What socialisation did you actually do with your puppy?

[Lostearrings]

I’m trying to work out what I should be doing with our puppy who turns 10 weeks on Monday. We’ve had him a week and, in that time, he’s obviously got used to being at home with us, we’ve had grandparents to stay, a few individual friends over and he’s been on a few “walks” (in a sling) along our road where he’s seen no one and a few car trips to a busier area in the village where we’ve sat for 20 - 30 mins and watched the world go by. As we live in a fairly quiet village not much has gone by - plenty of cars and the occasional walker, jogger, cyclist.
I feel that I need to come up with a plan for the next couple of weeks. What sorts of places would you suggest?

Pets at home, car parks, fields with other animals, roads with increasing levels of traffic, cafes, train stations, places with dogs. But your aim is to make these nice experiences for him (train goes past, he gets a treat) while also teaching him to focus on you, not the other person or dog (he says hi sometimes and then you guide away with a treat and reward him for moving away, but most times you use a treat once he has seen the dog/person to keep him walking with you and reward after). He never gets to say hi if he is pulling towards a person or dog. Turn away, reward for moving away, then try a calm approach if appropriate. You want him calm, confident but indifferent to other things.

Following… I also have a 10.5 week old

Has he had both vaccines?

Our girl is getting more confident every day, but she still wees when she’s nervous and meets someone new

We’ve done lots of walks in quiet areas where she has met traffic, had people over to visit, introduced her to other animals and one dog, but the only car trip she has had so far was the ride home from the breeder last week, so we are planning a drive tomorrow

Next week, I’m planning on taking her on walks around our busy village

From puppy training the lady who ran it had some good suggestions such as taking puppy to a supermarket car park and letting them look and listen to the sounds and sights. Likewise near a school or sports pitch. We also took our puppy out to pubs and other places we had in mind to take her generally.

Also used you tube to play sounds like sirens and fireworks.

Different surfaces - sand, grass, hard floors

Also used a book ‘easy peasy puppy’ (something like that!) which had really useful list and tried to tick as many off as possible. I got a bit overwhelmed with the book to be honest, kept seeing more that I felt I should be doing to do all the right things but it was a useful starting point.

As you live in a village, I'd be introducing him safely to horses, sheep, donkeys, goats, hens and any other species he's likely to encounter on his daily walks. I'd also keep going to slightly busier places where more people are milling about. The more you expose a pup of this age to people and other animals the better.

The weather is awful for this isn’t it?

Mine did; car, bus, tube, Thames clipper, playground, front of my bike, pub, i didn’t do it but firework sounds don’t bother him and that’s good. Being left in the other room. I didn’t do enough with other dogs. People coming to the door.

I didn't get my pup until 16 weeks so worked really hard on his socialisation.
We'd walk around my local small town. Pop into cafes, pubs, even my beauty salon lol. Popped into the vets just to say hi. I took him to the groomers again just to say hi.
I'd sit on benches watching the world go by. There's a farm on our walk so we'd look at farm animals. Heavy machinery
..just getting him used to the noise. If there were roadworks etc I'd walk him past.
Sadly people think socialisation is just meeting other dogs...it is far more than this.
Oh, I'd take him out in the car most days as he was terribly car sick to begin with.

Whilst still in the sling, we hung around schools at end of day to get her used to the sound and movement of children.
Walks along busy roads to get her used to the sound if busy traffic.
Gradually increasing intervals of being left on her own

We took our dog everywhere from 8 weeks old. We were careful about what dogs he interacted with but that was because we wanted positive experiences only more than a disease issue. Of course we wouldnt let him near dogs we knew were unvaccinated.

We believe in lots of controlled interactions as early as possible. It's really important for rotties.

Thanks for the ideas. I felt a bit stuck today. Schools closed as it’s Easter hols; miserable weather so no one really out in our village (the playground was empty!) and then the nearest town is a bit of a tourist trap so very busy with no parking.
I’ll put together a bit of a plan for next week. It will be easier after that as he’ll have had his next jabs so can have his paws on the floor.

I took my sturdy Labrador puppy out to meet the dustmen. Lots of crashing, flashing, hi-viz jackets, and they gave him bits of his kibble. Now I can't get him past a dustcart!

I parked outside the supermarket with the hatch up and sat with him. School at kicking out time (had a word with a parent to tell her why I was lurking).

Use your imagination. I enjoyed it.

lots of great suggestions. Let me just add power tools/garden noises to that. Ours is 13 weeks and we have done a tonne of socialisation including putting fireworks on YouTube. Yesterday we were strimming, mowing etc so that was a few more off the tick list.

It's not necessarily socialisation, it's acclimation.

But realistically, most of this should have been done already by a good breeder - your role is to build on that, and get the dog used to ignoring things. No greeting people. Not bothering other dogs. Ignoring distractions etc.

The most important thing is getting your dog used to be handled (ears, groin, eyes, mouth) and getting your dog being used to the car. Too many people focus on getting their dog to be friendly with bin men, or children, that they forget the very basics.

If your dog doesn't like the car, or doesn't like being touched by strangers or even you in sensitive areas, you're in for a rough 10+ years

@muddyfordyes fabulous suggestion we did the same with the bins and hi viz.

I think this is interesting both mine came as 10 month old dogs from their breeders both are failed show dogs. One in particular has been very well handled and actually been shown so takes everything in his stride, both had travelled extensively in a car and were excellent with other dogs. One in particular takes the view that everything he’s met/experienced has always been ok so that means everything he will meet/experience will be ok. So for example I know. he’d never seen the sea when I got him or walked over a narrow plank bridge over a fast flowing stream but he’s had lots of other positive life experiences so his view is why should this be any different?

I do lots of sitting and watching when they are at the 'in the sling' phase as they are so cuddled up and reassured by you - so standing at the side of the main road to watch the lorries and tractors go by, sitting on a bench at the local country park in the bit where there are lots of small children running round and shrieking/ on their bikes/ scootering, sitting in the coffee shop, just walking round our little town to see as many different sorts of people as possible, trips in the car (short).
At home, working on a calm response to the door bell and visitors coming in is a great socialisation activity.
With my current foster puppy I introduced a settle mat for out and about straightaway so from very tiny he got used to being told to settle and curling up on it and it is super useful as a skill to get them to quietly observe. We go to a cafe or coffee shop every other day and he gets to see so much from his safe spot

If you live in a village, do your best to get him used to:
horses being ridden past (different from horses grazing in a paddock; can you hang out at a riding stables or a livery yard?);
any livestock in the area, ideally in motion;
as much farm machinery as possible - tractors, trailers, sprayers;
gas guns/ bird scarers;
poultry;
church bells.

Also things like strimmers, power tools, ride-on mowers.

You don't have to introduce a puppy to absolutely everything, as a PP says, so long as they've had a good experience with lots of things, they'll generally be confident with whatever they encounter later. You won't be able to find a combine running at the moment, for example, but I found with my younger dog that, having been on a pavement with large lorries trundling by when very young, she was absolutely fine with a combine right next to the footpath.

Lots of outings in the car. You’d be surprised at how many dogs don’t like car rides