Chambray Labradors Florida's Leader For All Labrador Retrievers
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This header at
the website has brought about many inquiries as why Chambray is the
“Leader for all Labrador Retrievers”.
Aside from the obvious of having produced more champions & grand champions than any other breeder, there is a list below that we are very, very proud of and it has nothing to do with our professional entities of making money by managing, conditioning, training and showing at dog shows.
Leadership comes in many ways besides the number of champions bred or the record setting successes at winning at dog shows, below are a few examples of that leadership.
- In the last
21 years we have rescued, re-homed and relocated over 250
Labradors (several other breeds as well). Mostly from the
hurricane damaged homes and families that have been hit in our
area and in the last years from the devastation that the economy
has brought about. All these dogs were rescued, cared for and
eventually re-homed with their owners,
or relocated with new owners at NO CHARGE. Today because of zoning laws, we are not allowed to take in dogs for rescue; however we will act as go-betweens in the adoption process. We will take all the information that the dog being given up for adoption has and will then pass that along to all those calling in looking for an adoption. This has become a very time consuming project, but we feel that it very well serves the Labrador Retriever community.
Hi Sandy & Johanna & Chambray Labradors
It is with most regrets that I have to inform you that Mason passed away last week at the age of 14 years. You may remember that you placed him with us at the age of 10 months after he didn't turn out for show and his original owners returned him for a replacement. The old saying "Someone's discards are other people's treasures". Treasure he was to us and everyone that ever met him. He was truly destined to be part of our family. Not only was he the greatest family dog, he was absolutely gorgeous. You don't know how many times people would stop their cars as we walked him and ask "Is that a Chambray Labrador?"
Our son Garrett, who was only 3 years when we brought Mason home grew up with him all these years as best of friends and misses him terribly. We would not even think of looking anywhere else but at Chambray Farms for another great Labrador. Please consider us again for one of your great "kids" as you call them.
Trudy, Elio, Garrett and Samantha Rodriguez
Hi Sandy
Thank you so much for allowing us to adopt Ace through you even though he wasn't a Chambray dog. He is the noblest dog I have ever had and I think often at how hard it must of been for his original family to part with him because of the economic situation. You made the transition between all of us so magical and special. You allowed both families to meet at your place and spend time with each other to get to know him and where he had been before. It was so special and sentimental all at the same time. You even agreed to keep him at your place for a week until we got our yard ready for him. He has been with us now for 4 years and has brought us so much joy. We still stay in touch with his first family even though they lost their house through foreclosure. You spent countless hours with us and his previous family and of course kept him for over a week and you won't accept any money for your time and efforts. You truly are a gift to the dog owner community.
Sarah and Edward Montiel
Dear Mr Herzon
On behalf of the South East Florida Labrador Rescue and Relocation Project we would like to thank you for all the work you have done for caring so much about Labradors. Your actions last year after the 4 hurricanes that struck Florida were beyond the call of duty. 27 Labradors are much better off today because of your efforts. Their rescue, refuge, relief and ultimate relocation or return to their former homes was all made possible by your gallant efforts. You housed 17 of these dogs yourself for over 3 weeks and you arranged for the safe rescue and relief of the other 10. What a credit you are to the breed!
Jan Pritchard (Surrogate Home and Project
Coordinator)
SEFLRRP.
- For the last 5 years we have been providing FREE YEAR-LONG TRAINING to all “Paws With A Cause Org.” dogs placed in foster homes in South Florida. There have been dozens that have taken advantage of the class and private training provided to the foster caregivers at NO CHARGE.
Deb Davis
National Development/Communications Coordinator
Paws With A Cause National Headquarters
4646 South Division
Wayland MI 49348
616-877-7297 Phone 616-723-1178 Cell
616-877-0248 Fax
800-253-7297
ddavis@pawswithacause.org
www.pawswithacause.org
RE: Donating Obedience Classes
Dear Mr. Herzon:
On behalf of Paws With A Cause®, we would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your support of our program and for generously donating Foster Puppy Obedience classes for Paws Foster Puppies "Zigfield" and "Zelda". We truly appreciate it.
Your help and support is invaluable to our agency. It is the commitment from the community of caring businesses, such as yours, that enable us to continue our work to bring independence to the Hard of Hearing/Deaf and Mobility Challenged individuals throughout the United States.
Again, on behalf of PAWS®, we thank you again for all that you have done and wish you the best.
Very truly yours
AJ Springstead-Sapp
CEO
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Editor's note: these are the 2 Paws With A Cause
puppies that are being raised by two different families until they are
18 months old. At right photo is Zelda at the Kissimmee Dog Shows on
Sept. 10th.
For more info on this
project click below |
Dear Mr. Herzon
Thank you so much for all the training assistance you provided us with Gizmo, the Paws With A Cause dog that we fostered through until he went back to the organization. It truly broke our hearts to see him go back after living with us for a year and a half, however from the very beginning you prepared us for the moment for when we would have to part with him and say "good bye"!
You truly are a champion to the breed and to dog training.
Laurie Weiss and family.
- For the New Horizons Service Dog Organization we have provided free artificial insemination and free stud service for their breeding program to produce dogs for their service programs and puppies to sell to raise money for all the upkeep and expenses needed for the service program.
Check out our contributions to the New Horizons Service Dog Org. http://www.wpbf.com/video/27597332/detail.html
The Labradors in the video were
sired by our donations to this Service Dog Org. and were sired by
our top stud dog Chambrays Out Of The Ruff (Hogan).
- As a public service to all dogs since 1997 we have provided FREE TRAINING & TESTING for the AKC Canine Good Citizen CGC to hundreds of participants.
Dear AKC® Responsible Dog Ownership Day Participant
Thank you for participating in the third AKC Responsible Dog Ownership Day (AKC RDO Day) - We greatly appreciate your involvement. Your event is one of many that will be held across the country in September promoting valuable messages about responsible dog ownership.
The American Kennel Club will be celebrating in Raleigh, NC on Saturday, Sept. 10th and in New York on Saturday, Sept. 17th. The AKC flagship events will drum up excitement for the day and publicize the many activities that our clubs and partners will be hosting across the country.
Thank you again for helping make AKC Responsible Dog Ownership Day a national celebration!
Sincerely
AKC Communications Department
AKC Canine Good Citizen (CGC)
Certificate #2592
CGC Evaluator since 1997
- We have provided several at NO CHARGE “Health Clinics” which has brought in well over 100 participants all in the name of the Betterment of the Breed. The largest clinic was the collection of over 51 dogs for an Optigen PRA Clinic. The collection of the swabs for each dog, the swab kits and the mailing in of the kits was all done FREE OF CHARGE. The latest clinic was for Exercise Induced Collapse (EIC) which drew in 21 dogs to the collection, again the collection, the kits and the mailing out was done at NO CHARGE all for the Betterment of the Breed.
Chambray's 20/20 PRA DNA Clinic December 2008 (51 dogs)
Chambray's EIC Clinic January 2011 (21 dogs)
Chambrays PRA & EIC InGen Clinic March 2011 (16 dogs EIC 12 dogs PRA)
- We have provided our services as Handler/Instructors for The Junior Handler’s Showmanship Jamborees held in Central Florida for years that has seen well over 400 juniors participate. All of our time at the seminars, travel to and room/board were provided by us Free Of Charge to the clubs sponsoring the events for the junior handlers attending.
Mr. Herzon
Thank you so much for your continued participation with the Junior Handler's Jamborees since its inception. Also, thank you for your efforts in having the Greater Miami Dog Club donate $500 to this year's efforts. (2008)
Michael Suave
AKC Representative and Project Coordinator
Dear Sandy and Jessica
We wish to thank you both for volunteering your services with the Junior Handler's Jamborees. It is because of your tireless efforts that each year the number of participants has grown to this year's numbering over 169 juniors from all over Florida and now 3 other states. We truly hope that we can count on both of you to once again join us at next year's event.
Marci Knorr
Chairperson CFJHJ
- Our newest program Community Reach Out started out recently just for Labradors and has already seen several other breeds participate. We are providing at NO CHARGE free training at all the Saturday dog shows that we travel to throughout Florida. We have had 4 sessions with over 50 dogs participating in 4 different cities in Florida. This is for all Labradors, not just the ones we bred. We announce on the front page what city is next on our travel itinerary and we give each person that is interested in joining us our direct contact number so that we can meet up at the shows we are traveling to.
Dr Mr. Herzon
Thank you for allowing us and our dog to join your Lakeland dog training session. We were so surprised to find out that you allowed other breeds besides Labradors, but were actually stunned when we asked you how much we owed for the 2 hour work session and you said "It's on the house!".
Max and Sofia Lewis
- For the last 21 years we have provided the South Florida show community an annual "Fun Match" to participate in to get their dogs ready for the AKC shows. These matches used to be put on by the area dog clubs, but sadly that no longer has been the case for a decade or so, in fact the last 3 that the Greater Miami Dog Club held were totally done by the Herzons and some of our Labrador partners that volunteered their time and efforts to help us put those 3 matches together.
- Remedial Reading Programs & Hospital Visitations in public schools, libraries, retirement homes and hospitals. Together with 20+ of our owner/partners and their Labradors (other breeds too) through a program we innovated with one of our owners, the K9ForKids Reading Program, more than a 100 community service hours have been logged at schools, libraries, geriatric wards, and hospitals with visitations by our members. These Chambray dogs and owners are spread out all over Florida, with the largest group in Miami-Dade, however there are others in Ft Lauderdale, West Palm Beach, Tampa, Orlando, Ocala and Tallahassee.
- Private Training Sessions for those with disabilities wanting to advance with their dogs for Service Dog accreditation and acceptance. In the last 3 years we have logged well over 50 hours with 10 different owners and their dogs with all the time for training with each as a donation to the Service Dog cause. These owners and their dogs also received the 8 Week Basic Obedience Training Course for free as well as the AKC's Canine Good Citizen Training and Testing for free as well.
Hi I am Maria Ugarte together with my friend Eva Schwartz.
We been coming to your house for because we knew you to be a great dog trainer. It is very difficult for us because we have to be taken to your house by our other friend who can drive a car. You are always willing to work with our dogs even when we are late and you are patient. Our dogs like you very much and have learned much on the last year with our visits. We were surprised when you don't charge us and we say thank you very much. We always tell others with disabilities of you and your dogs.
Maria and Eva
Hello Mr. Herzon of Chambray
I take great pleasure in writing you this "thank you". You have been most admirable in your commitment to aid those in need as I have been with my Labrador-mix dog. You always seemed to have time to meet with us, knowing full well how busy you are with all of your pure-bred show dogs and all those owners that depend on you for everything. We just completed our evaluations with the Delta Society and passed with flying colors and all because you took the time and energy to see us through Basic Obedience and the CGC training and testing. Your insistence on not accepting payment for your services goes beyond the call of duty for anyone in your profession. I have made a donation to the AKC's Canine Health Foundation in the name of Chambray Labradors ( http://www.akcchf.org/ ). Please accept my heartfelt gratitude for all that you do for those with disabilities.
Jane A. Pardin & Judy
- Free Micro-Chip scanning service to clinics, animal shelters and private citizens that do not possess the appropriate scanners that have found dogs in the South Dade area. Plus hosting a Free Lost & Found Service (Lab Alert) for over 1,000 Labradors that we have micro-chipped in the last 20 years at training classes, fun matches and seminars. The Lost & Found Service has re-united over 30 dogs that had strayed away from home and ended up at a shelter, vet's office or the county pound. Including 3 dogs in other states besides Florida. Today we use the AKC's CAR micro-chip that comes with the AKC's own Lost & Found Service, but we still provide our Lab Alert as a back-up notification system all at NO CHARGE.
Justice is
back home again! Thanks to you and your relentless search for
Justice, he is now back in our lives after being gone for 6 months.
You helped track him down even though he had been living in a
shelter for months and had even been adopted and eventually returned
to another shelter. You made calls and followed up on several leads
and finally we we
are re-united with Justice. We wanted you to have the reward that we
had been offering, instead you had us direct it to cancer research
for dogs!
Mario and Estelle Locario
The above mentioned programs are only the tip of the iceberg of free community services that we provided the different organizations and dog owners throughout Florida. As stated previously leadership comes in many forms besides breeding champions and we are just as proud of our community service programs and activities as we are our winning show record.
We honestly believe that there is no other Labrador breeder, trainer nor handler that provides all the community service programs that Chambray Labradors does.
In addition to all the pro-bono services, programs and activities mentioned above, we also provide well over 100 owners, breeders and exhibitors the one-of-a-kind Labrador Owners Community network for breeding, raising, training and exhibiting the best in show quality Labradors all with the Betterment of the Breed in mind.
The following email from one of our owners sums up what over 100 emails have said as well about our commitment to the breed in all areas of participation.
Mr. Herzon
Last year we added one of your Chambray puppies to our family. Through your vast involvement in the breed and numerous programs for participation, we have discovered a new world with dogs that we did not know existed before!
We have visited several dog shows in the area and were totally amazed at the huge following you have created with your passion and service to the breed. We had visited the Miami dog show in December and met up with well over 70 owners that were either showing or supporting "Team Chambray". There was nothing else at that dog show like what you and your family have created.
We then visited a dog show right here in West Palm Beach and once again, almost the entire crowd around the Labrador ring were your owners or "partners" as you refer to all of us. We followed that visit with another show in Ft Lauderdale and once again more than 90% of the crowd in the entire arena were the Chambray people!
The interesting thing about all of these shows we have attended is that the crowd at each show were mostly different people and not the same people showing up all the time! We were able to chat with dozens and dozens of people at all of these shows and each one credits you with their introduction into the dog world.
When I read "Florida's Leader For All Labrador Retrievers", it all came together for me as to why you have such a large following and only a small part is about actually showing dogs. Some of the people we met had adopted a "rescue" dog through you, others were part of your "Therapy & Community Service Group", there were many that attend your various training classes, including several that were specially being trained for Service Assistance. Of course the majority owned a "Chambray dog", all of these people could not be prouder to be part of such a special group, including our family!
Thank you for all you provide all of us "Owners, Partners, Associates, Co-Breeders, Co-Owners, Trainees and Thankful Followers! You and your family are truly a blessing to the breed.
Amy Sheffield
Contact Information:
By Mail:
Chambray Labradors
PO Box 960368
Miami, Florida 33296
Because of our extensive involvement with our Labradors and those of our owners throughout the day, it is best to contact us using Email!
By Phone:
(305) 232-LABS
(305) 232-5227
By Email:
labs@chambraylabradors.com
Let us hear from you.
