VanGoghlden’s Twice In A Lifetime TKN – Ben
Ben’s Pedigree(you can see his clearances from here by clicking back to standard pedigree)
Ben is an Elsa son. He is a full sibling to Liza. He is also a half sibling to our original Bentley. He is a half sibling to Rona, Doug and Willa as well.
I don’t typically tell stories about my dogs on the website. But Ben needs a little back story. Bentley was my once in a lifetime heart dog. He was my first Golden and lived to be 16 years old. He was the most intelligent and emotionally intuitive dog that I have ever known. He has been gone now for many years but I miss him every single day. I had an opportunity thanks to the amazing Marcia Schlehr to use frozen semen from Bentley’s father Bandit. We had a litter of 10 puppies that were all half siblings to my Bentley. There were 3 boys. As a breeder we pick puppies based on structure, balance and attitude etc. As for this puppy he was 3rd pick out of the 3 boys. He was the smallest, with the smallest head and although built decently and well balanced he was about as plain as they come. Clearly, I shouldn’t keep this puppy. BUT this puppy had an entirely different plan. He had an uncanny resemblance to Bentley and from the moment he was born he knew I was his person. His brothers had showy movement and he didn’t even want to cooperate to stack (when we stand puppies for show/structure evaluation) The other puppies would sleep and he would pop up and just stare at me longingly. If I ever walked by and didn’t say hello to him specifically he would whine or bark at me. Bentley although my heart dog was a serious drama queen and a whiner. Guess what this puppy was…. I thought for sure I was just wanting him to be like Bentley and was just seeing things he did that were similar. So as this litter grew I kept saying I need to part with little Ben Two but he reminds me so much of Bentley. The breeder part of me had my mind made up. You always keep the best puppy and this puppy was not it! So at six weeks I thought I’d just take him out and try teaching him some basic obedience. He learned sit, stay, down and stand in about five minutes. For the record that doesn’t happen! This puppy seemed to just “know” things. When it was time to microchip I hesitated (Which for the record I don’t hesitate) and had to poke him twice. He cried and tears just rolled down my face as I held him close. At that point the family stepped in and said we are not parting with this puppy no matter what you say as the breeder. You need to keep this puppy. So I agreed that I would try to grow him out for a few months and see how he developed. Initially, I could barely tell him apart from his sister Liza, that I kept. (This is not a good thing. Your males should have much more substantial heads and substantial everything but as young puppies a head alone should differentiate the sexes) To my surprise as he grew his head started to improve, his structure started to become more substantial and most telling of all this dog can move like no tomorrow! (An unbalanced dog cannot move well) Ben much like his half brother before him is incredibly emotionally intuitive. If you are not doing well emotionally, yet put on a smiley face and come over here Ben will call you out. He will calmly lay his head on your lap as if to say “You’re going to be alright” This is the exact same thing Bentley used to do. That puppy that learned to do some basic obedience in a few minutes flat well he also figured out how to get out of his crate at about 8 weeks of age. Smart dogs are great the only issue being they problem solve and look for the loop holes to your rules. Well Ben also happens to be very sensitive to upsetting his people. So while he loved to escape his crate he also didn’t want to get into any trouble so he just slept right in front of it. Golden’s can almost never be trusted without a crate fully until they are adults. Ben was that rare dog. He is just a good dog there is no other way to describe him, he’s sweet and very loving, smart yet more concerned about pleasing his people, and emotionally very concerned about your well being. While there are many things very different about Ben and Bentley (You never ever get your heart dog back not even with a half sibling) there are so many of the very best parts of Bentley that I have been blessed to experience yet again. So what Ben knew at birth I am now fully on board with and Ben will forever be my dog. With the health and longevity behind him in his pedigree we also are very excited to have this kind of boy in our breeding program. Not many people can say his dad lived to be 15 and his half brother to 16 and his pedigree is loaded with those teen numbers. Ben is on the smaller side of the standard which correlates with longevity in some scientific studies so unfortunately his show career would be difficult but we he does love to train. He got his Trick Dog Novice Title in a one shot try video during covid. With zero training he can just do that many things and he’s that smart. We do some agility for fun but he absolutely loves doing therapy dog work. While it’s a tough call for me in many ways he is even better than his half brother Bentley. We are just so blessed to have this guy.
