Have just been watching a programme entitled Secrets of the Palace Pets. 14 mins in there is a great photo of the Queen surrounded by 5 labs. Apparently she keep 21 labs and springer spaniels at Sandringham. Our Harry was the grandson of Sandringham Sidney ( the nearest I've ever come to royalty ) and he was handsome and clever. We got him when the girls were 6 and 12 years old and he was a brilliant family dog. When each of them went off to uni he was the one they missed most and when they rang home they always asked for him to be put on the phone. At the end of term I was always asked to bring him to Norwich train station to meet them. All those years ago we paid only £75 for him and I have to say that he ranks number one as the best bargain of my life.
An aquaintance had a Sandringham Lab from a dog rescue home! The dog had been bought as a Christmas present and the recipients did not like it; she was a lovely dog and madly in love with my Black Lab who was embarrassed by her attentions, used to turn his head away and pretend she wasn't there. I would imagine the Queen's Labs were kept in kennels as they would have been her working dogs?
Yes I think they mostly are - in the summer the Sandringham gardens are sometimes open to the public and I went a few years back hoping to see the kennels, but the public were not allowed to in that area ( which makes sense I suppose). Some years ago there was a documentary called 'Sandringham Sidney and Friends; and it looked like some were inside dogs. I remember clearly one shot of the Queen saying to one of the grown up black labs 'Who ate the puppies supper?' I read somewhere the other day that she is on her 17th lab as a pet - I think the source of info might have been something written by Ben Fogle, another lab lover.
