Is a field Lab right for you?
A field-bred Lab is not the Lab next door
Field-line Labradors are leaner, faster and more driven than the blocky show-line Labs most people picture. They're bred to retrieve all day, in cold water, for someone who gives them direction. In a home that gives them work, they're the easiest dogs in the world to live with. In a home that doesn't, they eat drywall.
The facts
Exercise
An hour or more a day of real exercise — running, swimming, retrieving — from about six months, plus training. A walk around the block is not exercise for this dog.
Size
Females 21–22½ inches and 55–62 lb, males 22½–24 inches and 65–78 lb, kept lean. Ours are lighter than most pet Labs, on purpose.
Coat
Short, dense and waterproof. They shed all year and heavily twice a year. Weekly brushing; baths only when they've found something dead.
Lifespan
Usually 11 to 13 years. Our dogs who died of old age lived 12½ to 14; cancer is the most common cause of death in the breed.
Cost
About $1,800–2,500 a year for food, routine vet care, preventives and insurance, before training, hunt test entries or a dog-box for the truck.
The downsides
Mouthy as puppies, food-obsessed for life, counter-surfers, prone to getting fat, and slow to grow up — many aren't sensible until three. A bored field Lab will find a job you won't like.
Before you apply
We don't hunt. Can we still have one?
Yes, if you'll train and exercise it — hunt tests, dock diving, long hikes, a daily retrieving session. About a third of our puppies go to non-hunting families, and they're matched with the calmer puppies.
Are they good with kids?
Generally very, once they're past the mouthy stage. A field-bred puppy will knock over a toddler by accident. Families with children under six should expect a hard first year.
Can a field Lab live in an apartment?
Only with an owner who gets it outside, properly, twice a day. We rarely place in apartments, and only with people who already have a working-dog routine.