Puppy Survival Thread Autumn 2025 - all welcome!

[VanGoSunflowers]

Hello everyone! Won’t tag you all as you know everyone is welcome 😊

@olivehater beautiful! 😍

Thankyou. Coubus you did help to influence me in my choice between poodle and poodle cross on my other thread. So thank yo for your help. Thinking made the right decision.

I think you've made a great choice! I'm so glad you're happy with your new family member and I hope you'll find this thread helpful in the coming weeks😊

What a beauty! Can never go wrong with a poodle!

@olivehater I love his curls! Are you happy to share his name?

@gotthearse Rory (and Billy before him) just love their teddies. They are all over my house! I can see 5 just from my bed. TBH, he just potters about most of the day while I’m working. He’s not a normal pup though TBH!

Does yours have a Kong? One of those little jars of meat paste fills a Kong perfectly and you can freeze it so it lasts longer.

@SomethingSimple This too will pass is good advice for yourself! I felt a lot of that too in the early weeks. Especially after I’d had him a few weeks but couldn’t yet take him for walks. I had a few ‘wtf was I thinking’ moments as well as tears over my perceived lack of skill - I had no clue what I was doing and it knocked my confidence! It will definitely get better. Getting someone else to watch them so you can have a break helps!

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks ahhh new name! I’m glad it’s similar to your old one or I might not be able to cope with the change 😂 Eris is being a typical pup still then??

@gotthearse mine loves a teddy or a chew of some description. Usually a non-food one although he does have occasional ears now his adult teeth are through. In the early weeks, I would spend a large portion of the time ignoring him and letting him potter about and make his own entertainment (supervised of course). I may have thought at one point that what I did or didn’t do would make a difference to his temperament in the house but we have a WhatsApp group with the rest of the litter (well, the owners not the actual puppies 😂) and they’re all very similar in temperament. Like @Idstillratherbepaddleboarding ‘s lab, mine is pretty chilled! I also found that after he had been here a while and sussed out everything in the house that he could, he was bored by it and didn’t seem interested.

@olivehater hello! Wow, your pup is gorgeous ❤️ how are you getting on with him??

No news here really other than I am tentatively starting to think the training to ignore other dogs might actually be working?! Unless yesterday was a fluke - I’d been getting him to sit and stay whenever a dog walked past us, mainly to stop my arm being ripped out at the socket. Yesterday we were offlead, two Dutch shepherds off lead also and Pablo saw them and looked at me for instruction! Didn’t go over and came with me instead! It feels good when they listen to you that one time out of a hundred 😂

Hi all, can I join the trenches ?

We got our 8 week old Cockapoo Kobi last weekend and I’ve not slept since 🤣

He’s absolutely gorgeous and so funny but is not at all happy unless he can see me. We tried a crate first and thought we’d cracked it as he whined for a couple of minutes on the first night and then nothing until I woke him for a wee.

Since then he’s not settled at night at all unless I sleep on the (small) sofa with him.

Yesterday we got a puppy pen and it has his food bowels, bed and toys in. Last night I tried leaving him for a little while in there but with the door open. He cried and cried so I came back down, dragged a camping mattress in and put him in the pen with it closed but with me sleeping right next to him. He then slept fine.

I know the advice is to gradually increase the distance but I feel that’ll take years lol.

There is someone home a lot but there will be times he will need to be on his own for a short while and I fear he will not cope. I have snuffle mats etc for that though so hopefully that distraction will work.
Atm he cries as soon as I get off the sofa 🤦🏻‍♀️

I have had a puppy before but don’t seem to remember what I did that helped.

Picture tax

@TheOriginalNutty beautiful pup! Personally with the crate I’ve always spent the first few nights on the kitchen sofa which is 6ft away and within view of the crate. I’ve kept doing this until they seem totally content with their crate/pen and then started creeping out (sometimes with variable success 😂). Some seem to get it right away (I’ve been lucky with my puppy this time). But when I’ve had adult foster dogs it’s sometimes taken a bit longer. However I’ve never had a dog that hasn’t adapted to sleeping downstairs by themselves. I’ve never had dogs upstairs and it’s also my cat’s safe space. I also feed in the crate initially and play hide the dog kibble/treats in there so they see it as a fun/positive space. I also leave the door open during the day so they can go in and explore or even take themselves off to the crate as a bed (which my 5 month old girl does now). Generally it just takes time I think, some settle quickly, sadly others not so much. It does feel like forever when you’re in the midst of it though and sleep deprivation is the absolute worst! Hopefully your gorgeous pup will get better as he settles and feels at home. It’s very early days. Good luck.

Marley slept for 7 hours last night, woke up at 6 for a wee, then went back to bed til 7.30! I feel more human today after a good sleep. He humped for the first yesterday, my welly, looked a bit surprised while he was doing it 😂 Wonder if that's what prompted him to sleep through the night. Though he also had his first walk outside so that might have done it too.

Went to first puppy training class on Monday, without Marley for the first session. At the end the instructor says that next week he wants us to come in and sit down with a foot on the lead and ignore pup, so pup has no choice but to lie down. Not sure how I feel about that as I've been teaching him to settle on his 'place' using rewards.

@VanGoSunflowers Eris ( the goddess of strife and discord) is aptly named, lets put it that way. The problem is, as I mentioned before, DD1 has been 'claimed' by Eris. And DD1 is a soft touch. 'No Eris, don't do that' 'No Eris, naughty girl' (said with big smiles). Which means that, unfortunately, Eris is starting to think being a massive dick is just great. At this rate, I'm going to give her to Satan for a week to straighten her out (for those of you not aware, Satan is a grumpy old - much loved - cocker spaniel that my mother owns and who has an uncanny ability to strike fear into the heart of any dog).

Eris is also still a nasty little winky sucker. And every time I think I've managed to train her out of it, I catch her doing it. She still greets other dogs that way 😳

I'm so pleased that Pablo is really proving himself to be a good boy! It's funny, isn't it? Some days when they're that age they're little angels and others they are little buggers.

@TheOriginalNutty welcome! Cockerpoos are notorious for being very very clingy, unfortunately! If you can, I would just have him upstairs and not wake him for wees. You'd be surprised how many young puppies can be clean through the night (9/10-5/6) if they're not woken up.

I don't use a crate (so follow @Houndymumma advice if you're wedded to using one), but I typically have puppies on my bed from the night the rest of their littermates go home and they never wake me up. If you do want to continue with the crate, you're probably going to be in for the long haul in terms of sleeping downstairs.

@zobalina77 congrats! The humping is entirely normal - it's something puppies do when they're too overstimulated but don't know what to do! It's actually quite beneficial (IMO) to let them do it as it wears them out. Lots of people frown on it, but then you can end up with an over-stimulated puppy with no outlet (which means sleepness nights)!

I wouldn't be happy with that advice if it goes against your current training (and also how does ignoring a puppy help them?!). Also forcing a puppy into a down doesn't teach them anything. Surely you want your puppy to want to learn? So you use what motivates them!?

Yes @TheHungryHungryLandsharks is right. Some who don’t mind their pups upstairs find taking them up to bed helps. It really depends if you want longterm to have the dog upstairs in the bedroom, or downstairs. As soon as mine are trustworthy and don’t eat stupid things, I give them full run of the kitchen at night and their crate door is permanently clipped open. It’s purely another dog bed. But we have a large open plan kitchen/living area which would be impossible to totally puppy proof. There’s really no wrong or right way, it’s how you want to manage things within your own home. But it is very early days for you and once use to things and feeling more secure, they generally adapt ok. It’s just a painful process for us in the meantime.

@Houndymumma thanks ☺️ it’s so hard to find what is right for them sometimes isn’t it.

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks new I should have stuck with labs 😉 lol
Im not opposed to having him upstairs but I think my partner is. However, he doesn’t live here so 🤣

@TheOriginalNutty puppy > partner 😁

It’s hard though as you don’t want to end up in a situation of the dog always wanting to be upstairs with you because that’s what it’s used to! I don’t mind, simply because even when I was a child I had dogs on my bed at night so these days I would actually struggle without dogs!

Cockerpoos are a more manageable size for bed sharing than a lab though…😀

For me I have a heavy breed, with short legs and long backs so regular stair use should really be discouraged so that makes our decision easy, along with said cat wanting his own dog free space although he’s great with dogs. Nice for him to be able to escape the dog nose up his bottom though 😂

I’d say choose what you want longterm and stick with it. I remember doing 20 minute daily round robin trips in the car with my late boy as a puppy whilst he screamed and messed. Then one day it finally stopped and he was a great little traveller for the next 13 years. However those first 3 weeks felt like forever!! 😆

Bru looks exactly like my choc lab puppy when we brought her home 10 years ago (also she maintained the lovely chunky choc lab tummy 😃)

Hi all - just catching up with the new thread. Ive just posted on the old one - I didn't clock this one was so far underway already!!

@CoubousAndTourmaIet I didn’t realise you were Aubrielle on the other thread 🤦‍♀️😂

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks this has thrown me too 😂 but glad you are still here

So many new and gorgeous puppies - Thankyou for all of the puppy tax which always makes my day.

I posted this pic in the old thread of my naughty naughty boy this morning covered in fox poo and the remains of a dead bird. Dog ownership - not for the faint hearted!!!!

@TheOriginalNutty Hi and welcome! Where your pup sleeps is a personal choice as @Houndymumma and @TheHungryHungryLandsharks say - I can tell
you what happened with mine if it helps as I was a bit of a halfway house with it! My Lab is now 7 months and brought him home at 8 weeks.
I spent two weeks on a make shift bed made out of sofa cushions and then a further 5 weeks on the sofa in the same room while he was in his crate. That sounds like a long time and in all honestly, I probably could have done that quicker than I did but my sofa is pretty comfortable and I knew I would sleep better that way than going up to bed and having to come down to him when he cries.
I did eventually manage to get upstairs and left him in his crate in the living room. The next transition I made was partially covering the crate with a blanket but staying in the same room so he couldn’t see me, but knew I was there. I did that for a few nights and eventually took the plunge and went to bed.
The first couple of nights upstairs, there was a soft whine to begin with but calling out to him from my bed would settle him down so he knew I was in the vicinity.
Now, when he was about 5 months old I ended up bringing him to bed with me which is where he has slept ever since. The only reason being, I found out by accident (took him for a weekend away and didn’t bring the crate) that he would sleep in far later than 6am that way 😂
I am glad I used a crate at the beginning though. Back then, it was really useful to force a nap schedule on him.

With regards to leaving them alone, again - it’s slow and steady. I’m sure you know all about ‘flitting’ in and out of the room etc. once upon a time, mine would cry the minute I left the room. I built him up VERY gradually over time, working on it bit by bit, until he got comfortable. I had to leave him for 4 hours yesterday to pop in to the office and he was absolutely fine. You will get there, it just feels like a monumental effort sometimes! I don’t ever really need to leave him all that often unless I’m popping to the supermarket for half an hour but I live alone and have an 8yo DS so I needed to know that if I HAD to leave him, he would be ok. They grow in confidence all of a sudden and things become easier. At the start, he wouldn’t let me out of his sight. Now, he will still follow me everywhere if he has chance to but if I’m upstairs for an hour for example, I don’t hear a peep out of him and he is usually curled up on the sofa when I come down.

He is my first dog though, so it’s been a lot of trial and error (and LOTS of support from these threads) so don’t necessarily follow my path, it’s more to show you that it does get easier!

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks do you find that having so much experience with raising puppies makes each new pup easier? I think we were talking about this on the other thread - I’ve no ‘ideal dog’ to compare Pablo too so I wonder if that makes it a bit easier to take 😂
You have definitely chosen the right name for Eris from the sounds of things!
Would you mind telling me again which hump toy you get? Pablo has finally destroyed his and I need a slightly bigger and more robust one for the furry package of hormones 😂😂

I was very pleased with him. Someone said to me that when a dog you’re training occasionally shows signs of doing what you want them to, it keeps you at the table like a bad gambler and I think that was a good way of putting it 😂

Shall I have a waffle about my puppy rearing routines?

I'm sort of a bit of everything; like @TheHungryHungryLandsharks , I don't crate, our pups are reared free range. Like @Houndymumma my dogs don't go upstairs because stairs are not recommended for giants, but the cats do sleep on the beds. Like @VanGoSunflowers I start off with weeks of sofa sleeping to be near pup, although he/she is in the next room with a dog gate up.

With other stuff, I teach my pups to "settle" calmly right from the start. I'm not a fan of food as therapy, so no scatter feeding, licki mats, kongs etc. They do have toys and chews when they're little but not so much as adults. They still have 4 meals when adult because of high risk of GDV.

My training is all a bit different because with a dog that will be 50-60 kg as an adult, you can't afford to have resource guarding or jumping up to steal food. We are very very calm with them, for our own safety, there is no overexcitement, all play has to be controlled and quiet. All walks are on lead for their own safety.

To answer the question @VanGoSunflowers put to @TheHungryHungryLandsharks , I'm far less experienced than THHL, current pup is my 9th puppy, but yes, I think it is easier the more experienced you are. Obviously every pup brings its own challenges, they're all totally different, but overall you get straight back into the routine of puppy proofing, sleep, toileting, feeding and knowing instinctively what you need to do. And I think you stress over it less. With our current girl the hardest part was 7- 9 months, that was my puppy blues phase, because she was so awful to lead walk but a large part of that was my anxiety and self-doubt. We're fine now and I love walking her even though she's a disobedient little cow, she's a lovable hooligan ❤

@GoodBones85 you'll never be rid of me 😁It may just be me...but your boy doesn't look particularly apologetic about what he did 😂

@VanGoSunflowers that's a very good question. Honestly, as with @CoubousAndTourmaIet it's a bit of a yes and also a no - every pup brings it's own challenges, but when you stick to one breed you get to know that breed inside out so even if the challenges are different, your ability to predict your dogs reactions/behaviour etc. gets better and more informed, so it is easier.

With Twatdog his issues were lunging and snarling (never aggression, but it scared people - you've seen the photos) before he bit - teething not actual biting - which was quite intimidating, barking for attention (he's quite vocal), and mania (solved, eventually, by his sex toy) which appeared as zoomies that could last hours. Despite all his 'issues', I knew his snarling and lunging wasn't aggression, and I knew how to handle his barking for attention, and so because I knew how to manage those issues...I was able to figure out the mania issue. And, as with @CoubousAndTourmaIet says, you do just stress less because you do really begin to understand that puppy/dog training is not linear.

Eris is - despite her winky sucking, ball-manic, ways - quite a dream in comparison to him.

@Houndymumma have you found the same with Bassetts?

That being said, I definitely find each litter easier - because I have a set time-scale I work to and I know what sort milestones to expect when, and how to house train large groups. I didn't have that at the start and it was chaos! Plus I have an expert in DMum at my side, plus two DDs and DSis/BIL...although admittedly they all piss off once the puppies are about 7 weeks as they know what little horrors the puppies turn into!

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B084GQXFC8?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_1

That's the one I get! Or the duck! Not particularly robust but it can be sewn up easily and is the perfect size for a large dog!

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks Each dog I’ve had makes me know what to expect more, and what worked with previous hounds. I know my own breed very well indeed but haven’t a clue on any other dogs as I’ve never had another type. That’s the mistake some new dog owners make I think, not appreciating how different breeds can be and how important it is to get one that fits in with your lifestyle. I babysat a friend’s Flat Coat Retriever for a weekend once, wow was that a shock!! 😂

However having a puppy again for the first time in 15 years has been a learning curve. It’s like I’ve completely forgotten or wiped my memories from last time! It’s easier when I’ve had adult fosters in as they’re all grown up, but unfortunately my cat wasn’t happy with random adult dogs appearing and it’s his home, hence the pup and probably no more fosters.

The three of us have that in common @Houndymumma @TheHungryHungryLandsharks multiple dogs of a single breed and experience of a multi dog household. I think that also makes a difference.

I honestly would struggle if you gave me a cocker or a poodle but could probably cope reasonably okay with a GR or Lab.

@CoubousAndTourmaIet Yes, it definitely makes a difference! I think I could probably just about cope with a Cocker (mostly due to Satan) or a Flattie (because they're just thicker versions of Goldies), but I have no idea what I'd do with a Utility or Lifestock Guardian dog.

It's interesting as when DMum rescued Satan the fosterer said 'cockers are gundogs, but they're not retrievers so you need to remember that' and I sort of understood it...and now I really do get it.

@Houndymumma you probably wiped the memories because it was so traumatising last time! 😀How does your cat get on with the puppy?

I can imagine though that after being a Bassett expert that spending time with a Flattie was a shock! I absolutely love Flatties - they're so beautiful to look at, and so soft and sweet.