New puppy: Tell me it gets better?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

OK. The first rule of raising puppies: take them outside every time they have a) eaten, b) slept or c) played. Yes, this is all the time.

Wait outside and play untill she poops or pees, even it this takes a while. This should ideally be a place where she can be off-leash, but if not, no biggie: the training will just take longer

Reward the dog with praise or treats when she performs a proper outside waste disposal, and reinforce with a sharp “No” or other suitable word when she does it inside (some people swear by “positive reinforcement only” when training a puppy, but you really need to be committed to that before the puppy is in the house).
Re: the leash. Try keeping it around and bringing it out while playing with your puppy, let her see it, and give her a treat before she has a chance to flee. Repeat untill she is less afraid of it.

[QUOTE=Misnomer]
It’s going to be several months before she’s fully housetrained, anyway. Right?

[/QUOTE]

Not really. A bright puppy can be “housebroken” i.e. trained to indicate it needs to go outside, within days. It will be severall months intill she has sufficient bladder controll to avoid accidents. If your puppy pees on the carpet while whining and scratching at the door, and you just weren’t fast enough, well, that’s not her fault, is it (she’ll probably be more ashamed than you at that point)

22

Crating a pup before it’s house-trained makes a lot of sense because they won’t poop or pee (usually) in a place where they have to lie down. My little hound actually likes her crate (or hut, as we call it). She goes in there sometimes and just hangs out with her toys, and she eats in there to keep her delicious puppy chow away from the older dogs. We also leave the smaller dogs in their crates when we leave the house both to protect them from our sometimes temperamental larger dog and because one of our rescue dogs has separation anxiety and will chew on anything to express her angst, including scissors, nail clippers, and bottles of prescription medications. She gets to share a good-sized crate with the chihuahua, which comforts her, and the puppy gets one all to herself.

I think that the less often a dog eliminates in the house, the easier house-training will be. They are creatures of habit, so the best thing I can do is make sure their habits are good ones.

23

Crating is supposed to resemble denning of wild wolves. The crate should always be a place of refuge/safety/rest, never used for punishment.

One way to stop crate whining is to sleep (or just lie down) on a pallet on the floor next to the crate (where the puppy can see you) until the puppy is asleep, then get up and go to your own bed if you want.

Septima is right on the money regarding the first rule of puppies. Yes, that will take a lot of your time and attention. You should be spending a lot of time working with her now, while she’s young; it will pay off later!

When coming out of the crate, the puppy should be bum-rushed right to the outside potty place. Delay (to check your pockets, get the mailbox key, etc) is fatal to your carpeting. Don’t open the crate until you’re ready to go straight out.

I had very good success with all-positive potty training, even though my puppy was a rescue with no concept of indoor behavior: no rubbing her nose in it, no punishment, but when she started to go indoors, I’d grab her up, hopefully interrupting her, soak a paper towel in it, take dog and wet paper towel outside, and place the towel down in the grass with the dog facing it and praise her. I’d try to stay outside with her until she went (she didn’t always need to go any more, so sometimes this was frustrating) and praise her again when she went.

She picked this up pretty fast, and she’s been perfect ever since. We don’t crate her for sleeping now, and she wakes me with a whine and an intense stare if she really has to go.

The mouthing thing isn’t just teething – puppies interact with the world using their mouths. You can solve this by reinforcing bite inhibition the same way a puppy’s littermates do – when a puppy bites a littermate, the bitten one yelps and withdraws from play. That’s what I did with Simone. Yelp, yip, say ow, make any sharp noise you prefer, then turn your back and walk away. You only have to give her the cold shoulder for a minute or so – don’t overdo it, she won’t associate it with the event after 30-60 seconds anyway. but if you do this immediately and consistently, whether or not the bite actually hurts, you will see results – Simone learned VERY quickly, despite being poorly socialized and extremely mouthy, she made the connection consistently in a day or two and was solid within a week.

I try to stay as positive as possible in all interactions with the dogs. Remember, you’re leading a pack and raising a family, not punishing a wrongdoer.

Best of luck to you – she’s a real cutie!

Sailboat

24

Additional thought – a puppy can’t spend 8-10 hours holding it. Will someone be able to take her out of the crate during the working day? My wife works close enough to home to go home for lunch and walk the dogs…I recognize we’re lucky in that way. While she will eventually be able to tolerate waiting until you get off work, it will be many months before she can hold her pee more than a few hours ( the traditional, probably inaccurate, formula is a puppy can hold it in 1 hour per month of age, iirc). It would be very helpful if someone can let her out to pee every 4 hours at the most.

Sailboat

25

Puppies are all about discovering how stupid you can sound…

“Oh, what a smart puppy, go piddle outside, yes, you are, so smart. So good…”

Of course, it doesn’t matter what you say - its the praise and excitement in your voice that does it. Which tends to sound silly even if you aren’t saying stupid things…

26

Yeah. One reviewer suggested that the Monks advocated beating a dog into submission. That’s why I suggested it. You gotta let 'em know who’s boss. My favorite part of the day is when I break out the brass knuckles and start cracking a few doggie heads. Good times.

I stand by my comment. The book comes highly recommended. The glowing reviews greatly outnumber the negative ones.

27

Can you explain what the negative reviewers were referring to, then, when they said the book was “too harsh” and “too hands-on”?

28

[QUOTE=lissener]
It sounds like you’re doing what many people do: getting a puppy and just assuming that the training will happen naturally, without any research or preparation; that the puppy will just naturally outgrow certain behaviors if you A) want it bad enough, and B) communicate your annoyance with him.
[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=Cisco]
Seriously, Misnomer, you’re asking some very basic questions that you should’ve found out the answers to before taking responsibility for a puppy.
[/QUOTE]
:rolleyes: I made no such assumption, and I’ve been doing puppy research for months: do either of you realize how much conflicting advice/information is out there about how to train dogs? You even disagree with each other – and Contrapuntal – about which book I should read! (I’ve read a couple, btw.) How about recognizing a new puppy owner who was tired and worried about early training and wanting some reassurance/additional advice, instead of just assuming that I woke up one day and decided to get a puppy because it was cute. I’m 37, not 13. I’m in the process of sorting through all of the information I have and going with what makes sense to me; I guess a little understanding and benefit of the doubt was too much to expect from either of you.

[QUOTE=Omega Glory]
Mine was an Xmas puppy, and I had a couple of days to get him into the swing of things, but how long do you sleep? It only took a few days for him to get the idea about why we were out there, thus ending the need for waking up more than once per night. I can fall asleep very easily when I’m tired, so getting up in the middle of my eight hour slumber for a few minutes (so the dog went out every four hours) wasn’t too bad. Having to go out into the snow was worse. YMMV, and of course you’ve got to do what works for you. Some people limit their dog’s water at night for that reason.
[/QUOTE]
I usually sleep for 6-7 hours on weeknights, and I’m a light sleeper who has a hard time falling back asleep once up (and especially once outside with a puppy). I think your method would kill me. grin But I’m ordering a thick bathrobe and outdoor slippers so that I don’t have to get dressed every time, and hopefully that will help both me and the puppy. :slight_smile:

Also, thanks for mentioning the kong: I knew about them but had forgotten. I’ll ask my vet her thoughts when she comes out to examine the puppy, and I might wind up getting one. Bailey seems to be ok in her crate at night, though.

[QUOTE=Cisco]
I read a puppy book before getting my puppy last winter and two more within the first few weeks I had her and I never had any of these issues.
[/QUOTE]
Aren’t “these issues” pretty typical puppy things? Or are you saying that your puppy never fought her leash, had to be housebroken, or chewed on anything other than the approved toys, and all because you read a book? :dubious:

[QUOTE=Dangerosa]
I mean a small fenced area outside
[/QUOTE]
Ooooh! :slight_smile:

Our backyard doesn’t have enough grass for a dog to use, but there’s a large grassy common area behind our townhouse where we take the dogs (and yes, we pick up after them!). Unfortunately, though, it means that neither dog can ever be off-leash outside, and a fenced area out there wouldn’t last long.

My boyfriend works from home, so we have that covered.

[QUOTE=Renee]
Also, don’t give her water for the last 2 hours or so before she goes to bed. Take her out right before you go to sleep, then, as long as she hasn’t had water before bed, she should make it through the night. We foster puppies a lot, and I’ve rarely had to get up in the middle of the night to let them out.
[/QUOTE]
Yeah, we’re doing the restricted water thing at night. She actually did well last night: 6 hours straight! I’m pretty sure her schedule just needs time to adjust to ours.

[QUOTE=Septima]
OK. The first rule of raising puppies: take them outside every time they have a) eaten, b) slept or c) played. Yes, this is all the time.
[/QUOTE]
Yeah, we’re pretty much doing that, too. :slight_smile:

Here’s a perfect example of the conflicting info I mentioned earlier: two of the resources I read said that you should not play with the puppy outside while housbreaking: that outside should be just for going potty. I think our method is somewhere in between right now, and she’s peed outside several times already (though not as often as she’s peed inside ;)).

Yep, doing that. I really did do research before getting this puppy. :slight_smile: And I would never reprimand the puppy if she was trying to do the right thing – as you said, that would be my fault!

Oh, she’s much better with the leash already. Day 1 was hard for her, but she didn’t fight it at all this morning.

[QUOTE=Sailboat]
Best of luck to you – she’s a real cutie!
[/QUOTE]
Thanks!

29

Puppy! Bailey is very cute, Misnomer. Congrats on the new addition.

Here’s another book recommendation: The Power of Positive Training by Pat Miller. Very easy to digest for a new owner, great training methods, simple training plans. She uses clicker training, which has worked wonderfully with my dog. My guy’s already 4, coming to us from another home with different rules, so I would imagine that we’re having a slower go of it than you would with a pup.

One thought about the retractable leash: dogs learn to walk nicely on the leash by learning that the length of the leash is their boundary. With a retractable leash they don’t know where that limit is so you might have a harder time controlling him with that type. Have you considered/tried a harness? He may like it better than being led around by the neck.

Kongs=wonderful. Freeze peanut butter, baby food, yogurt, etc inside for a long lasting keep-busy treat. (Add fennel to the yogurt to help with the toots!)

Good luck! Have fun in puppy class, it will get you guys off to a great start :slight_smile:

30

I’ve read, in total, probably 5 or 6 dog books since getting my puppy last December and taken what I felt was best out of each. When it comes to an animal I am responsible for I just trust the collective knowledge of multiple researched and published books authored by PhDs and other professionals on the topic more than I trust a bunch of random people on a message board. I might ask a very specific question of little consequence here because someone might have experience with that particular issue but I wouldn’t come here with how do I potty train, does my dog hate me, will she ever take a leash, etc, etc. It’s just not the proper venue, IMO. That stuff should be figured out before you decide to take charge of a puppy.

Yes, they are typical puppy things. That’s why I don’t think you should be having issues figuring them out and dealing with them after you got your puppy.

Just what the hell is that supposed to mean? I wasn’t insulting you and I don’t think lissener was either. Your response was over the top and I’d really appreciate an explanation.

31

[QUOTE=Nikki Tikki Tavi]
Puppy! Bailey is very cute, Misnomer. Congrats on the new addition.
[/QUOTE]
Thank you!

Hmm, interesting. My SO and I agreed that it would be best to start her off with the type of leash we want her to wind up with, and that’s a retractable one. Partly because it’s what we use with the other dog and you can’t beat the versatility, and partly because neither dog can ever be off-leash when we walk them and the retractable one lets the puppy run around. Wouldn’t the “length of leash” thing still be accurate for retractables, it’s just that the boundary is further than with another kind of leash?

I’ll keep thinking about that, but thankfully the leash thing is less and less of an issue each time I take her outside. :slight_smile:

[QUOTE=Cisco]
When it comes to an animal I am responsible for I just trust the collective knowledge of multiple researched and published books authored by PhDs and other professionals on the topic more than I trust a bunch of random people on a message board.
[/QUOTE]
And I’m not above adding the experience and knowledge of random people on a message board to the collective knowledge of which you speak. How can additional opinions/suggestions ever be a bad thing? I’ve already told you that I read two dog books before even getting the puppy – and I never implied that would be it. Congrats on your 5-6 books in almost 11 months: I’ve had my dog for all of 2 days and I read more books than you before I got her. Is the pissing match over now?

It certainly wouldn’t be the proper venue if I’d asked those questions in GQ or even IMHO, or if I hadn’t said right from the start that I was just being neurotic about being a good puppy owner. But no, I posted in MPSIMS, after 3.5 hours of sleep, clearly (I thought) mostly looking for support but also welcoming suggestions. All of that reading certainly didn’t help your context comprehension skills.

Again, I didn’t post in GQ. I’m not saying “I got a puppy, now what??” I certainly would have “figured it out” if I’d never written the OP; in fact, so far the only thing I’ve done differently as a result of this thread is to buy some puppy Kongs (best. things. evar.). If you – or lissener – somehow got the impression that I was sitting here totally bewildered by suddenly having a puppy, you were sorely mistaken.

You surely did insult me, by flat out accusing me of getting a puppy without being prepared for one. No one whose age no longer ends in “-teen” and who cares about animals or has ever had a pet would do that. Instead of considering the forum and my lack of sleep and thinking, “Meh, she’s just tired and wanting to do the best by her very young, very new puppy, maybe I’ll recommend a book,” you judged me and made assumptions that were simply not accurate. You’re the one who overreacted. Enough of an explanation for you?

32

No, not enough. I want to know what you meant when you said it was “too much to expect from either of you.” If you have a problem with me I’d like to know about it.

As for insulting you; I wasn’t trying to. You chose to be insulted and reacted with insults - maybe because what we said was true? And your thought that adults don’t enter serious situations cluelessly just leads me to believe that you’re one of the majority who does so.

33

[QUOTE=Cisco]
No, not enough. I want to know what you meant when you said it was “too much to expect from either of you.” If you have a problem with me I’d like to know about it.
[/QUOTE]
The only “problem” I have with you is the way you’ve interacted with me in this thread. “Too much to expect from either of you” meant exactly what I said: neither of you seemed capable of granting me any understanding or benefit of the doubt, so apparently it was too much to expect.

I “chose” to be insulted because I perceived an insult. If you weren’t trying to insult me, that’s fine and an apology would be accepted. But trotting out “maybe because what we said was true”? Give me a break. :rolleyes:

You keep having reading comprehension problems: what I said was that no adult who cares about animals or has ever had a pet would get a puppy without preparation. The leap from that to “adults don’t enter serious situations cluelessly” is staggering.

And with that, I am done with you in this thread. Feel free to have the last word if you like. I’ll keep responding to constructive posts, but this interaction with you is going way downhill and is no longer worth the effort. See ya 'round the Dope.

34

You’ll have to ask them. Meanwhile, why don’t you refrain from criticizing a book until you have actually read it?

35

  1. Saying "I haven’t read this book but the impression I got from the reviews . . . " is not criticizing it.

  2. You’re acting as if there aren’t books out there that condone hitting your dog. Especially ones that were written over 30 years ago.

36

You’re right. It isn’t criticism. It’s more like imagining shit. And giving credence to online reviews in lieu of actually reading the book. And even then, choosing to ignore the overwhelming number of positive reviews in favor of the few negative ones. I’m not sure what you’d call it.

More imaginary stuff. What other books have I mentioned? What other books have we discussed?

  1. It has been revised since then.

  2. Good point. Nobody knew fuck all about training dogs 35 years ago.

37

-Personal beef with me?
-Angry person in general?
-Milquetoast in real life but pitbull online?
-Misnomer’s online boyfriend?
-Author of How to be Your Dog’s Best Friend?
-Online boyfriend of author of How to be Your Dog’s Best Friend?

There’s got to be a reason you’re acting so irrationally antagonistic.

38

I have 2 beagles. They will wear you out. Both mine were rescued after abuse. They are terrific dogs. Their crate is under the covers at the foot of my bed.
They were easy to house break. Quincy was beaten and he was not going to take getting hit again. My wife screamed and threatened him with a newspaper. He went to the mattresses and would snarl like he would defend himself to the death. I just took him into the back yard and waited til he went and praised him That took 2 days and he never screwed up again.
Nordberg seemed to learn from him. She never went inside the house. She did what he did.
Beagles do not see you as the ultimate authority. They see you as making suggestions. When there is a sniff going on, you do not exist. Their bodies are just locomotion devices for their noses.

39

So you’ve devolved into ad hominem argument. Why am I not surprised?

To answer your questions : None of the above, even for your non-standard usages of *irrational *and antagonistic.

40

Like “more like imagining shit” wasn’t ad hominen :rolleyes: