Rustic Red Retrievers

Rustic Red Retrievers Oregon Based AKC/UKC Golden Retriever program with a focus on sports, genetic diversity, breed preservation.

Parents have all breed club reccomended OFAs and DNA to ensure the health of our future pups.

Can’t forget about this handsome man! Just got his BCAT certificate in the mail! Can’t wait for our next events with thi...
05/25/2026

Can’t forget about this handsome man! Just got his BCAT certificate in the mail! Can’t wait for our next events with this guy

Girlfriend was excellent at the vet! All prepped for OFA and PennHip! We can’t wait to get this data back so we know how...
05/20/2026

Girlfriend was excellent at the vet! All prepped for OFA and PennHip!

We can’t wait to get this data back so we know how to make smart decisions for Birdie moving forward.

Didn’t wind up with too many photos of bogey while camping but at our next trial he should earn a fun Dock Elite Advance...
05/09/2026

Didn’t wind up with too many photos of bogey while camping but at our next trial he should earn a fun Dock Elite Advanced title for 30 total jumps into Elite. This is very seasonal for us and we only do between 4-8 splashes per event so it takes us a little while to rack up the needed jumps for titles and leaderboards but hey we make it happen!

Birdie was an excellent girl for her first camping trip AND dock diving trial. She didn’t wind up in the water of the po...
05/09/2026

Birdie was an excellent girl for her first camping trip AND dock diving trial. She didn’t wind up in the water of the pool, but did wind up jumping and splashing in the river afterwards! Hopefully more water time means our next trial we may get a jump out of her!

We wild camp with no neighbors (and a fi collar) and Birdie stayed close to camp, came when called and ROMPED in the woods with Bogey off leash. Excellent all around!

Little educational post about my life experience with fear periods! My first major experience with this highly controver...
05/05/2026

Little educational post about my life experience with fear periods!

My first major experience with this highly controversial behavioral phenomenon was with Bogey and I am pretty sure I am experiencing something similar with Birdie right now.

Birdie is right at 9 months right now and for the people who believe in this part of puppy development, most would agree this is a pretty normal age for it to occur. Birdie is normally really quiet, not reactive to much and very willing to try new things. A week or so ago, Birdie started growling more at noises in the night, hackles up. Even barking at her reflection in the window or the TV. She’s more startled by normal household noises like the coffee grinder and neighbors walking by. She’s less willing to try new things and my tactic is almost always to opt for offering positive reinforcement paired with the weird thing happening. There is NO harm in reassuring a startled or nervous dog. Adding a negative stimulus can absolutely validate these fears and further build skepticism even after the fear period passes. If Birdie is unwilling to take a treat, that’s okay! Even gentle petting and reassurance is a fine option. If she wants to investigate, I let her. But she is also so used to the engage disengage exercises that she is very able to just walk away from the stressful thing which is a perfectly acceptable option. What I don’t do is intentional exposure - while their brains are going through this, they respond differently than they normally would, especially compared to a mature adult dog. Exposure often isn’t helpful but can be harmful.

Bogey’s experience is was pretty similar but was the most obvious at 18 months. I remember taking him to his agility class while heavily pregnant myself and all of the sudden this guy was TERRIFIED of a coat rack. Like slink and simultaneously sprint past it everytime he saw it. Approaching it was never on the table. We did a touch of intentional exposure and left it at that. His brain from 18-24 months was so vastly different and just letting him age and mature was all he needed to overcome nearly all of these weird concerned feelings.

Moral of my sharing this? I get a lot of puppy owners in groups posting ‘my adolescent dog is scared of everything right now’ and what I wish more people knew was that yes - sometimes systematic exposure and desensitization is necessary, and sometimes all the dog needs is less exposure and time. Sometimes it takes a professional looking at the dog to really give a good answer as to what an individual circumstance calls for.

Thanks for coming to my TED Talk. Hope this helped you feel better about some strange fears your young dog had that seemingly just vanished.

Congrats Aurora!
05/03/2026

Congrats Aurora!

FastCAT pics always make my day! Shoutout to Margot McKelvie Photography for the wonderful photos. Serendipity Dog Event...
05/01/2026

FastCAT pics always make my day!

Shoutout to Margot McKelvie Photography for the wonderful photos.
Serendipity Dog Events for hosting and Bigfoot Goldens for joining the fun!

This little gal has an exam before her preliminary OFAs scheduled for 5/20! I am so excited. I was going to wait until s...
04/30/2026

This little gal has an exam before her preliminary OFAs scheduled for 5/20! I am so excited. I was going to wait until she turned a year, but I did some research on the percentage of accuracy to final scores at 9 vs 12 months old and it’s almost the exact same. So we will be getting them done a bit early just to peek inside before letting her do much at the trials we have planned for bogey this year. But if she looks good we will definitely be doing a little bit now!

First FastCAT trial of the year! Two weekends until our first dock diving event and then back at another FastCAT trial! ...
04/21/2026

First FastCAT trial of the year! Two weekends until our first dock diving event and then back at another FastCAT trial!

Now that we have a BCAT, time to work this summer for a DCAT 🫶🏻

Birdie loved playing in the river! Her first time going in!
04/11/2026

Birdie loved playing in the river! Her first time going in!

I think Birdie enjoyed her play date (it was really training but don’t tell her that)
04/09/2026

I think Birdie enjoyed her play date (it was really training but don’t tell her that)

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