I have been involved with Labrador retrievers since 1979. My wife and I started Sunset Labradors in 1998. We have dedicated ourselves to the working and companion Labrador retriever. Over the years I have trained many Labrador retrievers and have always had a great interest in field trials. I have always dreamed of training one of our retrievers to compete in field trials, however due to my job and responsibility to our family members I was unable to travel away from home for any length of time.
I retired from my job in 2005 after 31 years of employment with New York State. I began training one of our labs for strictly field trial work. Everything seemed to be falling in to place, our lab pup was really working out and I was able to travel away for periods of time. Then my world came crashing down, I had been diagnosed with progressive arthritis in 2004 and by mid 2007 I was bone on bone and was hobbling around in severe pain. All of my mobility became very limited and surgery was coming soon. With the help and support of my wife, Arlene who is a Registered Nurse I was able to make it to 2007. My surgery was scheduled for the fall and with the help through the summer months of our son in law, Rob, I made it to September. After surgery I owe my quick recovery to my mother who I stayed with for 5 weeks during which time I was like an invalid but with her care I made it through a very hard time.
Now here we are March of 2009 and I am almost 100%. The desire has returned to train a field trial dog and maybe it will happen. The purpose of our new website is to provide as much information as we can about the Labrador retriever and the training of a Labrador retriever. I am not a professional dog trainer and do not claim to be. I have in the past trained many labs for hunting. The most important part of hunting with a Labrador retriever is obedience training. We will be discussing obedience training frequently in our blog.
We hope you enjoy your visit to our blog. We look forward to questions and comments and we hope our blog will be helpful to your Labrador retriever training. Enjoy your visit and check back often.