PurpleBug

Thank you everyone! They did ask us to contact them via email as they can't always answer the phone or spend time talking. We don't want to bombard them with emails and phone calls if there isn't anything too abnormal. Given the comments here, we don't feel that there is anything necessarily out of the ordinary but while we're trying not to be overbearing we are going to try and get hold of them via phone/text and nudge them for some more info. Sas, I've sent you a message back - thanks :)

Thank you both for your responses. Its really appreciated and your inputs on what is normal have been very helpful for us. Showdog, yes, we are aware that we have made mistakes. We thought we were doing the right thing and asking the right questions but now realise that we haven't got the information that we should have. I think we thought there were registered breeders, back yard breeders and puppy mills and we assumed that going through a registered breeder plus making sure we did meet the mother and ask about hereditary diseases would go a long way towards making sure we were getting a well bred dog. We didn't realise how easy it is to advertise on dogsonline. We're in a situation now where the breeder might be fine but we simply don't know and I can tell you that we're kicking ourselves and feeling rather foolish! Your responses plus reading some of the other threads here have given us a lot of extra information so I think we are armed with better questions now and a better idea of what is usual from breeders. I'm very very glad we decided to do a bit more investigation before we went any further, even if it is later than ideal... Thank you

Hi all My husband and I are hoping we might be able to benefit from your experience. Sorry if this is long, I want to make sure everything is down. We are currently looking for a second Boston Terrier to join our cuddle bug and very playful wee boy :) He is pure bred and was shown as a puppy. We had been hoping to adopt another adolescent but they are few and far between so we have been considering a puppy. We've been in touch with a breeder who has a young litter and we have put down a deposit but we now have some concerns. Our main priority is to get a healthy pup but with hindsight we fear we have been slightly naive. We were first in touch with this breeder around 5 months ago and there were one or two emails back and forward. We got back in touch about 4 weeks ago when we decided to get another dog and found out that they have a litter. Their correspondence was a bit slow but my husband talked to them on the phone and it wasn't that long between emails. They asked for a deposit in advance to guarantee a pup from this litter which we didn't feel was unreasonable. They said we could not but they couldn't guarantee we would get one if we waited. The breeder asked us to drop them an email confirming our preferences etc for when they match pups with homes. We did this and reiterated in the email that we wanted to meet the parents/mother before we took the puppy home and that we would pay the rest of the balance at the same time. We had asked on the phone to visit them before we paid the deposit but she said that they didn't like people coming over before the pups first vaccinations which we thought was sensible. We thought we were being careful as we were going with a dogsonline listed breeder, they said the parents were clear of juvenile cataracts (which we believe to be the major thing that needs testing in Australian Bostons) and the breeder also has a dogs nsw registration. I did a search on her name and the kennel name as well to see if anything came up and nothing did. It has now been two weeks since we paid the deposit and sent the last email and we have had no communication from them. We sent them a text to confirm the deposit had been paid and to ask them to confirm when it arrived. They texted back to say they would but they haven't. The lack of communication has made us a bit twitchy and I've been doing more reading here since then. We've also been thinking again about what has been said and I'm now getting myself more concerned. 1) My husband thinks she mentioned on the phone that she has two litters at the moment which is why she's so busy. We didn't think much of it, but having read some of the breeder sections here we now think that is a bit unusual. My husband also reread the emails that he sent 5 months ago and she mentioned having been busy raising a litter then. Three litters in 6 months seems like a lot to us. 2) We haven't been given any information on the bloodlines that are being bred and we haven't seen any certificates yet to confirm that the parents are indeed free of cataracts. To be fair, while we know to ask about the cataracts we didn't think to ask for proof in advance of picking up the puppy. Getting our current boy was so easy and he came with all his certificates when we went to meet him that it wasn't something we thought we needed to do in advance. My husband is also not sure if its been explicitly confirmed that the pups will have papers. 3) I'm thinking that if their communication is so bad now, what is it likely to be if we want support in 6 months time? 4) I've read a couple of things suggesting that ideally a breeder should also show as that way you know they are breeding for strong pups with few faults - would you agree? This breeder doesn't appear to show that we can tell. If the communication had been good we probably wouldn't have been wondering all of these things. However, the radio silence following the payment of deposit and the email has left us spooked and caused us to second guess ourselves. We would be very interested to hear your thoughts. Should we expect more communication? Is there anything above that would concern you or are we being unfair to a lady who probably has her hands full looking after young puppies? We don't want to abandon our deposit if we're being unfair but equally we feel that relative to owning a dog for its lifetime the money is not the issue so if we have to walk away we will. Thanks P.S. I hope I have posted in the correct part of the forum. Sorry if I haven't.