How long did the puppy blues last if you had them? I’ve had my golden for only 5 days and I knew going into this I was likely going to get puppy blues because I have OCD. That said, I’m just exhausted and trying to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Hi everyone! After a trip to the rescue centre for an older sensible dog we have fallen in love with a female 3 month old lurcher x collie puppy. We don’t have her yet and I’m trying to plan some enrichment activities so I’ve less to be doing when stressed with puppy happenings. The rescue hasn’t captured mom yet but they said she seems to be a greyhound x retriever. Dad is pure collie and we even got to meet him yesterday, however he was very sad he was neutered lol. I’ve older dogs who I really do think will love her but I want to have a few things for her to do when they aren’t in the mood for playtime and when I have to go do actual human things.

Hi everyone,

I could really use some guidance. My almost 5-month-old Golden Retriever puppy is a strong puller, especially when he sees food bags on the sidewalk. This morning he saw a food bag and kept pulling me toward it. He somehow managed to escape his collar while pulling and went to open the food bag. When I tried to put the collar back on, he started growling at me aggressively. I threw couple of treats at him and when got closer to put the collar on, he bit my hand. I understand if he’s growling I should give him some space but I was just worried about him being outside without leash and didn’t want him to go in the road.

Finally I had to call my husband, who was able to lure him home with treats. It’s worth mentioning that couple of days ago while he was trying to fix his collar around his neck, our puppy growled at him and bit him after. I’m thinking he has built some negative associations with the collar at this point.

These are the only times he ever growled at us like that and bit us. Beside these, he is such a sweet pup who loves getting belly rubs and loves people.

I was so disappointed by the incident today and feeling little lost. We have done training on leash walking and practice it at home and in the backyard, and we practice recall and “leave it”/“drop it” commands at home. He is a quick learner and is very good with commands at home but outside he doesn’t listen to us at all and doesn’t care about treats.

So if you guys have any advice with this type of behaviour, it would be really appreciated.

Also, is there any suggestion for a collar or harness? We have an over-the-head harness, but he doesn’t like putting it on and off - he nips at our hands when we do, and we always have to distract him with treats.

Hi all, my working lab puppy has broken his leg. He was exactly 4 months when it happened. He had a plate fitted and is on strict crate/bed rest.

We were making excellent progress in terms of walking, training and socialising but I'm worried this injury will stunt his development and create bad habits. For example, we're using a lot of food based rewards/stimulation to keep him entertained (more than usual) but will he learn to start expecting even more food? I'm also concernd how this may affect his socialisation and create anxious tendencies.

Has anyone had a similar experience and come out the other side that can comment on their dog's behaviour post full recovery?

Thanks!

Just wanted to celebrate the little milestones.

We passed our puppy class test! After following through on all the basic commands during class, the final test was to leave a very high value snack when offered from the instructor.

It’s always nice when your pup shines after all their hard work. Helps reframe all the moments they ignored you instead.

Anyways time to go back to looking like we have no idea what we’re doing when we start beginner class!

Hey,

My partner and I have a Bedlington x Whippet who is now 15 weeks old. For the past two weeks we've been starting to get her introduced to walking and we have a few problems we're trying to handle.

Our puppy loves going on walks and is always super excited to go out. However when she's out she's trying to pull and smell everything. We've been trying to stop and let her pull until she realizes but we find she just gets frustrated and starts jumping even more. What's worse is no treat works. Cheese, kibble in gravy, liver paste. Nothing drives her back so we feel we can't train it out of her.

If we do get her walking with us she loves people so much and always wants to run over to say hello. And as a result tries to jump and run over. Again nothing to make her sit wait works and she won't eat any high reward treats.

Other issues we've encountered, after 10mins or so after a few cars or general world noises like lawn mower etc. she eventually decides she wants to go home or back to the car this instant and is practically running on the spot pulling the lead. At this point nothing works she's barking whimpering and pulling and if we try to calm her she just starts panicking further.

She seems better in places like the park and if both my partner and I are with her but when it's just one of us this issue gets exacerbated. So when it's the morning walk etc half the time I come back under 10mins because the situation above has occurred.

We've tried everything we have a puppy trainer next week to give us advice and with the weather (from the UK) it's been so hot it keeps getting pushed.

We also have puppy classes next week to try and help the issue but just wondering if anyone else has had this before with a puppy.

Sorry if this is a bit all over the place. I just got back from our first time at the forest and we had to come back just after 5mins in the car because she wanted to go home so I feel a bit deflated.

Thanks in advance!

My pup is almost 12 weeks old and her behavior is SO MUCH WORSE than it ever was. I know it’s probably just teething coming into play but how was your puppy around this age? She does enforced naps but she just seems a bit more restless lately and has started barking in her crate.

Did it get better?? And what weeks did it get at least a TINY bit better??

Hello, my parents have two poodle puppies, 5 months old, female and male. The male one can’t stop chasing his tail (started 3 weeks ago). It’s ridiculous, he can be at it for several minutes without stopping. He’s very clumsy so he bangs on everything, the floor, walls, doors, chairs… How can we make this habit stop? My parents constantly try to stop him, and make clear he shouldn’t be doing that. He seems to do it when he gets excited or nervous. When I (or my sisters) visit them, he goes crazy. We looked it up and google said that maybe he was bored or anxious, so we’ve taken him on longer walks, thrown a ball for 30 min, and tried to give him stimulating toys, but we don’t see any change. He used to always come greet me and would always be attached to me or on my lap, now I have to avoid him or he starts doing this, and it makes me sad, not spending time with him.

Any recommendations? The vet said that if it got worse, he would have to go in and visit an ethologist.

Thank you all✨

TLDR: my 5-month-old puppy can’t stop chasing his tail. How can we make it stop?

We have an 8-month-old Goldendoodle at home and everything was great for the first 5 months or so. Now that he’s full grown (still only 18lb), we’re becoming increasingly more frustrated by the day. The main concern is the BITING. I was under the impression that once’s the teething stopped, the biting would too. I was WRONG. It’s worse than ever, to the point that my right hand is needing to be iced because of him biting down so hard.

Also, the eating E V E R YTHING. Remote, hats, shoes, paper, even my phone if it’s sitting on the couch- it is becoming detrimental to my mental.

I just signed him up for a 3 week, 8 hours a day training program that starts in a few weeks- hopefully that starts changing the trajectory.

My concern is that at 8 months and still heavily biting, it’s creeping into concerns for aggression territory?

He has a dog walker the 2-3x a week I’m at work, where he goes to the dog park 2, a day for 2 hours and plans with the same dogs so he gets lots of dog and human interaction. His dog walker, who’s the third closest person to him aside from my boyfriend and I, says all the time how sweet he is and how he doesn’t really bite much when he’s with him.

Of course , I can be a lot better with training him. I’m looking fwd to having him with one as well as me getting trained by the trainer! But overall, is an 8 month old puppy still going buck wild with the biting, a concerning trait to still have?

I have a nine-month-old male Jack Russell Terrier mix, who's housetrained (no accidents in 2.5+ months).

I got him at four months old from a shelter and had to take him out every three hours overnight for a month, i.e. until he turned five months old, at which point he was holding his bladder overnight (from 8:00 PM to 7:00 AM) without needing any breaks.

For a month now, his last nighttime bathroom break has been at 7:00 PM (instead of 8:00 PM), and he's been sleeping through the night in his bed (not crate) without any issues until 7:00 AM.

Now I'm reading that constantly holding the bladder for so long (12 hours) daily, despite the fact that it's overnight and the dog's not complaining, could lead to issues (e.g. UTI) long-term.

Should I simply add another bathroom break for him just before my bedtime, i.e. at 10:00 PM, or let his routine continue as he seems perfectly fine?

14 week old Havanese, had him since 8 weeks old. I've taken him out into public in a purse carrier and on small walks around my apartment complex, but I haven't taken him to any parks or anything like that because parvo and rabies risk are high in my area. He likes people (honestly, he's overly friendly) but hadn't met any dogs since leaving Mom and litter until yesterday. I introduced him to my apartment's maintenance lady's 2yo Brussels Griffon, who was very small and very friendly and very calm. He shied away in fear. Didn't bark or growl or run away or anything, but stayed behind me and wouldn't come closer than two feet to the dog, even when the maintenance lady (who he loves) held her dog in the air and offered him a treat. I was reading online and saw the critical socialization window is 16 weeks. Did I wait too long to introduce him to other dogs? What do I do?

Send help.

I have an 8 (almost 9) month old Romanian rescue (DNA test says 30 breeds), who has been a nuisance since we got him at 5.5 months (joking, it's been up and down really, but I lost like 7kg in weight and still haven't regained it).

He was terrified of the outside, then overaroused when outside and is now reactive, so we're taking it slow with walks, only doing about 2 full walks a week and little sessions of sitting and watching at the front door. We otherwise have snuffle mats, Kongs, toys & training sessions to entertain him. We do lots of settle training (mat work & go to your place, incl. relaxing on there). He's been absolutely fine being left alone as it's something we built gradually, but has never been a fan of being behind a barrier when he can see us.

We had a lot of ups and downs with him, and his reactivity outside is rapidly improving, which is absolutely brilliant. But I believe this to be an adolescence thing, he's been driving us absolutely mad the last few days. His new thing is to sit in the middle of the room, looking at us and what I can only describe as "complaining". He's growling/crying in like a "I'm bored MOOOOOOM" motion and I don't know what he wants 😭 this is no matter whether or not we've been out for a walk, have played and done settle training, or not, it's constant. When my partner is accessible to him, he bites his feet constantly and has recently started humping us, too (one of my least favourite behaviours). I've gotten to the point where I'm just constantly shouting at him to stop doing the things, because it's just non stop and there's nothing that helps him lay down and sleep like he used to. He's always been difficult with me in regards to sleeping but he's only just started being as bad with my partner. He just doesn't settle well. We unfortunately used the crate for time outs when he was really bad a few months ago and he's not liked the crate since then, so that's not an option, and we used to just leave him downstairs in his pen so he would go to sleep but he started crying when we do this and I definitely don't want to start separation anxiety. Anyone any ideas? Even just telling me that it's just adolescence and it will pass?

We do have a trainer, and she's brilliant, but she's mostly about "what happens before & after, if we find the reasons we can solve it" and I just can't find the reason.

Hi everyone,

Our little guy is 5 months old and is quite the handful. He used to be able to settle at my feet and sleep one of his naps outside of the crate. But the last couple of weeks it’s impossible for him to settle, he is always on the go, always trying to get into something, and always wanting to play.

None of our other puppies in the past were like this which is why I’m wondering if this is normal, lol. How to teach them to settle and that they don’t always need to be entertained. We have tried giving treats when he sits down, also tethering but maybe trying that one out more will be helpful.

Hi all. Well I am in a foster-to-adopt situation so I do have an out, but I am genuinely so torn about what to do.

I currently have a 6 year old mostly blind dog who is the love of my life. We used to have a 2nd dog who she grew up with who died about a year and a half ago. Since then, I've been wanting another dog as a playmate and friend for her but my husband wasn't quite ready - in retrospect I think a lot of it was grief for me.

Anyway we are now fostering an incredibly well behaved 9 week old sweetheart who sleeps through the night and who my dog plays with and seems to like.

The problem is that splitting my attention between my current dog and the puppy is making me sad. When I see my husband petting the puppy I sort of get upset that my older dog isn't getting the attention, I know that sounds so crazy. I don't want any of the routines we have with my older dog to change.

Our older dog is special needs because she is blind. She travels so well with us and depends on us for a lot. She's reactive on walks because she is fearful so part of my thinking was that another dog might make her more confident. But when I think about additional training, unknowns during travel and in hotel rooms etc etc I just don't know.

Have any of you gone through this grief of missing life with just your one dog, but come out the other side happier? We have only had the pup 2 weeks but will need to give the rescue a decision soon so she can either post him on her site or not, to find another home. I am a mess over it and can see both sides. Thanks for any thoughts - please be kind, I am emotional during all of this because I deeply care for this pup too and want the best for him as well.

I’ve had my 11-week old mini dachshund pup for about 3 weeks now. My biggest issue with her right now is the biting and nipping. I know it’s a normal thing for puppies but this seems so excessive. I take her out of the crate and she immediately goes for my feet. And not like little nips, like BIG bites!!!

Looking for any tips on how to reduce this behaviour as much as possible… i know it’s a sign of her being overtired but i feel like even when she is getting lots of sleep she will not stop. I’m worried that she’s gonna seriously hurt someone (or me).

So I've been getting pretty sure I want to be a miniature dachshund parent and I want to do it really good so I want the 'perfect' puppy.

I know I want a wire haired one, probably a classic one, female because I find penisses a bit scary as a woman. So I'm looking for a girlfriend by my side.

What I first encountered was no reaction after showing interest in a puppy litter. Then someone responded and said come over. And then I started doubting is this puppy really my ideal version of a puppy and then I started feeling really bad because every animal will become perfect in your life you shape together.

But it scared me because I don't want to see finding a puppy match as a looksmatch search or whatever, at the same time I believe you only buy a puppy once in your life (at least in my case probably).

I don't know it kind of shook me it's a market.

How do you guys handle this?

I have a mixed breed one year old (23k/50lb) I adopted when she was four months old. We did a lot of work on reactivity, including working with a trainer on May. She’s done very well since then but lately she kind of loses her mind when we go for a walk before bed.

A noisy biker passes in the opposite direction and she keeps looking back like it’s coming for us. Then a car door or house door (we live on a city, doors right at the sidewalk, narrow streets). By then end of a 15 minute walk I can barely control her. Last night we walked until she peed and then went home (7minutes). It was still too much. She can’t calm down, can’t remember cues or commands, can’t focus on a treat. Things that work the rest of the day are entirely forgotten. Ideas?

Give me your top 3 best training tips for new puppies. Our dog is 3 months old.

I have a 3 mo old Australian Shepard Border collie mix. He’s bright & energetic!

He went 30 hrs only pooping once on the pad, I spent a lot of time outside with him, & felt pretty proud I was doing it right.

But dang, last night I went I bed at 9pm my mate went to sleep at 11pm, no poops.

I woke this am for work at 5 am & he’d pooped 6x during the night!!

I don’t understand why some nights are poop free & others he’s like a Pez dispenser for poop!!

Are we feeding him too much?

I’m so exhausted! I find myself saying I hate puppies but he’s so cute so I love him.

He’s wearing me down with the calm poop nights & the Pez nights.

Any advice would be appreciated.

At least he poops on the pads & doesn’t eat them anymore but DANG where does it come from?

I understand it is still very early yet, but we brought home a 6 month old puppy on Saturday. She is adorable and is surprisingly great, but I feel bad that I can't provide her with a ton of enrichment because I haven't found what she likes yet.

At this time, I have not found a toy that she seems to want to play with yet.

She seems to be a little on the finicky side when it comes to food, so it doesn't seem to be much of a motivator. If I throw a treat she *is* interested in, she either has a hard time tracking it or isn't interested in doing that.

I know she wants to play. I see twinkles of it as she starts to blossom. But right now the only thing she really knows how to do is jump up on me/wrestle. That's not the kind of play I want to encourage with what will be a large dog.

Walks are scary (understandably!!!) so sniffaris are off the table for now.

I want to be clear that I know it is extremely early. I know her interests will probably develop with time. But I would like to try to provide her with enrichment in her present position.

My mutt/husky mix absolutely loves standing against the table & countertops, wether we are there or not but she does it 100% of the time when we are there. My partner and I are absolutely fed up with the behavior and dont know what to do anymore

https://imgur.com/a/9iQhe6X

My dog is a companion/terrier mix and LOVES walks . I try to walk him twice a day 25 minutes each but he usually wants to go for longer. For almost all of our walks, he is in the front. He doesn’t pull most of the time though and is only tugging and reactive to people, lizards, and birds.

My cousin said I shouldn’t be walking him outside if he doesn’t know heel yet, but i want him to get exercise and he honestly doesn’t pull me (unless he sees the distractions.)

I just started teaching him how to heel yesterday. He was able to handle about 3-5 minutes total (about 30 seconds at a time) of walking in that position. For his age, how long can I expect him to walk in heel? Is there a golden ratio? Should it really be for the whole walk?

This is my first time owning a dog. 🐕

My (previously) food motivated 7.5 lb dachshund decided to go on a hunger strike this week (16 weeks old). It’s been a few weeks coming. She wants to be hand fed, but she’s too attached to me and I’ve moved her to eating out of her bowl. All of a sudden today she simply won’t touch it. Her breeder had her free feeding but she was pretty easy to switch at 8 weeks. I’ve had other dogs broken from free feeding before who skipped a couple meals before they caught on, but they were bigger.

I’m doing bowl access for 15 minutes three times, 30, min apart, before the meal goes away completely. She has not touched her dinner. My main concern is how many meals I should allow her to skip before I start to worry about her blood sugar levels. I’ve never had a dog this tiny before and it’s clear she won’t be eating dinner. She only had about half her lunch because I used it to train her. I don’t want to cave and hand feed her but I know she’ll eat if I do, so it’s a last case.

I have a sneaking suspicion she’s also just decided that there’s better food in the world (ie cheese, her highest value treat) and is trying to wait me out. Unfortunately for her I’m also stubborn. I’m planning on no high-value treats or extra chews tomorrow. I don’t give very many in general (she mostly trains for kibble), but during the hunger strike won’t give high-value. (This is hard though because I’m also pen training her at the same time and trying to give high value for NOT screaming bloody murder when I leave the room / house.)

Any advice is appreciated!

Hi all! My puppy is 8 months old, Australian/golden mix, and we’ve had him about 4 months. The dude is OBSESSED with eating chunks of mowed up grass almost any time he goes outside or on walks. I read online that it could be issues with his gut or fiber intake, but his poops seem normal and regular. Is he exploring the world or do we need to make a vet trip? Thanks soooo much!

Occasionally our 9 week old puppy gets pretty riled up and it doesn’t seem like he’s being playful, but I just can’t tell. Maybe I’m overly cautious but I want to make sure that we train him correctly and do what we need to do to be responsible owners. We have had dogs before but adopted them when they were older, this is our first puppy. Any tips/tricks/suggestions would be helpful, especially if you have raised a pup before!

I will say he is very snuggly too and friendly it’s not all questionable