Puppy survival thread! July 2020

[Juiceey]

Roll up roll up... I'm a day late but here we are.

Latest update: Juiceypup is obsessed with DS's feet, who is now starting to get upset by it. He doesn't do it to anyone else, only him, and we don't know why. DS goes stock still as instructed but we have to prise his mouth open to get him off his toe. Has brought him to tears a few times.

@GingerAndTheBiscuits
No - I dismantled the crate this morning! He never goes in for more than a minute and I've given up. I've never used a crate for previous dogs (I'm not sure anyone had a crate when I was young) but I do have a stair gate which is more useful for me and means he can roam downstairs only where we don't have carpet and I've removed all the rugs except one. We have two sleep mattress things in the sitting room and one in the dining room. He prefers to sleep on the floor usually and I'll move him onto a mat. Noise is a big thing still but not today's battle.

We have stair gates but I’m concerned about her hurting herself chewing on doors/wires despite our best efforts to puppy proof. She could only really go in the kitchen and even then with some risk. Aargh. Never imagined how hard this would be.

I am very pleased you go some sleep though

We've completely given up on crate too. She's never gone on apart from for very high value treats and is straight out afterwards. Dpup now sleeps on my bed at my feet. She goes all night but bonus is when she does jump down needing a pee I wake up and whip her outside. Even more bonus is that she's happy just to go back to bed where she stays til someone in the household is up. That's been pretty late some days now we are on our summer holidays- then of course all hell breaks loose because she's well rested. We keep her active til quote late in the evening most days and push her exercise to the maximum safe (she's a small low risk pup so can do this more than you could with certain breeds). The puppy proofing has fallen by the wayside a little but she ignores wires etc anyway. 'Leave it' is the single most useful command we've taught. It's very versatile and is working for the shark moments now as well as things she shouldn't be messing with. Drop is still work in progress though.

That sounds really tough Ginger. I wonder if a trainer could help? Glad you got some sleep Olive.

Brilliant news re starting puppy classes muck. Wish the ones near me would start.

Owlpup had his second injections today, so just one more week until we can go out. We did have a bit of a walk around the car park, the first time out on a lead. It went as expected. 😆 He was so excited though. When we were walking from car back to the house, he sat himself down in front of the front door and needed encouraging back in.

How do your pups travel in the car? I've got a small crate in the boot, plan was to use that until he was big enough and trained enough to just sit in the boot with a grill across. He's already outgrown the crate though, and it's only a fiat punto so nothing bigger will fit in. I don't really want him on the back seat with my excitable 7 year old.

Mine currently sits on DD's lap or on the front seat on a towel if she's not there. I'm plaguing to get a doofus booster type seat going forward

@OwlInAnOakTree We’ve been working with a trainer almost since she arrived. She is looking at our daily routine to see if that is playing a part but there seem to be precious little answers out there between “shut dog in crate/kitchen and come back in the morning” and “don’t ever leave your anxious dog alone”.

I’m in touch with one of the other adopters of our pup’s siblings and she is also getting very little sleep. Maybe there’s just something about this litter that hates sleeping!

@OwlInAnOakTree we put muckypup on the back seat, clipped by his harness into the seat belt, but that's because we don't usually have passengers. It's a three door hatchback so it's a bit awkward sometimes as he isnt quite big enough to just jump in, but he will soon. The first trip, I sat in the back with him but was soon screaming 'stop the car!' because he thought it was great we were stuck in a confined space and started to jump and bite me and I couldn't get away. So I agree, you really don't want ds in the back with Owlpup!

@Midnightstar66 how did you teach 'leave it'? It sounds a very useful one!

After a week of sleeping 11-6 Gus decided today started at 4.20! He needed a wee then wouldn't settle again. I fed him at 5.30 and he was ravenous and after food he went straight back to sleep!

He is still eating Burns puppy which came with him from the breeder, he is 2.6 kgs and gets 4 meals of between 12 and 15 grams. I thought of giving him his last meal at 9ish but worry he'll end up needing to get up in the middle of the night needing to poo. we are planning on moving him to raw food once we've moved house as we don't currently have the freezer space.

DPup just had diarrhoea all over the garden which was a nightmare to sort. We then came inside and she promptly weed. I honestly could cry.
Just having one of those days

Just googled 'how to teach leave it to your puppy' and am now following the Simpawtico method - and incredibly muckypup got the basics of it in a few minutes. So proud!

Well done muckypup!

That sounds like a pretty shitty day Iamadreamer. Literally. Hope tomorrow is better!

Thanks for car tips. I think pup will be too big very soon for a booster seat type thing. And yes, that's what I thought re the back seat muckandnettles! I think I'll keep the crate for now...seems safest. He can lie down in it for now, just has to lower his head a bit to sit.

Bought some pigs ears today...he's just tucking into his first one. He's very much enjoying it but can't see it lasting very long.

Polka pup had a mad do tonight ragging at my feet and me shouting "help!" As he wouldn't let go. He released me after playing bored but god, I need to teach leave it...
I'll look up that video recommended up thread

The 'leave it' is a work in progress but the basics are easy enough. You just need to keep plodding away at it. For a long time.
I took muckypup out by myself and let him off the lead today so felt very proud of that. I even treated myself to an ice cream and sat with him outside a cafe. Sounds more civilised than it felt, as I was gulping down the ice cream asap before any jumping, biting, accident happened to humiliate me, but it was okay in the end. I just wanted to enjoy being out of the house as long as possible. It reminded me of eating out with toddlers, you are just pleased you achieved it but haven't enjoyed the food!

In other news, he has really jumped up at me a few times tonight and I really felt what a strong dog he is becoming (at 16 weeks!) so I need to get as much training done as possible as soon as possible. Dh is totally pissed off with him and is avoiding him - he hasn't got the patience for this. Frankly it is easier managing him by myself most of the time. Ds just likes to pick him up and hug him, so it's much easier if it's just me as I can at least be consistent and I do generally keep my patience.

Calm and patient is the key but it's hard work. Small victories are good. I like the idea of the ice cream and credit for you for being truthful that it was rushed and nit totally blissful and stress free. I feel your pain.

And here we are again

@polkadotpjs thank you!

@Gingerandthebiscuits I feel your pain x

I'm so thankful for this thread as it helps to know that even if we are struggling with different things, we are all struggling with some aspect of pup parenthood!

I watched the Simpawtico video on biting someone posted and we have been having a bit of success with his method so huge thanks to whoever posted that. Shadowpup definitely can tell the difference between clothing and person tbough, he clearly has an issue with a particular skirt of mine as I spent most of yesterday wrestling with him over it and ended up with a hard bite on my leg.

We had always planned on Shadowpup sleeping in a crate in our room which he had been since we got him but last week we had several days of absolute hell getting him up and down the stairs. He's a spaniel so had it drummer into us by breeder and vets to not allow any jumping off things of climbing stairs to try and prevent hip issues which are really common with his breed. So we were carrying him up and down the stairs. Last week every time we picked him up to do this he lost it. Full on aggressive snarling, growling, really hard biting and thrashing. Absolutely no way of being able to keep doing it and no amount of softly softly or treats was working. So we have now had to put him in the downstairs crate for night time which resulted in a few days of waking up to mad barking every time one of the cats came in. And we have 4 cats who are in and out all night 😂😂

He's also decided to be like a steam train on a mission for the road sections of our walks, not helped by the DC either running behind him or in front of him. A whole handful of cheese did nothing yesterday to distract him. He's on a collar and lead for walks because I was determined he wouldn't pull, and all the springer groups I'm on are full of people with harness wearing dogs dragging them down the road as it gives them something to throw their weight against. In training sessions he will walk nicely and offlead he's pretty good too. I guess like everything else it's just keep at it and hope it clicks at some point.

On a positive note we have been visiting the beach every weekend and he gets so much socialisation and has now learnt to sniff bottoms not noses to greet other dogs which was a proud moment!

My pooch is now 15 weeks and just started with the biting full force. Until now it wasn't a problem and I'd read all your comments thinking I'd got away with it. So will be watching the Video today for hints and tips.

He sleeps through the night from 8pm, with a wee break at 10/11 as we all go to bed. Then I wake him at 7am with a dry bed so I'm counting my blessings where I can.

Off for his morning walk - pull and drag more like - before I power up laptop and start work.

The best video on biting I've seen is a breeder called Susanne Shelton just talking about what she does and how she never gets bitten. She is one of the experts on the FB site Pandemic Puppy Raising and if I get to my laptop today I'll provide a link. It's very practical and really helpful, just a woman talking about it.

www.facebook.com/groups/802064763617784/learning_content/?filter=838614103293043&post=2864708360231861

This link should go to the video blog about biting - it's quite long and at the start you think she is stating the obvious, but it gets better and better and you need that theory at the beginning I think. Anyway, if you have a spare hour this is worth a watch!

Any of you with young dc - I've just had ten minutes fun blowing bubbles for muckypup in the garden. 50p bubbles from Tesco. The magic thing was that he just chased the bubbles, didn't really work out I was doing them, so didn't jump at me.

I feel like I can only say this here because people in real life won't get it. Having this pup and being furloughed is really affecting my mental health. Everyone thinks its brilliant that I have time with her but what it means is I'm the only one who does anything with her and every day is like groundhog day. It's really wearing me down.
Sorry for the moan!