Shade Mountain Kennel (Beaver Springs, Pennsylvania)

4 month old Winston is the second Shichon I’ve adopted from Shade Mountain Kennel. (The first is now 11 years old and is a wonderfully empathic dog) The new puppy is everything Alana described and more! Within the first week he adjusted and is behaving in ways that are better than expected for a young pup transitioning to his new home.

Alana is kind and honest. After adoption She will still be available to answer any questions you have.,Trust her, she describes her pups and breeds accurately. She knows what she’s doing.
I highly recommend this breeder!

My boy is cute and shaggy! She made she we had everything we needed before we left! Of course he’s not groomed but he’s a handsome fellow!

We purchased our bernedoodle from Shade Mountain Kennel in October 2020. We brought him home in November 2020 and from the onset it was clear he was a well bred and cared for pup. He slept in his kennel immediately and was very quick to house train. He has an absolutely pleasant demeanor and is a very easily trained dog.

We get compliments all the time on his looks and that’s because both his dame and sire were AKC registered and purebred dogs which produce high quality dogs. The best thing about him has been and will always be his temperament. Again, a testament to the breeding practices of SMK, our pup is calm, sweet, loving, energetic, and very easily trained. He doesn’t have an aggressive bone in his body and for part Bernese Mountain dog, he also lacks their stubbornness.

Shade Mountain Kennel really does know how to select sires and dames to produce high quality dogs. We are extremely impressed and grateful for their dedication to producing the best family pets that they can.

Should be called shady mountain kennel. Their prices are ridiculous then when you look at the website they say you must use a specific food for the 2 year health warranty. SURPRISE SURPRISE guess who the sales rep is for the food?? Shade mountain! They send you to a specific page so they make even more money every time you buy their recommended “chicken meal” garbage food that doesn’t even have real meat in the ingredients.

I personally had a horrible experience with Shade Mountain Kennel, and I wanted to write this review to warn others that this is not a quality caring breeder.  I had placed a deposit in April on a puppy before it was born, at the time of the deposit the price stated on the website was $1700.  When the puppy was 4 weeks old I noticed the price had increased by $800, so I sent Alana an email asking her to verify the final price at pickup because I didn’t have anything showing the final total.  She agreed that the price I had stated was correct and she HAD to raise her prices due to many people asking her what was wrong with her dogs since the price was so low. Please. Couldn’t she prove that with a health guarantee and testing instead of price gouging?

When it came time to receive the 6 week picture, I never got it. So I emailed Alana asking her to send it and didn’t get a response.  Thinking the email got lost and my kids were so very excited to see a new picture, I waited a day and sent her another email.  After a few hours I received an email back that simply said that our puppy was killed by climbing out the door and under a divider into the space of another mother dog and that dog saw the puppy as a threat and destroyed her.  I was shocked that she couldn’t even call me on the phone to tell me the news and she waited two days after it happened and didn’t attempt to tell me until I sent her two messages.Alana went on to tell me that she was SO upset by it that she couldn’t even talk about it that she will refund our deposit right away because she didn’t have anything for us.  So after digesting her story, I sent her an email back telling her how upset we were and would it be possible to have a pick of the litter she currently had listed on her website or a litter after that at our same price?  She told me no that she didn’t want to make us wait until fall to bring a puppy home and even though she knew how hard it was going to be for us to find another dog at this time. She went on to tell me that these dogs go for $4000-6000 right now, so apparently her pricing, no matter how deceitful was a bargain.
Tell me what caring breeder who actually cared about the health of the dogs and the families they were placed with would do this?  Alana only cares about the money and she doesn’t care about who or what she has to do or hurt in order to get it.  She had to conjure up this story in order to get rid of me since she didn’t want to honor the price.  It took me 2 days and several excuses from her to get my deposit back, but in the end I did.
Red flags for dealing with this place – no genetic testing, no contract, no application, no receipt or invoice to show what the total due would be, prices change very frequently.
I wouldn’t recommend this place if it was the last place on earth to get a puppy.  Shade Mountain is a basic backyard breeder taking full advantage of the pandemic prices. Do your research and you will find other poor reviews on Alana.  I recommend going somewhere else and saving the hassle of dealing with this place.

We purchased our Shih Tzu (Max, but we called him Louie) from The Snook’s Shade Mountain Kennel on July 30th, two days shy of his “8 week” birthday. He only weighed 1 lb. and normal puppies of this breed and age should be closer to 2-3 lbs. Alicia at the desk said this was normal and he was healthy and eating regularly so we took him home and loved him like a son. The following morning we rushed him to the emergency vet and was diagnosed with a respiratory infection. The next day, Louie passed away and we had to deal with one of the worst moments of our lives.

After Louie passed, I informed Alana, the owner of Shade Mountain Kennel, and it was received with complete lack of compassion and went immediately into finger pointing at us. Based on her response, I can only surmise that this situation has happened multiple times before. However, as a business owner, it was her responsibility to at least speak to us like an adult rather than accuse us of being responsible for Louie’s death by EMAIL. One excuse was “the red you saw (in the vomit) was probably from the red color treats he gets.” It was dried blood from internal bleeding. After the accusations we contacted her several times to have an adult discussion in which she deflected with excuses why she would not speak to us (sent by email of course) and eventually had her husband John clean up her mess.

In my opinion, a reputable dog breeder genuinely cares about the well being of their animals and not money first. Shade Mountain is a commercial dog breeder. They take great photos, say all the right things on the website (likely stock photos and content) and check off just the right amount of “not a puppy mill” boxes which is why we bought Louie. (not to mention they are cheaper than most “breeders” and now I know why). However, once a problem was exposed, many more cracks followed and a clearer picture emerged of the character behind this operation and the risks willing to be taken for a few hundred bucks.

None of this will bring our Louie back, and quite frankly we don’t care about the money. I write this in the hopes of preventing another couple, family or puppy from dealing with a tragedy like this. I don’t wish this experience upon anyone. It’s heartbreaking.