Never had one one before. Our puppy arrived today....tips please!

[Indaba]

Think subject line says it all.

And am sure this has been done a million times, but any handy hints for complete novice in the dog world. Got loads of books to read but am interested in any little things you have learned.

Much appreciated!!!!!

[Indaba]

not been on for a day or so cos knackered

am being completely over caring....cuddle him when he wakes up in night and wrap him warm blanket that I warm

i know, rod for own back but blimey hes just "lost"his mum and siblings and was put on a plane to Cape Town all on his own at the weekend

flame me, I don't care

[swallowedAfly]

sounds like pup is settling well btw - just need to get past that 4am bit.

[swallowedAfly]

my dog is 10 months now and she still sleeps at least half of time. she goes to sleep before me and only wakes up when ds gets on the bed, goes down eats a bit, goes out to the loo then sneaks back to my bed. we go out drop ds at school and go for a big walk and she runs like crazy. we come home and she sleeps again.

end of day the same walk and pick up ds, come home, plays a bit with ds, gets under my feet whilst i make tea, dozes on and off and then it's bed time. i tend to be on the laptop or watching stuff or reading in my bedroom from 7.30pm or so when i put ds to bed. that's when she clocks off for the day. she is currently unconscious and pressed into the backs of my leg like a cat.

so i reckon actually she sleeps for about 16hrs a day.

[Indaba]

Its nice to come on this thread so I can talk about my puppy ad nauseum.....feel I have boring everyone else in RL senseless.

Anyway, he is following Gina Ford timetable for last two days (by default...no controlled crying in our house!!!!!!)

Up at 7am, eat, play, sleep, up at 11.30am, eat play sleep, same at 2.30, down until 7 till 11pm and repeat, up again at 4am.....cuddles with mum (I know I should have lights dimmed and no eye contact ) till back to sleep till 7am.

There must be a book in this for GF somewhere. She has been very quiet of late

[SparklyCloud]

Best tip I can give you is to train him to the whistle, so when you are out and he is off lead, he will come when called, or whistled, immediately.

Buy a whistle from pets at home. Every time you feed him, blow the whistle just before you put the food down, same with treats. After a few days of this, try him out, go somewhere in the house away from him, blow whistle, if he comes to it give treat. Soon he will come to the whistle outside. Good luck!

[Indaba]

thanks everyone.

Am feeling like it is having a new human baby in the house. Worrying he won't sleep then worrying he is sleeping too much. Has he eaten enough? etc etc.

And am so glad we have wooden floors

Thanks for all your help.

Can see these threads are going to be a lot more interesting now instead of boring old AIBU and chat

[Springyknickersohnovicars]

My puppy hasn't eaten her breakfast, she'll eat if hand fed it but is completely ignoring the food if it is in her bowl. She's been here since Wednesday and up until this morning has been a gannet. She was sick in the nght but no runny poos. Can't spell the diahorrea word or can I?

She's on Burns puppy food same food she was on at the rescue though they had her on sensitive 100% for the first day and gradually reduced that to 50 50 today, on RSPCA's advice.

It's only been since this morning, is this still the settling in period or should I worry or do anything else?

[Spamspamspam]

Congratulations on your new bundle of joy!

Come along and join us on the New Puppy Threads, they really are invaluable.

One bit of advice we all took on was the NOT overstimulating your puppy. The whole if it doesn't sleep at night don't let it sleep during the day is not good advice in my experience. Puppies need A LOT of sleep and the better quality sleep they get during the day the better they will sleep at night. It is really tempting to try and tire them out and do a lot during the day under the impression that this will make them sleep at night but this hasn't been the case for me and a lot of others, the puppies just get overstimulated and won't sleep. So many people on the New Puppy thread found they had a much easier puppy in terms of sleeping and behaviour once they chilled out a bit and did far less with their puppies.

[Booboostoo]

As above!

Crate
Clicker
Puppy classes and loads of socialisation
Recall work right from the beginning.

[Springyknickersohnovicars]

Yep I was told the OTT praise too, RSPCA quote "when she poops in the garden make out as if it is the best thing you have ever seen in your entire life"

Neighbours thought I was nuts before, now they know it.

[Quodlibet]

Echoing the off the lead thing - my doggy neighbour pointed out to me when I first got my dog that as a little puppy you're all she has in the world - she won't run away from you in a public place. Early puppidom is a good time to teach recall training before they get the teenage confidence and feel like they can swan off if they feel like it.

I thought the Roger Mugford books about training with only positive reinforcement were good.

[swallowedAfly]

sorry there's more - you will love training her and making her a really good dog. this is very sad but i'm so proud of us whenever we're out walking everyone always remarks on how good she is and how good natured and well socialised etc especially for such a young dog. she has superb social skills and instincts in approaching and playing with other dogs and people. she's my pfb (first dog i ever had apart from when i was a baby).

[swallowedAfly]

no comment on the upstairs issue as i'd be a hypocrite. dog sleeps with me every night in my bed and the first night i couldn't bear the screaming so slept with her on my chest on the sofa

it's not a problem as i'm single and i have a dog blanket over the bed to reduce the hairy issues. would hate to think what she'd do if i attempted to bring a man into bed.

[swallowedAfly]

lots of good advice - definitely start training right away and rewarding good behaviour. lots of treat and rewards in early days (it feels ridiculous because you find yourself thinking i can't be giving treats constantly forever, they're only doing it for the treat but it isn't like that - i used to alternate treats with really over the top praise and affection - as in both or just the affection. eventually the treats can just be occasional and they're still obedient).

one thing i would say is don't be too cautious about letting them off the lead - i personally think the younger the better as it builds both of your confidence and gets recall working great so that you have a fantastic walking companion who you can let roam and run and get loads of exercise confident they'll come back when you call. i always feel sorry for dogs not allowed off lead in safe spaces because their owner was never confident enough to train them. out in the fields i let my lab off lead right from the start and she is fab to walk with - so much fun. good start is to make you the exciting figure - run with them, leg it along with them and then stop suddenly and get them to drop to the floor and fuss like mad. run in a circle with a treat in your hand or ball or whatever they love and get them running and doing turns with you.

yes i'd say as soon as immunised and safe get out there with them in the open and do off lead training and make it fun and fast and varied.

[smartyparts]

We have a 6 month old pup.

Agree with clicker training (although haven't tried it on the kids yet ).

It has been fantastic for getting him to come back on walks unless there's another dog

[rogersmellyonthetelly]

Second pp, if you don't want them to do it when they are full grown, don't let them do it now. Re the crate thing, I got one after a couple of weeks, it saved my sanity, my house and my sex life. Crate is in our bedroom, and she Is allowed on the bed when I say so, but not unless invited.
Make your rules now and stick to them. I found toilet training the hardest thing, as I work at home in the day and found I got distracted, but take her outside as soon as she wakes, after every meal and whenever she gets excited or starts to fidget.
Personally I never used puppy pads in the crate, as puppies will not soil their den unless desperate and I found that because she was in my room in the night that I heard her start to fidget and whine a little, at that point I got up took her to wee then came straight back into the crate with no other attention, and she would settle straight back to sleep. Gradually she went from waking at 2 am and 5 am for a wee to waking at 3 am and then up at 6, then at 4 etc, she stuck at 5 for a while but when i noticed that she wasn't weeing straight away when I took her out, I asked on here and everyone said she was old enough to go through the night holding it. That was about 5 months. She is 6 months now and starts to stir whenever we do in the morning, she has never cried except when we leave her to go out and then not for long.

[DooinMeCleanin]

Clicker training is simple. You'll need a clicker and treats.

'Charge' the clicker for the first few sessions by clicking and then giving a treat. The pup will start to associate the sound of the click with something good happening.

After that use the click to mark behaviours you want. As an example I am clicker training my parents dog to get off the sofa. I call her up, point to the floor and when she gets down I click and treat. Once she is getting better at it I'll add a command i.e. "Off". The clicker is just a faster way of marking the correct behaviour so the dog tends to learn what you want from them a lot quicker.

This book explains more about positive training and clicker training. You can even train your dc although they tend to get annoyed if you use the dogs clicker on them . The principle is the still the same e.g "Well done, you've walked all the way to school without whining, have a chocolate button". Works on husbands too. I plan on using positive training to take over the world [evilgrin]

[Springyknickersohnovicars]

Get a crate:

Ignore crying, never remove puppy from crate when crying it will be seen as a reward by the pup and encourage it.

When you wake take puppy straight out.

Take puppy out after each feed.

When puppy starts to sniff take the puppy out.

Whatever you want from a grown dog allow or encourage as a puppy, so if you want a large dog lying on you on the sofa, let the puppy lie on you on the sofa. If you want her on your bed as a large dog let the puppy on your bed and ditto if you don't.

Now that I have given you the benefit of my wisdom can you please let me a couple of matchsticks to keep my eyes open with. My puppy has now been home for three nights, one night crying, one night quiet until 7 and tonight up at 5 am.

So although extremely inexperienced all of the above tips were received from the RSPCA as she's a rescue dog.

[Sarah009]

Ooh I love vizlas, not the easiest dog tho! They learn quickly both good and bad habits. We don't give our dog any attention when we enter a room or arrive home until he's calm. Stops him getting over excited thinking he's it. Don't look at him or talk to him, then when he's calm give him lots of attention. Have fun with your viz.

[Indaba]

whats clicker training? forgive my ignorance

[MartyrStewart]

love Love LOVE Vizslas

Just praise and treat every time he does something you want him to. Clicker training works well with intelligent dogs.

Take him out into the garden every half an hour - then go CRAZY when he does a wee outside. If it all becomes too much for you - PM me and I will be happy to take him off your hands

[Indaba]

A Hungarian Vizsla.

He is in his crate now. Asleep.

Like the mother of a new born child I think I should be getting my sleep now, whilst he is, instead of MNing.

[tooearlytobeup]

LeBof PMSL!

When we got our pup, I bought stairgates, using the excuse that my then 3 year old needed to have a place to get away from the pup and play with her toys in peace.

Really it was so we could shag without being disturbed. I could not have coped with spaniel eyes watching me and pleading to sleep on the bed

[LeBOF]

Rhinestone, it's terrible- there's no way I can do it with her looking at me; it's worse than a baby! And we have to sneak upstairs and put the baby gate on, but she clocks on every time, and scratches at the carpet at the bottom of the stairs- it's ruined

[MartyrStewart]

Discard the Pack Leader theory, but treat them like a dog, not a child. If you have sons, however, boys are like dogs, so go ahead.