Why choose Cobbers For Life?

We are a small family business with a lot of heart!  We are passionate about this breed and want to share the joys of ownership with other responsible people who love and care for their canine companions. We put a lot into our dogs, our breeding programs and customer care. 

Our dogs are part of our family. Our business has been vetted by Right Paw so that you can have confidence in the way we work. We are also proud members of the MDBA, meeting their requirements for health testing and ethical practice. 

Our puppies are nurtured within a family home, where they are socialised early to family life, children and other pets. Our dogs and their puppies live on a beautiful acreage with lots of fresh air, sun and space to exercise and swim. We do not keep large numbers of dogs as we know that Cobberdogs thrive within family homes where the humans outnumber the dogs! For ethical reasons we only have 2 or 3 litters per year to meet demand.

 The Australian Cobberdog (ACD) is an established, purebred dog with a stable DNA profile and predictable traits, whereas the labradoodle, cavoodle and other "oodles" are crossbreeds (poodle crossed with another breed) with variable characteristics. The Cobberdog was developed with strict health and temperament standards for therapy work, while the Labradoodle was initially a simple Labrador-Poodle cross that became popular. Sometimes this lead to inconsistent breeding and unpredictable offspring. Australian Cobberdogs come with an MDBA pedigree certificate, which lists generations of ACDs in their ancestry. ACD breeders are using the breed profile outlined by the MDBA to establish consistent physical and behavioural traits.

There is no such thing as a non-shedding dog! Having said that, the Australian Cobberdog is a low to very low shedding dog. They are also allergy-friendly. We can provide cuttings of our adult dogs' hair on request, for allergy testing. We have never received feedback that any of our dogs have triggered an allergic reaction. On the contrary we have been told by some customers that ours was the first dog they had never reacted to!

Australian Cobberdogs are well suited to therapy work due to their intelligence, intuition, desire to please and human-focus. We do not sell trained dogs, but some of our dogs are used in therapy, schools and other settings. The following is relevant to dogs in NSW, Australia.

 Service dogs are individually trained to perform specific tasks for a person with a disability and have public access rights.  

An emotional support animal (ESA) is a companion animal that provides comfort and emotional support for a person with a mental health condition like anxiety or PTSD. Unlike a service dog, an ESA is considered a pet and does not have public access rights in places like shops or airplanes, as there is no legal definition or formal accreditation for ESAs in Australia. While a person can have any breed of dog for emotional support, they don't require specific training to perform tasks. 

Therapy dogs provide comfort and support to many people in settings like hospitals or schools and do not have public access rights. 

A school dog (also called a "school support dog") is a type of therapy dog trained specifically for the school environment to help with students' well-being. The Department of Education has policies and procedures for the use of school dogs.

For more information:

 Therapy Dogs NSW provides training courses and certification for a fee.

Dogs Connect provides training and other resources to assist schools, hospitals and other places in starting a therapy dog program.

Information about what is an emotional support animal and how to get your pet certified as an ESA.

Our puppies are raised with adult dogs, including Susie's Dad's big black dog, as well as chickens and a cat. They are familiar with the sounds of nearby sheep and cattle. We have found that prey drive (the desire to hunt small animals) varies between individual dogs, with some having very little drive to hunt. The best way to ensure your puppy gets along with your other pets is to introduce them carefully and only with supervision to one another when your puppy is still young. Trainers can provide more specialised advice on this. For example, keeping your puppy's attention on yourself and not on the other animal (eg. with treats), so that they learn not to fuss over the other animal when they are in their presence.