Puppy Survival Thread - January - February

[C4itl]

Continuing on the thread from www.mumsnet.com/Talk/the_doghouse/4105422-Puppy-Survival-Thread-December?pg=28 before we hit the message limit

Just been out to clear a wee bit for her (literally a wee bit!) Wee cutie!

We have a pup with massive FOMO too @Phad088, although she is a little younger at 4.5 months. Also a cocker spaniel cross (with springer). She won’t really settle unless it’s in her crate and we have to leave the room. She will lie down outside her crate now, but not in a relaxed way, she cranes her neck up so much to look at you to see if she’s early a treat for lying down - it is most definitely not a relaxed settle. Just hoping that comes with age when she realises we are mostly being boring!

If you can get yourself on some good training that would probably help - I was dubious about training over Zoom but it’s actually been fantastic and really kept us focussed and given us a bit of structure as it is a struggle to know how to fill the time with the puppy sometimes

Hi, hope its ok to jump on.

We have a 12 week old cockerpoo and I am in depths of despair. I have not enjoyed having a puppy at all. I feel like I did with pnd and was so glad Puppy blues is a thing and not just me!
I don’t think she is that bad either...its just me. She sleeps through the night in her crate. For me, its waking each day and anticipating a bad day of bitey dog and toilet accidents. We’ve also got a grumpy rescue cat who doesn’t enjoy being chased.has anyone solved this one or is it a time thing as well? I am wfh so I feel the responsibility for doing everything but don’t have a clue. She is actually really good as she sleeps under my desk although not convinced she is sleeping as the slightest movement and she is up and alert, can’t go to the loo without her following!. Husband likes the idea of walks but its been a bit stop/start since Thursday when she was allowed out. The struggle with harness(she likes to bite) is just another annoying thing
She is very bitey and not very affectionate at all so I don’t feel like playing with her as I know she just gets bitey. @Phad088 if someone offered to take her off me at the moment, I would accept the offer. Even my 8yr said she wouldn’t mind this morning. We are taking each day as it comes and I know its early days. We really need training classes and then we can build from there and I’m glad that people have said zoom ones work for them. We were waiting for dog trainer my friend knows to see if she could do 121 but she’s not replied so definitely its priority now as I need a confidence boost. I looked things up on the internet but I just come away confused just like i did when i had a baby!

@SpreadHummusNotHate

We have a pup with massive FOMO too *@Phad088*, although she is a little younger at 4.5 months. Also a cocker spaniel cross (with springer). She won’t really settle unless it’s in her crate and we have to leave the room. She will lie down outside her crate now, but not in a relaxed way, she cranes her neck up so much to look at you to see if she’s early a treat for lying down - it is most definitely not a relaxed settle. Just hoping that comes with age when she realises we are mostly being boring!

If you can get yourself on some good training that would probably help - I was dubious about training over Zoom but it’s actually been fantastic and really kept us focussed and given us a bit of structure as it is a struggle to know how to fill the time with the puppy sometimes

How do you deal with all the FOMO, it irritates me no end and definitely adds to my stress and annoyance

@Phad088 we have a 6.5 month old cocker. Lovely nature but also loves a whine. You do need to change your trainer because they can be trained out of that whining but it requires everyone to be on board and everyone doing the same thing. The trainer told us it is a cocker tendency as they can be quite vocal - not barking vocal but 'talking'. Ours makes a noise like out of that Charley the Cat public information ads (if you are old enough to remember that). He still does whine but it is getting better but he is very vocal.

he has serious FOMO. Still at his age, if he hears anyone get up, he's up (during the day). He wants to be at the centre of everything but we've got used to that now.

if it's a lot of whining, it is worth checking with the vet to make sure it's not physical/pain (cockers/cockerpoos often get problems with their ears)

do you have any of the dog toys where they have to figure things out and solve puzzles?

I would also make sure that your dp/kids do more with the dog and take yourself out of the equation if you're finding it stressful.

@Phad088 to be honest I’m really just hoping she’ll grow out of it, every adult dog I know is much less “busy”. To help my sanity until then I crate her for naps because otherwise she wouldn’t sleep, and would be an overtired bitey monster. Also started practicing the flitting game where you basically flit between a couple of rooms doing boring things and paying the pup no attention - they can follow you if they want but I think the idea is they soon learn it isn’t rewarding and stay put instead

@HappyThursdays that’s so funny ours does the Charley the Cat noise too - we have been calling her Charley when she does it - I prefer it to her barking anyway!

@Posiemam I really feel for you, it really is hard. The biting has really improved now that that she’s almost 6 months. Got better around the 15 week stage so hang in there. As for the other aspects, pulling, jumping on dogs and people that is still a nightmare. That’s why I don’t enjoy walks with her, she’s just so manic there’s nothing restful about it at all.

@HappyThursdays yep the trainer is trying to train the whining out of her but it’s still her go to response for most things

I think 2 years seems to be a turning point for when things will calm down. Until then we’ll have to manage best we can with a hyper manic dog

Personally I think the issue is that the training to stop whining really has to come from you. My dog behaves differently for different people and at different places.

I honestly think you should invest in another trainer that will work you. It doesn't sound like a great setup tbh.

@BiteyShark totally agree. She whines a lot less with me as I’m quite disciplined in keeping it under control. But whines much more with my partner as he tells her off half heartedly as he thinks it’s just a puppy thing!

[quote Phad088]@BiteyShark totally agree. She whines a lot less with me as I’m quite disciplined in keeping it under control. But whines much more with my partner as he tells her off half heartedly as he thinks it’s just a puppy thing![/quote]
Ah then what you need is a different 1-1 trainer who will work with your DP as well. It took that for my DH to realise that what I was telling him to do was correct and actually someone else with experience telling him the same thing made him see sense.

Hi all, hope no one minds me jumping in on this thread - we're 2 1/2 weeks in to dog ownership with our 11 week old German shepherd. So far it has been nowhere near as demanding as I thought it would be - perhaps because I am currently not working and at home now and for the next couple of years so I've got lots of time to dedicate to her. She is sleeping pretty much through the night from 11:30- 6:30 which has amazed us, I genuinely thought it would be like a newborn for the first few months. But aside from the first 3 nights where one of us slept on the sofa next to her crate while she settled in, we've not been woken up or had her crying in her crate for ages which has been a surprise.
Toilet training is proving frustrating but we are lucky in that our entire house is tiled/wooden floors so it's pretty easy to clean up - I don't know how anyone copes with a new puppy and carpet! She's doing more poos outside now and starting to wee outside occasionally but unless we are literally watching her non stop it's pretty impossible to get her outside in time! DH Is pulling his hair out but he's at work every day so doesn't really bear the brunt of it all. We've got through a lot of kitchen roll! The vet said she's allowed out from this weekend so I'm hoping a couple of daily walks will help with encouraging her to go outside.
Our main issue though is the biting which seems to be pretty common when it comes to GS. She gets so over excited and can't control herself when she plays - we are constantly trying to remove our hair/trousers/toes from her mouth and replace with balls/toys/frozen flannels etc. She's getting slightly more obedient but I think it will be a while before we see any real improvement. My concern is for our DS6 - he absolutely adores her and wants to hug her and play all the time but she often can't keep her teeth off his legs or socks, often resulting in DS getting upset or feeling like she's attacking him. Obviously she's going to get much bigger in the coming months so I'm a bit concerned that she might not understand the strength of her bite when playing and really hurt him. We are trying to be very consistent in walking away from her and stopping play when she bites but it's a battle at the moment because she gets so carried away!
Otherwise though she is absolutely beautiful and has injected a lot of fun into the house after a pretty stressful year. Can't imagine the house without her, although I do miss lay ins at the weekend where we'd all snuggle in bed watching Netflix/sleeping until hunger struck - but the idea of having our little terror in our room and bed right now is a big no no!

@cakebythepound1234 aw what a gorgeous pup!!

I think you have mirrored what most puppy owners go through early on.

My experience early on was similar, slept well at night generally, lots of sleeping in day time but toileting and the biting was awful. DS2 got very upset as it feels so personal i think. Pugpup is 20 weeks now and it is so much better, he still has his bitey moments and its not very nice but definitely not as often and as soon as we stand up and look away he stops immediately.

We had a 1:1 trainer and its really helped as she's helped us use specific commands for the biting etc.

Sounds like you are doing really well though.

It’s really hard at the beginning, but C4pup is also at 20 weeks and everything is a lot lot better now, hardly any biting and just generally a lot easier to manage on a day to day basis. Please don’t give up on them, it gets better!

We are at 20 weeks and still lots of biting. And jumping up, especially on furniture. She sees the cats and thinks she can do the same. I've caught her on the kitchen table à couple of times. Our old Ddog never did this.

@cakebythepound1234 for toilet training don't wait for the signals, take her out every half hour, when she wakes up, after training and after playing. Lots of praise when she does a wee.

Do you guys have any humping behaviour at all at 9/10 weeks? My guy had zoomies last night and tried to calm him down on my lap and started humping my leg instead! How do you deal with that?

Humping usually meant we’d let her get overtired/overstimulated. Getting them to sleep before zoomies humping starts is the trick!

Leaving the room and shutting the door v briefly usually resets them .

@LondonPupMum we do online zoom puppy training and this has been mentioned. At that age they don't mean anything by it and its just a way of them showing that they're excited.

For those of you struggling, I'd really recommend an online puppy class, it's really helpful to hear others are having the same issues as you, or may even be having it a lot worse!

Feel free to send me a message and I can send over the link to the one I use.

@C4itl thanks! We have a training session online on Sunday which I’m looking forward to. I get so worried about things and need to lower my expectations I think. A tired pup that humps and I think I’ve got a lifelong behavioural issue 😂

@LondonPupMum I was exactly the same, every little thing he did I was thinking 'this is it he's going to be a nightmare forever' but they change so quickly it's never really as big of a deal as you think!

@Puppypuppypuppy did you get my message about the training? Not sure whether it sent

Hi all hope you’ve had a good day! I’m interested, does delaying your pup going to bed and keeping them awake later have any impact on them sleeping longer or less wake ups in night?

@LondonPupMum no difference what so ever for us, it just makes him less manageable during the day.

He’s slept from 6:30 tonight, we’ve just put him out for a wee and then he’ll sleep till I get him up at 4:30am for a toilet trip, then back to sleep till 7:30, same again then back to sleep till 8:30 for breakfast.

We tried the keeping him awake thing at the start when he wasn’t sleeping through and it just made him crazy

@LondonPupMum When ours was the age your puppy is we had no sleep routine and she basically napped overnight and got up a million times. We hardly slept for 3 weeks. Keeping her awake if she wanted to sleep would probably just have caused bitey zoomies. She is such a good sleeper now (coming up for 6 months), if we want a lie in we can put her to bed about 11.30pm, get up for a loo trip at 7am and then she'll go back to bed until half 9. I think we're very lucky though, she sleeps until we wake her. Her best pal (a german shepherd) apparently wakes her family up at 6am every morning!

I doubt it would help with overnight wake ups either, they're probably up cos they need the toilet or some company. It's sooo tough when you're in the thick of it but it'll pass. We were doing twice a night toilet trips for about a month and then once a night for another month and now she sleeps through. I'm not sure there's any way to get them to sleep better, other than wait for them to grow up and get bigger bladders!

Doggy daycare owner has said he thinks pup might be coming into season. It would be early but not impossible. I'm dreading it! Not really sure how to handle it.

Omg he slept through last night!! Was desperate for the loo at 7.30 this morn though