Find Your Puppy

Seven yellow puppies, three boys and four girls, born on a Thursday evening during a thunderstorm that Cotton ignored completely. It was an easy whelping, a little under five hours from first to last, and everyone was nursing within minutes. Birth weights were 14 to 18 ounces. They are named for the sea islands up and down this coast. Both parents are yellow, so every puppy is yellow. Two yellow Labradors cannot produce a black or chocolate puppy. Shades run from Cotton's pale cream to Skip's medium gold, and the ears are the best guide to where each will end up. All have black pigment. None can be affected by EIC, CNM, PRA-prcd or HNPK, and none carry dilute. At four and a half weeks they are up on their legs, eating softened food twice a day and keeping their bed clean. They moved out to the porch pen last weekend, and on Saturday we carried the basket out to the garden for their first portraits, where nobody stayed in it for long. The shallow pool comes out next week and the first trip to the creek edge will follow around seven weeks, weather and tide permitting. They go home from October 15. Two are still available.

Pearl came into season in early September and was bred to Tide on the 16th and 18th. An ultrasound on October 14 will tell us whether she is in whelp and give us a rough count. If all goes well, puppies arrive around November 19 and go home in the middle of January. This will be Pearl's first litter. We expect Tide's substance and steadiness with Pearl's athleticism and drive: good dogs for active families, and for anyone who would like to try hunt tests or dock diving with a Labrador that still looks like one. Colors: both parents are black and both carry yellow, so we expect mostly black puppies and some yellows, about one in four on average. Tide does not carry chocolate, so there will be no chocolate puppies in this litter. Pearl is an EIC carrier and Tide is clear, so no puppy can be affected, and about half will be carriers, which matters only if a dog is bred. We are taking four deposits ahead of the ultrasound.