Butterscotch - 10 days old

This is Buddy at about 10 days of age, he hasn't opened his eyes yet but you can see how big and strong he is.

It was great that Annie sent us regular photos of our new pup, so that the kids could follow his progress.

We also felt like we bonded to him and got to know him through the photos. And of course we started to notice that our puppy was the cutest one :)

Butterscotch's first photo

14th January 2007

One day old Butterscotch with his siblings Jack, Toby and Lucy. Butterscotch, or Buddy for short, is the one on the left of the photo with the cute white stripe.

Buddy was a bit bigger than the others at first, but Annie the breeder told us that usually they grow to roughly the same size. Most of them will be around 8 kg as adults.

Why get a "designer" or hybrid dog?

There was a great article in the Sydney Morning Herald recently about designer dogs, A Bit of Ruff , which says "Cute pet or unwelcome mongrel? The rise of the hybrid pooch has rocked the dog world."

A great article which debunks some of the arguments that have been put forward against designer dogs, also known as hybrid dogs or purpose-bred dogs. So yes, we do understand that a cavoodle isn't a real breed of dog, really it is just a glorified mutt.

However, in choosing a hybrid dog we were hoping for a pet that had the best qualities of two dog breeds, without some of the hereditary problems of a pure breed dog.

PS - 6 months later we are very happy to report that Buddy seems to be the ideal cross-breed, he has the gentle, loving nature of the cavalier, he is smart and he doesn't shed at all!