If you sat in your home laboratory and tried to create the perfect dog, you would obviously be better off taking a trip to the local Labrador Retriever breeder, where you would find a top dog waiting for you.
The Labrador Retriever is regularly voted Most Popular Dog by the American and UK Kennel Clubs – leading one to think perhaps ‘labradorable’ would be a better moniker for this all-round good dog.
But the Labrador is so much more than just patting fodder, as any lab owner will tell you. The Labrador understands every word you say – sometimes it is almost as though they can read your thoughts. You get picture.
Labrador ancestors originated in Newfoundland and today’s breed still displays the madcap love of water that its ancestors put to good use in helping haul in fishing nets.
With their webbed feet and buoyant personalities, labs are the perfect holiday pet: all swimming and splashing, the perfect beach bums – and not too fussy about what’s on the menu. The Labrador rolling on its back with an amply full tummy to stroke is hard to resist.
But labs are a serious piece of doggy kit, too – not only born to run, but born to retrieve, with a sense of smell par excellence and a maw soft enough to carry home the egg, let alone the fowl.
Good looking, yes – heart like a lion, yes; but gentle and intelligent enough to be a guide to the blind, a help to the disabled, as well as a loving family pet. These days labs go into hospitals and old people’s homes as petting animals and are being trained to sniff out cancers.
Naturally, they like to chew the fat – or anything. They are as cute as a button as pups, and come in glorious shades – from sand to red fox through chocolate and ebony – and are thus the perfect, on trend accessory for all seasons.
Look into the face of a Labrador and wisdom stares back at you. Unless they’re waiting for you to throw their favourite stick: then the ears go back and the tongue tends to loll a bit ridiculously.
They like children, they like people – and they are almost like humans themselves. Labradors know some good jokes. You could put a judge’s wig on any Labrador and he would look the part.
And throughout history, there have been famous Labradors, who suddenly became heroes while going about their business as guide dogs, family pets, sniffer or gun dogs.
On September 11, 2001, guide dog Dorado – a yellow Labrador – became a hero when he led his owner Omar Eduardo Rivera down 70 floors of the stricken World Trade Center to safety. Mr Riviera had released his dog so that he could escape; but Dorado stayed and saved his master, who escaped into the street just before the Towers collapsed.
Top dog – and so much more.
For the Labrador Retriever, I therefore rest my case – slightly chewed at one corner and with a bit of a slimy handle. You don’t think I carry it myself, do you?
Article By Angela Meredith
Notes
The Chatsworth Country Fair is taking place this weekend (3-5 September), with Gundog Team Tests and Dog Agility. Click here for more information.
Guide Dog Week 2010 will take place 2-10 October. For more information visit Guide Dogs
Sources
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labrador_?Retriever
http://dogsinthenews.com/issues/0109/articles/010914a.htm
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/features/can-dogs-smell-cancer.shtml