How I overcame the Winter of our discontent

Wise counsel and cool-headedness keep a youngster in the family

As soon as I brought Winter home I began to ask myself: "Have you bought yourself a lot more trouble than you bargained for?"

Winter is a one-year-old black labrador retriever. Labradors are the kind of dogs that many people, seeing them frolicking about in parks, drool over, thinking what a welcome addition they would make to any family. However, few realize how demanding they can be as adolescents, and Winter's previous owners had learned that lesson the hard way.