I have 7/9 pups tested and will do the last 2 today. Tomorrow I will spend the day matching puppies with people. It's a very long and stressful job making sure everyone has the best matched puppy possible. Things to consider from the pups side: health, energy level, sight sensitivity, sound sensitivity, focus, patience, forgiveness, confidence, food desire, retrieve desire, learning speed, play drive, prey drive, etc. There's a LOT to placing a puppy!
Of course everyone wants the perfect puppy. But you know what? There is no perfect puppy. You might ask for 10 things but your puppy might come with 7 of the 10. But that's okay! You know why? Because there are many things that are TWEAKABLE. Things that you can encourage more of or discourage. Play and prey drive for instance. You can build on what the puppy comes with or you can suppress what the puppy comes with. Same with confidence. Same with patience. You cannot however change some things. Like pain tolerance, and forgiveness. Those are set in stone.
Then there's the owners to take into consideration. There's just as many categories there as there is for puppies. Experience is the most important. For instance I can take a mediocre puppy and turn him into a star. That's because I've had decades and decades of learning dog psychology, behaviour and training. So along with owner's energy levels, family specifics, etc both the amount of time they have for their dog and their previous experience play a large part in my decision.
The above photo is the room set up for testing. That's not what the pup sees when he first comes in. That is all the items I use to test for the above qualities. Can you guess what each one is for? It takes 15-30 minutes to test each puppy. That all depends on the puppy. You cannot rush these things!l
Anyways, I best get to testing the remaining pups. I have owners waiting to hear!
