Puppy Pre-School
Welcome to Puppy Pre-School.
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Table of Contents
Puppies are adventurous, they will get into trouble and go exploring around your home and garden. Therefore, creating a safe place is essential to avoid unexpected accidents which could result in an emergency trip to your vet, and all the unnecessary stress that you will feel as your puppy's carer.
These simple tips will help:
- Remove toxic plants
- Shoes
- Mobile phones
- TV remote
- Try to keep your home tidy and clutter free
Look around your home and see if there are any things puppy can jump up and pull, tablecloths etc
Remove any precious furniture, that would make you feel upset if damaged from puppy chewing.
Fence of any ponds or dangerous steep steps outside and inside block access to stairs.
Check all fencing and gates and any other boundaries puppy could climb through or go under.
Puppies will chew cables, so remove, block access or secure. The same with any toxic products within your home and garden.
Training your puppy its name will teach your puppy to engage with you on hearing their name. Which is vital during everyday activities throughout their lifetime.
Have some super delicious treats on you, and make sure you are in a quiet place within your home. Sit quietly on the floor, say your puppy's name, and instantly reward from your hand. At this initial stage, we do not need puppy to look at you or do anything else, we are simply building value for the name. Repeat this a few times in one session, then leave for a little while and repeat again with several short sessions during the day. Gradually add more distance between you and your puppy and more distraction in the environment.
The collar, harness, and lead are an essential element of training, and this should begin as soon as possible. Make sure the collar is the correct size and made of soft material, the harness is best if a 'Y' shaped harness as this doesn't restrict your puppy's movement. Have a lightweight lead.
We need to start by making the sight of the collar very rewarding to you puppy. Every time your puppy has sight of the collar give them a tasty treat, hide the collar behind you, bring it back into view of your puppy and reward again, repeat for several sessions. Once your puppy is super confident at the sight of the collar, we can now place the collar gently around your puppy's neck, not doing it up yet, reward and repeat as previously. Once totally happy with this then put the collar on correctly, and reward, remove the collar, repeat playing with your puppy with the collar on, gradually increasing the time the collar is left on.
Introduce the harness in the same way with lots of positive association when the harness appears good things happen.
When introducing the lead start with a light weight one. Lots of positive associations again, building up to puppy moving around your home without you picking the lead up. Rewarding with lots of food, toy play and physical praise, reward every time you clip the lead on or off. Progress to picking the lead up and following your puppy around without applying pressure, again lots of rewarding.
Puppies go to the toilet inside due to several factors. Full bladder control has not been established, over excitement and submissive urination.
How can you help?
Make sure your puppy goes outside upon waking, after eating, after playing, returning from a walk, before guests arrive and after they leave, before bed, and every couple of hours throughout the day.
Observation of your puppy, learn their body language. Signs they need to go outside could include sniffing, circling, and pacing up and down.
Once you see the signs, calmly take your puppy outside, stay quiet and relaxed, just watch. Once they have gone to the toilet reward with an amazing treat, and lots of verbal and physical praise. Rewarding must be instant as soon as your puppy has finished going to the toilet.
Inside accidents get no attention from you, keep absolutely quiet, just clean up.
Keep this going and your puppy will learn that toileting outside gets massively rewarded and inside nothing happens.
Hand feeding your puppy is a little time-consuming and inconvenient. However, the benefits of doing this really do make the bond between you and your puppy so much stronger. We are aiming to be at the top of our puppy's favourite list, taking this relationship into the adolescent and adult dog stages.
The benefits include:
• Focus
• Impulse control
• Bite inhibition
• Relationship building
• Slowing down fast eaters
• Building confidence
Because everything comes from you, your puppy will focus more on you. It is not an answer to all behaviour problems but will build a strong relationship between you and your puppy, giving you the foundation building blocks to develop more complex good behaviour moving forward into the adolescent months. And helping your puppy to understand reinforcement criteria and reward structure.
While hand feeding, you can teach your puppy to take food gently so they are learning to trust and respect your hand.
Use up your puppy's daily food allowance during their training instead of adding lots extra treats. Their food will be of greater nutritional value than treats, which are often equivalent to having fast food and snacks in human terms. Any leftover daily food could be used for enrichment activities.
Most puppies struggle to sleep through the night. They will need nighttime toilet breaks until they are mature enough to hold on throughout the whole night. Do remember that puppies develop at a faster rate than human babies, so this stage will not last long. However, time and patience is still required.
Please remember that your puppy has been removed from everything they have ever known, their litter mates, mother, and all the familiar smells and sounds of the breeders' home. This can cause feelings of isolation and distress. Puppies' new home will smell different, make new noises, etc, this can make it difficult for your puppy to settle, sometimes due to being over excited or possibly feeling overwhelmed or nervous. Some puppies adjust to new homes quickly, and others take several weeks of disturbed sleep. Most puppies sleep through the night from around 4 months.
A crate is very useful when encouraging your puppy to sleep through the night. It can be removed as your puppy becomes older. However, it does create a safe environment for your puppy and adult dog.
At Omnidogs, we would recommend putting the crate next to your bed initially while your puppy is very young and getting used to the new environment. If they become stressed or frightened, you can simply place your hand down to offer reassurance and a soothing voice if necessary. The crate needs to be big enough that the puppy can lay comfortably and have a little room to grow but not massive, so there's is no room to roam around. Make it a comfortable place if you have some bedding from the breeder place that is in the crate along with a soft toy and a little water.
During the day and evening, make sure your puppy has had plenty of mental enrichment and age appropriate exercise. If they sleep all evening, they are likely to be awake during the night. Use puzzle games, snuffle mats, and Kongs etc licking sniffing and chewing calm puppies before bedtime.
Finally, take the puppy out to the toilet last thing before going to bed, we would recommend the lady person to bed in the household does this.
Just spending time together.
A relationship is about being with one another and sharing experiences, this will strengthen your bond, especially if you have a few short awesome play sessions during the day. Clear communication without any grey areas to cause confusion. Make sure your puppy fully understands what you are asking. If not break down the behaviour, you are asking for into incremental stages and reward with fantastic treats or toy play reinforcing the behaviour and building understanding.
Training develops relationships, and well-trained puppies and looking ahead adult dogs are then allowed more freedom. If they come back when called, they have off lead time etc. Training also reduces frustration as clear boundaries are set.
Play games regularly, make your relationship fun. Do not become frustrated, remain calm and pay attention to your puppy's likes and dislikes. If they do not like something do not push this as they will become anxious and frightened.
It is super important to expose your puppy to as much as possible within the first year of his/her life, this includes the period before they are 12 weeks old. You can do this by inviting family and friends to visit. Carrying your puppy while you visit new environments, so they get to see and hear new things. You can hold your puppy in your arms or use a puppy Carrying Harness. Try visiting your local supermarket car park, garden centres, local dog friendly cafe, walking around a town centre, school as children are going in or at home time, any local sports activities. Remember do not put your puppy onto the floor in public places until fully vaccinated.
With a puppy that isn't confident in these environments move away, adding distance, rewarding happy behaviour, and start moving forwards slowly, using incremental stages, building confidence using lots of reward, this may take several sessions.
Firstly, build value for your puppy around the car, lots of positive association again, making sure your puppy is happy being close to the car. Pick puppy up and reward lots for sitting in the car where they will be travelling, repeat this stage several times. Once they are happy, close the door or boot, open again and reward, again repeat until happy and relaxed. Then turn on the engine repeat the stage with lots of rewarding, once ready move the car a little, again rewarding the calm behaviour.
You are now ready to have a short journey, it can be helpful to have someone beside your puppy to reward the calm behaviour on the first few trips, make sure your puppy is secure when travelling. If you puppy becomes stressed at any stage, go back to where they were confident, repeat and move forward at a slower pace.
You are now ready to have a short journey, it can be helpful to have someone beside your puppy to reward the calm behaviour on the first few trips, make sure your puppy is secure when travelling. If you puppy becomes stressed at any stage, go back to where they were confident, repeat and move forward at a slower pace.
When introducing handling and grooming to your puppy, it is best to associate this with something positive, such as treats or toy play. By building this positive association you help your puppy to feel good about these things happening, therefore they become less anxious and stressed. When looking into your puppy's ears, reward this with a fabulous treat, repeat a few more times, building the understanding that 'good things happen when you look in my ears,' resulting in a happy and confident puppy.
Use this method for introducing brushing, nail clipping, looking between the toes and in your puppy's eyes.
Sit
Have a treat in your hand and slowly raise it a few centimetres up over puppy's head. As your puppy's bottom goes down, reward with a treat. The bottom doesn't need to touch the floor the first time, build up to this using incremental stages, eventually reward as soon as puppy's bottom hits the floor. Repeat several times always rewarding the bottom hitting the floor. Once this becomes an established behaviour, name it and reward as previously.
Biting
Play biting is your puppy learning, unfortunately it hurts. To help keep this to a minimum, do not handle your puppy when they are over stimulated. Give your puppy an alternative, something to chew or lick, scattering food around the garden and letting puppy find it, this is called enrichment. Hand feeding, gentle toy play and stroking your puppy when they are relaxed will help your puppy to understand that hands mean good things happen. If they do bite move away, nothing happens. After a couple of minutes return and engage your puppy into a game of tug. Overtime the biting will stop.
Chewing
Puppies will chew during the teething period; they are doing this as losing their teeth hurts. The chewing dislodges baby teeth and helps relieve the stress and anxiety associated with pain. Give your puppy new things to chew and rotate these regularly.
Puppies also chew when learning about their environment, try to watch and observe them, distract when necessary to stop the behaviour. Again, they will grow out of this stage.