I had someone ask me that the other day what my breeding philosophy was. I first had to pause and think, what is philosophy? I guess I should’ve asked my DIL who graduated from Oxford (yes, the university in England) with a philosophy degree. ;P

But what is dog breeding philosophy? I guess I’d never really thought about putting my dog raising/breeding philosophy into words before.

So I mulled it over and tried to put it into words. It’s probably too “wordy” but hey, that’s just the way I am. So in a (big) nutshell, this is what I came up with.

Pinewood Dog Raising Philosophy

1. Health: It starts with healthy parent dogs which produce healthy puppies. Getting the necessary health certifications; physical and genetic for our adults. Getting regular check-ups, grooming, training, and good nutrition for them also. This also includes the puppy’s nutrition, deworming (as needed), fecal exams, thorough vet exams and first vaccinations. We believe in minimal vaccinations and using natural flea/tick products and avoiding chemicals and poisons on our animals and yards.
2. Socialization: We believe in using ENS (Early Neurological Stimulation) between the ages of 3-16 days to help the puppies “improve cardiovascular performance”, it also helps develop “stronger heart beats, stronger adrenal glands, more tolerance to stress and greater resistance to disease”. We believe early socialization, stimulation, enrichment, and handling is a crucial part of puppyhood; exposing them to different sights, sounds, textures, people, animals, etc to help them become well-adjusted adult dogs. We like to have a good foundation for their new families to build on.
3. Training: We believe in age-appropriate training for our puppies which includes introducing them to the litter box at a young age which produces better potty habits, and starting them on outdoor potty training. We introduce them to crate training and being comfortable in their crate for short periods of time. We start using techniques to help the puppies on resource guarding prevention and separation anxiety prevention which we also teach to our new puppy owners. And encourage them to continue at home with their new puppy. We also offer a discount to a wonderful online puppy training resource called Baxter and Bella.
4. Nutrition: We believe good nutrition is key for all our dogs; adults and puppies. We use Fromm Gold Adult for our adults and Fromm Classic Puppy for our moms and puppies. It is a high-quality kibble. (Although if we had the resources (time and space), I think a species appropriate raw diet is actually best).  We use and recommend NuVet supplements for our dogs and puppies and request that our puppy parents continue using it with their puppies for at least the first year of life as the puppy is growing and developing. NuVet is a vitamin, mineral, immune support chewable tablet.
5. Breeding practices: We believe in breeding selectively, pairing the two parents who complement each other and who we think would be the best fit together to produce excellent puppies. Breeding when we have a waiting list of appropriate homes to place our puppies with and not overbreeding our parent dogs. We believe in placing our adults in loving families if they; do not fit in our program, are through being a parent (we spay/neuter and have them all up to date on vaccinations, microchipped, etc before placing them) or for some reason do not pass their health testing.

Our goal is to produce healthy, happy companions that will give their new families joy and companionship for years to come. An added bonus has been so many families coming back for a second puppy or referring their family and friends to us.

❤️