Check out the entry for the curly-coated retriever The AKC’s Complete Dog Book (the latest edition).
The entry on the flat-coat, which follows this one, is also quite good.
These entries are written by the parent breed clubs, and many of them are quite Pravda-esque– “XX is the smartest dog ever. It is also one of the most ancient.” But these two, at least, are pretty level-headed.
Neither of these conflate the old “Labrador” dog (St. John’s water dog) with the modern Labrador retriever.
The modern Labrador retriever is a British breed; the St. John’s water dog is the ancestral breed from Newfoundland.
Labrador retrievers are not Canadian. They are as Canadian as the other three breeds of British retriever that derive from this dog.
