About Us

Meet our Family - Virtual Tour of our home - Hand raising family oriented puppies - Selectively bred beagles for companion pets

Family Raised Beagle Puppies, Selectively Bred for Indoor Companion Pets & Outdoor Sidekicks!

Successfully finding, adopting, adapting and raising the right little beagle puppy to become your lifelong companion pet is our goal, and together we can work to make good matches for the happy years to come!
When expanding your family, it is important to adopt a beagle who has been specifically intended for a pet home lifestyle, so that everyone can enjoy a lifetime of harmony. For over 20 years we have selectively bred our Sunshine Acres Beagle lines for the pet home, luxurious indoor pet qualities, and we make the sincere efforts to hand-raise our puppies from birth to grow up in approved pet homes only. It is our family’s mission to develop the ultimate Companion pet, for both indoor living and outdoor adventures, as a unique sidekick for their happy families.

As a family with 20+ years experience breeding and raising family pets, Miss C's kids Christi and Cody have grown up with beagle puppies to snuggle and play with their entire lives! Click here to see more about our Family & your puppy's first home.

"He has grown into SUCH a handsome boy. People comment all the time on how good looking he is. And he just has the best personality...such a lover. A friend came over who was having a rough time and Charlie seemed to sense in and just gave him nothing but love and snuggles - didn't leave his lap. Puppy therapy is such a real thing. Charlie saves on heating bills by keeping my bed warm in the winter ;) and I have reached a new level of hatred for Mondays when I have to go to the office and leave him after a fabulous weekend of fetch and snuggles. I think of you all so often and cannot begin to express how thankful I am for all you do to raise such incredible dogs. Charlie has improved my life in countless ways.
-Sarah Zook from California

"She is SO cute. And you cannot believe how affectionate she is. We let her snuggle with us on the couch every night -- and in the bed for naps and early in the AM -- She loves that! But happily goes in her crate when we put her there. But her favorite place is to snuggle with me. :-) "
- Karen Richardson, chairmen of Hi5 network
- Jon Rubenstein, CEO of Palm

"Taken this afternoon! (Note the "kahki interiors" that match our new pup!!)
-karen and jon"

"Hey guys!!We are sending hugs and licks to you from Mexico. I am way overdue to send you recent photos of Pixi. She is doing great -- and cute as ever.I am copying our good friend Vanessa on this email. She and her husband live in LA and also are next door to us here in Punta Mita Mexico. She is a huge dog person, and like me, no longer has her 2 beloved labradors. She met Pixi last night and LOVED HER.So she may be in the market for a nano beagle cutie some day!! (i gave her your website link so she could explore) Certainly any pup adopted by the Helfet's would have an equally "diva lifestyle" to our little girl!!Bestkaren, jon and pixi"

(We love networking!)

Here is Pixi - taken a few days ago. We all wish you a very Happy New Year at Sunshine Acres!! Im sure you have been busy sending home all the Xmas beagles!! Hugs and Licks. Karen, Jon and "diva"

The beloved beagle breed is known for their well-rounded and curious traits making for an engaging addition to their pack, therefore many families seek to add a beagle to their household to be their family's pet.
Our love for the beagle breed has inspired us to selectively breed their wonderful qualities specifically for appropriate pet homes, keeping the quality puppies that our family has fallen in love with, and reproducing them for our approved families to enjoy.
However, there are differences between lines, and when families accidently adopt a beagle who was not intended for their lifestyle, this conflict of interest can give the breed a bad rep. Aside from their inquistive nature, beagles are also known for their skilled nose. The dog's nose is what tells them about their environment. Many beagle breeders selectively breed for abilities in the hunting market, in order to appeal to that market looking for hounds. However, this doesn't mean that the dogs are sold only to hunters- families make up the customer base as well. Pet-homes will often unknowingly adopt easy-buys from the paper without further knowledge about the background and mission behind their new addition. Beagles that were bred for hunting skills are often unhappy when added to a pet-only home, as they are being denied their life’s passion for the sporting track, and are then given a bad rep for following their sub sequentially notorious drive to run off and track.
We and many other families know that the beagle breed can a be wonderful addition to the family. Rather than breeding to magnify hunting instinct, as many beagle lines are bred and started on, we have instead chosen to breed only homebody lines who’s passion is to be right there with the family, focusing on you, the human pack leader, and thus following whatever you choose to do. This focus on homelife versus tracking needs makes for an overall less distracted beagle, which is easier to train, along with fewer worries about running away.
Our beagles would rather be right there by your side, having fun around the yard, playing on the living room floor, camping in with you in the mountains, or cozying up on the couch!

Beautiful & Luxurious Coats

Over the years we have put focus not only on family oriented traits, but also the quality of coat, and the luxurious coats of our uniquely bred pet-lines are perfect for indoor residence. The sporting beagles' standard was set originally to have a courser coat, intended to move the breed towards the purpose of the hunt, to break off easily in the brambles when on the scent's trail. Since our beagles are not intended for hunting purposes, we have worked on improving the coats generation after generation and have created a softer coat in our bloodline.
We also have developed many special less shedding coats, particularly in our rare color beagles such as the khakis, chocolates, silvers and oranges, and sometimes even the tricolors take on this quality as well.Families with allergies have rejoiced in being able to add a rare colored lapdog to their lives. We often hear from happy Sunshine families on the softness of their sunshine acres beagle’s coat, perfect for snuggle time, couch breaks, and playtime on the floor! No matter the color, we get many comments from families on how they are softer and lesser shedding than their previous beagle.

Miss Christina and rare color beagle puppies: silver, chocolate, and khaki.

Khaki Beagle and litter of beagle puppies

Our beagle beauties enter forever households throughout America, both to the east and to the west of our small family home here in North Carolina, just outside of Charlotte. Their dynamic colors undeniably catch eyes wherever they go, and stop onlookers in their tracks. Admiring their beauty, many people who meet a sunshine acres beagle seek out more information on where they could get their own sidekick. Our families enthusiastically tell them about our family's beagles and refer them to our website- therefore many of our customers have found us through word of mouth.
Our beagles catch attention everywhere they go, and offer wonderful networking opportunities. After seeing one of our khaki nano sized sunshine acres beagles "Nina" with her parents in a coffee shop in San Francisco, Karen Richardson (chairmen of Hi5 network) and her husband Jon Rubenstein (iPod daddy, & Palm CEO) were absolutly smitten, got online and reviewed our website, emailed us to share about themselves & get pre-approved, and then flew out to meet us, join the waiting list to find their very own khaki nano female, and flew back out to adopt their tiny "Pixi” to love and easily travel with them in the cabin between homes in California and Mexico. We have a wonderful network of sunshine acres beagle families from across America who stay in touch for the years to come, and we love it when our happy families and their beagle sidekicks spread the word about our uniquely developed line!

All Sizes for the Pet Home!

Diverse lifestyles make up the homes across America, and our beagles continue to go into uniquely matching forever homes, living the companion lives they were intended to excell by. Selectively bred for slightly varying sizes with quality and health as our first priority, our babies fit into many lifestyles. For many the standard size 13” – 15” beagles match wonderfully with their lifestyle, and for many others the smaller mini sizes, 12” and under work better for their situation. Whatever the color, size or gender may be, our babies continue to have well-rounded characteristics.

Mini Khaki "Sandy" on left & Standard Tricolor "Bonnie" on right.

Standard sized tricolor "Paws" on left and our Nano sized Khaki "Happy" on right.

Standard sized Tricolor "Daisy" and Runt sized Khaki sister "Grace"

Runt sized Khaki "Newton" on left and Nano sized Silver "Milli" on right.

Standard sized Chocolate Beagle & Tricolor Beagle buddies, raised together.

Sunshine Acres Beagles are the result of 20 years of development, selectively breeding purely for all the traits that make them a wonderful addition to an indoor companion pet & outdoor sidekick lifestyle. They are intended for approved pet homes only, and are not for hunting, breeding, showing or resale. It is our family's mission to continue developing our exclusive line of companion pet beagles and to see that each of our babies join appropriate households to learn from and enjoy for many happy & harmonious years to come.

Learn about your puppy's first home, then let us learn about
the forever home for one of our babies there with you!

Potential homes can learn all about us and our family-oriented beagles before seeking our help, by reviewing our years of accumulated information, pictures, success stories, and overall experience here,
while we work to raise companion pets.

As a devoted family, we focus our time on caring for our puppies and beagles first and foremost. Hand-raised from birth, our puppies are our priority, giving them the attention, daily care, and guidance intrigal to becoming little family members. We start them off right, as our goal is for a successful addition to their new households as their approved forever families take over in raising them into their perfect companion pets.
We like to learn all about potential homes who have been following us via our updates, sometimes for months, sometimes for years! We consider potential homes for our babies in between our duties here, as they patiently continue learning from our in depth website. Once they are sincerely ready to commit to the responsibility of raising a companion beagle, we happily move forward in helping them guide a successful transistion.

In the meanwhile, our waiting list helps us to pre-approve folks, so that we can learn all about them and what they are looking for, and when the time is right we can focus on our approved households and help find matching puppies, so that they can then choose to claim just the one that steals their heart as their own to raise and love!

As the puppies join their new packs, they are attentive to their human caregivers, and look to their pack leaders for all of their guidance, making that first week home a valuable time to establish lifelong habits, and consistently lead them in the right direction towards being the perfect companion pet in their unique home for the harmonious years to come. We also help our new families with this goal by providing our advice from years of experience upon their making that commitment, to insure that they follow our new puppy guidance, and properly raise their new sunshine acres beagle puppy to enjoy for the years to come. We truly care about seeing lifelong happy family matches, and hearing from our babies and happy families as they adapt and grow up in their forever homes, which is why we have put so much into developing our unique adoption process to help families find, adopt, and raise up just the right puppy for them.

" Snicket is almost 7 months old now and she is doing so well! She has learned a few tricks like sit, laydown, roll over, and high five! She learned them all in just a few minutes too, shes a very smart little girl. The last time I took her in for a vet visit the vet asked where I got her and said that you all make really great pets! She is as healthy as a horse too! I have never had a puppy quite like her. She is such a cuddler and always wants to be close to me (she is currently snoozing under my knees while I write this!) and we love to take naps together! But she loves to play too and is always ready to go play with her friends at the dog park, but of course, she has to make the rounds with all the people before she says hello to the other dogs. She is so friendly Im glad I wasnt in the market for a watchdog (although she does like to bark at the dogs on tv)!!Everyone who meets her comments to me about how beautiful she is and how luxurious her coat is. When I tell people she is nearly full grown at 15 pounds I always get oohs and ahhs at her perfect little size :) She is happy, healthy, and such a lover! She just loves to give kisses and loves to be held. I have never seen another dog that relishes being held the way she does!
Thanks so much for my perfect little pet!
Kristi Hewitt and Snicket "

After learning about us, take the next step by exploring more pages, looking into Puppy Adoption, Adult Adoption, Boarding offered for the future, and enjoying years of happy families' testimonies.
Our Puppy Adoption pages include updates on Currently Available puppies, Upcoming litters, Recent adoptions, homecoming methods, and more! We also have adult dogs become that available from time to time, whether as a retiring momma, a relocation for someone who can't keep their sunshine beagle (due to moving ect) and occasionally beagle rescues. We also offer Boarding for our beagles, a big plus if you like to travel- we love having our babies come back to stay with us, their first home, versus staying in a kennel somewhere else!
We hope you enjoy our website and look forward to helping you add your new companion to your life!

* Please take the time to read our 2nd page, "Indoor Companion Pets vs. Hunting Hound Bloodlines", for background information on why our beagles are so different and the years our family has devoted to developing our unique lines for pet homes only. We prefer to work with people who show a sincere interest, not only in adopting a family member, but also in working with our family to adopt one of our babies, by being patient and following our advice to successfully make a lifelong addition to your family and a continuing positive relationship with your puppy's first family, Christina, Christi and Cody, here at Sunshine Acres.
(After the 2nd page, you can follow the link at the bottom to see our available puppies and contact us with your family's info to be approved to take the next step.)