Could you helpful people recommend me dog breeds to consider?
We will be first time dog owners. We would be open to rescuing/adopting a young dog, but I don't think our inexperience puts us in a great position for this. Thus probably looking at a puppy.
There is me, DH and two teen boys. Dog idea is really being led by me, but they are all amenable; DH would definitely get stuck in.
We live rurally (in a small village, national park, direct access to miles of trails). We have recently moved to a large(ish) house, big garden (nearly an acre).
Between DH and I, we work from home 4 days/week. Both of us are full time. 1 day per week dog would ideally come to the office with us (it's our own business, so we are in charge of saying this is fine!). We can cover a fifth day at home for early puppy days, and there are local dog walkers if we wanted to change our mind and use them for the fifth day.
I trail run ~5 days/week and would VERY much like the dog to become a running companion. We can offer lots of weekend walking time, likely including bigger expeditions/hillwalks on many weekends. Definitely 2 good walks/runs per day during the week (and probably additional short ones). I know that the running & long walks will take at least a year to build up to.
Dog would need to do an hour's car commute & back once or twice a week.
I very much like the idea of investing in training the dog. Obviously I've never done it before, but I think (hopefully!) I'd quite like the process. Training good manners and good recall would be high priority. I quite like the idea of gundog-style training, and there are agility classes & similar locally too.
To counter my inexperience (a bit!), I have lots of friends with dogs and a highly recommended trainer very locally.
We're looking for a medium sized dog. To give you an idea, these are breeds I think I might like (though not all for good practical reasons!)
- Cocker/Springer/Sprocker Spaniel - they are good runners, you see lots locally round here, they are beautiful. But reading about them puts me off as everyone says crazy...
- Border Collie - my grandad had one (as a family pet, not working) and I have fond memories. Very trainable. Next door have a super-chilled, well behaved, 10 month old collie - I had assumed he was an adult dog, no puppy madness evident! My dog-owning friends also suggested a collie. But reading about them the advice says not as a first dog.
- Labrador - this seems to be a sensible choice? But probably on the big side of what we imagine, and you see lots of chunky labs that don't look like they'd like to go on a 10 mile run with me...
- So I thus started to google collie / lab crosses ??
Breeds we are not keen on
- Anything 'toy'
- Anything enormous
- Anything that cannot (with practice and as an adult) run 10 miles or hike up a munro
I don't think I'm bothered about boy vs girl (we would spay/neuter anyway). Don't mind a bit of hair, but I guess lower grooming maintenance would make it easier.
We have enough £ for vets, food, etc.