Golden retriever - size question

[Autumnpumpkin]

Hi,

Merry Christmas everyone!

We are considering a Golden Retriever, we are a family of 5 our youngest child is 8. We feel they would be a great fit for our family but we do have concerns over their size, round us they seem to vary from absolutely massive to not so big. We wouId go for a female as that’s our preferred anyway but I’m wondering if anyone knows of any breeders that breed smaller golden retrievers or is it pot luck and each litter can vary in size?

Thanks in advance

I've always found there to be a noticeable difference between working and show energy levels.

All the show ones I've known (after the mad puppy stage) are pretty chilled and sometimes quite lazy.

I have a GR/poodle (show GR) who's extremely laid back and she's only 18 months. If she gets bored she just goes to sleep 😂

A family member has a show GR puppy. He is 9 months old and already 40kg!

Mine is the same, she's been a lazy, sleepy old girl since she was about three years old.

They are very trainable dogs - which is why they are so popular for guide dogs, of course. You shouldn't have to worry about being able to walk a GR due to their size / strength because you should be training them not to need any kind of restraining on a walk. Ours is barely ever walked on a lead, she just walks to heel or just in front of us and responds to voice commands.

Size wise, you mention car etc. and they do definitely need a lot of space. We have a large estate car and she needs to have a full half of the boot. I definitely wouldn't be happy putting her in a normal boot, and she's way too big to be on the back seat at all. And she's a small GR! She was the smallest bitch of the litter but that's not a guarantee I guess.

As a pp said, they do tend to lay down in the most awkward place possible. Doorways, bottom of stairs, middle of the kitchen floor during cooking Xmas dinner! And even though ours can curl up fairly small when she wants to, she somehow manages to get 50% longer when she sprawls in a doorway.

And good god, the fur!

Wouldn't swap her for the world though.

My cross (as mentioned above) is 37kg and was never particularly small, even when I brought her home! She was the smallest born though but is now the heaviest of her 8 siblings (including boys).

I love her size though. She's like a massive live teddy bear. She's extremely strong but that's only really an issue at the start of her walks when she's excited. The only issue I have is that she likes to lay in really awkward places - doorways and in front of the fridge freezer are her favourites- and it takes all my strength to slide her out the way (she refuses to budge an inch). She also likes to thunder towards me at full speed but just miss me. I can't lie that my heart skips a beat every time as when she was a puppy she'd run straight into me and it was like being hit by a freight train 🙈

Totally missed the PP about doorways before I posted 😂

Hi OP, we have a female working line retriever. I think she’s really quite small, I even asked the vet if she seems ok; at 13 months she is 27kg and about the size of a small Labrador, but slim and sleek (with a very swooshy tail that can clear a coffee table in seconds 😂) She seems a LOT smaller than the show line retrievers we meet. She does need a lot of exercise/stimulation, but this doesn’t have to be hours of walking, she loves playing games indoors (great for the kids to get involved) and she’s very independent, she’ll happily take herself off to the garden for ages (she does enjoy digging though!)
So far (touch wood) she barely sheds but we do brush her (she absolutely hates baths though). Car wise, we have a large boot and another dog, they share happily, but she does hog our bed (completely our fault as she hated her crate). Do your research on breeders, talk to a few and get a feel. Ours was lovely and we are still in touch a year on.
Good luck with your decision and hope it all works out well for you!

I have a male GR 9 months and he is massive. We met a 1 year old GR recently and mine was huge compared to him. He is bigger than I expected already but his mum was big.

The plus side with GRs is they are so eager to please and very trainable. He is very strong and im 5”2 so I was worried but he is so good on lead and off lead too. Although he can get distracted if someone is petting him.

He is just a gentle giant. He’s amazing with my children and I also have 2 cats and he is great with them. One of them is his best friend. I absolutely love him.

I’d be interested to know how much physical exercise everyone is giving their Goldens please?
We are a fairly busy household with kids and their friends coming and going, boys that are obsessed with footballs and love to play with family members dogs plus then I can offer training and other mental stimulation so I think that part would be ok.

About two hours a day, plus they play most of the day. Mine are show lines, but they’re still Retrievers which means they need good exercise (60-90 mins minimum).

My eldest is getting a bit old now (12) so I leave the car boot open when I go to the beach and she just takes herself back to the car and hops in. But most of the time she can still do the full two hours, just doesn’t run around like the others.

That being said, outside of play and exercise mine just sleep. We do 15 mins training a day (testing impulse - such as leaving toys or picking up the right toy, or stopping playing when told etc). It’s not all about exercise but exercise is important

Our show ones had around 2 hours a day, including at least an hour off-lead, and were happy and relaxed with anything over 1 hour, plus lots of playing, most days of the week, with hikes or long walks at the weekend.

This one (working) will 'tolerate' 2 hours a day, most of it off lead, if she has a good hour or two of mental games but she's happier/more chilled with 3+ hours of walks, plus good amount of mental stimulation. She's never destructive, but she's more restless and can be a total attention seeking pain in the butt if she gets less than the minimum she needs. She was definitely one of the 'more active' pups from her litter though, so it is possible to have a more chilled working golden if you choose carefully.

The Discover dog section gets busy at Crufts, so head there first.

Our golden is an old lady now, she's 11. She puts up with one half hour walk a day, plus two little five minute trots to a green at the end of our street morning and evening. She spends most of the "long" walk trying to take a short cut home! They don't always needs hours. She loves toys though and we always have about twenty mins late evening when she arrives with a toy in her mouth for playtime.

Our male Goldie is 30kg so smaller than many and very strong. We were first time owners and learning on the job, and the main thing I'd have done differently is loads of training on walking to heel. We went to classes and he des lots of tricks beautifully but I don't think I grasped the importance of training in walking when he was small and excited, thinking it would just come. Working on it now but he's so strong, stubborn and determined! What a lovely boy though.

We do 2x walks of about 40min each day, and he spends a lot of time alone mooching about our garden. DH takes him on long jogs a couple times a week which he loves. He is very amenable to waiting for a walk, at the weekend we don't need to go out first thing, he's patient like that.

Mine is a dainty 29kg and very manageable. I'd echo what others say and she tends to plonk herself in the most inconvenient places like on the stairs or across doorways. She's a sprawler in bed too so I end up curled around her. Of all the goldies I know, some of the boys are total units, magnificent beasts. The girls do seem smaller.
Mine gets 1 offlead walk a day which usually includes some kind of swimming - that would be between 60-90mins and then an evening sniffy walk of 30mins. We never go far in these - sometimes just to the nearest drain!
Other than that she naps hard, really hard where if we are making too much noise she will go to another room. If she thinks I'm going to bed too late, she will get huffy. She's not destructive or barky so I think content enough. In the summer I leave my back door open as she prefers to be outside.
Prone to a little attention thievery but I'm just as guilty of this so it's fine, a complete floozie on walks so my hardest thing with her was training her not to approach people uninvited.
Good luck - they are the best dogs - total affectionate goofballs with a healthy optimistic nature.

I grew up with GRs, thought they were wonderful, but a bit big for our home so got an Australian Labradoodle, you can get them in several sizes, ours is 12kg and wonderful. Would thoroughly recomend looking into. Australians are a breed that are multi generational so the temperement is fairly predictable.

Other than that she naps hard, really hard where if we are making too much noise she will go to another room. If she thinks I'm going to bed too late, she will get huffy.

This is ours too! Complete with dramatic sighing 🤣

I have show line, he was extremely large and strong in his prime (nearly 14 now). Crazy as a box of frogs, the most loving, clumsy, beautiful, high energy dog. Not a bad bone in his body. Tore his cruciate age 7, £7.5k and one year later he calmed slightly. So get good insurance!

When he was little he had some IBS issues and I hand fed him- we have with all our dogs to some degree (previous would inhale food then vomit). None have resource guarded anything.

Neighbour had working line lab. Much smaller, lower energy, well behaved. Lived to age 16 with no health issues. It’s the Iuck of the draw/sometimes choosing a quieter pup or rehoming one so all the hard work is done for you.

Edit to add 42kg - vet said fine after measuring his skull… as he thought he was to fat but subsequently said no.

Thanks again everyone, this is really useful information.

I’ll be honest I hadn’t really looked into cross breeds, nothing against them, my old girl is a cross. For those who have mentioned Australian Labradoodles, where do you even look for a good breeder for these? They aren’t on websites such as Champdogs etc?

You do your own due diligence. My cross came from Pets4Homes which makes many recoil in horror, but it's pretty easy to whittle out the rubbish breeders by checking for parents that are hip/elbow scored and fully health tested. Just stating the puppies are health checked isn't enough.

I do know of a really good gr/poodle breeder if you want to DM me. She doesn't advertise as she has no need to. My dog wasn't from her as I wanted a slightly bigger one than her stud tends to produce (he's a standard poodle but the smaller end) but he's from great lines, as are the gr bitches she owns. Everybody speaks so highly of the pups they get from her.

Just make sure your floor can handle a GR. All the ones I've met (including my own!) are absolute mud magnets. I am mopping my floor numerous times a day. If there is a puddle, a burn, some marsh.. My girl will be in it.

As @CellophaneFlower says, you find decent breeders on P4H if you do your due diligence. You just have to be thorough.

As for exercise, it is often about tiring out the mind more than the body. I have a breed that will absolutely take as much as you give them (will work all day, or go on a 15-mile run in the morning and be up for a long walk just after lunch) but in the winter our two tend to get 40 mins in the morning, and about half an hour of training time in the afternoon. The morning walk is all free running (unless they're with me, when they'll get stopped or recalled a few times for the practice and control), and training time is hunting under control, retrieving, obedience and a bit of free running into which I throw random stops and recalls.

They get the odd long walk or other outing, and usually get an extra midday walk in summer.

That does them: they settle well in the evenings and are generally nice, polite dogs around the house.

GET ONE.
they may be big but once trained they are so much gentler than your average small and yappy dog.
I have a labrador. Big gentle giant. Yes he is big (34 kg) but now he is 4 and very calm (unless you whip him up). Need firm handling as puppies (but so do all puppies tbh)