Dogs be Dogs

Dogs be Dogs Team of qualified Dog Trainers and Behaviourist using force free, positive, science based methods.

🐶 Surviving Christmas with a puppy 🐶If this is your first Christmas with a puppy, welcome.It’s festive. It’s magical. It...
19/12/2025

🐶 Surviving Christmas with a puppy 🐶

If this is your first Christmas with a puppy, welcome.
It’s festive. It’s magical. It’s also basically a puppy assault course.

Puppies explore the world with their mouths and Christmas introduces an impressive amount of things they really shouldn’t eat, chew or run off with.

A bit of management now saves a lot of stress later.

Food that can cause real problems

Some very normal Christmas foods can be genuinely dangerous for puppies:
• Mince pies and anything with dried fruit. Raisins and grapes can be toxic.
• Chocolate, especially dark chocolate.
• Nuts. Macadamia nuts are toxic and the rest are excellent choking hazards.
• Cooked chicken or turkey bones. They splinter and can cause blockages or perforation of the gut.
• Onions. Including stuffing, gravy and anything cooked with onion.
• Alcohol. Glasses left at coffee table height are perfectly placed for a curious puppy.

Also worth remembering that guests, especially ones without dogs, often don’t realise any of this.

Non food things puppies absolutely will investigate

Christmas also brings:
• Tree lights and electrical wires
• Baubles and decorations
• Wrapping paper, ribbons and bows
• Batteries
• Presents under the tree

If you’re thinking “my puppy wouldn’t”, yes they would. Possibly while making eye contact.

A playpen is your friend here. You can put the puppy in it, or you can put the Christmas tree in it. Both are sensible life choices.

Arrivals and open doors

Christmas means doors opening constantly. Visitors arriving, people nipping back to the car, deliveries turning up.

Some guests won’t think about closing doors behind them.

Have a plan. Gates, pens, leads indoors, or popping your puppy somewhere safe before opening the door. Puppies are fast and regret is slow.

Overtired puppies bite

Missed naps plus excitement equals a puppy that cannot cope.

More biting, less listening, more chaos.

This isn’t bad behaviour. It’s an exhausted nervous system. Build in proper sleep, even if it feels rude disappearing with your puppy for ten minutes.

Toilet training may wobble

More going on, more accidents. That’s normal. Go back a step for a few days and it will settle.

Use chews and food enrichment

Have chews and stuffed Kongs ready before you need them.

You can use parts of Christmas dinner:
• Puppy safe vegetables such as broccoli, sprouts, carrots, swede, peas and cauliflower
• A small amount of plain turkey
Mixed with their normal food

It gives puppies something appropriate to focus on and reduces the chances of them stealing something far worse.

This is not about perfection

Christmas is temporary.
Putting sensible safety measures in place now protects your puppy long term.

If you know someone doing their first Christmas with a puppy, please share this with them.

06/12/2025

Monty has always been relaxed about this because we worked on it from day one. No restraint. No wrestling. Just clear communication, choice and practice. Prevention is better than cure, especially with husbandry skills.

In puppy class today we focused on exactly this. The everyday skills that make vet checks, grooming and home care easier later on. These foundations matter just as much as sit and recall.

If you want to build this confidence early, you can book your puppy classes with us in Mapledurham or Sulhamstead.

Giving a treat will reward bad behaviour.Are we sure about that?Because it is not as simple as it sounds.Let’s clear som...
23/11/2025

Giving a treat will reward bad behaviour.

Are we sure about that?

Because it is not as simple as it sounds.

Let’s clear something up that comes up with almost every dog owner I meet.

A lot of people worry that if a dog barks and we give them a treat, we are rewarding the barking. It sounds logical on the surface, but dogs are not little machines choosing behaviours for points. They are emotional beings trying to cope with the world, just like us, just like toddlers, just like anyone who has ever sat in standstill traffic on the M4 wondering why they left the house in the first place.

Here is something from my own experience.

When Nero came to live with us, he was frightened of children. This was proper fear, not mild uncertainty. If a child appeared, Nero would bark. That barking was emotion. It was his way of saying that he did not feel safe.

So we fed him while he looked at children. A tiny treat for glancing in their direction. Bit by bit he learned that children made good things happen. There were many layers to his progress, but over time Nero went from nervous barking to happily trotting next to kids on family walks. Giving him treats did not reward the barking. It helped him feel safe enough that the barking disappeared.

Now let us compare that to something completely different.

You are eating a sandwich.
Your dog barks at you.
You give them a bit because you want to finish your lunch in peace.
That barking absolutely got reinforced. They learned that barking at humans makes snacks appear.

And here is where it gets interesting.

Many owners worry about giving treats in the wrong moments, yet they miss the everyday situations where behaviour actually gets reinforced.

Here are examples that genuinely reinforce the behaviour you do not want:

• Dog jumps up, human says “no” while physically pushing the dog away.
The push, the eye contact and the attention of any kind can be a reward.

• Dog pulls all the way to the park.
They reach the park and get to run free. That arrival is the reward.

• Dog drags you over to greet another dog.
You allow the greeting. The greeting is the reward.

• Dog steals tea towels or socks and you immediately chase them.
The chase becomes the reward.

These situations build behaviour far more consistently than offering a treat to a frightened dog ever will.

Now for a big one. Crate training and leaving a dog alone.

People often tell me they have been advised to ignore a puppy crying in a crate or to avoid returning to a dog barking when they leave the room. The idea is that going back will reward the noise.

This is complete nonsense.

A puppy crying in a crate is not doing a performance. They are lonely or frightened or confused. A dog barking when left alone is not being clever or manipulative. They are worried. Emotions drive those sounds.

And here is the real problem.
If you ignore them until they fall silent, they do not learn confidence. They learn that no one comes when they need reassurance. Their anxiety rises.

If you go back to them as soon as they need you, you are not rewarding noise. You are supporting emotion. You are helping them feel safe. You are preventing escalation. You are building trust, which is the foundation for all independence later on.

No one ever solved fear by ignoring it.
Not a toddler crying at nursery.
Not a young person overwhelmed on their first day of school.
Not a puppy panicking in a crate.

Emotions are not behaviours.
Fear is not a strategy.
Comfort does not create a spoiled dog.
Comfort helps a dog feel secure enough to learn.

So yes, if your dog barks at your sandwich and you hand it over, that behaviour will grow.
But if your dog barks because they feel scared or unsure and you offer a treat or go back to them, you are not rewarding the barking. You are helping them cope. You are reducing the need for barking altogether.

Different emotion.
Different context.
Different outcome.

If you are reading this on a quiet Sunday afternoon and thinking that this suddenly makes sense, you are not alone. These things are confusing until someone explains them properly. If it helps you, it will help someone else too, so feel free to share.

And just like that… he is 8.How has the time gone that quickly?Nero. Tarn. Kasrst. Niz Wiz Supa Cheese.Professional chao...
13/11/2025

And just like that… he is 8.
How has the time gone that quickly?

Nero. Tarn. Kasrst. Niz Wiz Supa Cheese.
Professional chaos merchant. Collector of nicknames. Absolute heart stealer.

When he came to us, he was reactive to everything. Dogs, people, children… children were basically the spawn of satan in his eyes. He taught us so much. Not just the protocols and the science behind helping reactive dogs, but the bit that often gets forgotten. Empathy for the humans who are trying their absolute best with a dog who is struggling.

The last six years with him have been a whirlwind.
We love you three thousand, you wonderful, complicated, brilliant boy.

Happy birthday, lad.

This is what consistent training looks like…Our Gundog Class teams absolutely smashed it during the latest field assessm...
02/11/2025

This is what consistent training looks like…

Our Gundog Class teams absolutely smashed it during the latest field assessments - huge congratulations to everyone who took part!

🌟 Results:

🐾Rupert & Robert - Distinction in Grade 1 & Grade 2 Retriever

🐾 Otis & George - Grade 1 Hunting Retriever Pass

🐾 Rhya & Dominic - Grade 1 HPR Distinction

🐾 Alfie & Sam - Grade 1 Hunting Retriever Merit
🐾Alfie & Hannah - Grade 2 Hunting Retriever Distinction (just needed a warm-up or mum’s magic handling 😉)

🐾 Flynn & Martin - Grade 1 Hunting Retriever - Distinction

🐾 Effie & Carien - Grade 2 Hunting Retriever Distinction

🐾 Duke & Abigail - Grade 3 Hunting Retriever Distinction

Every dog and handler pair has come so far - from wobbly recalls to polished retrieves and calm control. Watching those partnerships come together in the field is exactly what our Gundog Classes are all about.

📍 Our Gundog Classes run at Mapledurham. All gundog breeds and crosses welcome!

🐾 Want to start your training journey with your gundog?

👉 Booking link in comments.

Thank you so much Cedarlily Therapy for assessing these wonderful dogs!

And a massive thank you to Kirsty and Richard for your support as well as expert dummy throwing!

Has your dog been confused since the clocks changed?I was on BBC Radio Berkshire this morning talking about dog lag – wh...
29/10/2025

Has your dog been confused since the clocks changed?

I was on BBC Radio Berkshire this morning talking about dog lag – when our dogs’ internal clocks don’t match the one on the wall. Cue early wake-ups, noisy mornings and general chaos!

If you’d like expert help creating calmer routines or building better behaviour drop us a DM!

🐕 When did “being a dog” become a behaviour problem?Recently, I spoke with owners of a young, working-bred dog who lived...
23/10/2025

🐕 When did “being a dog” become a behaviour problem?

Recently, I spoke with owners of a young, working-bred dog who lived in a busy terraced area of central London.

He was walked twice a day for 30 minutes on lead, and for the rest of the time, they expected him to be quiet and lie down.

When he tried to initiate play or interact with them, they would shout “Quiet!” and “Lie down!” — it made me jump several times during the call.

They weren’t unkind people — just genuinely unaware of what that breed needed. They had imagined a calm companion who would be content with short walks and quiet evenings, but instead found themselves living with a young, energetic dog whose instincts simply didn’t fit their lifestyle.

In the end, they made the difficult decision to rehome him to an environment better suited to his needs.

And that, sadly, isn’t an isolated story.

⸻

People want dogs that don’t bark, don’t dig, don’t chase, don’t sniff, don’t guard, don’t chew, don’t pull, and definitely don’t get muddy.

They want Spaniels that don’t hunt, Shepherds that don’t bark, Retrievers that don’t pick things up, Collies that don’t herd, and Terriers that don’t go after small furries.

In short, they want dogs to stop being what we’ve bred them to be.

⸻

Take the busy working-bred Spaniel as an example.

For generations, we’ve carefully selected the ones that never stop moving — the dogs who will crash through brambles, hunt all day, and keep searching even when they’re exhausted.

And then we’re surprised when that same drive doesn’t magically switch off in a suburban living room.

⸻

From a behaviour perspective, this mismatch between a dog’s instincts and our lifestyle expectations is where so many “problems” begin.

It’s not that the dog is naughty, stubborn, or disobedient — it’s that we’ve set them up to fail by asking them to suppress everything they were designed to do.

⸻

So often, when I meet owners struggling with their dog’s behaviour, I hear:
“He just won’t calm down.”
“She never stops chasing things.”
“He keeps picking things up on walks.”
“She’s obsessed with squirrels.”

And I understand the frustration — truly, I do.

But the answer isn’t always “more exercise.”

Sometimes it’s about recognising that what we see as “annoying” or “problematic” behaviour is often the dog’s only outlet for instincts that have nowhere else to go.

When we shut those behaviours down — by punishing or constantly telling the dog to stop — we’re not solving the problem, we’re suppressing it.

⸻

For many dogs, the solution is giving those instincts somewhere appropriate to go.

🐾 Retrievers need chances to carry, fetch, and hold.
🐾 Spaniels need scent games and controlled hunting exercises.
🐾 Collies thrive on focus and movement — things like agility or controlled herding-style tasks.
🐾 Terriers love digging boxes, scentwork, or controlled searching for hidden toys.

⸻

If we love dogs as much as we say we do, we have to start respecting the purpose they were bred for — not punishing them for expressing it.

That doesn’t mean we all have to take up fieldwork or herding sheep, but it does mean finding ways to meet those natural needs through training, enrichment, and breed-appropriate activities that let them be who they are.

⸻

So next time your Spaniel flushes a pigeon, your Retriever proudly brings you a sock, or your Terrier unearths a mouse nest, take a breath and remember — that’s not misbehaviour.

That’s history written into their DNA.

⸻

👉 What’s one thing your dog does that reminds you of what they were bred for?

💬 If this resonates, share it to help more people understand that dogs are allowed to be dogs.

I love a good breed-mix mystery! Can you guess?Tara joined us recently and has already got everyone guessing.What do you...
20/10/2025

I love a good breed-mix mystery! Can you guess?

Tara joined us recently and has already got everyone guessing.

What do you think — any ideas what breeds might make up that adorable face?

Let’s see who gets closest 👇

12/10/2025

These were today’s puppies in socialisation –
and honestly, I loved watching them grow.

There’s nothing quite like seeing those little lightbulb moments…
when confidence blooms mid-play,
or when a pup figures out how to read another’s body language.

It might look like chaos (and sometimes it is!) –
but every bounce and wag is learning in action.

If this made you smile,
leave a 🐾 below or tag a friend who needs a dose of puppy joy today.

09/10/2025

So your dog’s outgrown puppy and adolescent classes — what’s next?

If you’ve finished the early stages of training but still love working with your dog, Dog Training Club is where you’ll want to be.

It’s for humans who enjoy training and want to keep building useful, real-life skills — without the pressure.

We’ll be working on:
• calm, connected lead walking
• recall around distractions
• polite greetings (for both dogs and humans)
• focus when excitement levels rise
• and settling when life gets busy

We follow the APDT Good Companion Awards, so your progress actually means something — and yes, there are rosettes for every level.

If you’ve got the training bug, this is the perfect next step.
📍 Booking link in the first comment.

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Hi fellow dog lover,

I am Tash, I live in Caversham with my three dogs Nika the Labrador and Monty & Mabel the Irish Terriers, three chickens (Terri, Millie and Vinnie), oh and my husband also lives with us!

I can help you with most behavioural or training issues - from poor recall and pulling on the lead to aggression, reactivity and separation anxiety.