A Complete Price Guide for the Irish Wolfhound
The Irish Wolfhound is an Irish dog breed that can be considered both ancient and not so ancient. For those who are curious, it can trace its roots to the Iron Age and even further back. However, it has undergone considerable change when compared with its distant ancestors, with an excellent example being how its enormous size is a product of more recent centuries. Regardless, the Irish Wolfhound was being used for hunting wolves by early modern times. Unfortunately, when wolves went extinct in Ireland in 1786, the Irish Wolfhound soon followed suit. Still, the dog breed had descendants. Thanks to that, Captain George Augustus Graham managed to create a dog that looked like the original animal by using its descendants. Of course, this would be the Irish Wolfhound that exists in the present time, which remains a very popular sighthound.
What Can You Expect to Pay for an Irish Wolfhound?
Interested individuals have a number of options for getting an Irish Wolfhound. The most straightforward method would be buying a puppy from a dog breeder. However, they should know that this will be the most expensive option by far. Besides this, there is the option of either adopting or rescuing an Irish Wolfhound. Of course, those options have their issues as well. For example, both options are very dependent on availability. Similarly, chances are very good that both options will result in an older dog.
In any case, interested individuals should expect to pay $1,500 to $2,500 for an Irish Wolfhound puppy. It is very much possible for them to get these dogs at either much lower prices or much higher prices. However, interested individuals should expect there to be unusual reasons for unusual prices. In the first case, chances are good that they won’t be getting the dog from a reputable dog breeder. Instead, chances are good that they will be getting the dog from a puppy mill, which refers to a business that focuses on maximizing profitability by producing as many puppies as possible with either no or next-to-no regard for the well-being of those animals. As such, getting a puppy from a puppy mill can actually be a very bad financial decision in the long run. After all, that disregard for the animal’s wellbeing means a much higher chance of both physical issues and behavioral issues, which can be very costly to say the least. In the second case, it should be mentioned that there are Irish Wolfhounds and then there are Irish Wolfhounds. The aforementioned range of $1,400 to $2,500 is meant for average members of the dog breed. If interested individuals want to get their hands on a show-quality animal, they can expect to spend $3,000 or more because of that.
As for adopting or rescuing an Irish Wolfhound, both options are much cheaper at around $100 to $500. Be warned that the issue of availability is even more serious for Irish Wolfhounds than for a lot of other dog breeds. They aren’t total unknowns. However, they aren’t exactly one of the dog breeds that are so popular that their members can be found in considerable numbers just about everywhere. Due to this, if interested individuals are looking to either adopt or rescue an Irish Wolfhound, they might want to look into dog breed-specific organizations to see what options are available to them. On the plus side, if they do manage to get an Irish Wolfhound from one of these organizations, chances are good that they will know any physical issues and behavioral issues beforehand. Something that should provide them with a measure of peace of mind.
What Influences the Price of an Irish Wolfhound?
There are numerous factors that can influence the price of a particular puppy. As such, it is a good idea for interested individuals to look into these factors to see which ones matter to them and which ones do no matter to them. By doing so, they might be able to get a better price on a dog that is suitable for their particular needs and preferences. For starters, it is worth mentioning that purebred dogs tend to be more expensive than their mixed-breed counterparts. The status of purebred dogs has taken a hit in recent times because of the excesses that some dog breeders have engaged in for the purpose of creating animals that conform ever more closely to the standards. Even so, there can be no doubt about the fact that purebred dogs are still seen in a more prestigious light by a lot of people out there, which has a corresponding effect on their price. Of course, this rule won’t always be the case. After all, designer dogs can get quite expensive in their own right even though they aren’t recognized by major kennel clubs by their very definition. Irish Wolfhounds are purebred dogs. Still, if interested individuals come upon a mixed-breed dog with Irish Wolfhound heritage, they might be able to get a very similar animal at a portion of the cost. Said animal won’t be as predictable as its purebred counterparts, but that is one of the tradeoffs.
Moving on, demand has a huge effect on the price of a dog. Moreover, what matters isn’t aggregate demand so much as local demand. This is because interested individuals don’t have access to every single dog breeder producing Irish Wolfhounds out there. Instead, they are limited to the ones that they can visit within a reasonable time-frame. Theoretically, interested individuals can buy a puppy from someone who they can’t visit. However, that has some serious problems, with examples including both their inability to check up on the dog breeder and their inability to check up on the puppy being offered to them by the dog breeder. For that matter, if a dog breeder is willing to sell a puppy without seeing the buyer, they might want to stay away from said dog breeder. Of course, some dogs are more in-demand than others even though they are members of the same dog breed. For instance, the offspring of show winners are more prized than their normal counterparts, which is why interested individuals should be prepared to pay $3,000 or more for one of these puppies. On a related note, those puppies tend to see more resources invested in them as well. Essentially, dog breeders know that those puppies will be valuable, so it makes financial sense for them to spend more on medical costs, training costs, and other costs for them in an effort to get more out of each dog. Naturally, the same process happens for other dogs as well. These puppies would be on one end of a spectrum. Meanwhile, puppies from puppy mills would be on the other end of the same spectrum, which is one of the reasons that they are offered at such lower prices.
The color of a dog’s coat is another factor that can play an important role in its price. There are some dog breeds that have just one or two approved coat colors, meaning that this isn’t too much of an issue for them. However, the Irish Wolfhound isn’t one of those dog breeds. Instead, it can have a wide range of coat colors. One might imagine that this is as simple as rarer coat colors being the most expensive coat colors. Unfortunately, while that tends to be the case, that isn’t guaranteed to be the case. Annoyingly, the prevailing preferences for coat colors can change very fast, which in turn, means that the influence of coat color on a particular dog’s price can change very fast as well. Still, this is an important matter that interested individuals should keep in mind. Age is also important. Generally speaking, people want younger puppies. As a result, younger puppies command higher prices. In contrast, older dogs see their prices fall.
What Other Costs Do You Need to Keep in Mind?
Dog owners need to consider more than just the price of getting the dog. After all, there are a lot of other costs that need to be considered as well. Some of these costs are a one-time thing, meaning that they won’t need to be repeated unless something goes wrong. Meanwhile, other costs will repeat again and again because dogs are living animals. Be warned that Irish Wolfhounds are big dogs, which in turn, mean big costs. First of all, interested individuals should expect the first year to be more expensive than subsequent years. This is because they are going to need to buy a bed, a dog bowl, and other necessary items for their new dog. A bigger dog means a need for bigger items, so these won’t be cheap. Furthermore, this is because a puppy is going to need additional medical care, which is never cheap. Some of these medical costs might actually be included in the cost of getting the dog in the first place. In which case, interested individuals are still going to be paying for them, just in a somewhat different place than what they might have expected.
Fortunately, these costs will go down in subsequent years, though even then, interested individuals should expect to spend something like $2,000 on an annual basis. Much of this will come from just the food costs. A puppy will eat something like $600 to $900 on an annual basis while a full-grown dog will be a bit more expensive to feed than their younger self. Toys can cost a fair amount of money as well. However, Irish Wolfhounds aren’t particularly rough on their toys. Moreover, this is something that will slow down as these dogs get older, so the cost of $50 to $155 should go down over time. As for preventative healthcare, expect that to hit the low hundreds on an annual basis. Of course, if the dog actually gets some kind of serious medical problem, expect that number to shoot up to the high hundreds or even the low thousands. This is one of the reasons that it is so important for people to get an Irish Wolfhound from a reputable dog breed with a proven record of producing healthy animals. Training and socialization are both important. Irish Wolfhounds aren’t particularly problematic when it comes to their behavior. Even so, they are still big dogs, meaning that interested individuals need to make sure that their dogs are both well-trained and properly socialized lest the lack of either causes problems for either them or people around them. Group classes should cost a few hundred dollars. Moreover, they can do double-duty by providing not just training but also socialization because of the presence of other dogs.
How Can You Find a Reliable Dog Breeder?
On a final note, if people are going to buy an Irish Wolfhound, they should do so from a reputable dog breeder (https://www.humanesociety.org/resources/how-find-responsible-dog-breeder). Fortunately, finding one has become easier than ever in modern times. As such, they should have no problem finding someone suitable so long as they are willing to make an effort. Generally speaking, reputable dog breeders are alright with potential customers taking a look at their operations. After all, it is a chance for them to show that their animals are living in clean, comfortable environments, which is a good sign that the latter are receiving a proper level of care. Simultaneously, it is common for reputable dog breeders to want to learn more about their potential customers in an effort to ensure that the dog will be going to a suitable home. Thanks to this, interested individuals should be very suspicious of anyone who tries to push a puppy onto them because an excessive level of eagerness to sell suggests a high degree of interest in the sale that might be coming at the expense of the dog’s wellbeing. However, even if this doesn’t happen, they should still ask for information about the dog’s lineage, medical status, and other relevant information. All of which a reputable dog breeder should be prepared to provide documentation for. On top of this, interested individuals should also be asking about testimonials because that can provide them with some of the best insight into what they can expect from the dog breeder that they are interacting with.
