Health Guarantee (summary): You cannot take a chance on the health of your dog... you invest a lot of time, money, energy and love into your puppy, you do not want to have problems with your be-loved puppy... not now... not later... not ever... especially when they reach adulthood and you have spent many years growing closer together. While NO breeder can guarantee that you will never have a health problem such a hip-dysplasia... it is up to the breeder to do everything that they can to prevent this terrible debilitating disease, starting with only the best genetic matching and then by getting the dogs X-rayed and OFA certified ASAP.

Even with every pre-caution taken, a health problem can still occasionally present itself and then it is up to the breeder to make things right.  Select K9's gives a full "one-year" conditional guarantee of genetic health with every puppy "if" the problem is severe enough to warrant replacement (ie... a slight allergy does NOT warrant a replacement).  Select K9's also gives a full 26 month warranty against a dog developing crippling genetic hip/elbow dysplasia.  We reserve the right to rule out environmental causes and we need to have a vet approved by our Kennel verify the problem at the new owner's expense. This is to help rule out kids falling/stepping on puppies, puppies falling off tables, and other incidental accidents, etc...  This may also require OFA comfirmed X- rays showing that the dog actually has crippling genetic hip/elbow dysplasia.  In the very rare instance that a pup from our Kennel proves to be of poor genetic health, we will gladly replace your puppy with a puppy of equal or higher quality when a similar litter becomes available.  If Penn-Hip procedure has been used at any time during the life of the dog, the guarantee is void.  Also, if the dog has been bred before the age of two years.... or if a male/female has been spayed/neutered before one year of age, the hip/elbow guarantee will be void. Recent studies show that a puppy that is kept in-tact for one year of age will have a better chance at developing better hips and elbows. We work incredibly hard to make sure that our puppies are healthy. We want them to remain healthy for many years to come!

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-Please call or e-mail us for a "full copy" of our Health Guarantee.

*ALL of our dogs have either OFA certifications or the German (A) stamp for hip certifications.

- Unless otherwise noted, all of our puppies will come with "limited registration" (no breeding rights).  Please ask us if you are interested in breeding.

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The following was taken from Ed Frawley's website... a very experienced G.S. dog breeder of more than 30 years!

Hip dysplasia has four major causes:

• genetics
• diet
• over feeding
• too much exercise at a young age

*It is felt that genetics play between a 25% and 30% role in a dog having hip dysplasia. This means that new owners can assume a great deal of responsibility (70% to 75%) in their dog developing good hips.  

This begins with feeding an all-natural diet. It also means that you should keep your dog thin. Carrying too much weight at a young age is going to add stress on soft puppy bones and you only kid yourself if you think this does not have an effect on skeletal development of a young dog.

New owners need to be very careful of over exercising a pup. This means no jogging until after the dog is 12 months old. This mean not exercising to the point of exhaustion, or taking the pup for long long walks. Around the block is fine, a 2 mile walk is not fine.

In addition I will only replace a pup once. If someone gets two pups from my kennel and both have bad hips, then that person is doing something wrong.

Source:  Ed Frawley of Leerburg Kennels

*The following might be a little long but please take the time to read it thouroghly as nutrition is one of the most important steps in raising your pet!  It will only take you a few minutes... you owe it to your pet! 

*Please check out the Dog food advisor website link below.  It might just change your dogs life and may add some $-money to your wallet! 

Nutrition - Quality commercial dog foods and the RAW diet

Raw food:

Given the choice we would feed nothing but the RAW diet, but at this time we do supplement with comercial dry food. To feed the RAW diet as a "sole" source of food, you have to be very careful to meet the required nutrients needed by your dog.  Proper ratios of minerals and vitamins are crucial to the develpment and good health of your puppy/dog.  To properly feed the RAW diet you need to carefully manage a list of essential ingredients in order to get the necessary nutrition for your canine.  If you are interested and need more info. please check our "links page".  The RAW diet does tend to cost more and certainly takes more time to prepare, but if you can manage... it is definetly worth the time and money invested.  As mentioned earlier, we are currently unable to feed the RAW diet as a "sole" source of nutrition for our dogs.  This is mostly because of the need of a reliable, affordable supply of ingreedients as well as the time investment required when raising several dogs. If I were only raising one or two dogs this would definetly be my only choice of food for my dog(s).  Meat scraps provide pure and natural sources of "meat quality" protein to promote good muscle development.  Raw meat also contains enzymes which helps in the digestion process. German Shepherds suposedly have sensitive digestive systems... but we have never experienced it.  Many good nutrients like "enzymes" are killed off or depleted after the high temperature cooking process used in most comercial dog foods.  Raw bones containing marrow add highly digestable calcium and trace minerals to help build strong skelital systems and good hips. They also help keep teeth clean & healthy, and are great for exercing the dog's jaw. They also give the dog something to do while in their kennel.  In my opinion these high quality, naturally occurring nutrients are what is the absoulute best for all dogs.  Many other Top quality breeders and wholistic veterinarians share the same view and most canine nutritionalists heavily endorse the RAW diet.  There has been many books written on the topic, but the Veterinary schools have just recently started to educate students about the health benefits of the RAW diet and proper nutrition. 

Some poeple are concerned about feeding bones to their dogs and... they should be "if" the bones are "cooked".  Cooking bones can make them brittle which can cause them to splinter. These splinters can lodge in a dog's mouth, throat, stomach or intestines. This is why you should only feed RAW bones. These are what dogs would eat in nature, and what their ancestors the coyote and wolf are safely eating every day.  We have a great relationship with our local butcher, he saves back various meat scraps and bones for our dogs.  He gives us a high volume discount and fills bags to convenient sizes for us. He has been a great asset to our kennel. Most butchers are willing to help you out with this as in many cases they have to pay to get rid of these scraps, so all they have invested in most cases is labor and machine wear from cutting all those big bones.

Commercial food:

I used to feed dog foods like Eukanuba, Iams and Science Diet to my dogs, because according to the TV ads I was buying the best for my pet. Then I started to educate myself on dog foods (after all the recalls) and realized that they are spending a lot of their money on marketing/advertising and not enough on quality ingredients, in my opinion.  The nutrition label may look well stacked but there is so much more to a good dog food then the artificial vitamins and minerals that the company has injected into the kibble to get an impressive label.  I have learned to go beyond the nutritional facts and go on to the ingredients label.  This label tells you what is actually in the food that your are feeding to your beloved pet.  This list is organized in order from "most" to "least" ingredients.  While these brands are not a bad dog food... I firmly believe that there are better dog foods that cost less such as NutriSource (and others).  Some companies are very good at "marketing" an inferior product.  Please read the following and then make your own decision.  Your pet deserves the best and you owe it to your pet and yourself to do the research to make sure that you are giving him/her the absolute best food for your dollar.  Your money should be going towards quality ingredients, not paying for expensive advertising, commercials and dog show sponsor ads.

In the case with Science Diet the first ingredient is Corn!!  The second ingredient is chicken by-product meal, and the third ingredient is corn meal!  Then they add animal fat... no idea what type of animal and why does animal "fat" show up so early in the ingredients list?  We eventually have a chicken liver "flavor" added but never actual quality chicken meat or chicken meal.  Meat by-products are the inedibles of the animals and may contain feet, beaks, feathers, hooves, organs, bones and even fur.  So why does it say vetrinarian reccomended?  I had a vet tell me that they are taught very little about nutrition in vet school. They have so many different species of animals to learn that there is not much time for nutrition...  "that is what a nutritionalist is for"  I was told.  It has been said that important medical equipment/supplies have been paid for by Hills Science Diet and then donated to vet schools across the country.  Science diet has also been known to give away or greatly reduce the price of their dog food to vets for their own dogs.  One vet told me that he used to be able to get all of the Science Diet dog food that he wanted for his 5 dogs for "free".  That is a big monthy savings - "free dog food".  So the point is... take everything with a "grain of salt" when looking at claimed slogans and ads!  Just because a dog food company is big enough to sponsor a worldwide dog show or is capable of buying big expensive medical equimpment does not mean that it is the best dog food availabe for your dog and for your dollar! 

Quality meat is very expensive!  We all know this.  It costs a LOT of money to raise a large animal from birth to adulthood.  There are many ways to add protein to a dog kibble and most people just look at the nutrition label and read the numbers to make a decision based on these numbers alone, this is what the dog food companies count on us doing everyday!  The truth of the matter is that you can get your protein from cheaper sources like soybean, wheat, corn and other grain products that are sources of inferior plant proteins that are harder for dogs to utilize, or you can get the protein from "Meat" which is easier for dogs to digest, utilize and absorb.  Meat also contains essential amino acids that dogs need to build strong muscle.  Meat protein is what dogs were designed to consume... this is why they have canine teeth... to rip apart meat carcasses.  They don't have molars like a cow to grind corn. When was the last time you saw a coyote or a wolf grazing in a corn field???  Never!  Whether we like it or not our dogs are carnivores just like the wolf, they are not herbivores!  Yet dog companies insist on putting grains like wheat, corn and soy in dog food!  Why??  Because they are cheap fillers. Some of these companies have to resort to spraying hot melted animal fat over the grain based kibble just so the dog will eat it!  Even though dogs may eat these cheaper foods, they still contain many unusable and hard to digest inferior plant proteins.  The protein numbers on the dog food bag may read the same "value" but the protein comes from two completely different sources.  Many studies are now showing that too much wheat and/or corn in a puppies diet could be a leading cause of allergies in dogs!  Other grains like rice, oatmeal and barley are considered to be much easier to digest and are also thought to be less of an allergen to puppies.  

Dog food companies need to face the facts... dogs were never meant to graze in corn fields!  Many dog food companies respond with the philosophy that nobody would want to spend the extra money on a "meat based" dog food and would rather purchase the cheaper grain based products.  Well maybe they are right with some people... but I do believe that if they spent more effort educating their customers then most of their customers would realize that our pets will eat up to "two thirds" (2/3) less food when it is "meat based" and does not contain all those worthless grain fillers!!!  This dramatic decrease in food consumption can definitely help offset the higher price (might be cheaper)!  I believe that in most cases they are about the same price when you compare the amount of kibble consumed and the health of the dog.  Besides... with less food being taken into the dog... means less waste coming out of the dog!!  No one likes to clean up dog feces... so this alone should help customers make the right decision.  Of course, the main thing is that our pets will live longer, healthier lives when fed a high quality, highly nutritional diet!  

Ingredients....
We recently had a large beef cow die.  It was one that our kids were attached to and was kind-of a pet so we had the vet out for three full days trying everything possible to save our pet cow!  She administered many drugs to our cow during that time in the hopes of saving our cow from this mystery illness.  However, after much effort, a lot of money, and many drugs... she still passed away.  Very sad and expensive moment for our family.  So then we had a 1,200 lb. carcass that we had to dispose of.  We called a rendering company and the truck came the next day.  We asked the driver.... what becomes of our beloved cow?  He replied "we process them into dog food".   Wow... that made me think... not because she was being processed into dog food, because I would normally be fine with that... this big giant animal could still be used for something useful.  The problem that I had was that I knew she had been injected with many types of drugs and pills over the past couple of days.  Many of the drugs given to cows make the meat inedible or "not safe" for human consumption for months afterwards. If those drugs were not bad enough, the vet almost euthanized her in order to end her suffering, but she died first. Imagine having this toxic poison in the cow's body and then feeding this poison to your dog!  This meat was not fit for human consumption and is now being ground up into dog kibble and fed to our beloved pets!  Cooking the meet may get rid of some of viruses and bacterias, but it does not get rid of all of the antibiotics and chemicals.  Sadly... as we all found out from the pet food recalls a few years back... there is very little in safety standards for pet foods... not like human grade food.  Then we wonder why our dogs are dying prematurely of things like kidney failure and cancer!  Please check out the following short video explaining what type of meat can be found in some dog food.  "The truth about dog and cat food"    Also, please read the following short article.  "The shocking-truth-about-dog-food"   and also  "opednews TEST-ANIMALS"

Personally I like to feed poultry or chicken based dog food.  Layer hens get slaughtered when egg production drops or at about two years of age.  These slightly older chickens are still considered human grade meat and may end up as chicken nuggets or similar.  Therefore, I feel a little safer feeding my dogs chicken based feed.  If a chicken gets sick, they are not going to inject a $10 drug into a $ 1.50 bird.  This is why these older chickens are still considered human grade food and why I prefer poultry.  Of course all of this is just my opinion.  

The first 5 ingredients: The first ingredient should be meat NOT a meat by-product.  It should be chicken or Lamb, etc...  some argue with this and say it should be "chicken meal" or "lamb meal" as it contains less water then meat and has more concentrated protein but I personally do not mind as long as it is listed as either the first or second ingreedient. I assume that an ingreedient listed as "chicken" or "Lamb" are better cuts of meat and are more like what we would expect "human grade" food to look like.  Chicken/lamb meal is essentially a concentrated or dehydrated form of the meat and is very high in protein.  I guess either order is acceptable to me.  However, I do not like to see ANY "meat by-products" in my dog food as this is usually the inedible parts of the animal such as chicken feet, chicken beaks, hooves, organs, feathers, and bones.  Some of these ingredients are ground up and added as filler to make the kibble stretch out farther, they usually have very little nutritional value, but are almost free for the dog food companies to acquire.  

Other good nutritional items to look for are things like chelated minerals, omega 3's, and pro-biotic enzymes to help in digestion.


*While there are better dog foods than NutriSource... I have yet to find one as good as NutriSource in the same price range.  I continually look at other foods and I always keep my mind open as I continue my search for the perfect affordable food.  The reality is that there is NO such thing as a perfect commercial food. This is why I try to substitute with the RAW diet whenever possible. I buy scrap bones covered with meat from my local butcher shop as often as I can. I keep a large 26 cu.ft. chest freezer for the frozen bones/meat out in the kennel.  The calcium, minerals and protein from these meat covered bones is absolutely the best food a dog can possibly have, it is what nature intended for them to eat. Uncooked "raw" bones are totally safe for dogs to eat... again... coyotes and wolves eat raw bones every day. The danger with bones comes when you cook them... they become brittle and can splinter causing harm to the digestive track and other.  The reason I supplement with the commercial dog food is that it has many of the minerals and vitamins that could possibly be missing in a total meat/bone diet.  People that feed the true RAW diet have to be careful to get a proper mix of other ingredients in order to ensure that ALL of the dogs nutritional needs are being met.  I just do not have the time/resources to accomplish the total RAW diet at this time.  Sometime in the future I hope to be able to run a complete RAW diet with our dogs, as I believe it is healthier and a more natural alternative.  Studies have proven that dogs on the RAW diet live longer, healthier lives.  Unfortunately, sometimes we have to make compromises in life and I am trying hard to leverage the amount of time that I have with an extremely busy "life" filled with a job, family, and the many tedious chores required with the proper care of animals. In the end we need to realize that we are doing the best that we can.  

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Check out the following website http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com and then compare the ingredients of the feeds below.  *When at the site, click on "dry dog foods" (under Dog Food Reviews on the left side).  Make sure you are finding your exact formula as many companies offer different varieties of their products.

*Please note that NutriSource was rated as a four star dog food and Eukanuba, Iams and Science Diet only recieved a two star rating, because of the corn, chicken by-product and other inferior products in their ingredients list.  Proof that sometimes you can get a better product for less money.  Invest your money into quality ingreedients not fancy advertising!   *(Dogfood recipes can change over time).

* I "bolded" a couple of the ingredients that I feel should NOT be in a quality dog food.  They are cheap ingredients that only act as fillers and/or low end sources of protein.  Please take the time to visit the "dog food advisor" website above so that you can make your own educated decision.  You owe it to your pet, your pocket book, and to your own happiness with a long living, healthy pet! 

Eukanuba puppy feed label

Ingredients:
Chicken, Corn Meal, Chicken By-Product Meal (Natural source of Chondroitin Sulfate and Glucosamine), Ground Whole Grain Sorghum, Brewers Rice, Dried Beet Pulp, Chicken Flavor, Dried Egg Product, Fish Oil (preserved with mixed Tocopherols, a source of Vitamin E), Brewers Dried Yeast, Fish Meal, Potassium Chloride, Chicken Fat (preserved with mixed Tocopherols, a source of Vitamin E), Salt, Calcium Carbonate, Choline Chloride, Fructooligosaccharides, Minerals (Ferrous Sulfate, Zinc Oxide, Manganese Sulfate, Copper Sulfate, Manganous Oxide, Potassium Iodide, Cobalt Carbonate), DL-Methionine, Vitamins (Ascorbic Acid, Vitamin A Acetate, Calcium Pantothenate, Biotin, Thiamine Mononitrate (source of vitamin B1), Vitamin B12 Supplement, Niacin, Riboflavin Supplement (source of vitamin B2), Pyridoxine Hydrochloride (source of vitamin B6), Inositol, Vitamin D3 Supplement, Folic Acid), Vitamin E Supplement, Marigold, Beta-Carotene, Rosemary Extract.

NutriSource puppy feed label  (medium breed)
(we have found NutriSource puppy food from $35 - $40 per 30lb. bag and adult is approx. the same price but is in a larger 33lb. bag)

Ingredients:
Chicken meal, chicken, brown rice, white rice, fish meal (a source of fish oil), oatmeal, chicken fat (preserved with mixed tocopherols and citric acid), flax seeds, beet pulp, tomato pomace, sunflower oil, natural flavors, dried egg product, brewers yeast, potassium chloride, salt, proteinated minerals (zinc proteinate, iron proteinate, copper proteinate, manganese proteinate, cobalt proteinate, selenium proteinate), yeast culture (saccharomyces cerevisiae, enterococcus faecium, lactobacillus acidophilus, aspergillus niger, trichoderma longibrachiatum, bacillus subtillis), vitamins (vitamin A acetate, vitamin D3 supplement, vitamin E supplement, niacin, pantothenic acid, thiamine mononitrate, pyridoxine hydrochloride, riboflavin supplement, folic acid, biotin, vitamin B12 supplement), glucosamine hydrochloride, lecithin, ascorbic acid (vitamin C), choline chloride, chondroitin sulfate, yucca schidigera extract, calcium iodate, rosemary extract.

Science Diet puppy feed label

Ingredients:

Whole Grain Corn, Chicken By-Product Meal, Corn Gluten Meal, Animal Fat (preserved with mixed tocopherols and citric acid), Dried Beet Pulp, Chicken Liver Flavor, Brewers Rice, Dicalcium Phosphate, Lactic Acid, Fish Oil, Flaxseed, Soybean Oil, Iodized Salt, Potassium Chloride, L-lysine, Choline Chloride, Vitamin E Supplement, vitamins (L-ascorbyl-2-polyphosphate (source of vitamin C), Vitamin E Supplement, Niacin, Thiamine Mononitrate, Vitamin A Supplement, Calcium Pantothenate, Biotin, Vitamin B12 Supplement, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Riboflavin, Folic Acid, Vitamin D3 Supplement), Magnesium Oxide, minerals (Ferrous Sulfate, Zinc Oxide, Copper Sulfate, Manganous Oxide, Calcium Iodate, Sodium Selenite), preserved with Mixed Tocopherols and Citric Acid, Phosphoric Acid, Beta-Carotene, Rosemary Extract.

.Help your puppy become all that his genetic potential will allow him to be!  Feed only Premium Quality dog foods to your pet.  You will have a longer living, healthier, happier, more energetic pet with less waste to deal with.

Free sample bag of Premium NutriSource puppy food with every puppy purchased at Selectk9's.