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Best Pet Dog
Whoever heard of doing a review on your own dog or pet, right? Well, let’s face it, we all think we have the best pet dog in the world. Though our pets are lovable affectionate creatures, they do have their strengths and weaknesses, as well as features and attributes found on any other product. So, what is the best pet dog? What do you want in a pet dog and how do you define the best pet dog? It is important to know what you are getting before you invest in a pet dog. The best pet dog for some could be a raving nuisance for others. While not all versions of the same species of pet dogs are identical, they do share many similarities, such as the way Pit Bulls tend to chew up neighborhood pets and small children. That is certainly the type of information you’d like to know ahead of time. Even the best pet dog will do that when they are puppies.So, at the risk of looking insensitive, I would like to do a review on my recently deceased, beloved Yellow Labrador, Ginger, considered by some to be the best pet dog. You’re probably asking me why did we choose a yellow lab? Actually, Ginger was not a real yellow lab, she was what’s known as a fox-red, yellow lab. A real, yellow lab is pictured below:
Is a Yellow Lab the Best Pet Dog?
The answer is pretty obvious: Because everyone loves big, yellow dogs. Let us dig right in with the essentials and critical product specs of this particular pet dog.
Name: Ginger (RIP: November 1994 – April 2008)
Animal: Dog
Species: Labrador
Color: Yellow
Sex: Female
Weight: About 80lbs most of her life
Arms and Legs: Four (2 in front, 2 in back)
Other: 1ea Wagging Tail, active tongue, functioning heart, liver, 2-kidneys, lungs, very loud bark and other essential organs.
Requirements: Water, 8oz Kirkland Canned moist Canine food, and 1 Cup of Dry, twice a day. Basically, there are 6 criteria that define the quality of a pet canine. Here is the list, along with a brief description or example of each:
Setup and Installation: Adaptation to your home and training
Protection and Security: Barking at anyone who comes near the house
Sports and Recreation: Frisbee, hunting, fishing, hiking…..football?
Love and Loyalty: Will choose you over his/her next meal
Maintenance and Costs: Will not destroy your house either through bankruptcy or the chewing up of your foundation.
Intelligence: If you want a rocket scientist, dogs are probably not for you, but fortunately, not many of us expect our pets to understand advanced science. Yellow Labs are much better suited for learning things like Stay, come, Sit, and lie down, over complex things like physics, which most people don’t understand, anyway.
Best Pet Dog Review
Now that we’ve established the criteria, let us begin the review. Installation of our dog, Ginger was a breeze. Like any new puppy, she messed in the house a few times, until finally learning that we preferred her to kill the grass in our lawn. I don’t mean to be harsh here, but we definitely have to knock a few points off her score for the acidity of her urine. Ginger refused to take walks as a puppy, but once she finally got the hang of it, her daily walks became a lifetime sentence. In reality, it was only 14.5 years, but you get the idea – the dog HAD to HAVE a walk EVERY day. Is this a characteristic of a Yellow Lab, or was it just our dog, Ginger? We may never know unless we buy another yellow lab someday.
Setup and Installation: 82
As for making us feel protected and secure, this is where Ginger really shined. Though the fox-reddish, yellow color of a lovable family lab would give her away, most intruders wouldn’t get far enough to take a look. Her bark was as mean and as loud as the meanest and loudest, kid-chewing, Pit Bull anyone ever knew. Once we got over the abrupt, bone-startling bark ourselves, we really miss having her scare the hell out of friends and family at the front door.
Protection and Security: 97
Ginger was the best Frisbee Player -animal or human, that I ever knew. I often wished she could get an NFL contract as a professional receiver to help pay for her own veterinary care, and possibly help me get a really nice car. She was that good. Unfortunately, labs tend to have hip problems as they get older, and Ginger’s Frisbee playing days, as well as her dreams of an NFL football career were over at about age 9. While many retired athletes spend their leisure time hunting and fishing, Ginger’s tendency to get diarrhea from drinking from lakes, streams and puddles, sadly prevented her from enjoying a front page glamour shot on Field and Stream. All in all, though, Ginger was a fine, warm-blooded, canine athlete.
Sports and Recreation: 92
Some dogs (including many of the Yellow Labs that I’ve known), will express their love by calmly sitting at your side. Ginger’s way was licking you, and pacing the floor obsessively. Though I don’t have ratings category for this, Ginger was not the calmest of dogs. She expressed her great love for us by making herself a nervous wreck and demanding constant attention, in-turn, making me a nervous wreck, and wanting to kill her. Earlier, I defined loyalty as a dog that will sacrifice its next meal to stay by your side. Ginger, one time, left an entire bowl of food to stay by my wife’s bed side while she was not feeling well. It’s this kind of loyalty that makes you regret wanting to kill the dog for making you so nervous all the time by loving you all the time.
Love and Loyalty: 90
Startup costs were a little excessive in the beginning, as we attempted to figure out why Ginger kept getting diarrhea. The vet finally diagnosed her as having Ghiardia. This is not to be confused with Ghiradelli Chocolates which would certainly produce similar symptoms in an 80lb dog, if she ate enough. It simply meant that she was getting diarrhea from drinking out of puddles, lakes and streams. Labs are meant to enjoy the great outdoors, but Ginger simply was not meant to ‘rough-it’. She would have to be confined to dirtying up our carpet and making spots on the backyard lawn.
Maintenance and Costs: 82
While Ginger would obviously score very high on the wunderlik test, it probably would not be on account of her intelligence. Ginger, may have not been the smartest pup in the kennel, but she had a keen stubbornness that could sometimes be confused for intelligence. Ginger was more of a senser than a thinker. She had great dog instincts, and could fetch a toy hidden in the house, simply by smelling her way to find it. Ginger was very good at thinking with her nose. Not, exactly a way to get a masters degree in science, but if that’s what you really wanted, wouldn’t you have looked at a poodle?
Intelligence: 72
Objectively and mathematically speaking, Ginger’s overall score averages out to an 86.6. But how can we be objective and mathematical about a living, breathing companion that loves you so much she makes you want to kill her? Quite simply, we can’t. There are qualities about pets like these, which we simply cannot quantify with numbers and ratings. A few years ago, my wife met the parent of a 3 or 4 year old girl who got to know Ginger on her many walks. The little girl was frowning, despite the fact that her parents had just given her a cute, little puppy. She said she didn’t want a little dog – she wanted a ‘big, yellow dog. Insensitive parents! How can they not know and understand what their child really wants?
- Friendliness: 100
- Companionship: 100
- Intelligence: 70
- Obedience: 85
- Loyalty: 100
- Maintenance: 70
- Security: 95
- Independence: 6
- Value: 90
- Overall: 80
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