Both my pups' parents weigh 26kg when "fighting fit" and are field type. They are somewhat shorter than many, though, and from his photos I'd say that Blake is quite a bit taller. As always, I think it's hard to say what weight a dog should be because it depends on so many factors, not least the proportion of lean muscle to body fat. A muscular dog will weigh a good sight more than a similarly covered dog that doesn't have the same level of exercise.
Thank you snowbunny really helpful. We are trying to balance growth, diet and ideal weight with Blake. He is naturally going to be a lighter dog than our two, but by how much is difficult to tell. We have had advice re: diet, looking at energy expended and how Blake is accessing his energy for activity v growth and weight gain. His actual ideal weight might actually only be around 26-27kg.
Bella is from show lines and is 25.6kg at her weigh in today. When she was close to 26kg a month ago vet wanted her at 25kg but I think she's fine as she is and I can feel her ribs!!!!
I really think the weight difference between a slim, fit, moderate show Lab, and a field Lab, is pretty minor - a couple of kgs at most. Only based on my own experience of comparing my show line dog to field line dogs. I really urge those with show line dogs not to expect their dogs to weigh a lot more - unless they are really overly heavily built, the difference is really not that great. Field line dogs are often very, very, tall. And often weigh a great deal more than my slim show line Lab standing at 22 1/4 inches. His weight varies between 28kg and 29kg, and he is an intact, fit boy. Unless your show Lab is really heavily built, or is much taller than the UK breed standard height range, you shouldn't be expecting him/her to be really heavy compared to field bred dogs.
