Dustin Retrievers review: Dog breeding

Complaint against Dustin Retrievers, 23 Hells Canyon Road South, Twin Bridges, Montana 59754, [protected]

(Shawn and Janet Dustin)

From: Joseph L. Andronaco

221 E Oak Street, 406

Bozeman, Montana 59715

[protected]

To whom it may concern:

We would like to file a complaint against Dustin Retrievers for

- selling us a dog that exhibited clear signs of neglect or psychological problems not consistent with a properly socialized, healthy animal.

My partner and I purchased a one-year-old chocolate lab (Otto) from Dustin Retrievers on 7/2/2023 and immediately experienced problems with the animal consistent with my above description. The dog urinated on himself almost immediately when we approached him to take him out, feed him, offering him treats, attempting to have him chase and retrieve anything. The dog was timid at the breeders and the owner Shawn had to force him into the kennel in the back of our car, making flippant comments about how the dog just needed to get comfortable.

As you can see from the attached texts, this was more than a case of the dog getting comfortable in his new environment. The problems culminated when on 7/14/2023, Otto went literally berserk and slipped his collar and ran away. He would not even respond to his name. We have spent days looking for him, posting on social media, working with animal control and the local shelter to no avail.

When we contacted the breeder, they feigned concern but fed us platitudes. At one point last week, they even admitted the dog had issues. That said, at no point, did they fully take responsibility for selling us a dog for nearly $3,000 (if you threw in the training DVDs they pushed on us that we paid in cash) that was not ready to be sold and should not have been sold. In fact, we never received proof that the animal was healthy and properly vaccinated and cared for prior to our purchase. We received a form document with handwritten information and market documents of his pedigree but nothing that was official and proper.

We got emotionally invested in the dog and wanted to keep him to see if he would work out but came to the conclusion that he was unmanageable after he ran away. We are just not equipped (nor is anyone really) to manage and live with a dog that has psychological problems like Otto.

The only concrete response we got was that they would sell us another dog at a “discount” purportedly. We are not interested in such, given our sincere concern with the breeder’s practices and quality of animals. Sadly, we feel that any animal we would get from Dustin Retrievers would be damaged at this point.