A Breeder should be open to any questions you may have with regards to Golden Retrievers, their breeding program and their puppies. Do not hesitate to have a list of questions to ask that will require the breeder to take some time out of their busy day to answer for you. A breeder should be just as committed to finding a good home for their puppies are you are to find a reputable breeder to purchase your puppy from.

What should be the first thing you ask the breeder? You may want to start with what organizations the breeder is associated with. Most reputable breeders are members of the Golden Retriever Club Of America (GRCA). They may also be associated with local Golden clubs, kennel clubs or competition clubs. More important next to being a GRCA member would be is the breeder also a member and volunteer of their local Golden Retriever Rescue.

Is the Breeder active in showing their dogs in conformation, obedience, field, agility, rally or any other AKC competitions? A Breeder who is not active in any of these venues will not have the opportunity to compare their dogs to others out there and know if the dogs they are breeding are competitive. Most reputable Breeders are only breeding for themselves in order to compete in these areas and strives with each breeding to improve upon the qualities that their dogs have and need to be competitive in those rings. Breeders cannot rely on pedigrees alone, what looks good on paper won't necessarily produce what they want in the whelping box.

If a Breeder is not a member of either the Golden Retriever Club Of America, a local Golden Retriever Club or Golden Retriever Rescue, and is not active in AKC competition events, you may want to look elsewhere at that point.

Whether you've found the serious hobby breeder on the internet or at a dog show, you will want to ask the same questions to each. It is much more personable to ask questions via telephone rather than email with a breeder you have found on the internet. A brief introduction via email is fine, then ask the breeder when it would be convenient for you to call them to ask questions.

Some questions to initially ask about clearances would be:

Do you have current health clearances on your dogs?

Which heath clearances do you do?

Where do you get your hip and elbow x-rays done?

Do you have OFA certificates for both hips and elbows?

Where do you get your heart and eye examinations done?

Do you have Board Certified certificates of examination for Heart and Eyes?

When looking for a Golden Retriever Breeder, please be sure to ask for 'health clearances' on both the sire and dam of the litter.  These clearances should include but are not limited to an OFA Hip rating of ‘Fair’, ‘Good’ or ‘Excellent’; an OFA Elbow rating of  ‘normal’ ; an eye report from a Board Certified Canine Ophthalmologist indicating ‘normal’ in both eyes or with a possible notation of 'other' which will indicate that it is not an inheritable issue or condition; and a heart clearance from a Board Certified Canine Cardiologist indicating ‘normal’.  Do not accept any reports that are not on authentic OFA or CERF forms.

Samples of OFA Certificates:
Hips - http://www.offa.org/samplecerts.html#hiprpt
Elbows - http://www.offa.org/samplecerts.html#elrpt
Cardiac - http://www.offa.org/samplecerts.html#cardrpt
Cardiac Application Form:  http://www.offa.org/cardappbw.pdf

GRCA Update on the big four health clearances (Hips, Elbows, Eyes, Heart)    http://www.grca.org/health/bigfour.html

Please understand there is no such thing as a ‘perfect dog’.  Breeders should do their best to reduce the risk of genetic defects but there is always a risk when breeding that one can produce such defects.  It is simply impossible to avoid all genetic problems in a breeding program.  If any breeder tells you otherwise, they are not being truthful with you.  A reputable Golden Retriever breeder should be able to produce OFA certificates for Hips and Elbows, Board Certified examination reports for Eyes and Heart.  Accept no excuse for a breeding not having those reports!

At this point you have spoken with the breeder, so far they appear to meet your requirements and it's time to go out and visit the breeder in person. The breeder should allot a sufficient amount of time for your visit and let you know what to expect when you arrive at their property.

A Reputable Golden Retriever Breeder *MAY*...

Advise you that in order to qualify for one of their puppies that they must meet the entire family that lives in your household so they can see the interaction between your family and their dogs in order to determine if you are the right family for one of their puppies. Families with children who are not well behaved or supervised at a breeder visit most likely will not qualify for a puppy from a reputable breeder.

Advise you in advance that you must visit their property first before any other location on that day so that you will not potentially bring any disease or parasites from another breeder's property.

Advise you that before you get into the area where their puppies or dogs are located that you will need to spray the bottom of your shoes with a bleach solution as to not bring in any potential life threatening diseases to their property. Parvovirus and other viral or bacterial infections can be carried in on on your shoes and are invisible to the eye.

Advise you that you may not handle the puppies until they reach a specific age, breeders may vary on the age range that they allow visitors to handle their puppies. Some breeders will not allow visitors to handle the puppies at younger ages until after multiple visits and/or have reserved one of the puppies.

Advise you that if the puppies have not been whelped yet or the puppies are too young that they will be able to interact with their other dogs of different ages so that you can get an idea of what to expect when the puppies are older. Young puppies are hard to resist but you need to know what to expect when the puppies are full grown in terms of height and weight and overall size not to mention their adult coats which means ALOT of Golden hair everywhere!

Please keep in mind that every reputable breeder has their own comfort level with regards to people visiting their property and litters and please remember that any requests the breeder makes of you are in the best interest of the puppies with regards to the health and safety of their puppies.

The most wonderful thing about breeding in this day and age is that breeders have options that they didn't have years ago. Breeders can do natural breedings, artificial insemination, fresh chilled semen or a 'blast from the past' using frozen semen. It used to be that if you wanted to breed to a dog in a different part of the country, you had to ship your bitch to that stud dog wherever he was located. Typically you will not find the sire of the litter at the breeder's home. Now when we say 'typically', that does not hold true in every circumstance. Sometimes breeders purchase male puppies from outside of their own breeding program in the hopes that he turns out to be what they were looking for and can then use him for that breeding program in the future. Some breeders start out with a male puppy and then purchase a female puppy that they believe will be a good match for that male puppy later on. It is not always a 'red flag' if both sire and dam are on the premises but more often than not it doesn't happen that way.

Some questions to ask the breeder about the litter:

Why did the breeder choose this particular stud dog?
What research tools did the breeder use?
What was the breeder trying to achieve through this breeding?
What are the strengths and weaknesses in both sire and dam?
Did the breeder achieve the goals they were hoping for through this breeding?
What can the breeder tell you about the sire's temperament and longevity history in his background?
What can the breeder tell you about the dam's temperament and longevity history in her background?

Health Issues in the Golden Retriever

Now that you have found a particular Golden Retriever breeder that you are comfortable with and are seriously thinking about purchasing a puppy from, let's talk about health issues in the Golden Retriever that cannot be screened for through 'clearances'.  Some of The diseases that Golden Retriever breeders are very concerned about do not have screening tests available but reputable breeders are both aware of them and should do the most they can to minimize environmental contributions to those issues.  The environment in which a Golden Retriever is raised and lives within can be a contributing factor to canine cancer and other diseases such as dysplasia and diabetes. 

Reputable Golden Retriever breeders should not use herbicides, pesticides, or any chemical means know to cause Cancer in the areas that their dogs reside in.  Ask your potential breeder about how they maintain their property and what chemicals they use both inside and outside their home or kennel.  They also should be feeding a quality dog food of which the ingredients do not contain by-products, chemical additives or chemical preservatives. This usually cannot be be accomplished by the breeder without extensive cost to the breeder be it financial or time consuming or both.   Indoors we use the VX-5000 Vapor Cleaner which only uses pure hot steam to clean made from distilled water.   It is the best investment we ever made for a cleaning tool.  Please visit our links page to find out more about this product.  We are not associated in any way with this product but we did a lot of research before buying it for ourselves and it does a fantastic job!

Cancer is running rampant in so many living creatures and it is unfortunate that we have no way of isolating a genetic marker in canines but there is current research ongoing to do so. We cannot say if it is genetic or environmental, if either of those two. What we do at our house is we do not use pesticides, herbicides or harmful chemicals in and outside our home where our family and our dogs frequent to reduce the possibility of environmental cancers. We feed holistic type foods to our dogs which contain no by-products or chemical additives. We do the best we can with our own foods also.

With regards to doing our best with projected longevity, unfortunately there's nothing that can truly predict what a puppy's lifespan will be. Golden Retriever life spans are now averaging approximately 10 1/2 years. The oldest litter we have was whelped 4/97 which would make the survivors almost 12. 3 of that litter passed away last year. One of them passed away at 7. The sire of that litter lived to just over 10, the dam of that litter lived to just short of 10. That is just one example

Now... the grandparents of that same litter have one still alive at 13, the others passed at 14, 11 and just short of 10. You can have litter mates where one can pass at 4 and others pass at 10-14 yrs old. There are many factors that may play into longevity. Unfortunately, no breeder can make the prediction that your puppy will live a long healthy life. What a reputable breeder should do is look at the pedigree of the dam and the pedigree of a potential stud dog and do research to find out where the various 'weaknesses' are in that pedigree which would include cancer and longevity.

Ask the breeder of your potential puppy to give you a breakdown of what I just did above with longevity. Ask them for the puppy's 5 generation longevity pedigree which they can give you the link to view from the k9data website.