Ode to a Dog Breeder

The Breeders Clock

As a breeder, your time clock has changed.

The new clock is governed by the puppies who have two schedules. Awake and Sleep.

When it is awake o’clock, YOU the breeder must tend to the puppies needs. YOU are responsible for choosing to bring them in to the world. So YOU need to be sure you can achieve everything they need, to be reared in a healthy environment, which ensures their welfare and social development needs are met.

The awake o’clock – is unpredictable which makes it hard for a breeder to plan around. The breeder can obviously apply some level of logic to their sleep and awake patterns.

The awake clock means you are awake…. You WILL be awake for every awake o’clock.

You will be getting some of your own household needs and work needs met during the awake o’clock. You might have the support of a partner who assists with the awake o’clock.

When the puppies sleep, this is now known as the sleep o’clock this is an ideal time for the breeder to do the chores that need doing and go shopping for essentials. Whilst out of the house the breeder is feeling the pressure to get back home (to perhaps relieve the person on duty) so this time out of the house is also not the breeders time.

Sleep o’clock is typically when the breeder likes to keep an eye on the puppies when the bitch is still feeding them.

So the sleep o’clock is also pretty busy. The sleep o’clock is when you feel you have slightly more time to your self, maybe to have a shower, tidy the house for all the visitors.

Sleep o’clock is spent doing everything quickly as you don’t know when sleep o’clock becomes awake o’clock.

In the first four weeks sleep o’clock is FOR the puppies, generally it is hard to find a good slot for the breeder to sleep! Sleep o’clock becomes more reliable for the breeder as time goes on. So sleeping at night does happen at some point although even then, it is broken…. as a good breeder will check on the puppies during the night simply to see if they are all ok, breathing and give them a poke if they cant see them moving.

There isn’t enough hours in the day for another time zone as everything is on the puppies awake and sleep clock. The breeder will struggle to fit in the essential requirement of sleep in line with the puppies sleep patterns.

Time is precious to the breeder. It is no longer their time as they knew before.

So if your breeder forgets what might be obvious or trips over their choice of words this is actually a sign of how much physical effort they are putting in to their puppies. They probably haven’t had a fresh hot cup of tea for quite some time! (but plenty of reheated cups of tea which are never the same).

If your breeder looks like they need at least two weeks in a spa hotel then you will know that they have done their level best to give everything to those puppies in their care.
Not forgetting the importance of being awake during the awake time to see the antics of the puppies fooling about, playing, developing, getting stronger and just generally being the cutest wonderful thing you have ever seen.

Breeding – when done properly will result in exhaustion, it also results in 100% job satisfaction (when everything goes well), Working conditions for the breeder however are questionable as the hours are long without any official food breaks!

If your breeder looks exhausted, think just how much they have done and feel grateful that they cared enough to do that for the puppy you might be buying.

On the note of whether YOU should be a breeder, if you cant sacrifice your time to your puppies, then DONT.