Torquay Dog Training

13/11/2024

HELP!! MY PUPPY IS CHEWING!!

Chewing is a natural dog behaviour. They use it to self soothe, to emotionally regulate themselves, relieve boredom as well as just being enjoyable. When puppies are teething their need to chew is even greater!
Dogs have no understanding of our human world and what we value or are dangerous so your furniture, wood surrounds, electrical wire, carpet are all potential chew things.
So it’s important to understand that when your dog chews up expensive clothing, new shoes, your dining room table, designer glasses, remote control, children's toys… I could go on… They are NOT being naughty but just doing what feels natural. As inappropriate and annoying to us that may be.

What you can do to help your puppy

1. MANAGEMENT
All management means is, how do I prevent my puppy/dog practicing behaviours I feel(not the dog) is inappropriate.

1.Clean environment - Ensure that anything of value to you is not in your puppy’s space. This could be shoes, toys, electrical or technological items, hair brush ect

2.Supervision - Puppies need to be supervised 24/7. Left to their own devices they will get themselves into trouble so it’s important that you are always there to guide them. If they do decide that something feels good to chew on calmly and kindly redirect them away and then either remove the item they were chewing on or remove your puppy from that environment.

3. Crates, Play pens & Stair gates - These can be really useful tools when you are unable to supervise your puppy. So if you need to leave your puppy whether that’s to shower, do the school run or sort out the family ect contain your puppies access to your home

2.APPROPRIATE CHEWS
It’s important that your puppy has access to chews so leaving out toys, nylabones ect is really good, however your puppy can get bored of these things and your puppy needs extra chewing opportunities so giving them fresh chew opportunities everyday will go a long way to saving your home. Natural chews that your puppy can lay down and really sink their teeth into and digest will really help. Things like: Raw Carrot, pigs/goat ears, Whimzee chews, lambs braid, chicken feet. There are great companies online that sell natural chews specifically for puppies.
You can also try giving your puppy new toys that they can just destroy. Mine enjoy the squeeky soft toys, once they get to the squeak I remove it.

3.MENTAL STIMULATION
Dogs have the intelligence of a 2 year old child. Chewing can be worse if our puppy’s/dogs are bored so it’s important that they get enough mental stimulation. This is not the same as going for a walk or running around the park. 15 minutes of mental training is the equivalent to about an hour's walk. Try teaching tricks, hiding treats or puzzle games.

FINAL THOUGHTS
It’s very understandable to get angry and frustrated when your home, garden or something you love has been destroyed, however It’s so important to remember that your puppy is just doing what feels natural and that they are chewing for a reason and it’s not to annoy YOU.

13/11/2024

Help!! My puppy is chewing

Chewing is a natural dog behaviour. They use it to self soothe, to emotionally regulate themselves, relieve boredom as well as just being enjoyable. When puppies are teething their need to chew is even greater!

Dogs have no understanding of our human world and what we value or are dangerous so your furniture, wood surrounds, electrical wire, carpet are all potential chew things.

So it’s important to understand that when your dog chews up expensive clothing, new shoes, your dining room table, designer glasses, remote control, children's toys… I could go on… They are NOT being naughty but just doing what feels natural. As inappropriate and annoying to us that may be.

What you can do to help your puppy

1. MANAGEMENT
All management means is, how do I prevent my puppy/dog practicing behaviours I feel(not the dog) is inappropriate.

1.Clean environment - Ensure that anything of value to you is not in your puppy’s space. This could be shoes, toys, electrical or technological items, hair brush ect

2.Supervision - Puppies need to be supervised 24/7. Left to their own devices they will get themselves into trouble so it’s important that you are always there to guide them. If they do decide that something feels good to chew on calmly and kindly redirect them away and then either remove the item they were chewing on or remove your puppy from that environment.

3. Crates, Play pens & Stair gates - These can be really useful tools when you are unable to supervise your puppy. So if you need to leave your puppy whether that’s to shower, do the school run or sort out the family ect contain your puppies access to your home

2.APPROPRIATE CHEWS
It’s important that your puppy has access to chews so leaving out toys, nylabones ect is really good, however your puppy can get bored of these things and your puppy needs extra chewing opportunities so giving them fresh chew opportunities everyday will go a long way to saving your home. Natural chews that your puppy can lay down and really sink their teeth into and digest will really help. Things like: Raw Carrot, pigs/goat ears, Whimzee chews, lambs braid, chicken feet. There are great companies online that sell natural chews specifically for puppies.
You can also try giving your puppy new toys that they can just destroy. Mine enjoy the squeeky soft toys, once they get to the squeak I remove it.

3.MENTAL STIMULATION
Dogs have the intelligence of a 2 year old child. Chewing can be worse if our puppy’s/dogs are bored so it’s important that they get enough mental stimulation. This is not the same as going for a walk or running around the park. 15 minutes of mental training is the equivalent to about an hour's walk. Try teaching tricks, hiding treats or puzzle games.

FINAL THOUGHTS
It’s very understandable to get angry and frustrated when your home, garden or something you love has been destroyed, however It’s so important to remember that your puppy is just doing what feels natural and that they are chewing for a reason and it’s not to annoy YOU.

08/11/2024

17/10/2024

Certified Dog Behaviourist and Family Dog Mediator in Torbay | Embrace Dogs

13/10/2024

I was out for a lovely dog walk in the woods yesterday, when coming the other way was a man with a dog on lead. My cue to get my dogs out of the way as this may have been a dog that needed space.

So I scattered some treats off the path for my 2 to snuffle up so they could pass in piece. Mission accomplished!

What I did notice, however, was this dog was being walked on a an extendable lead that was attached to a head collar.

Part of being an ethical dog professional is ensuring clients are aware of the risks of any methods or equipment they are using, so here's an awareness post as to why the head collar + extendable lead combo is not a good idea.

The head collar, for those not aware, is a type of collar that goes around the snout of the dog with an attachment point for the lead.

By design, when the dog pulls, or you pull the dog, their head gets turned to the side, making it difficult for them to pull.

The risks associated with head collars are:

- Neck and spine injury - the unexpected forces through the neck of a dog with forward momentum once they hit the end of the lead, or the lead is tugged, risks severe injury.
- Prevention of natural gait - which long term can create discomfort through compensatory muscle usage.
- Physical discomfort to the snout and eyes, especially if poorly fitted
- Emotional distress, especially if not properly trained to wear

Now let's look at the extendable lead. While often convenient for the human, the problems we can see with extendable leads include:

- A constant pulling sensation where it's attached to the dog due to the lead consistently trying to retract
- When the dog reaches the end of the lead, they experience the forces of their forward momentum being unexpectedly brought to a halt, sending a jolt through the body

Now lets put these 2 things together. When a head collar is attached to an extendable lead, the lead will be pulling consistently. So the neck muscles must work hard to keep the head forward.

Imagine if you had an elastic rope pulling your head to one side when your trying to look at something straight ahead. How long do you think it would take before your neck muscles started to ache? Imagine what sort of pain you would be in if this was a regular occurance.

Then we also have to consider what happens when the dog reaches the end of the lead.

Considering the average extendable lead is much longer than a standard lead, the dog is able to move faster and even run, enabling an even bigger impact once they reach the limit of the lead. Creating the potential for more severe damage to the neck and spine.

When choosing what equipment to walk your dog on, the top 2 priorities are, keeping both you and your dog safe AND keeping your dog comfortable.

This is particularly relevant when selecting equipment to stop your dog from pulling, as many things on the market advertising anti-pull features, do so by causing pain or discomfort. Definitely not something that should be part of an enriching walk for your dog.

07/10/2024

01/10/2024

15/09/2024

14/09/2024

Dee deciding it's time for a cupboard clear out!
She's certain there's something in there and has pulled out both cupboards to prove it!🐕😅

11/09/2024

We've been coming to this field for about 2 months now, and this is the 1st time Batman has decided to interact with the dog walk.

He saw Pup walking up and down and wanted to join in too.

If I'd tried to push him into doing it, or encouraged him with treats, that would have risked him doing something that made him uncomfortable because I wanted him to.

The real learning that would come out of that would not only that dog walks make me uncomfortable, but also that I am not to be trusted. I dont look out for his best interests and he should be suspicious of the things i ask him to do. Not something that I want or would be helpful in our relationship.

Instead he learnt from real life feedback. He learnt how it felt to walk a dog walk and be raised of the ground. He formed his own opinion independent of me and in this case it was a good one.

If it wasn't, that would have been okay too. Some dogs may like dog walks, others not so much. And that's OK too. Those dogs will find joy in their own way that's more them.

06/09/2024

19/08/2024

04/08/2024

The importance of control.

When we struggle with our dogs behaviour in some way. We often feel like we don't have control.

When we feel like we don't have control of something in our environment, especially something that is our responsibility like our dogs, that can trigger further feelings of anxiety, frustration, anger and general stress.

So it's normal to want to regain a sense of control over your dog in order to ease those uncomfortable feelings.

This can sometimes look like:
👉 shouting at the dog or squashing their behaviour with other punishments
👉 making their lead very short
👉 using equipment that makes it easier to control them like a head halti or other things designed to stop dogs pulling
👉 Telling the dog to do stuff like sit or look at you when they start behaving in the way we don't like

Our foster dog Batman is quite the barky boy.

He will bark at ▪️noises from our neighbours ▪️my partner when he unintentionally invades his space or sometimes when he walks through a gate ▪️dogs on walks that get too close to us ▪️strangers that get too close when he's inside the car.

When I was reflecting on the things that clearly bother him the most, there was a clear theme.

The thing they all had in common were that he had no control over them.

He doesn't understands that we live in a flat. When we hear noises such as our upstairs neighbours walking up the stairs that go over out hallway, he doesn't understand that those noises aren't from inside our home. He just knows that something is happening outside of his control.

When a dog invades his space on a walk, not only can he not control what comes into his bubble of percieved safety, but he's also on a lead which limits his ability to communicate, defend himself or get away.

When a stranger passes him in the car, he is trapped in a small space and cannot control how close they get.

How we feel when we are not in control: anxious, angry, frustrated,stressed,
is probably not all that different to how our dogs feel when they are not in control. Which is why we see some big, over-reactive behaviours.

But scroll back up and look again at the list of things we often do to our dogs when we want to regain control of their behaviour.

All of them take even more control away from the dog.

If loss of control was contributing to their behaviour in the first place, taking even more away from them isn't going to make them feel, or act better.

I'm not saying that you should let your dog do whatever they want all the time. That wouldn't be safe.

But we can be mindful of how we treat our dogs and respond to their behaviours.

Next time you find yourself in a situation where you feel the need to control your dog's behaviour, instead of just taking away the control of the dog, think what can you do that will make them feel safe enough to not need do that behaviour anymore.