeders have more patience than others.
- A lot of breeders may or may not have updated websites. It’s not their area of expertise and they often don’t have time. You may have better luck with their socials, but it’s not guaranteed.
The Bottom Line (hint: it’s not money)
What it really boils down to is that most responsible breeders aren’t risking their bitches’ lives to make you happy. It’s to make the next generation in their breeding program, their next competition partner, maybe even their next heart dog. THAT’s why the focus isn’t on you as the buyer. Yes, money is exchanging hands, but like I said: This is NOT a traditional business model.
Puppies Can’t Be Custom Made
Not trying to harp on about custom made puppies, but here I am.
For example, when you ask a Golden breeder for a puppy with a long list of specific features, like: female, dark golden (or dog forbid “English Crème”), under 50 lb with moderate energy, sweet and cuddly, etc., you just annoy them. Golden breeders in particular get irritated when you ask for a specific color because 1) responsible Golden breeders don’t breed for color and 2) because they don’t breed for color, they don’t always know what they’ll get.
Additionally, breeders can’t control the sex distribution in their litters. They can’t control size either. Heritability of size is only somewhat predictable. And besides, under 50 lb is under breed standard size.
Unrealistic Expectations of Infants: There is No Perfect Puppy
Many puppy buyers – if they don’t have unrealistic expectations of what working with a breeder is like – definitely have unrealistic expectations of what the puppy will be like. When you spend 8 weeks looking at pictures and videos of precious puppy souls on social media, your rose colored glasses just get rosier and rosier. Puppies are undoubtedly some of the cutest baby animals on the planet, but you’re probably not seeing what the breeder is actually going through each day.
For Golden puppies, you aren’t seeing them tug on socks, shoes, pants, sleeves. Or maybe you are and you think it’s cute. You aren’t seeing how much puppies poop and the constant clean-up. The Behind-The-Scenes content is not nearly as fun as what makes it onto the internet. So, buyers tend to forget what hard work it is to have a puppy. You daydream about all of the cute, cuddly moments and how sweet puppies are and you forget.
Puppy Blues
You forget that puppies are 4-legged nightmares. And then you get the Puppy Blues. I’m not sure if it happens a lot in other breeds, but Puppy Blues are a big thing with Goldens. Golden Retriever puppies are some of the cutest and sweetest puppies on the planet. Especially well-bred ones from show lines, if I do say so myself. But, y’all, Golden puppies can be and often are absolute terrors.
I have seen, so many times, that Goldens are too sweet to use anything other than positive reinforcement with them. If I had used only one quadrant with Eevee, she would have bulldozed me.
So what are the puppy blues?
Puppy blues are when you get a puppy that pushes every single button you have when you weren’t expecting it. Puppy blues are almost always a symptom of unrealistic expectations. Maybe you had a super easy puppy the first time. Maybe you haven’t had a puppy in over a decade and you just forgot what it’s like. Or maybe, you weren’t matched with the right puppy.
Puppy blues can make you want to give up. They can put you at your wit’s end. Make you pull your hair out or want to give the puppy back.
Curing the Puppy Blues
The best cure for puppy blues is prophylactic: change your expectations on the front end. Expect things to suck for awhile and remember: you just brought an infant of another species into your house. Infants don’t know anything. YOU have to teach them how to be a good dog in a human world. Puppies are going to pee in the house. They are going to bark and tear stuff up. Retriever and herding breed puppies are going to bite, and not in an aggressive way. Retrievers explore the world with their mouths and they love to play with things in their mouth, including you. Herding breed puppies nip instinctively and sometimes they nip hard.
So, prepare to bleed. And yes, I mean that literally. Puppy proof your house ahead of time. Be willing to correct your puppy. Be hands on with your puppy, and I mean that literally too. Learning to be handled is super important for puppies and I think so many people are afraid to handle them in the way they should. It’s ok to pick up your puppy if it’s being bad. It’s ok to grab them and stop them from doing something foolish. If you teach your puppy to be ok with being handled at a young age, your vet and your groomer will thank you. And you will thank your past self.
It’s also ok for puppies to be uncomfortable sometimes. Learning to deal with discomfort and stress at a young age is also super important for them. Neither of my dogs like to get their nails done, but they tolerate it.
From Unrealistic Expectations to Realistic
Here’s the overall TLDR for this post:
- Expect to wait a long time for a well bred puppy.
- Responsible breeders don’t operate like a traditional business. They breed for themselves and not for you.
- Therefore, you won’t be getting a “customer is always right” experience.
- Puppies can’t be custom ordered and they aren’t a commodity.
- Puppies are infants of another species. Don’t expect them to behave.
- Be prepared to bleed, to lose sleep, to clean up A LOT, and most of all: train.
- Prepare to be frustrated, to get angry, for things to not go well.
- Don’t expect your new puppy to be like your previous dog. Dogs are individuals, just like humans.
If you mentally and physically prepare for the worst, you are more likely to come out with the best. I knew I was getting a naughty puppy when I got Eevee and I was much less frustrated with her as a puppy than I was with Rocket. And now, she’s the absolute best. And so is Rocket. Are they perfect? No, but no dog is.
