~About Amber Ridge~

   Amber Ridge Kennels is owned and operated by husband & wife team, Jordan & Joanna Howe. We have 2 children we are located on 20 beautiful acres in the heart of Michigan's beautiful Lower Peninsula. Our dogs and puppies are raised as part of the family and the utmost care and attention go into each and every litter. We strive to place our pups in homes where they will be a perfect fit.

   Our goal in breeding Labrador Retrievers has and always will be producing healthy, genetically sound puppies who will grow to be the perfect companions, whether hunting or simply playing in the backyard.

   Our breeding story begins about 16 years ago when sisters on both sides of the family got their first Labs. We fell in love with them and a year or so down the road we decided to get our very our Labrador. We brought home Mae, a black, half English, half American Lab, in June of 2011. Her sire was fox red and that began our dream to one day breed that color exclusively.

In late summer 2013 we brought home our first Fox Red girl a Full English Lab we named Amber. Our fox red male, Jack, followed in 2015 and we had our first fox red litter in December 2016.

(A quick side note about the fox red color: there is no separate color for fox red, in the genetics it is simply the darkest shade of yellow and has been around as long as chocolate, black and yellow. There is NO dilute in their genetics as with charcoal or silver.)

   From Mae's very first litter in 2013 we began learning much about the time, resources, and attention to detail required to take care of a litter of pups and their dam. Over the years, as our knowledge of the process and the breed grew, we added more and more health testing to our program to further enhance the excellence of our puppies and the Labrador breed itself. We are fully committed to continuing that in the future.

   In 2021 it became necessary to take a break from breeding. It was not an easy decision as we also ended up having to rehome our breeding female at the time, Sydney, and send Jack to live with a friend for several months. Mae went to live with a very sweet couple and Amber, who was retired by this time, stayed on as our pet. We had every intention to pick up after a year or two with Jack still as our breeding male and a new fox red female, sadly Jack had to be put down in Oct 2021. We were devastated and decided to put the breeding program on hold indefinitely.

   Then Amber passed away in March of 2024 and suddenly after more than 13 years with 1 or 2, and at one point 4, dogs around something was missing. Our children had never been without a dog and they missed Amber terribly. So we began the search for a new puppy to help ease the loss but also to maybe start breeding eventually again.

   Enter Fern! A sweet, full English, fox red girl who is the start of the next generation so-to-speak. We have high hopes for her and the other dogs we add to our program that the excellence we strove for in the past will continue into the future.

   Our goal is to bring each person who adopts a puppy from us a genetically sound, intelligent puppy and you can be assured that all puppies adopted from us are from a sound breeding program; which starts with the fact that we believe in breeding our girls only after they have turned two years and all our dogs have had their health clearances done. We also believe in retiring them when they are six years old and we do not breed them every heat cycle but only when they are healthy and ready. Because of this we have a limited number of puppies throughout the year so it may be necessary to be put on a waiting list when searching for that forever friend or hunting partner.