@dagodingo

You seem to want to twist my words. Yes, I hardly think you want all the details of this ordeal. This has caused us great anguish, we never dreamed we would ever return a pup.

Of course we knew we were surrendering the pup. The day could have gone a lot smoother.

Again, we came here for help with our puppy. We never named the breeder, we needed advice from people experienced with this breed. We wanted to make an informed decision.

For those that think we were wrong to return to the breeder, we had a contract and never considered not honoring it. The pup needs to be settled and with an older dog (as per our trainer) and that is where we understand she is. Not in some shelter causing her fear.

To those in this forum that continue to call us liars, please know we have emails and pictures that could prove our statements.

We posted here to get sound, reasonable help from people experienced with Basenjis, help that we were otherwise not receiving. We needed to make an informed decision as soon as possible for the goodness of this beautiful pup that we did not want to give up on. It is STILL heartbreaking.

Reading all of this is very upsetting but we are relieved to read that our pup has gone on to the home that we were told she would be re-homed to.

It was a horrible day and it broke our hearts that we were not allowed to say goodbye

Thank you so much.
I know everyone knows how devastating it is to send a beautiful creature back. She is impossible to say goodbye to and impossible to keep.
Comments like this help quite a lot. You helped us make the right choice. We are not trainers and we are not equipped for the probably long and hard process to help her.
it is so sad that even this process of return can be made hard.

As I said previously, it is terrific how this community makes every attempt to help. It is with a broken heart that we are returning this puppy.
As to the leash - 90% of the time this puppy is delightful. She pees 16 times a day at 3 months old. Maybe a handful of times she aggressively attacks our hands while unleashing. I walk her outside, take her to the second step upstairs for a better reach to the leash and do the same thing every time. If it was every time or the majority I would agree it is a defensive mindset. It is a small part of the time she just snaps.
Yesterday we were sitting on our deck. She went over under my wife's chair and sat calmly. She then reached up to bite the inside of her leg, and chased her around the deck trying to continue the biting. This should not be normal behavior and is not acceptable in our lives.

We did our best in evaluating, even read many posts by this breeder here. She is very knowledgeable, thoughtful and intelligent and we respected her. That is why we do not want to out her here.
There were life reasons why the c-section was done that we understood, even though we disapprove.
Since it was c-section, they all were born the same time, so the much smaller size is anyone's guess, perhaps the conception date?
I say runt only to describe what is clearly a much smaller dog.

When we got home we learned her eating habits were odd. She grabbed all she could fit in her mouth and find a quiet space to eat alone. We think she had to do that because the much larger pups must have harassed her. They certainly did while we visited.
She is going directly to a new home, found by the breeder. We have a contract, and even with all of the lies and deceit we are honest people. Except for the contract we would have contacted brat.
We do not know what our future holds in respect to a furry friend. Now is not the time to decide anything, but the idea of an older dog is possible.
Again, We thank everyone for the tips and comments. This is a powerful forum.

Thank you ALL so much. By not having a mother, she missed out on critical training, even protection from attacks by the litter. I had a litter at home once, and the mother would remove the runt to feed her separately.
We are sure this damaged her.
The day we picked her up when we put on the collar was scary. The attack by the other 4 was vicious and she was dragged through the pen.
We do not believe she ever left the pen until we took her home at 9 weeks.
This runt was 5.2 pounds at 8.5 weeks.
We do not have the tools or the emotional strength to solve this, and the breeder found another home for her. In 62 years, both of us have loved our furry friends to the last day, and this is the most devastating decision we have ever made.
This forum helped us quite a lot in making the decision to get a Basenji, but we did not know the history of this little girl and the parents. Had we known of the c-section, the 11 year old sire with a tick born disease, with no mother or socialization we probably would have backed out. This is incredibly painful, and we pray the next family can help her.
Thanks to everyone here for trying so hard to help us. You did help us make this decision.
You can see the size of their heads, we got the small one.

A snapping example - we leash her to go outside. Unleashing her is normally simple. Sometimes she will bite or snap at us while we try to remove the leash. Then she will follow upstairs nipping at our feet, or clothes, tearing them in the process.
There does not seem to be a trigger we can figure out.
Our last dog was a smooth fox terrier - almost basenji like. Highly intelligent and independent.
This basenji is often in our lap, and is very loving normally. She has learned many things, like sit, lay down, stand, wait.... She will actually play fetch and drop the toy for us to throw again. We can take food and chew things out of her mouth with little issue.
We are hoping for some specific tips to replace what the dam did not instill in her. She does not have any manners. She will bite harder each time until she draws blood. No noise we make seems to make her understand it hurts. She does not seem concerned that we are in pain.
As the example shows, she is usually great, but something in her mind snaps where she will not allow any contact, and will attack. If this was every time, we could try to find a cause, but the randomness of the breakdown is very confusing. Nothing changes, same leash, same location, etc.
Our trainer seems familiar, but how do yo know? She could google their traits just like I can. She seems very skilled. But she and our vet both agree being without the mother is incredibly damaging.

Puppy is 13 weeks old now.
Elective C-section, then Mastitis. 'Breeder' stated she did not know how long before she weaned the puppies. No formula, just moistened dry kibble. No surrogate. We have pictures of the dogs and pen at 6 weeks and we cannot see a place for the dam to be.
Runt had bite marks on face at 6 weeks, and at 9 weeks when we put a collar on she was attacked and dragged around the pen by the entire litter.
Puppies lived in pen for 9 weeks, no indication the dam ever was in this pen.

HELP - the runt has serious mental developmental issues. Most of the day she is wonderful. She then snaps randomly with vicious biting. She does not understand bite control. For our month with her, she is getting much more dangerous. We love her, and never follow our breeders suggestions, like smack with a rolled up newspaper or other lousy ideas. A lot of play, toys, walks and meeting people and kids. Running in our fenced yard. We are always positive, even while being snapped at. We do the yipping when bitten, all the usual tricks. Not our first puppy....

We are trying to understand how to train a puppy that maybe saw her mother for 2 to 3 weeks, possibly less. The Dam is the expert trainer for proper behavior. We do not know how to replace or replicate that training. We are working with a $600 personal trainer for this but no success so far. She lived the "Lord of the Flies".
If we give up and this puppy goes to another family, they may not have the history we have to know why she is so maladjusted.