Puppy Survival Thread - for old and new pups heading into winter

[Lougle]

A thread to continue our journey with our puppies as we head into winter.

If you're new to having a puppy, jump straight in.

Brock is my third, yes. I also have a 3/4 chihuahua 1/4 whippet cross!

Awwwwww!! I do want another retriever but Fluffpup is so perfect for us that I can't imagine any other dog living up to her. Will get one in another year or so I think.

Actually I secretly want 5.

Very cute @Prancingponies hats off to you jumping in again! I'm maxed out at two.

ah @Lougle you must be knackered. I had similar the night the before. I need to get myself into bed earlier but it never happens.

We had a nice walk this morning, we were pottering about in an enclosed field when a woman popped her head over the gate and asked if my pup was friendly... so I told her she's super nervous and she said "oh mine has no boundaries" so we both put them on lead and had a chat about toilet training fails and how the first year is brutal. Pup just watched calmly, no barking or growling

What a lovely lady @BleakGarden

Any advice...when walking pup has started getting excited and jumping up at us and nipping an biting. It's not aggressive, its definitely excitement. At the moment I pull him back with a sit or a scatter feed, but I'm concerned about him making the connection between "if i jump and bite, I get treats". Does that make sense? I can't always predict when he will do it, but a previous dog did this and we never solved the problem and she bit my dc (by this point she was an adult dog, with adult teeth). I'm really worried there is something about the way I am training puppies!

@FoxRedPuppy your puppy is little. Are you leaning right down with the treat? If I lean right down with my treat (my back has to be almost 90° to my legs) then Hazel has all 4 paws on the floor. If I just lean down to give her the treat as I walk, she jumps up to reach it. It's possible that your pup is doing the same. The nipping, for us, is simply that she's trying to grab the treat, eat it, then continue walking for the treat, so her front teeth graze across my fingers.

I may be way off base, but that's a guess at what might be happening.

Sometimes it could be that, but also when he is off the lead and he will run and jump out of excitement. I think he gets overexcited and it all sort of boils over, but not sure how to deal with it.

Like today dd ran slightly ahead of us and he ran after her and jumped up and nipped.

Charlie does this @FoxRedPuppy . Stopping and reminding him of manners/practising sit and middle helps. Definitely easily over excitable!

I also feel like he’ll never be toilet trained. We only have one accident a day, approx. But that’s only because I take him out when I spot signs/after sleep etc. As soon as I drop my attention he pees inside! He doesn’t actually ask to go out at any point really. Thai evening he stood right next to me in the kitchen and peed!

Poor DD2, Hazel keeps running away from her and hiding. I think it's because she's seen as 'Mum who will take away my fun' I'm trying to get DD2 to just do fun stuff with her.

One of the first things I taught was coffee time is quiet time. It's a bit more squished now Grace is almost full sized!

I think Maggie is tired today after doggy day care yesterday. She went to bed early last night, then this morning has quite quickly become bitey and pulling my clothes so I have put her back to her bed and she didn’t make any fuss. She had a licky mat with cheese spread on which she very much enjoyed. We have puppy school tonight so hopefully she will enjoy that. We are reviewing our previous two sessions - Maggie still flatly refuses to lie down on command but she will now do ‘touch’ and will actually come from across the room to touch rather than only do it if I’m 3cm from her nose. Little wins

Maggie sounds like she's doing great @thenewaveragebear1983

I've extended Hazel's crate space and turned her crate round today. She was crying this morning and hiding from DD2 when she approached. I think she wants to be out in the big wide world. So we've decided to separate her pen sides during the day, and let her roam free. At the moment, she's not a massive chewer and she has really got the hang of 'leave it'. She carried a toilet roll into our room but she dropped it immediately when I said to leave it.

We were having an issue that whenever they were together, the dogs were play fighting, but now that they're together a lot of the time, they are settling more.

Hazel can still get out of the cat flap, but whenever she needs a poo she's been barrelling up to the poo palace, whether we're there or not, which is fab.

She graduates puppy class tomorrow... Bronze class next week.

Pupxx is still refusing to walk with just me, his harness/collar are all ok, he just won't walk. The trainer is going to pop in on Friday. I'm finding the puppy stage hard work, not loving it at all 😞

I hope the trainer finds a solution @userxx . That's very upsetting for you. Are the other people puppy will walk for walking at a different time, or a different place?

Yep, he will walk with others 🤷‍♀️. He's so full of beans because of the lack of morning walk. I'm feeling totally fed up today and really missing my old life.

It will pass @userxx. And it's very very hard at the start (or at least I found it very hard) What's the specific issue? I've had them all. I was literally just saying to my mum after taking Fluffpup out for longer than usual in the morning - that the reason for taking longer was that I enjoyed taking her for a walk now, as opposed to a year ago when she embarrassed me at least 30 times per walk. No walk is better than a bad walk. Fluffpups issues were that she wanted to meet every human, dog, leaf, but of litter etc and would lunge over at people. Or she would sit and stare wistfully at people passing by, or try and eat everything. Or pull me over when she smelt something delicious. Or would lie down when she didn't want to move. She was awful, so awful. But today calmly walked past a Greggs with a heap of people standing around outside eating sausage rolls (her fav!)

It will pass, I hated the baby stage for my dc too! Can you take really tasty treats with you to tempt her?

It has snowed here, so night toilet trips became “running like a loon and trying to inhale the snow” trips. Still not sure he’s actually been to the toilet!

@Chocolatebuttonns come on in.

Let's start with the crate:
~Is it small enough? If your crate is very big, then she will have plenty of space to designate a little bit as her sleeping area and the rest as her toileting area.
~I would take out her bed and replace it with a piece of vet bedding. It's quite expensive but it's so much easier to rip it out and wash it than a bed would be. I bought a fairly large piece and cut it into crate sized pieces, so that I'd have 3 pieces I could rotate in the early days.
~Did you do crate training to build up a positive association with the crate? If not, you could spend a bit of time training her to go into her crate willingly. Lure her into the crate with treats (I used kibble) and say 'Yes!' when she goes in there. Then, when she's willingly going to the crate with treats, shut the door for literally a second, then open it and give a treat. Then lure her back out of the crate with a treat, and say 'OK' as she leaves the crate. Repeat this backwards and forwards treating as she goes in and out of the crate. Gradually build up the time you shut the crate door for 3, 5, 10, 15 seconds, until you can build up to a minute or two, then 5, etc.

With toilet training, it really is about building positive association with weeing in the right place and ignoring indoor wees. So find her a place that you want her to toilet in (we put down a wooden frame with gravel and a fence around it, but you don't have to at all). Take her out on a lead - carry her there if she won't walk. Then she stays there until she's done a wee. As she does it, you can say 'Be busy' or anything else you want to use as a toilet word. Then, once she's done a wee, JACKPOT!! She gets treats, praise, cuddles, and she gets to go inside.

Toileting in the early days needs to be your very first thought - if she wakes up, toilet. Drinks...toilet. Eats...toilet. Plays...toilet. Hasn't done anything in the last 20 minutes...toilet. I personally wouldn't use puppy pads. It's confusing and gives mixed messages - you don't want her to pee indoors.

I promise it gets better. Hazel is 4 months old now, and I can't remember the last time she peed inside. When she's outside, if she needs a poo, she runs up to the gravel patch and does it before playing again.

Amazing @Chocolatebuttonns !! That's your starting point. Take each bit as it comes. It must be very hard if you're working full time. I definitely would have found that a very pressurised situation. She won't be this tiny for long but she will take a lot of your time in the early days.