Advice for first time puppy owners

[mammaneedsadrink]

We’re picking up our new puppy next week and we are super excited. It’ll be the first pup for our family, but both me & DH had dogs growing up. We think we have got everything we need, plus we’re reading easy, peasy puppy Squeezy and are planning to book onto a puppy class in the coming weeks. We have 2 primary school aged children who we have been preparing for the new arrival as much as possible. We are determined to be good, responsible owners and want to ensure we are doing all we can to raise a well adjusted pup.

Really, I’m just looking for some tips for first time puppy owners. What didn’t you do that you wish you had, or was did you do that you regret? - that kind of thing.

For context she is a cockapoo and will be 11 weeks old when she comes home.

Assuming you’ve done your due diligence in how to handle the characteristics of those particularly breeds that make up a cockerpoo, the best piece of advice I can give is this;

Do not rely on your children to entertain or exhaust the puppy. You’re already three weeks behind in terms of training, so you need to prioritise that over the next few weeks. Mental stimulation I.e training, is far better for a puppy than shoving them in front of a Kong.

Too many people neglect training in the early weeks as they just want to cuddle their dog and baby it. No. Train it. Teach it to wait before it gets good. Teach it to sit, down, recall, toilet training, leave, drop.

Puppies are monsters and training them is a good way to tire them out.

Sounds like you're making all the right calls so far, from my experience ...(in no particular order)

1. Exposure to as many experiences as early as possible, i.e. other dogs, car/tran/bus travel, shopping centres, pubs loud noises, traffic etc.
2. Work on recall ASAP, call name, or use a whistle and treat, warp their brain (Call > Return > treat). even do it at home, it usually pays dividends later.
3. Don't be too alarmed when puppies play, it can often look like they are biting but they are just learning the limits.
4. When in the park, try not to pick the puppy up at the first sign of danger.
5. If they toilet in the wrong place, i.e. living room, try feeding them in the same place for a couple of days, as they don't like to toilet where they eat.
6. We started with "puppy pads"t, and moved them outside after a few weeks, which helped our puppy transition.
7. Fit a dog flap, and get them using it early.
8. Enjoy every minute, even when it's 3 am and it's "puppy playtime"
9. Don't buy an extendable lead.

Whatever you do, do not stop training class after the initial puppy course!
Dog training is a very long process that easily takes 12-18 months.

Try and work yourself through the good citizen dog scheme if available through your dog training club.

Assume that your breeder will accidentally mix up the registering of the correct microchips with all the correct different buyers.

You won't believe how often this happens. Register for an online account with whatever microchip company it is is and link your pet's chip to you. You find your pet, link them to you and if the details match it works. If it doesn't work, the the breeder has likely cocked up.

I have found out after 11 months of puppy ownership that my dog is registered to someone else and I have no dog at all registered to me! The breeder made a right mess of it. I've had to open a case.

DON'T ASSUME OTHER PEOPLE WILL DO THEIR JOB CORRECTLY.

Vaccinations lined up? You don't mention this but it could affect the timings for your training classes.

Do get it booked to start as soon as possible.

My last puppy was a bitey little bugger with very sharp teeth, so... Savlon? (She's a good girl now.)

Also another piece of advice - don't compare your training with anyone else's.

I ended up in an awful mindset where I was comparing my dog's progress with 10 second Instagram reels of people showing their dog doing a perfect behaviour once and implying that he/she does it all the time at 5 minutes old (I exaggerate but you get my point)

People online will say "oh my dog is only 10 weeks old but NEVER does this and ALWAYS does that, oh and he makes the tea and answers the door and mops the floor... Wait? Your dog doesn't?? Oh dear..."

Agree with @LandSharksAnonymous advice to get training but for God's sake don't fall into the trap I did, of forgetting you have a puppy and that they will behave like a puppy for a while! Dont beat yourself up that your six month old isn't acting like a six year old.

I don't have kids, so maybe that played into my 'vulnerability' for want of a better word so maybe you'll be better placed if you're already used to not comparing your kids.

edited to say - I regret that I spent so much of my puppy stage in this state rather than emotionally meeting her where she was at that stage of her life 😢

The breeder should have started house training the puppy and socialising with noises/children etc around the home which should help. Hopefully it will have also met cats at least.
Personally I don’t let dogs upstairs or on the furniture. If it wakes in the night go down to the dog. Every single time. They are only puppies for a short time and the time you put in for the first year makes the dog.
As others have said mental stimulation is important cockers can be very busy dogs and like a job, problems can arise if they are bored. I’ve no experience of poodles.
It’s a lovely time of year to have a puppy

Exciting puppy times ahead. From memory:

1. Expect them to cry overnight at least first night. Advice is go and reassure once to check they have access to water and puppy pad and are safe then dont return again or sleep on the sofa. It is hard.

1. Be patient training them to walk on a lead and exposure to traffic noise etc. It is all new and scary to them. Lots of reassurance.

1. Playtime can be as simple as calling their name and exaggerated praise/pet them and only occasional treat (treat them like kids and Haribo - sparingly!)

1. Whole family do the puppy shuffle where you dont lift your feet up so that there is no danger of squashing pup underfoot.

1. Lots of opportunities to pee outside. Praise when in act of peeing where you want them to pee.

1. Play games to get pup to sit. Same reinforcement/praise as above. We also play "which hand is it in" to win a treat. And teach wait command. We use hand actions and voice for sit/wait/lie down.

1. Have fun and welcome to puppyhood

X

These are great, thank you all!

we’ve already done the microchip, so that’s all ok thankfully and we have her 2nd jabs booked for Thursday, so seems we are on the right track 🤞🏼

Brace yourself (& kids) for the needle sharp puppy teeth! However once past teething (around 4-6 months) it gets a lot better. Good luck.