🐾🐶 How to grow a puppy 🐶 🐾
From 8 weeks to nearly 8 months!
Wow Dash has been an incredible puppy! 😃
One of the reasons you've not seen many puppy posts is because he has breezed through this sensitive critical period of development.
Puppies go through periods often referred to as "fear periods" where they find previously neutral things worrying or scary.
Puppies are also experiencing and seeing things for the very first time a lot. Every day. All the time! And it's normal for puppies to be cautious or worried about these new things.
But Dash took novel experiences, sights and sounds in his stride.
His confidence and optimism are fantastic.
Lots of this is genetic. But I've been working to maintain and boost this.
How?
✅️Building a secure attachment
✅️Nutrition
✅Lots of ️sleep
✅️Appropriate exercise
✅️Play
✅️Exploring new experiences
✅️Quality social interaction
Of course I have been teaching him too, but the main things that will help him develop into a confident dog are the ones above, not whether he can sit or not! (Spoiler alert: he can 😝).
I'll post more details on these important factors to well-rounded puppies and dogs.
As we hit adolescence, Dash has started to be unsure sometimes. This is also totally normal. Adolescence is also a critical development period where the brain changes rapidly.
More on this later!
🐾 Puppy's first week 🐾
Dash has been keeping me very busy!
What should a puppy's forst week or so look like? As a trainer, did I do a ton of training from day one and every day? NOPE!
When we adopt a puppy, we take him artificially early away from his mum and his siblings. Away from everything he has ever known.
The priority is supporting your puppy to feel safe and meeting their emotional needs.
So what's the first week or so like?
🔐 Safety - keeping him feeling safe. This means not leaving him on his own to cry in distress. Sleeping together and supporting his emotional needs. On Dash's first night he slept right next to me, cuddled into my neck. On night two he slept right next to me in a crate on the bed so that we were still right next to each other. No this isn't mollycoddling, and no it doesn't lead to clingy puppies or separation anxiety. I'll post more on creating a secure attachment later.
❤️ Relationship building - getting to know each other, building trust, connection and fun.
🏠 New home - getting used to his new home, its sights, smells and sensations. His new dog and human family members.
🌎 Learning about the world - gentle exposure to new things in the house, then outside. Being carried and kept safe while experiencing quiet areas, getting to know areas we will go, observing his new dog family members walking and sniffing.
💩 Toileting - Learning where to toilet by being set up for success, taken out frequently, rewarded for outdoor toileting and not told off for indoor toileting.
⚽️Playing - lots and lots of playing!
🎓 Learning - one easy behaviour which he already half knew - sit.
Look out for more on Dash's first few weeks soon...
🎆 FIREWORKS! 🎆
The single biggest tip I can give you if your dog is scared of fireworks is – mask the noise with Taiko drumming.
Firework bangs are low-frequency sounds which are easily able to pass through the walls of your house. You can’t mask low-frequency sounds with things like classical music. You can’t “dampen” the sound with blankets over crates. In fact, you can’t sound proof against low-frequency sounds at all.
But you CAN effectively mask the sound by using sounds of the same frequency or lower – Taiko drumming is really effective. So is putting a pair of trainers in the dryer or washing machine.
🥁 Use the best speakers you have and, if you can, turn up the bass – this is the low-frequency sound that you need.
🥁 I use the YouTube “Taiko Drums 10 hours” recording
🥁 If you can, play on two different devices started at different times to help cover any gaps in the music
This excellent advice comes from behaviourist and degree-qualified sound engineer Eileen Anderson of Eileenanddogs. She has some excellent resources if your dog is worried about sounds of any kind.
Understanding the distinction between fears and phobias is important for dogs who are sensitive to noise.
Fear and the startle response to a sudden loud noise is a natural behaviour which helps animals (and people) to avoid dangerous situations and threats. Being frightened and unsettled by fireworks is a normal response.
Phobias are generally excessive responses that interfere with an animal’s ability to function normally. Dogs with sound phobia will typically display profound reactions of panic, escape / avoidance, shaking, salivating.
If your dog is phobic, speak to a vet about medication now.
Taiko Drums 10 hours
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1czjURFkHh0
Eileen and Dogs – dogs and sound archives
https://eileenanddogs.com/blog/category/dogs-and-sound/
❤🐾What do you love about your dog? 🐾❤ Living with dogs with challenging behaviours can be hard. It can be too easy to focus on the things you're working on - the reactive barking and lunging, the fearful behaviour, the recall and focus, and so on - so let's hear it for what we LOVE 💕 about our dogs!
Here's some of the things I love about my trio, what about you?
Share the love 💘
My dogs met some puppies yesterday to help their growing brains 🧠🐾
Look how much support Piper and Zeke needed themselves to process these strange, squeaking, small beings, retreating back to me for reassurance.
Puppies are a pretty new experience for both of them, it's important to support both pups and adults in introductions.
✅No pressure for either the puppies or my dogs to approach each other at all.
✅Space for everyone to move away if they need to.
✅A barrier to keep everyone feeling safe and prevent suddenly coming too close to the potentially scary new being.
✅Support and reassurance for everyone.
✅Freedom of choice to opt out (my older dog Cara was there but hanging back, some of the other puppies chose not to interact).
These puppies are getting the best start in life through their breeder doing Puppy Culture - a programme that carefully introduces pups to new experiences, sights, sounds, textures, people, children and dogs, all before they leave for their new homes.
This is so, so important - so much brain growth and some key developmental stages are during the weeks puppies are with their breeder. Choosing someone who puts in work with their litter can make a huge difference and help develop confident, resilient puppies.
When I'm in the market for a pup, I will be looking for someone who does this!
Is your dog worried about getting in the car?
Zeke recently became scared of getting in my van after the new van was timed with a scary vet visit. He was showing strong avoidance tactics:
◾Planting himself, lying down flat, becoming an immovable object and ignoring known cues which would cause him to move
◾Pulling frantically away from or past the van, scrabbling for purchase, whites of his eyes showing
◾If he thought I was going to "force" him towards the van, if my hands moved as if to shorten the lead, he warned me very clearly that he would bite me to stop me doing that
What did I do?
🚫Immediately stopped taking him in the van or towards it
🏠Walked the dogs directly from the house
🐕Allowed him to pull me past it if that's what he needed to feel safe - no I don't want my dogs to pull on the lead but that's not the issue here
🌭Started to feed him as we passed the van, dropping food on the ground
Zeke used to get in the back of the van, so we started a new "picture" of getting in the side door.
If your dog has become scared, could you change the picture for them? Could they get in a different door for a while? Could they sit in a footwell? Could they go in a crate or carrier on the front passenger seat?
This video is the second session I did with Zeke. The first one was super short, we were about one metre away from the van and all we did was "can you eat this close to the van?" Yes. "Can you follow easy known cues this close to the van?" Yes.
And that was it.
After the session on the video, he jumped in the van for a walk, in the side door. He now jumps in the back exactly like he did before.
The whole training time was less than 10 minutes.
The management time of not going in the van was just over one week.
Note: Zeke had no previous history of being worried by vehicles. He had a year of travelling with me in the van with no issues. This is an example of a new behaviour, managed to not escalate and worked on in steps.
Merry Christmas from the three Everdogs Cara, Piper and Zeke 🎄❤ Hoping Santa Paws brings nice things for all the pups 🎅🐾
🐾TEACHING YOUR DOG TO ACTUALLY SETTLE🐾
Tried teaching a settle but instead have a dog constantly looking for the next treat?
You're probably making one small mistake.
Here's how to fix it!
You will need to have worked on a basic settle before doing this.
▪️To get a basic settle, reward very frequently.for lying down in your chosen spot or on a bed or mat.
▪️Place rewards ON THE FLOOR OR BED in between their front paws.
▪️This keeps the focus down and not on you and your hand.
▪️Stay quiet and still yourself, sit down, try to watch your dog out of the corner of your eye. You want your dog to learn to settle, not keep hyper vigilance on you and the next reward.
▪️Keep rewards slow and calm, don't cheerlead your dog for this one, we want CALM, therefore you need to be calm too.
▪️Once you have a basic down (usually a couple of sessions), start to space out the time between food.
▪️Watch your dog carefully for signs of RELAXED body postures and behaviour: kicking a back leg out instead of lying like a coiled spring, head down, chin resting, yawning, blinking, deep sigh, and REWARD THE HECK OUT OF THESE because this is what you actually want.
Zeke has already done some settle work so you can see he knows to offer a down and works out to lower his head.
Note he is actually quite relaxed and settled! Two minutes before this he was bouncing off the walls and I needed to finish some work, so I got him to settle while I did.
You get what you pay for! Pay for relaxed behaviour and you will get relaxed behaviour ❤
Thought it was time for a Zeke update! 🐾❤
I've had Zeke for just over ten months now.
For those new to the page, I adopted Zeke, working line border collie, then 14 months old, in January. He had had two homes already. His owners did everything they could but he was too much for them.
His owners reported that he did not rest at all during the day. Zeke had digestive issues that took four months to sort out. This caused him to be very mouthy, like a bitey puppy, and to chew and lick odd things like walls, windows and even parked cars.
He wasn't a fan of handling and would use his mouth to stop hands coming towards him.
We've made a TON of progress!
👍 Zeke now has free roam of the house overnight and can choose to sleep wherever he wants
👍 He is only in a pen for meal times (because my older dog eats slowly), when I leave the house, and occasionally when he is overtired and needs to be reminded to rest
👍 He is able to rest and relax for most of the day in between walks and activities like training or playing
👍 His recall is great and he is loving going on off lead adventures with me, Cara and Piper
👍 He has stopped reacting to Cara although is occasionally pushy with her as young dogs are
👍 He is learning how to calm himself down and how to listen when excited
👍 He has started his agility training and is doing well plus he is finding more people there who respect his space and are fun to be around
👍 He has a new person in his life who he has realised is safe to be around and who he now trusts to put his collar and harness on
But we still have a way to go:
▪️He still sometimes chews walls out of habit and particularly if he needs a poo
▪️He still needs to be in a pen sometimes and is not ready to be left alone unsupervised with Cara and Piper
▪️Handling or movement of hands near him when he is in a state of high arousal (excitement / high emotion) can still cause him to use his mouth to say "stop" sometimes
▪️Cara
TAKE A BREATH
Teaching Zeke to take a deep breath.
Look at his deliberate nostril flare on his second response here 😊👍
But why?
Taking slower, deeper breaths lowers the heart rate and shift the body and brain's reactions from "ready to act" to "ready to focus" (see Dr Karen Overall, veterinary behaviourist, Clinical Behavioural Medicine for Dogs and Cats).
Dogs that are quick to react, without thinking, whether that be a "reactive" dog (barking and lunging) or an "impulsive" dog, can benefit from learning how to slow down, breathe and focus.
Once they've learnt this we can add a cue and ask our dogs to take a deep breath.
If they can't, this is useful information for us that they probably can't focus in the environment they are in at that moment.
🎃 TRICKS FOR TREATS! 🎃
Teach your dog to hop on your feet and walk with you!
This is quite a tricky trick, and your dog needs a solid Peek a Boo / Middle first (see yesterday's video).
Everdog Piper shows how it's done then I switch to baby boy Zeke to show how to teach it. He's never done this before, this is his first session.
You need to be ready to "mark"the second your dog's paw hits any part of your foot so that he knows that's what the aim of the game is. Commonly used markers include "yes", "good" or a clicker.
Can you see how many times Zeke gets it right? And then with that feedback how he then deliberately chooses to step on my foot?😊 I'm super delighted with this as a first session! Good job baby boy! 😍
🎃TRICKS FOR TREATS! 🎃
Teach your dog "Peek a Boo" 👻
Here's handsome Everdog Zeke showing you this cool and useful trick!
💀 Can help a shy dog feel safer
🛑 Stop strangers touching your dog - *most* people won't reach between your legs! 🙈😂
🕷 Get that perfecty positioned sit for a photo or agility startline
🦇 Great for keeping your dog out of the way when at the bar or paying at the vets
🎃 Build value in your dog being near to you
🧙♀️ SO MUCH FUN!