Does anyone fancy a puppy survival thread part 3

[BiteyShark]

Continuation of the support thread.... anyone is welcome whether they have new or older puppies, just want a chat or are battling with ongoing puppy problems.

I thought I would start this thread off as I am hoping it might be the last one I need support from as BiteyPup is now 9.5 months old and we have survived the early puppy months and his teenage antics seem to be subsiding. Still working on our relationship and recall but it's getting better and can finally see some light at the end of the tunnel (fingers crossed)

Welcome JenTheSprtacusPuppy. At least you and your friend can share the puppy trials and tribulations together

Thewolfsjustapuppy what was your DH thinking

Hi Jen, sorry I missed you post. Very cute pups and so handy to have another puppy to play with on hand.
Feel free to vent the frustrations on here. We all have them

@Soubriquet

Hope you're ok. Please don't panic.

Not sure if you want to talk about it here? Might get confusing with other puppy news but maybe if you can start a thread with info about what happened in the lead up to the bite and background info (how old is she, etc), we can help

Soub totally resource guarding but such a scary thing to happen. Does she know leave it etc? Maybe some work on getting them to leave food for a higher value reward, food manners etc would help? I wouldn't worry, it's so likely to be a one off.

Well our puppy just pooed in the middle of puppy class and stunk out the place. No idea what made him do that when he's not had an accident for ages!

SkeletonSkins we train outside so a bit different but he does tend to like doing excited poos unless he is very empty. Could it have been that he was very worked up and excited with all the distractions of the training class?

I think my mistake was he has moved to the later class so I fed him before class as felt it was too late to leave it. Meant his post tea poo was timed perfectly for the middle of the class! Lesson learnt!

Bitey-the first puppy was very good really-took a while to crack the house training (and he still sometimes wee's in my dd's bedroom for some reason ).

This one is going to be harder I think, just as it's more difficult to give her the one on one time without dog 1 either wanting to be involved or getting sad because he is jealous. Dog 1 is a very cuddly beast but has been hiding under the bed a lot since the pup arrived-I'm hoping he will get used to her and they can start to bond soon. But I guess at least he hasn't reacted aggressively to her (which wouldn't be in his nature at all, but there is always the off chance).

To the pp whose dog bit-the one and only time Bear (dog 1) went for me (but fortunately didn't connect) was when we had given him a bone-he turned massively primal over it-it was weird! We haven't repeated it. My friend said similar about her Dog-just seemed to go slightly wolf when given a bone...all anecdotal of course but there may be something in it?

Thanks guys. I'm ok yes

I know it's silly, but I'm pretty sure she knew she had done wrong as she spent ages being really submissive.

Kept coming up to me crawling on her belly and then showing me her tummy as an apology.

We made up last night with lots of kisses and snuggles.

I think I'm going to have to train her to leave it but even with that, I'm not sure it would have worked because it's such a powerful high value item.

We will get there. She's only young

Soubriquet glad your feeling ok. It's narural to worry when something like that happens but they are very young and don't know any better until we teach them.

Soubriquet teaching her to trade is the best option - you need to maintain the trust so she's not worried about losing high value items to you. Have you taken things from her before?

You may need to rebuild your trust account
glasgowdogtrainer.wordpress.com/2013/03/17/building-a-balance-of-trust-with-your-dog/

Also it may be worth you reviewing how you approach interactions/training in terms of your dog's behaviour - the behaviours you describe are appeasement not submission. Any kind of submission/dominance training or terminology is likely to increase your chances of problems

Yeah I take quite a few things off her but never anything that high value.

Usually with food, unless it's something she shouldn't have, it's usually she has food, leave her be.

But I've taken things like biscuits and apples off her before and no reaction but this was obviously something she was desperate to keep

We don't do submissive/dominance theory here either btw. Just wanted to point that out

I just said her behaviour was extremely submissive after what she did

But I've taken things like biscuits and apples off her before and no reaction

But each time you've done that you've taught her that you're taking away something that she wants and not giving her anything in return - you've effectively punished her for releasing the object to you. And she's learned from that that you are not to be trusted when she has something nice, as you'll take it away. Every interaction is a training session - even if you don't intend it to be.

So when she grabbed the meat and saw you approach, her immediate response is a lack of trust in you - she knows you're going to take the nice thing off her and so of course it makes sense to guard it.

You definitely need to start building trust in releasing objects and trading otherwise this behaviour is likely to escalate - she's already learned that you take good stuff away and the anxiety that this creates is the foundation of resource-guarding.

Glad to hear you don't use dominance-submissive training - I was confused as you're still describing her behaviour as submissive - appeasing would be more accurate

This is a really useful illustration

Ahhh I see what you mean

Ok so it's better to swap rather than take?

Absolutely! I would spend a few minutes each day 'trading' on command (perhaps using a toy) and rewarding her with a small treat for the trade, then return the toy to her/use it to play with her, this will build up your 'trust' account. Once you're both comfortable with this (I'd give it a few days) then try her with something novel but safe and low interest (an apple is good, just 'drop' it accidentally on purpose) Again reward for the trade but this time don't return the object (apple). You should continue with these 2 exercises until she's releasing things quickly and comfortably on cue. If there are any signs of tension or guarding around the 'dropped' object then you need to stop this and go back to trading with a variety of toys to build up trust.

You can stop rewarding for the toy when she's comfortable with the release and happy with the reward of the game. But at the moment you need to build trust.

These exercises are really good to prevent resource guarding, build your dog's confidence in you and developing a high trust level increases the chances that you'll be able to remove something potentially dangerous if she grabs it out on a walk by making only a small 'withdrawal' from your trust account. If you don't have lots of pre-existing deposits in your trust account and go to do something that your dog perceives as unfair or unpleasant (like remove an exciting 'treat') the account goes overdrawn and the dog's trust in you breaks down which can lead to aggression. (as you've already seen). Good luck

Ah thank you. We will start working on that today

We do a lot of ball bringing and throwing so can get that in nicely

New pips is coming king into work wh me this morning.Im jot sure how much work will actually get done

vetinari - thanks for that explanation, we've been working on drop/leave it swops, but I hadn't thought about it quite like that so that is helpful :-)

Towel pup has groomers this afternoon: he really needs it (we've met a few b&w minis lately, and he looks like the before of a before and after photo!) - but I'm a bit nervous as dh and ds did it last time and ds found it mega-stressful/felt pup was having a hard time ... so I'm hoping they both play nicely this afternoon: wish me luck!!

Sorry-phone!
New pup is coming to work with me that was meant to say!

nigelsbigface I think your productivity at work might go down today

Just a tad

Proving that experience is not always helpful we have added a lab puppy to our 5 year old yellow lab and mayhem has been achieved. Except when the new one decides to take a nap and we can all relax for a few minutes.

She's beautiful punter

Very cute punter