I am the very proud (new) owner of an 11 week old Choc Lab. First of all, just want to say this site is amazing and helps with the diversity that we all have with our pups/dogs...like humans, they are all different. I live in rural France and trying to socialize Maggie presents with some problems. 1) I am single and contact with people and other animals is very irregular 2) Exposure to children, traffic, trains, cars, etc is almost non existant. Any one got any suggestions to help me socialize Maggie...I'm aware that the 'window' for early socialization is fast closing?
Hi, and welcome to the forum from Holly and me in Wales. We did some early socialising by taking her everywhere we could. We carried her downtown and sat outside shops. This let her meet people and get accustomed to street noises. We also took her to a train station, farms and other places so she could experience as much as possible. Our local supermarket was beside a main road and railway so we could tick all those boxes very easily. It was great when she had finally had her second jab and we didn't have to carry her everywhere. We did that same kind of thing for several months.
Hello and welcome to the forum! Well, here's the rub. As much as it may be true there is a "socialisation window", socialisation is also an ongoing thing, so it's not as if you can stop as soon as those few weeks are over and it'll all be OK. I live in the back end of nowhere, too (splitting time between Andorra and Spain), and have the same issues you do. We can go days and weeks without seeing another dog, and my dogs don't see many other people, either. But, you know what, that's generally OK. Because we don't see them, we don't have to worry about them 99% of the time, the lack of socialisation doesn't cause us any problems whatsoever. That 1% can be pretty extreme, and needs careful managing, but it's completely impractical to try to keep up with socialisation to cover that 1%. I did do all the normal stuff with socialisation for all three as puppies; it was a bit easier for me, as I was in Andorra for the first two and England for the more recent one, so there were opportunities to go and see the things that you tick off "the list". To do it here in Spain would have been more challenging. However, as time has gone on, I have become a huge believer that nature plays a far greater part in this than nurture. My two older dogs are litter mates, and we know some others from the same litter; one lives in our village in Andorra, and two others life with a friend in France. All of them appear to demonstrate symptoms of anxiety in one way or another; some more than others, but they're not your archetypal happy-go-lucky Labs. My choccy puppy, however, is just that. She adores everyone and everything, doesn't flinch at anything and is just hugely confident. She's been in a couple of shows and, as much as she is hugely excited by the dogs when she first gets there, very quickly settles down and ignores them. My older two would be completely overwhelmed in that same environment, terrified of all the new sights and sounds. I strongly believe this is down to their genetic make-up, more than anything I've done differently this time around. So, what I'm saying is, socialisation is a good thing. Do as much as you can, to give Maggie as may varied experiences as possible. The idea doesn't have to be that she must see a train, she must see a horse etc. What it means is giving her as much variety in the things she comes into contact with that she learns that new things aren't anything to be frightened of. Go and sit in front of a shop for ten minutes, take her for a drive, if you're near the sea, go and have a look at that, if you have any livestock around, go and see them. You can set up different textures and slightly wobbly boards in your garden for her to learn to walk across, so she's not bothered if suddenly she has to walk over a grating or something. But don't sweat ticking off a list of things that you're not going to regularly come into contact with, because she'll likely forget by the next time you see it anyway. If she is a confident girl, she'll be fine. If she's an anxious girl, she'll need some help when you do have to go into strange environments. I would recommend getting a copy of Leslie McDevitt's book, Control Unleashed, which describes some techniques which I find immensely useful for managing my older dogs' anxiety and my puppy's excitement when we are in unusual situations.
Good luck socialising your puppy! I think just as many positive experiences with new things as you can manage should be enough. I agree that a big consideration is personality. I adopted a 7 month old stray from Greece, who had no experiences at all really, and was terrified and stressed out by basically everything. Now at 3 years, he's not scared of much and is willing to go to new places mostly because of his personality. He requires management in unfamiliar situations, but he's able to cope fine with his day to day life in a city, despite his lack of early socialisation. As well as building confidence in a range of situations, it's also helpful for them to learn to rely on you to help them if they are nervous. If she is a bit nervous, you can increase the distance between her and the new thing, or reassure her and show her what she should do in the new situation, and allow her to approach everything at her own pace. If Lucky is worried by something and chooses to come to me for protection, I always reward him with praise and treats, because that's a good choice for a worried dog to make. Btw, @snowbunny, I'm so jealous that you can go days or weeks without seeing another dog! That's the biggest distraction for us, and we can't go on a single walk near where we live without having off lead dogs approach us.
Heh, yes, it's quite nice - although it does mean that it's impossible to proof things against other dogs, so when we do come across them, it can be a bit challenging - like when Luna thought she should say hi to the million Podencos some guy was walking the other day. They were all perfectly friendly, and ran up to us first, but she was in her element playing with them all and did not want to come away!
Thanks for the welcome. I can't wait for the 2nd jab in 11 days time...will make a huge difference and give my arms a rest from carrying her around
Even though it's early days, Maggie seems to be confident and totally un-phased by new experiences. She's certainly strong willed (can be a good and bad thing)! Thanks for the advice
For us it was winter in a rural area and people just aren't out as much. We visted the nursing home my Aunt is in. Here resident's families are encouraged to visit, I'm not suggesting you just wander into a nursing home. the ski resort parking lot, or for you a golf course? The school, maybe some have summer camp now? A big store parking lot. Added bonus is most of these don't have a bunch of dogs with unknow vaccinaton status wandering around so it was just people, sights, sound, smells and noise we were getting used to.
Hi @Maggie's Dad life in rural France can be difficult for socialisation just as it can be difficult in rural England. I used to pop my pup in the car and head off somewhere to introduce new sights and sounds. It is particularly helpful if you have visitors who require pick up/drop off at different places. I visited ferry ports, airports, train stations plus general visits around town, past the gendarmerie, a coffee in the local bar, sitting near children's playgrounds, walks along local lanes to see cows/horses/sheep. A big benefit as well is that my pup was travelling in the car every other day on average and settled from day making all travel so much easier. I'm currently planning socialisation for my next pup and have come to the conclusion that I had more variety and opportunities in rural France than I do now in rural England
