Adolescent Dog Survival...Sharing Tips & Tails

[BrodiePup]

Moving on from the puppy survival thread, this is for anyone with a hormonal teenager 🤪

Brodie is just over 7 months now, and is a fun loving pup who is (mostly) a pleasure to be around. My main issue is still walking him which can either be almost a pleasure, or like having a Tasmanian Devil doing breast stroke and bunny hopping down the road 😡. There seems to be no reason for which dog gets attached to the end of the lead, but at least it shows he can do it if he's in the mood!

We've also had our first proper tummy upset this week 🤢 no doubt due to some rubbish he picked up and swallowed before I spotted it. Thankfully it seems to have passed now.

I'm actually pleased about the clocks going back, it means I can fit in a good daylight walk before work again for another couple of weeks. Then it'll be a lunchtime off lead walk and an evening lead walk during the week when the days are at their shortest.

We've been Halloween themed mantrailing this afternoon. Ready with their bandanas here

@PyreneanAubrie I know, I am just here a couple of months prematurely so feel like an intruder. Although V has been humping like mad and his little lipstick even came out today (VOM 🤢) so he's almost teenage in my eyes 😂

@brushingboots I'm still awaiting being brought something dead and hoping it won't happen any time soon. Do you have any recs for light up collar type things? I was looking at the small lights which you attach from Amazon but they are look cheapy rubbish and have bad reviews.

@YorkshireFelix What a precocious boy 😆Clearly you are now a fully paid up member of the adolescent dog community 😉

Weirdly, none of our boy dogs ever did humping but two of our girls did, obsessively 🙄I really hope Brie doesn't do it.

@YorkshireFelix This is the one I bought the other week – got it in a small, and you'd want the XS I'd have thought. Unlike a lot of the ones I saw and some that I tried last year it's an actual collar with a d-ring rather than a necklace, so you could use it all the time.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B087JP8S2K?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title

But last winter when she hadn't finished growing and I didn't want to 'invest' (which now seems a bit silly) we used one of these that we cut down to size twice and it lasted fine. The only thing is that you then need another collar for the ID tag or put it elsewhere, but we just got her to wear both.
https://www.bmstores.co.uk/products/flashing-usb-dog-collar-399936?srsltid=AfmBOooajTT_ooHqhcwn51KUFz0CeYGlUt8Dfk6kZG07RA7OfgFLaPSU

I've got a few really good collar lights actually – two I got from a local shop here which take a watch battery and this rechargeable one from Pets at Home. It is much better than anticipated and sometimes I just clip that and another one onto her regular collar.
https://www.petsathome.com/product/pets-at-home-rechargeable-blinker-light-dog-collar-orange/7147819P?productId=7147819&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=google_shopping&cm_mmc=Google--CPC--%20google_shopping-_-google_shopping&ita=1976&ito=google_shopping&istCompanyId=7255ccad-a1fc-4729-af31-478f79e5071c&istFeedId=385e6b9a-8b03-4076-a8bb-e4737df8549c&istItemId=liiapilxl&istBid=t&cq_src=google_ads&cq_cmp=21200686448&cq_term=&cq_plac=&cq_net=g&cq_plt=gp&gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAjwyfe4BhAWEiwAkIL8sKkWdtxiQGP_PIQCbtc4H5NueWCOHVQYOUA0tnOtrOLNCNmhu7ifrhoCaU8QAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Oh they look brill thank you. I had only seen the necklace type ones (remind me of glow sticks!) but that one you linked looks great. I hadn't thought of looking at Pets at Home for lights and they look good too. Much appreciated.

I saw someone at the park a few months ago who had a light up ball and the dog had a light up collar and it was funny watching the ball fly through the air and collar run towards it in the pitch black 😄

Top spooky Yorkshire scene on our evening walk. Even got the mill chimney in there for good measure. I cannot confirm nor deny if I was wearing a flat cap at the time.

@YorkshireFelix 10/10 spooky vibes! Love it. I went to the woods this evening and freaked myself out like an idiot... except it was 5.30 when we left to go home not 7.30 and felt totally ridiculous that it was SO dark so early. Only another six (?) months to go!!!

@brushingboots I was shocked how dark it was at 5pm even though it happens every year!!

That looks proper atmospheric @YorkshireFelix !

I love dark and cold. Loathe summer. Yeah, I know, I'm a weirdo 😁

Can I have a proud Mama moment?

On this afternoons walk, the girl went nose to nose with two Shetland sheep and I gave one of them a head scratch between it's cute little ears! It made me happy to see my baby LGD bumping noses with sheep and they had no fear of her at all. Brie is totally silent outside her own territory (well, they always are) but I have no idea if that is true of most dogs or not...🤔 She also showed no reaction to a very snappy Staffy cross that was lunging for her so that was good.
In some ways she is doing well I think... maybe...

She still did lead biting on the way back though🙄

Missed so much on the thread so just been catching up!
We've also had some loose poos and sickness, definitely something in the air!!
Max has hit the teenager stage, running for miles when off lead, the lead pulling is horrendous and causing me some pain sometimes (i have a hernia) and he's so barky at home it's actually driving me mad!! And if he hasn't got a chew of some sort he pesters and pesters until i crack and just give him one!! I love him but he's driving me crazy at the moment.

Oh God @lookwhatyoumademedoo Bill does that. It's my own fault for giving in rather than thinking, what does a chew signal, when should I give him something, etc - instead, we have these long conversations (which I adore) but which seem to end in him whining and looking at the chew box till I give in. It's hard, though, as I still can't distinguish between whining because he needs a poo and whining because he needs a chew, and, as I discovered last week, whining because he feels really unwell. So I feel like I need to listen to him every time.

PS I'm going back to basics with lead walking now - starting to treat him whenever his nose is in the right place, and I've got one of those leads that clips at the front as well as the back. Early days but there does seem to be a marginal improvement so far.

@PyreneanAubrie She is brilliant, well done Brie!

oh i'm the same, he whines so i get up and open the back door just incase he does need the toilet, que him running into the garden, turning round and straight back into the house to stand at the treat jar whining and barking 🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️

My pup weed again on the boyfriend's gym equipment - a different piece this time.
I've blocked off that area and gone back to basics taking him out and treating him for weeing.

How can a pup have no accidents for two months and then go so backwards!

On a positive note, he snoozed on my lap from 7 -9.30 last night, and we hadn't even done anything different or tiring.

That's very frustrating @Cavalierchaos , they do seem to regress at times. It is a bumpy ride with puppies, that's for sure. Brie has gone back to pulling at our clothes, which she had stopped doing 🙄

But then, your post proves the point that for every negative there's usually a positive. It's great to hear that your boy was calmly and quietly snuggled up with you last night. Perhaps the long winter evenings won't be so hard now 🙂

Yes, @Bupster and @lookwhatyoumademedoo same here. It's why I'm stuck with the rawhide rings, it's the only things that stops the "I'm so booooored!!!" type whining. Husband won't give in to her demanding chews but I do 🙄I know it's bad.

Sorry Max had the viral thing too, hope he is now recovering.

Thanks, @YorkshireFelix It just amazes me how calm and gentle she is around creatures, while in her own garden she's just a typical bouncy and boisterous pup/adolescent.

Just another thought @Cavalierchaos but is there any chance that the weeing on your boyfriend's gym equipment could be territorial marking? I'm just thinking that if it was a toilet training regression it would be anywhere, not on a specific target. Does your dog, being male, see your boyfriend as a rival for your affections? It can happen with female owner, male dog.

Godalmighty, he has actually brought me to tears this afternoon for the first time in months - the whining is incessant. He won't eat his actual food, I've actually had to throw away his lunch and give him an emergency tray of Lily's kitchen so he eats something (he was fine eating the same bloody food for breakfast he won't now eat for lunch). I've had bugger all sleep, and several enormous work-related demands today which I'm barely coping with and I've actually come close to shouting at him. I thought I was past this phase. Jesus.

@Bupster Is there a bitch in season nearby? The only time our boys went off their food and whined like that it was always a bitch in season....

Catching up!

@PyreneanAubrie Hooray for a lovely sheep experience! That is so wholesome. This morning pupsy lunged at a cat which was definitely less wholesome and it culminated in what @Bupster and I describe as ‘swimming’ along the pavement. 0/10 would not recommend.

@lookwhatyoumademedoo How old is he now? We did have a very brief phase of needing to go back on the longline, and there was one bad incident with a partridge which I’d rather forget, but she did come out of it again and I’m very sure he will too. I’m intrigued by the fact that he barks too as the only teenage issue I really had (and have) is attention barking during human evening mealtimes, and I’ll be damned if I can stop it. None of my solutions seems to stick properly so I’ve ordered a settle mat to try that way.

@Bupster Noooo, silly Bill. We have had a lot of refusing food here and I know it’s tempting to chuck different food down/add magical formulas to it in an attempt to get them to eat something, anything, but all I found that did was just teach her that if she refused she got something better. What’s his issue with his food? I also wonder if he is actually hungry. I stopped lunch at about his age I think and just did two slightly bigger meals at breakfast and supper for her – but you may be on two meals a day already, I can’t remember. Could also be hormones. We definitely had refusing food thanks to hormones, and also, I think, developmental changes.

Take a deep breath, you can do it (Bruce) xxx

Our older one was a food refuser and lost a couple of kgs when I went for the "a dog won't starve itself" approach. I love that the younger one is excited for food every single meal time.

We did change foods to sort out the older ones food issues, even if she wouldn't have starved herself I didn't want her to eat because there was absolutely no other option. She's a Labrador after all, eating should be something they look forward to!

@brushingboots @PyreneanAubrie Thanks for talking me down, both of you! He's exhausted now - he didn't nap this afternoon as he was busy whining - but I had to take him in the car to work to drop something off, and then I took him to the dog park, and now he's conked out with his soft squidgy head on my foot and for the moment all is forgiven. When he wakes up though, all bets are off...

God knows what it is with the food. He was starving by the time I found something he'd eat, and devoured it all. I think part of it is him wanting more of my attention on a day when I needed to focus mostly on work, and not being able to settle at all, which maybe is partly hormones. And in the absence of naps and food, whining for stinky pork 'spaghetti' chews, which I'm no longer willing to hand out because it encourages him whining and they make him fart relentlessly. And me being so exhausted and spread thin I've just not been coping with any of it. Honestly, @brushingboots , I completely understand how you might leave the little sod and walk out of the house just for a moment's peace. I am so, so tired. Please God I can actually sleep tonight or I'm finally giving up and selling the little bollox for kebabs.