Choosing a Dog Made Simple

Here's a simple and easy guide to choosing a dog. These are some of the things you should consider when choosing your puppy or adult dog to ensure you pick a best friend for life.

Purebred, Crossbred or Mixed-Breed
A purebred dog is a dog whose parents are both of the same breed. Humans create purebred dogs through selective breeding - inbreeding. Purebred dogs did not exist before humans manufactured them - a dog would simply breed with any other dog it chose, so there were no "purebreds", just a race of mixed-breed dogs. The advantage of choosing a purebred dog is that you can accurately determine his size, shape, and personality. So, for example, if you were to choose a Poodle puppy you would know with certainty what he will look like when he gets older, his approximate size, that he will be intelligent, and easy to train, and that he will hardly ever shed any hair.

A crossbred is the child of two different purebred dogs. Crossbreds are also known as designer or hybrid dogs. For example, if you cross a Labrador and a Poodle, you get what's known as a "Labradoodle".

A mixed-breed is the result of two random dogs who mate. Also known as mongrel, random-bred, or mutt. For example, a mixed-breed is the result if a Purebred, such as a Poodle, and a Crossbred, such as a Labradoodle mating.

Puppy or Adult
You can choose between a puppy or an adult dog. A puppy is a blank page ready to be written. How he turns out is half up to you, and half up to his genetics. With puppies, you don't know exactly how they're going to turn out either - until they become adults. So, one of the pluses of choosing an adult dog from a shelter is that you already know what you're going to get. If you choose a puppy, you will get him at 8 to 12 weeks of age - the time when he is ready to leave his mother - also the time when he is incredibly cute! He will need to be socialized. This means letting him spend time with other dogs and pets and people. He will need some basic obedience training -learning such commands such as sit, stay, off, down and come. He will also need to be housebroken so he doesn't eliminate inside. If you choose an adult dog, on the other hand, you can choose one who has already been housebroken and had some obedience training.

Boy or Girl
Male dogs are more dominant and aggressive to other Male dogs. They will also urine-mark their territory. Other than that, male and female dogs are generally very similar in the way they behave.

Small, Medium, Large or X-Large
Small dogs are a lot cheaper to keep and maintain. The cost of feeding a large or giant dog can be double or triple the price of feeding a small dog. Large dogs also do larger poos and wees. Small dogs live a lot longer than larger dogs. The average lifespan of a small Yorkshire Terrier is around 14 years. Whereas the average lifespan of a giant Bullmastiff dog is around 9 years. Small breeds also reach their full size a lot quicker than large breed dogs. A small breed will reach it's full size by about 5 months, whereas a giant breed will take about 18 months to reach his full size.