If fact I would think 99% of silver labs in Canada are reg with the CKC. I didnt have a web site but Iam sure anyone with one would send you the papers if you wanted them. We only had a couple small litters and though I wanted to see my dogs papers no one asked for papers when buying a pup.

Thanks for the info guys I do realize that silver is not a pure bred lab but the wife saw one and she is pretty set on it now, I just want to make sure that I can train it for upland.

Maybe I throw my two cents in.

The ckc will take money and register anything. Just voted no to most in the last round of "recognized breeds" and its turning into a joke.

Regarding silver labs. If its a Weimaraner mixed with a Lab its not a Lab. If its a strange colored chocolate then you are part of the Lab club.

To each their own. The best bird dog is your bird dog and I wish you success in picking a great dog you and your family will enjoy.

A bit of advice. You can get a really well bred Labrador for 1500 bucks. If you are heading to one of these hobby farmers who have 12 bitches dragging their milk sacks around the yard the price should reflect the fact the dogs are not proven. The prices these guys charge are obscene. It would be like buying a Honda Accord when you can get a 911 Turbo for the same price.

When I bought my Lab from them, I was shown the pedigree of the pup as well as given the history of both the sire and the damn. To my knowledge most of the of the dogs from Smokin Gun Labs have been hunted with and came from hunting stock labs out of the U.S.
I have checked dozens and dozens of Canadian Labrador Retriever Breeders sites on the net, and have yet to come across 1 that lists the pedigrees of their breeding stock...some list show or field trial certificates that the dogs have won...but no pedigrees.
I guess you must have much better internet searching skills then me....good on you.

Jim

The only way to be sure is to buy from proven field lines from a reputable breeder. If not, we would all just save a bunch of money and pick up a dog at the pound or Kijiji.

Another purest here, blacks out hunt yellows more often than not and both out hunt the mutants and half breeds 9 times out of 10.

There is a lot more to this than elitist snobs wanting to look down at another outdoorsman although that can be the case as well. The Labrador breed is being destroyed from two angles and some where in the middle is common sense.

Field trial breeders put the prize ahead of the breed as often as the British show crowd. Bigger, faster, stronger and hyper with excess energy will win you more trials and stout, pretty and soft will win you more shows. A true Labrador is both and neither.

If you look at established breeders, you will find a waiting list and a monopoly on true hunting dogs that often spans the country and many generations. Even if the breeder has not been around for a very long time the dogs he chooses will have a proven bloodline that has been around.They do not pick breeding stock to the extremes because they are cool, aggressive or display any traits out side of the breed standard.

IF we do choose to purchase animals that do not conform, we are encouraging the delusion of the breed. For example; if we all insisted on lighter colored dogs, breeders would continually choose the lightest yellows from the litters for stock. Eventually they would be mostly white (Polar Bear) and the true yellow genetics would be lost. On the other extreme, if we insisted on bigger and more aggressive dogs, breeders would choose them as breeding stock. We would risk loosing the fun loving good natured Labradors that we can bring in to play with our children after the hunt.

Quality hunting Labradors that conform to breed standard are getting harder to find and everyone that purchases a designer dog to better fit their particular situation is a part of the problem. Regardless of if it to point pheasants and run large or a pretty shade of color to look cool, both are equally to blame.

If you want a silver dog, buy a Weimaraner. If you want a pointer buy a German Short Hair. If you want a tough dog buy a Chessie, If you want a guard dog buy a Sheppard. If you want something in between, by all means roll the dice and buy a cross breed, BUT please don't register it or call it a Labrador.

Registering a dog is as simple as having two registered dogs, making a phone call and filling out some papers. No one comes by and verifies via DNA testing or other means. It is for the most part an honour system. The love of money truly is the root of all evil and as long as we are willing to pay big money for genetic misfits the ruination of breeds will continue.

:thinking-006: true stuffs right there

As a silver? or a chocolate?

I wouldn't buy a purebred dog without seeing a certified pedigree. Certified pedigree. Certified pedigree. along with health certs. for hips , eyes, elbows etc.

The AKC and CKC reg silver labs as choc.

I have had 4 labs now 2 black, a yellow, and a chocolate. I buy first for pet/family member, second for hunting. All of them hunted well with minimal training for our hunting style. Teach them to retrieve properly as a pup, basic commands and take em out hunting, they all seemed to get it figured out and all absolutely loved to go out chasing birds. The one we have now i bought for his fathers temperment and comes from an english style show lab. He is a pleasure to hunt behind and is awesome in the house, very quiet, good with kids, as are most labs. My son has a silver from smoking gun and she seemed to pick up the hunting and retrieving quicker, even at 8 months old she was bringing birds back to hand. She is an awesome dog. I would highly recommend one of their pups, any color. Color does not matter to me, heck I had a friend with a lab/sheppard mix that we hunted with and did just fine. If I was into field trials and that sort of thing I would definately go with a breeder that specialized in them and spend the money on training. I know very little about how to properly train a hunting dog, but what I do know seems to work for me. I have hunted with guys that have had the whistle and hand signal trained dogs that were fun to hunt with also. The only advantage seemed to be locating downed birds quicker when they don't see them drop, with my dogs I just have to give them time and they will find it eventually. Good Luck in your search

So you had registered chocolates, not silvers?

There has never been an absolute shred of proof or any DNA testing done that proves Silver Labs have been crossbred with anything. Just a lot of speculation and hearsay acusations that Weimaraners are to blame for the introduction of the dd gene into Labs. From what I have read the truth is it has probably been there along but was rare. Both the Newfoundland and Chesapeake breeds carry the dd gene, both breeds are developed from the same original Saint John's Water Dog as was the original Labrador breed. So if the dd gene is present in them then why not in the Labrador breed? If it was introduced in the Labrador breed by another breed then it is more likely to have come from Chesapeake Bays that where cross breed with Labradors very early in the 1900's then from cross breeding with Weimaraners in the 1950ies as some state. The main reason it didn't show for so long is because Chocolate Labs where frond upon and often culled by breeders as where yellows at one time. It was not util the Chocolate color began to gain in popularity and more and more breeding of them resulted in finally 2 dogs with the right combination of genes resulted in the Silver colors. Go back and look at pictures of any so called pure bred dog from the early turn of the century including our beloved Labradors and see how they have completely changed in looks since the original standards have been laid down way back when. In my opinion only, dogs that are strictly bred for show or dogs strictly bred for field trials only have done more harm to the overall original Labrador breed as a pure hunting dog, then the popularity of any color combination coming along.
So which is the true Labrador?
I honestly ask you experts then which of these....Only the Black English Lab and do you include Yellow and Chocolates or the only Black American Style Labs and do you include Yellows and Chocolates, meets the CKC, AKC and the British Kennel Club Standards best?
I believe that the Silver Color or more importantly the dd gene which causes Silver, Champagne and Charcoal color Labs is here to stay in North American Labs at least...Only my opinion of course but I see no way now of avoiding it unless every Breeder does extensive DNA testing on their breeding pairs.
Bottom line is I toss a dummy my dog goes and gets it...I shot a duck my dog goes and gets it....I'm happy.

Jim

Short answer is yes thats what the CKC wanted the dogs to be reg as.

I should add the color of them falls with in the breed standard of the choc lab. Thats why all silver labs are reg as choc.

Thanks for that info. Are you out of the breeding now?

No problem. I do not own any labs....

The best hunting dog I ever hunted with was my buddies dalmatian he just loved the water. He put alot of time into training him and it really payed off in the end. I only wish my yellow lab was that good but I blame myself for not putting enough time into training.

Not as a silver lab

Do you really need to spend $1500 to get a really well bred Lab ?

Not as a silver you didn't ! CKC registers black yellow chocolate. Sedge coloured dogs are registered as chocolate

No. however it depends on what you are looking for. Companion hunting partner or competitive Field Trial or Hunt Test dog
Most dogs of a retriever breed will return a few birds
If you truly want to be competitive - what you pay for is what you will get

A dog that has a pedigree that is full of champions will not come cheap

I use to think that way. But, my chocolate lab which I purchased from a back yard breeder ended having bad hip dysplasia. He loved to hunt but we had to limit the time in field and use pain killers after hunting. As he got older he slowed down quick. He had a lot of pain and it was tough on him and the family. Had to purchase another pup early as he got older for increased hunting time. He did live till 12 though which was good. I will now only buy from a breeder that has hip certified parents. To me it is worth the extra when you consider the vet bills and medicine when they do have problems, and the piece of mind. They are loved family members. $1,000 to $1,500 seems to be where most are priced now for the reputable breeders. I seen one breeder of pet stock at $2,400 and they have a waiting list so that tells you where the market is heading.

Oddly enough, I was down in the Missouri River Breaks and happened to run into a fellow who had a Silver Lab. I had never seen one. I wasn't quite sure what it was so I asked and then we visited a little about his dog. he was getting ready to go out ice fishing, so we didn't visit long. In a nutshell, he said the dog was a very nice pet, but had a lot of health problems. He didn't elaborate on what those problems were... His dog was quite friendly and had nice conformation. How the dog performs in the field, I don't know. It does have some Weimaraner features to my eye. The coat was notably different from a Lab's coat when I petted the dog... Shorter and smoother than a lab's coat. That might be a good thing... Every lab I've been around sheds like crazy..

https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Dog...17%20015-L.jpg

I'll PM you about Finn

Truer words have never been spoken on this forum. Its up to the potential buyer to make an informed decision within regards to their purchase. I'm a lab guy when it comes down to it. I love them. Grew up with them. When it came time for me to purchase my first pup as a married father of two (After growing up with working labs) I had to swallow any sort of 'wish list' I had. One of my main criteria was a dog that would wholeheartedly protect my home while I'm working, when my wife and kids are home alone. I fooled myself into thinking there was a lab capable of more than posturing when someone came to the door, but 99 times out of 100 such is not so.....so inevitably I went with a Chessie and never looked back. Point I'm making is that 'looks' had to become the LAST item on my checklist for a potential gundog suitable to my needs. LITERALLY last, as no one can actually state any Chessie holds a candle to a lab in the looks department lol. BUT, I have one hell of a gundog that will defend my kids to the death if need be, and as MK said, I now own the toughest retriever breed on the planet. With that being said, I still yearn for a yellow working lab.

Ability should ALWAYS outweigh cosmetics. At the same time however, there is such a thing as too much 'ability', and I agree with MK that labs (Specifically American Field Lines) are the furthest thing from what a lab truly should be, which is a happy medium between what a conformation line typically is, and field lines.

Id like to also state that every silver lab ive ever encountered has also had a different feeling coat, along with very 'houndish' looking ears and body structure.

Id also like to say that the dog pictured in tatonkas photo does not have a 'working dog' like body composition. Which is odd. Nor does it have a proper otter tail.....VERY hound like tail........I'm going to **** people off and state its very weim looking

Well said

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