Puppy survival thread. Oct/Nov fireworks!

[sandwiches77]

New thread...

LegsMiserables I'm sure it will be fine.
I bet your pup will love having another person to fawn over him 🙂

I've left mine for a bit when she needs a nap - and she's OK for an hour, no mad barking. I'm leaving her for 2 hours this evening. Wish me luck! She is getting a good hours' vigorous playtime in the garden beforehand :)

We're meeting a dog walker next week. We don't really need one at the moment but thought it might be useful to have a backup option in case the need arises.

We've only left Ada a couple of times for 20-25 mins, and she's been ok but a bit whiny. Need to start working on it again.

She's not been settling in the evenings so we tried a short pavement walk at 7.30 and that stopped an evening of constantly redirecting and stopping chewing.

Operation get out of our bed has commenced and she's spent the last two nights downstairs, although not alone for a lot of it.

Still refusing kibble from her bowl!

We've left ours and he's been ok but only for 20 minutes.

Still in crate in our room. Still waking for the odd 4am poo too 🙄

However he will now sleep in his downstairs crate so I am determined to crack getting him to sleep downstairs and if there's poo on the kitchen floor in the morning, so be it.

We've been able to leave our pup for an hour or so and he has been fine. Only in a puppy-proofed room, though. I don't yet trust him to have the run of the house. He's actually (so far) very good about not chewing forbidden objects when we are there to supervise, but I have a feeling he could get up to mischief on his own.

Finally managed to make a post!

Is anyone doing gun dog training? Mac pup is 5.5months now and considering starting as I want something that works with his breed (sprocker- working lines). Feels like our local gun dog club might be a bit old school though, so just wondering what others experiences are 🤔

@TheBigMacDougal We started a pet gundog course last week. Struggled to find anything locally so we're travelling 35/40 mins to a positive gun dog trainer. I found them via a site that lists positive trainers, I'd share the link but I've lost it. Class is a mix of labs/spaniels and a pointer between 5 and 14 months old, 8 total. Can progress onto graded courses from this introduction.

GuyFawkesDay At least the 4am poo is outside and not on your kitchen floor 😀

@tizwozliz that sounds good. The trainer we go to does some gun dog stuff just as good practice e.g walking to heel leads to loose lead walking by proxy etc but I keep wondering if it’s enough for him. He spends most of the hour with his nose on the ground ignoring me 😂🤦🏼‍♀️

I'm not convinced we'll progress beyond the pet course - she doesn't seem to have a natural retrieving instinct :-)

There are some lovely well behaved 5 month old pups on our course. Ada's been the youngest on the other training courses so we excused a lot of her behaviour as youthful exuberance. Won't be able to use that excuse any longer

I'd like to find one too as FawkesPup loves retrieving and "find it" so the cocker instincts run strong! However he's nowhere near obedient enough 🤣.

The local dog class does do them so I will keep going trying to get onto theirs.

I want to do gun dog training but a bit of a shortage by the coast

We’ve signed Billy to to an agility club! He has to do an entrance test in January 😂 it’s like the 11+ all over again! If he’s accepted, he can start in March. All he has to do is show basic control (not sure what level they’re expecting though), a natural aptitude (which he has in spades!) and we have to show that we’re willing to get fully involved with the club and help out at events etc which we totally are. I hope he can do it as he’d love it!

I found the link - this is where we found our trainer

thegundogclub.co.uk/instructors/

We got on the mailing list some time ago so got notified as soon as the course dates were released and pretty much had to book the same day. Seems like there is a lot of demand

@LadyCatStark wow all sounds very competitive to get into! I'd like to do some agility but just for fun really but none near us!

I'd like to do agility or gundog training with AwesomePup but I can't find any near us. I'm sure there must be at least some gundog trainers as there are lots of people who go on hunts. I'll get dh to ask his friends who hunt where they trained their dogs, but I have a feeling they go for "traditional" rather than positive trainers. I just want something fun for us as a next step after the basic obedience puppy classes. He's pretty good with the puppy stuff now and I want to keep training him with new things. He's learnt to catch a toy this week, and he thinks it's the best thing ever so keeps bringing that same toy to me. I also appear to have inadvertantly taught him the command "thank you" instead of leave or drop. So he brings me his toy but won't then let go of it until I say thank you. It's like he's just a really polite dog enforcing manners on me 🤦

I've signed up for bronze puppy training course cos we've finished the basic course. Also signed up for a recall workshop.

Nearly 6 months old and no sign of the nipping stopping!

We had slacked off a bit on loose lead walking, so I made a point of working on it yesterday and today. He did very well, though at the end of our walk today the wind stirred up some leaves and he simply had to chase them. 🍂 It made me smile. He’s still very much a puppy with the impulse control of a gnat sometimes!

My pup just constantly stops on walks. Just stops dead and refuses to move!

@bargelights lol mine was scared by a gust of wind blowing a pile of leaves  she then caught a passing leaf as it flew past her!

@MsAwesomeDragon love that your pup waits for thank you. I sometimes say "ta" like you do to a baby when she brings me a toy and then remember I'm meant to say drop lol but actually she seems to have differentiated drop as drop on the floor and ta means drop in my hand so she's quite clever when she wants to be....

I've been teaching new tricks lately as she can't go to the park. She's mastered roll over and spin, now working on middle. Day 10 of bleeding for her and it's much lighter now but we're still on pavement walks for now, can't wait to get back the field and work on her recall again.

@cheeseisthebest I think that's quite a common shitzu thing isn't it. My friend had shitzus and they always used to just stop and not walk anymore so they'd have to be carried home lol.

We had protest sits a fortnight ago. Started suddenly just sitting down and refusing to move. Initially I thought it was weather related but have since walked in pouring rain without issue so I think it was a developmental blip.

Merli's favourite loose lead fail is trying to pick up litter including chewing gum (even if walked and on and firmly attached) It's a complete infection prevention fail

Thanks for link @tizwozliz I've mailed the only trainer who does spaniels but hoping they will consider a lab. They are 1 hr away from me but am resigned to the drive to get the training

Billy did the sit and refuse to move thing the other day when he didn’t want to come home from the beach. It was a full toddler strop and he kept turning his head away from me to ignore me 😂. In the end I had to pick him up and carry him 100m or so to the car. All 25kg of him! A man was really concerned that he was hurt and wanted to help, I had to tell him, no, he’s just a knob!

@MsAwesomeDragon there’s a gun dog club near us, but you have to be nominated and seconded by existing club members so I imagine it’s all quite insular. I don’t know one member let alone two!

@Aria20 the agility will only be for fun but there’s a 3 year waiting list apparently (due to Covid) and not enough spaces for everyone. We literally applied on the day they decided to take on new people, which was lucky! I dunno though, he probably won’t be as well behave as the older dogs that have been on the waiting list for a long time but then some of them might have moved on or gone somewhere else.

Yes could well be!