Every
puppy needs a calm, fair leader. They are happiest when you understand this and take
the leadership role. Dogs only know two positions; leader and follower. If you
do not take the leader position, then you leave the dog no choice but to take
on that role. This is where all the problems begin. Remember, dogs are experts
at reading body language. Their language is silent, so concentrate more on what
you do, rather than expecting them to understand what you say.
Bite
Inhibition
Puppy
biting is normal and necessary. Puppies need to learn how to control the
pressure of their bite. Allow the pup to bite your hands. When you feel
pressure more than a light touch, squeal “Ouch!”, get up and walk into another
room. This is how littermates play with each other. If one playmate bites too
hard, the other yelps and walks away to lick its wounds. The biter learns to
soften its mouth or risk losing its playmate. Loss of a playmate is more
understandable to the pup than punishment.
Feed
your pup one of it’s meals entirely by hand. This teaches the pup to take food
gently from human hands.
Socialization
Proper
socialization entails exposing a pup to as many sounds, sights, people, places,
animals, and locations. Some suggestions include; the park, pet store, school
yard when children are playing, in the car, shopping malls, busy streets with
garbage trucks, motorcycles, bicycles, and skateboards. Takes kibble everywhere
you go and ask people to toss or hand feed a treat to your dog. Search out
people who walk slowly or with a cane, in a wheelchair, strollers, men with
hats on, large men, children of all ages. The more things your pup sees at an
early age the easier it will be for them to adjust to new things as they grow
up.
Another
part of socializing your pup is poke and pull on it as children might do. Pull
its ears and tail, poke it on the body, pick up its hind legs, pull its
whiskers.
A
dog that is unphased by its environment is a pleasure to have around.
Following
– The Foundation For Come
Pups
naturally follow their owner until about 4 ½ months when investigating the
surroundings has more appeal. Have your pup follow you around the house. Say
“Rover, come along” and move briskly forward. If your pup runs past you, turn
around the other direction keep moving, don’t wait for your pup, say come
along. If your pup moves away to the left, you go right, and so forth. Remember
it is instinct to follow moving objects, so keep yourself moving at all times.
Do this lesson for one minute, then allow your pup to smell around for a while
and repeat again.
Keep
all training sessions short (one to five minutes) and do many of them
throughout the day.
Come
Never
yell come or call your dog to punish it, put it outside, or in the crate.The command come should
always be used in a positive way. It should mean treats, playtime, or
affection.If
you need to stop your dog from eating something on the ground or to ignore
another dog, use the words “Leave It”. You can yell these words, stomp your
foot, and clap your hands for the startle factor. If you use the word Come,
make sure you can follow through with the command (meaning the pup has a
trailing leash that you can grab and make the pup come to you). Otherwise, the
word looses its meaning for the dog.
Leash
Walking
Practice
walking on-leash around the house. Make sure the pup walks at your side. Do
lots of stops and have the pup Sit each time. Open the front door, walk out
then back in again. This is a great time to teach the pup not to dash out the
door. Leaders ALWAYS go through doorways or gates first! This is important body
language to a dog. Over emphasize this move by having your dog “wait” as you
walk out the door first. Use your body to block the doorway if he starts to
push his way through. Body blocks are understandable to dogs as they use this
on each other.
Let’s
Play
Playing
with your dog must have many rules. You as leader start and stop playtime.
Always have a special toy that only comes out when you decide to play. Use some phrase like “let’s play” and
get your dog jazzed up for one minute. Stop play and have your dog sit then
“settle down” for about 30 seconds. Say “let’s play” again and get your dog
excited for one minute. The more times you hype up your dog, then teach it to
settle down during play, the easier it will be for you to settle it down in
other situations.
If
your pup won’t drop the toy, try trading for a treat or another toy. Show your dog
often that dropping the toy has benefits, she gets a treat, then she gets the toy
back. Choose a word to end play such as “enough” or “finish”, and put the toy
back in the drawer.
Watch
Me
If
you have your dog’s eye contact, you have his attention. Have your dog sit in
front of you. Hold a treat at your nose. Say “watch me”. Slowly lower the treat
to it’s mouth and say “take it”. If the dog looks away as you are moving the
treat down, say watch me again and this time start slowly then speed up half
way down to keep it’s attention.
Scary
Things
Expose
your pup to as many scary things as possible when young. Things with wheels
such as, shopping carts, bicycles, wheelchairs, etc. Pop-open umbrellas are very scary. People: men wearing hats,
young children running and screaming, people walking with a cane or slowly,
etc. The more they are exposed to a variety of everyday situations without
anything bad happening to them, the more relaxed they will be as adult dogs.
Alone
training
Condition
your pup to be apart from you while you are home. This can save the dog from
serious separation anxiety as he matures. Start with short separations of five
minutes. Crate him or have an isolation area with nothing in it that he can
harm. If he’s barking when you’re ready to let him out, wait until he stops
before you open the door. Otherwise, he will associate barking as the way to be
let out.
Gradually
increase the length of time before you let him out
Settle
Down
Practice
getting your pup excited (which is always easy to do). Have a leash on your pup.
Jump around, move your arms, talk in a high voice, then say “settle down” and
use the leash to lure into a down position. He doesn’t have to stay for more
than 2 seconds. This is a good way to learn how to control your pup when he
gets rambunctious without you initiating it.
Grooming
A
few times a week, brush your pup’s coat, look in her ears, brush her teeth, use
an emery board to file her nails. Dogs dislike their feet touched, so the more
you touch their feet when they’re puppies, the easier it will be to clip their
nails when they get older.
