FAQ
Below are some of the frequently asked questions
What is your puppy selection process like?
At 7 weeks of age our puppies go through our personalized testing process to see what type of home they are most suitable for. We are USUALLY able to accommodate male VS female preference but color is not guaranteed.
What kind of care to your provide for your puppies?
Our puppies are raised in our house with our family from day one! They receive proper socialization and exposure so that when they leave our hands, they are confident and ready to take on their next big adventure!
What age do your puppies go home?
We let our puppies leave anywhere from 8-12 weeks of age
Why don't you dock tails?
In short, I think it is unnecessary. Docking is justified because of breed standard but cutting off a tail that an animals is born with is not improving on the genetics of the breed. The tail existed.
Breed standards in regards to tails are as follows -
ASCA - docked or naturally bobbed at no more than 4 inches in length (keep in mind that as recently as 2023
AKC - docked or naturally bobbed at no more than 4 inches in length (keep in mind that in 2023 AKC revised multiple breed standards of other breeds to allow for full tails in accordance with their parent clubs)
UKC - docked, naturally bobbed, or naturally full length
I have dogs that are ASCA, AKC, and UKC registered. For sports, tail docking does not matter and for showing/conformation, UKC allows tails and is way less political. My goals are to mainly use ASCA for herding titles, AKC for sport titles, and UKC for conformation.
Tail carriage - Australian Cattle Dogs, Samoyds, Border Collies, Carrigan Corgies, German Shepherds, Dutch Shepherds, Anatolian Shepherds, Shilo Shepherds, Belgian Malinois, Finnish Lapphund, Mudi, Norwegian Elk Hund, Belgian Shepherd Dogs, Icelandic Shepherd Dogs, Australian Kelpies, Great Pyrenees, Smooth Collies, etc to name a few all all herding breeds that keep tails.
There is also a UK study of working dogs in working capacities and 500 tails must be docked to spare 1 tail related injury. Additionally, other studies have now found that newborn puppies have MORE neurological transmitters than adult dogs and humans and therefore likely can feel more pain, not less. 90% of humans feel phantom pain after extremity amputations, many other species are now believed to also have phantom pain including dogs, pigs, cattle, and horses.
Docking is not painless, hold a puppy and remove its tail, it will shriek in pain and try to crawl away, there is blood. Docked litters statistically have significantly more weight loss, lack of weight gain, risk of infection. For breeders who say their puppies were nursing minutes after docking, the dam's milk contains a form of natural chemicals that act as pain killers so this makes complete sense.
Grooming - the grooming requirements on their tails are minimal. Aussies get matting on their ears and tails regardless and tail grooming is not really a concern.