My Goldendoodle, Holly

[rpcrowe]

Holly is a 13 month old Goldendoodle (A Goldendoodle is an intentional Golden Retriever, Standard Poodle cross). She is by far the smartest of the multitudes of dogs, both purebred and mixed breed, with whom I have shared my life. In fact, although I know that I am prejudiced, I consider her just about the perfect dog!

Canon 30D with 70-200mm f/4L IS lens and 550EX fill flash

[Colin Southern]

[COLOR=sandybrown]"She is by far the smartest of the multitudes of dogs, both purebred and mixed breed, with whom I have shared my life. In fact, although I know that I am prejudiced, I consider her just about the perfect dog!"

Sounds almost as smart as my 2 Dobermanns when I had them (I loved that old saying "Go on - break in - MAKE THEIR DAY!")

[Bill44]

Dobermans, unless trained otherwise, have the nature of a gentle lamb, I love them almost as much as German Shepherds.

[Colin Southern]

[COLOR=sandybrown]"Dobermans, unless trained otherwise, have the nature of a gentle lamb, I love them almost as much as German Shepherds. "

Mine were pretty typical I think - fun-loving and playful, but not overly great around young kids to be honest (they can snap back with a bit of a "warning shot" if one accidentally pulls an ear or something like that). Very protective of family though (as most dogs are), as one poor chap found out

Gone, but never forgotten.




Cheers,

Colin

[john w revie]

Nice looking Dog. It is a joy to share your life with a good dog. With the added bonus of always having a model to practice on.
Colin not the usual colour for dobermanns here in the UK normally they are black and tan.

[rpcrowe]

My previous dog, Sara lee, was beautiful golden retriever - German shepherd - wolf hybrid and was intelligent, gentle, yet quite formidable when she thought her family was in danger.

She loved kids (as does Holly). When I was adopting Sara, I was filling out the adoption papers at a pet store and a kid came up and suddenly pulled Sara's tail. She whipped around, saw it was a little kid and licked him. However, she was dangerous to toddlers though; because her tail was always wagging and was right at face level with most toddlers.

Where my hybrid Sara Lee was a formidable guard dog, Holly is a watch dog. Holly will bark aggressively at an intruder at night but, that is the extent of her aggressive or formidable behavior.

This is an image of Sara Lee. She was a large dog; about 71 cm at the shoulder and weighed 39 kilos. Holly is also a fairly large dog but at 66 cm at the shoulder and 27 kilos in weight, she is no where near the size of Sara Lee.

This image is of sara lee.

[crisscross]

RH one of Holly is a nice portrait, as is one of Sara Lee. I love doing doggy pics on borrowed animals.(my 'best friend' gallery)

With Holly I am wondering whether the main problem is going to be keeping her clean (assuming some retriever instincts, fetching rotting branches from the swamp etc) or the rest of your household....not least hope you are on top of sensor dust on the camera

[Colin Southern]

Colin not the usual colour for dobermanns here in the UK normally they are black and tan.

Apparantly they come in 4 "optional colour schemes" - black/rust being the most common, red/rust being the next most common, and then there's also blue/rust and fawn/rust (although I've never seen the last two).

I found it quite interesting genetics in that in the litter of 11 that my 2 came from, I think about 7 were black/rust and the rest red/rust. Wonderful personalities - I still miss them!

Cheers,

Colin

[rpcrowe]

RH one of Holly is a nice portrait, as is one of Sara Lee. I love doing doggy pics on borrowed animals.(my 'best friend' gallery)

With Holly I am wondering whether the main problem is going to be keeping her clean (assuming some retriever instincts, fetching rotting branches from the swamp etc) or the rest of your household....not least hope you are on top of sensor dust on the camera

Oh yes, keeping her clean is sometimes a chore. See the dirty paw image. However, except for muddy areas, she really seldom needs to be bathed. She has virtually no doggy odor. In the summer, she is in our swimming pool quite often which also keeps her clean.

Her light coloured coat and mud do not get along. However, we always know when her paws are muddy which would not be true for a darker coloured dog. The Doodle genetics work in funny ways... Doodles grow lighter in colour as they mature. Holly is quite a bit lighter in colour now than she was when she came to us at 7 weeks old. See her puppy image.

Another strange genetic behavior is that when you breed a Golden Retriever with a Poodle, you will get a dog with Doodle looks and characteristics; the product is called an F-1. However, if you breed two F-1 Goldendoodles, you will have a 40% chance of getting a Golden Retriever looking dog and 40% chance of getting a Poodle looking dog with only a 20% chance of getting a Doodle looking dog. However, if you breed an F-1 Goldendoodle back to a Poodle, you will end up with an F-2 Doodle looking dog which has a fairly curly coat and which is almost totally hypo-allergenic.

Now, if you breed an F-1 Goldendoodle to an F-1 Labradoodle (the product of a Labrador Retriever and Poodle cross), you will get a Doodle looking dog. The name given to this cross is either "Super Doodle or American Retriever". From what I have heard, they are excellent sporting retrievers.

Virtually all dog breeds were formed from the crossing different dog breeds. However, with Doodle genetics working the way they do, I believe that Doodles will always need to be designer bred.

[Colin Southern]

Oh yes, keeping her clean is sometimes a chore.

This reminds me of the time I was out collecting firewood with the Dogs - Kady comes running up with that happy look on her face ...

... she'd just done one of those "roll onto my back and wiggle from side to side" things - in a nice, fresh, cow pat! Sometimes doggie psychology is rather hard to figure out!