"Bydand Puppies"

Available Puppies link below

It's important to know, before considering a Bydand puppy, that we do not, under any
circumstances, ship puppies! The new owner must be prepared to come and pick them up at
our home. New owners, from out of the area may fly into Roanoke, VA and fly home with the
puppy inside the cabin with them, in an underseat carrier. But Bydand puppies do not fly in
cargo or as baggage. Period.

Bydand puppies always have, and always will, come with a full, lifetime money-back guarantee.
If you cannot, or do not wish to, keep a dog you purchased from us at any time during his life, for any reason whatsoever, we will take him back, no questions asked, and refund your purchase price in full.

Why? If we were not willing to stand behind our dogs, we would not be breeding dogs. This guarantee is designed to protect neither the seller nor the buyer- it is designed to protect the dogs we put on this earth, and whose existence is ultimately our responsibility. At Bydand, our pups are raised in the house, among the adult Havanese, and are extensively socialized from the day they are whelped until they leave for their new homes. We were among the pioneer proponents of early socialization

in working Sporting dogs back in the 70s, when we did extensive research on the subject.
Neonates handled in specific ways beginning at birth have been shown to develop higher stress
tolerance as adults. Understanding the critical periods in early neurological development,

and providing novel stimuli at the appropriate times, results in pups that are able to learn and adapt to new situations throughout life more easily than those who have not been similarly exposed. Canines are, by definition, pack-hunting predators, and as such are “hard-wired” with the genes to assume a particular pack status position. (At 49 days, a dog's innate pack status position can be readily ascertained by experienced trainers by performing a series of simple tests.) Understanding

that all dogs, even 10 pound Toys, are pack-hunting predators and not little people in fur coats
is essential to successful dog ownership.

A dog, being an adaptable creature, will assume a particular pack position in whatever pack he
may find himself- for our purposes, that is generally the family to which he is sold. This human
family and whatever animals it may include becomes his “pack”, and he will attempt to reach the
level of dominance within that pack that he is hard-wired to assume. Understanding this simple
fact both before and after purchasing a pup can help avoid many of the behavioral problems
that plague dog owners.

Before purchasing, evaluate your own family situation- are there young children in the house? Most kids under the age of 10 cannot assume a position of dominance over even the smallest dog whose innate pack status position is on the high end, and will often end up being bitten as a result of trying. (In spite of the fact we may be uncomfortable with the notion, pack status among dogs is achieved through physical domination, or the implied imminent threat thereof. Dogs do not negotiate, and trying to teach them to do so is about as successful as trying to teach a pig to sing…it mostly just annoys the pig.)

Because of that “physical domination” thing, it is also wise to evaluate your own feelings about
corporal punishment- if you are uncomfortable putting a physical correction on a dog, you will
certainly be more successful with a dog whose innate pack status position is on the low end of

the scale, even if there are no children in the house. The dominance issue will affect housebreaking, for example, which is a fact of which many potential owners are not aware. When sorting a litter of puppies, we take into account the future “pack” each puppy will be a part of, and this determines to a large degree which puppy ends up in which home. At Bydand, we do not generally place our puppies before 10

weeks. Because the Havanese is an unusually social breed, the adults in the household
contribute greatly to the early education of the puppies- by keeping them in the pack longer
the pups learn “dog manners” from the adults, which serves them well throughout life in their

dealings with other dogs. They learn "people manners" from us, and included in this is litter box training. For the past two years, Bydand puppies have been trained to use Purina's Second Nature Dog Litter from the time they are old enough to toddle. Puppies stay far cleaner than with any other method, and they learn very early on that there is a particular acceptable place to eliminate. The transition from litter to the outdoors when the pup is old enough is generally seamless because of this,

and in the interim period, the pup has an acceptable indoor option. Some urban dogs continue
to use the litter throughout adulthood. (Ch Bydand Jumpin Jack Flash, who is a member of the
first litter raised on SecondNature two years ago, has a litter box on the balcony of his 7th floor
Florida condo, which still he uses when needed. Many of our adult Havs will choose to use the
litter box on rainy days, a laundry room is often a logical place for it.)

If one compares the breeding of purebred dogs to the creation of sculpture, it is a long and
arduous process. It begins with an understanding of tools and technique (anatomy and genetics)
and culminates, finally, with the adult dog, which is the finished product. The puppy is like an
unfinished sculpture, and the finishing process is largely up to the new owner. No amount of
finishing will camouflage the flaws in a piece of sculpture that was poorly designed, but a well-
designed piece can certainly fail to achieve its potential if poorly finished, and the same is true of
dogs. We fully expect our puppy buyers to consider us their first resource if help is needed at any
time in the dog's life.