Originally Posted by
Abulafia
1. Time alone—yep. That is just too much time alone. Certainly for a puppy, but even for an older dog if it's on anything other than the rarest of bases. Labs are a people-oriented, people dependent breed. It's part of what makes them such absolutely wonderful dogs—but that's only if you can give them this key aspect of what they need: to be with their people. While older Labs may do much better w/ alone time, every time I have seen a Lab w/ behavior problems it is because the Lab has been poorly trained (or not at all), and / or left alone too much. And a Lab with behavior problems is a lot of dog to be dealing w/.