Katrina #2 Chocolate Labrador Retriever Female 8 Years Old ID #3372

August 15, 2023

Are you searching for the perfect combination of beauty, energy, loyalty, and friendship in a dog? Well look no further than the lovely Katrina, a 9 year old former breeder mama who could be the perfect addition to your family!

Katrina came to us in mid-June when she was no longer producing puppies for her owner. She was well socialized and friendly, and just needed some fine-tuning of her manners to make her a perfect inside pet. She also needed to lose some weight, which was accomplished with lots of walks and a reduction in her calorie intake. In early August Katrina had her spay surgery and has now recovered well and is looking for her forever home. Prior to her surgery, she had senior bloodwork done, and all results were within normal ranges.

Katrina is an easy, loving dog. She is around young children every day and loves the attention from them as well as the adults in her foster home. There is also another dog and a cat in her foster home, whom she considers her “pack.” She is a secure, confident dog who is not frightened by the usual things – vacuum cleaners, thunder, and fireworks. She loves to go for walks and is easy to walk with a harness until she sees another dog she would like to meet – then she goes into draft horse pulling mode! Katrina has a beautiful, thick, medium brown coat with golden highlights. She loves to be brushed with a Furminator brush. She has age-appropriate moderate periodontal disease.

Katrina would do well in a home where she will get lots of attention from her people. Although she likes other dogs, that is not a requirement for her. She will go into a crate with a treat and willingly spend some time there, but she can be trusted to be uncrated when left alone. She LOVES her daily walks so walking her is preferred over simply allowing her to sniff and stroll around a fenced yard. She will play fetch for short periods of time, and loves chewy toys especially Benebones. Like a good lab, she destroys cloth and stuffy toys!

August 14, 2023

Is this weather what the saying “dog days of summer” is referring to?  I know I sure am panting a lot! The cool tile floor in the kitchen feels good when I come inside!

Since my last report, I had my spay surgery to officially end my puppy producing days. I was kind of dopey that day but started feeling better quickly. Now I’m fully recovered, my incision looks great, and we are taking our long morning walks again so I’m happy!

Foster mom says I’m ready to find my forever home so I’m hoping the perfect family is out there looking for a beautiful sweetheart – ME!!

Notes from FM:

Last week we saw once again how secure, confident, and outgoing Katrina is. At the check-in for her spay appointment, there were dozens of dogs and cats in line with their owners. Many of them were clearly distressed by the crowd and noise. But not Katrina! Her head and ears were up, her tail wagging, and she tried to invite interaction from one and all.  It was very cute!

She had pre-operative senior bloodwork done and all the results were healthy and normal. She hasn’t bothered her incision at all and has recovered nicely.

So now she’s ready for her next chapter!

Katrina loves to be close to her people, snoozing away while I sit at the computer ❤️

August 3, 2023

Hello friends!

I’m having a wonderful summer and I hope you are too! Last week I had a great time at Camp Autumn & Nelson. They spoiled me and expanded my new circle of friends, both 4 legged and 2 legged. Thank you to them!

My favorite times of the day are:

1. Going for my long morning walk
2. When my little people arrive for the day

3. After dinner game of fetch in the yard
4. Evening toy time with my family while they read or watch tv

Next week I will finally have my surgery since I’ve lost 15 pounds and I am trim and fit. I will keep you all posted on how it goes, but I know I will get good care from my family so I’m not worried!

Notes from FM:

Aside from a few small quirks, you would never know Katrina spent her first (almost) 9 years in a pen on a farm. She is such a great family dog! Those quirks are: marking with a little urine when she’s placed in an environment with new dog smells, and not being aware of how much space her body occupies, so she bumps into your legs pretty often. Those quirks are offset by her many positive qualities: she is confident, loves her people and wants to be close by, not scared of anything, even strangers, thunderstorms, and fireworks, loves to be brushed and cuddled, is a real beauty with her medium brown coat with gold highlights, is alert to the comings and goings of 2 adults and 2 young children all day, but settles nicely during down time and sleeps all night on her bed. She eats her dog food predictably but stops eating when she’s done so sometimes doesn’t eat everything. She doesn’t mind her crate and shows no anxiety about being left alone (although the resident dog is always with her.) She needs help getting into the car but settles quickly and is quiet, even on long rides (she’s been on several 3 hour trips to our vacation house.) She likes cats, especially if they let her give them a really good sniff! Katrina plays fetch now, bringing the Kong back to you for another throw. She loves to raid the toy basket and has perfected her tennis-ball-shredding skills and pulling apart most toys made of cloth (like a good lab should do!) We are enjoying her immensely

July 25, 2023

Katrian’s foster family had a vacation planned for this week, so the pretty chocolate momma came to spend the week with us.  She is such a great dog!  She met resident labs Pepper and Colin and resident humans Nelson and me, Autumn.

She happily greeted everyone.  She might have remembered Nelson and I from when we pulled her from the farm, gave her a bath and took her to the vet.  She did not hold it against us if she did.  😉

Katrina slid right into our home and routine like she’s always

been here.  She easily crates when we have to leave her.  She is wonderful on leash.  She’s good with every man, woman, and child she’s ever met.  I even saw her navigating around a 4 year old eating chips and riding a big wheel.  She had no issues with any of this.  Good girl Katrina!  She’s good with dogs and even the resident cat in her foster home. She also likes to fetch.  Wow, can we clone this one?!

It did take Katrina a few days to fully finish her meals, but now she happily waits while the kibble is poured and eats her whole bowl.  She likes going on sniffy walks so she and resident sniffy lab Colin have had a great time being sniffari buddies!  She did have two marking/pee incidents the first day here.  This was to be expected and we were warned she does this.  We have not had any issues since.  She’s doing all her business in the backyard or on walks.

Katrina is 8 years old, turning 9 on 7/28/23 according to her paperwork.  She will be here for her birthday, so we’ll have to celebrate.  I predict a party hat and some goodies for all the dogs that day!  She is scheduled to be spayed on 8/7/23 and once she’s recovered from that, she will be ready to find her furever family.  She is going to make some family very, very happy!

Katrina sends love and licks to everyone in Brookline blog land!!❤😝

July 5, 2023

Hello everyone!

How did you all fare with those scary booms and bangs last night?!? Well, some pups think they’re scary, but I hardly noticed. My foster brother isn’t bothered by them either, so we were cool. Same with the thunderstorms this past week! FM says I’m just a chill girl, and she smiles and pets me when she says it so I guess it’s a compliment!

I’ve decided that Taste of the Wild roasted lamb kibble mixed with a tablespoon or 2 of wet food is acceptable for my meals, so I’m almost cleaning out my bowl at mealtime. And I’m looking svelte at 85 lbs. now! Only a few more lbs. to go!

I’m spending the week at the mountain house now and there are so many little people! They come and go all day and I never bark or fuss, which is a good thing since sometimes the little ones are napping! I wag my tail whenever they talk to me and pet me and they can see how much I like them. There were 2 other doggie cousins here for a few days so there were 4 of us and we all got along great!

I’ll check in with you again soon!

From FM: Katrina continues to be an easy, go with the flow gal. She now looks forward to mealtimes and like a typical lab, she stays close to the kitchen when she thinks it’s getting close to breakfast or dinner time! Occasionally she shows some slight stiffness in her hips when getting up from a reclining position, but that could be due to her slightly positive Lyme test. The 30 day course of doxycycline should help with any Lyme symptoms.

We will check in after her spay surgery next week!

June 26, 2023

Good morning!

It’s hard to believe I’ve been in my foster home for 10 days now and this new life is quite a change! It turns out I didn’t have my spay surgery last week because the surgeon said I have to lose 10 lbs. first. So we are taking more walks, which I love, and there’s a little less food in my bowl. Hopefully in a few weeks I’ll have this step behind me!

Over the weekend I went with my foster parents and brother to their vacation house in the Pa. mountains. So that meant riding in the car for a few hours, which I didn’t mind at all. I do need help getting into the back of the SUV, but I can jump out by myself. My foster brother and I rode in the back on a comfy cushion and snoozed the whole way. At the house there is a staircase to get up to the front door, and I never saw so many steps so I was confused. But with some encouragement, and watching my family go up and down, I gave it a try and discovered I could do it too! I loved laying on the deck with my brother and taking in all the different bird songs and sights. And the smells I found on our walks!! Unbelievable!! Now we’re back home and I was happy to play with my toys and chewy sticks and see my little people. Life sure is good!

Notes from FM: Katrina continues to surprise us with how quickly she is adapting to the life of an indoor pet. She is relaxed when she’s around her people, and likes her routine.

Feeding is still somewhat of a mystery. We tried many different types of kibble and form of delivery, with a variety of “add ins,” with no success. We finally settled on some lunch meat shredded in the bottom of the bowl, then a small amount of kibble, and some wet food mixed in. She tries to get the lunch meat out and leave the kibble. I guess the silver lining is she needs to lose weight anyway!

As Katrina said, we went to our vacation house over the weekend. There were new smells in the house from the other dogs that visit (grand dogs) and she thought it would be ok to mark with her own scent. Fortunately, we caught her immediately so she had to stay on a short leash 24/7. But she went with the routine, slept well every night, and made some more new friends on our walks.

Another one of Katrina’s great qualities is she is not a barker. When we are out walking and pass a yard or house with a barking dog, she notices but keeps right on walking and doesn’t make a sound.

Her spay appointment is rescheduled for mid-July, so hopefully she’ll have achieved her goal weight of 80 lbs. by then. We’ll keep everyone posted!

June 20, 2023

Greetings from Katrina everyone! I have learned so many new things in the past few days! And every day I show my foster fam what a sweet, lovable indoor dog I can be! At first I was nervous being inside because, you know, strange sights and sounds like…. what are those voices and pictures coming from that box on the wall?!? So, I had to stay really close to FM just in case any of that electricity stuff was dangerous! But foster brother Archie started showing me cool things like TOYS and how to sniff out the best smells on our walks and how to relax inside near our people. And did I mention that I get to spend time every day with cool little people? Apparently a 4 year old and a 2 year old hang out with their grandparents while their mommy and daddy are at work so that means more pets and treats for me! Tomorrow is a big day for me because it will be the official end of my puppy-bearing years, and I guess I’ll be happy about that once I feel better. I’ll keep you posted!

Notes from FM:

Katrina is making amazing progress. As of today, we allowed her to be off leash and out of the kitchen when inside. No accidents and she did some sniffing around but then chose to be in the kitchen or where the action was. She doesn’t have much appetite for her kibble and I’ve tried a different kind but she didn’t want that either. So, we’re wondering now if she got table scraps or something else that boosted her weight up to 93 lbs. We’ll keep working on that. Katrina has been in her crate now for short periods of time and doesn’t protest. She likes to be brushed with the Furminator and her coat is shiny and gorgeous. She sleeps all night on a dog bed beside my side of the bed. She walks very well on leash with her harness with no pulling.

She’s going to make a great companion for someone!

P.S. the photo with the children had the permission of their mothers to share it on social media. 😉

June 17, 2023

Katrina is an 8 year old recently retired breeder momma.  She got her rescue ride today and is settling into her new foster home very well!

Katrina’s first day of retirement has been busy! Here’s the recap:

First there were the new people who took me on a car ride, then introduced me to water in the form of a bath. I got to meet all the friendly people at the vet’s office! After a few shots and some yummy treats, I got another car ride with another new friend. This friend says she is my foster mom and I will be hanging out here for a while. I am enjoying resting on the patio, checking out the new smells in the yard, and I kept a close eye on  FM while she worked in the kitchen.

We took a nice stroll around the neighborhood where I met MORE new friends. My tail wags constantly and everyone tells me what a pretty girl I am. This retirement gig is looking pretty cool!

Notes from FM: we’re going to help Katrina get back to a healthy weight – 93 lbs. is a little hefty for her height!

She is curious, confident, and very friendly. This good girl was obviously well socialized. She walked well with her harness – no pulling at all. Spay appointment is Tuesday 6/20. More updates to follow!