The Puppy Podcast

The Puppy Podcast is about dogs at home in the most literal sense: Pete Morgan talking through what has been happening with the two Labradors in his household. Lincoln is the older yellow Lab, relatively polite with other dogs and trusted off the lead in the park. Elvis is the black Lab who was the original puppy behind the name. He gets more of the airtime, partly because he is the young one and partly, as Morgan puts it, because he is a pain. The show is as much about bringing a second dog into a home as it is about raising a puppy. The most useful material is advice that comes with its cost attached. Elvis only really knows one way to greet a dog, the running headbutt he gives Lincoln, and other dogs, smaller ones especially, do not take kindly to it. So while Lincoln runs free, Elvis stays on the lead almost everywhere, and Morgan says plainly that this comes from not socializing him early enough. The takeaway is simple. Hearing what skipping it has cost one family is what makes it stick. Health scares get the same treatment. A scab on Lincoln's head, picked at and then watched, kept growing until a return trip to the vet identified it as wet eczema, and Morgan's firmest advice is not to look up pictures of it online. Not everything is a lesson. One conversation weighs how far to go with a dog's birthday party, alongside the story of a dog named Hudson wandering a venue off the lead while strangers who had come in for a drink found themselves at his party. Another has two people counting to three to name their favourite of the two dogs while one of them insists on squeezing onto the sofa. Other voices join Morgan at times, sometimes with a dog in the middle of things. There is a dog-welfare news thread as well, including a story about a dog in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, seized after being left on a short chain outside during a polar vortex, a case Morgan calls ridiculous. Listeners are part of the fabric, sending in their dogs, photos and stories, and puppy dog of the week gets one last outing at the end. Harder moments surface too, including an apology for a long gap between episodes and thanks for listeners' words of comfort after what Morgan calls a horrendous couple of weeks. Even the production is candid: one episode opens with a warning that a microphone fault left it sounding echoey. The stories wander through vet visits, park trips and sofa negotiations before the point arrives, and that unhurried pace suits the material. An episode titled 'The Puppy Podcast - The Final!' has Morgan thanking listeners for two and a half years of sharing the ride, then heading out for a short walk with Lincoln and Elvis.