My name is Shawna Green. I live in Georgetown, Texas with my husband, PJ (a business school professor at the University of Texas at Austin), our five children (Alexis, Gentry, Amiyah, Melvin, and Addison), and our three dogs (Poppy, Fenway, and Harvey).
We’ve lived here for just a few years. We’re California natives, but come to Austin by way of Boston, MA, where PJ went to grad school. The Austin area was a dream for us: space, no snow, and BBQ!
Falling in Love With Labradoodles
When we moved to Austin, we were looking to expand our family with a new pet. We knew we wanted some sort of doodle, but weren’t really sure what we were looking for–or, frankly, what the differences were between various types of doodles. After doing some research, we came across a website telling the story of the Australian Labradoodle. We were attracted to the multigenerational Australian Labradoodle–offering the consistency of a purebred dog, but without the health or genetic issues so common in many purebreeds.
Then we met a few! And we were in love! We had been breeders of other breeds in the past–but we realized that we wanted to provide others with the opportunity to experience these wonderful family members.
What We Do
We’re a home-based, research driven breeder. Multigenerational Australian Labradoodles are, by their nature, kind, gentle, brilliant, and affectionate. These are some of the reasons we love them so much! But their wonderful disposition is not solely genetic: healthy, well-mannered, disciplined dogs are as much a product of “nurture” as of “nature”. Their early experiences–and (believe it or not) the experiences of their mother, even before they’re born–have a substantial effect on not just their early lives, but on their entire life. We think it’s really important that every dog, breeder or otherwise, live with a family that loves them. And puppies need a special type of care and individual focus for the first 8 weeks of their lives. So our breeder dogs either live with us, in our home, as family members; or they live in the home of a family that loves them and cares for them as a loved family member.
And each litter of puppies is born in our home. Our family interacts with them from an early age, working to socialize them, stimulate their neurological development, and ensure they’re prepared to be wonderful canine citizens when they come to live with their adoptive families.
We love what we do, and our approach to breeding and developing puppies is driven by research and science. We are obsessive about genetic health; all of our breeding dogs undergo extensive genetic testing to ensure they’re not carriers for any known common ailments or diseases in the breed. We embrace a number of empirically validated socialization and cognitive-development practices. And from the week our puppies are born, we begin working with the adoptive families who have reserved a puppy in that litter, educating them on our approach and how to be prepared to care for and raise a wonderful canine citizen.
We think Australian Labradoodles are the ideal breed of dog, and we know you’ll love them. We’d love to have the opportunity to provide you with the incredible gift of a beautiful, new puppy family member. But we know you may have questions–about the breed, about us, or about our process. Please don’t hesitate to email us at [email protected].