Hi everyone, I'm new to the forum here! Ivy is an 18-week old chocolate and I'm having a very difficult time with her hyper behavior. During the workday, I keep her in a pen in my basement so she isn't cooped up and I luckily have parents close enough to come over to break up her day. This is not isolated to the weekdays though. She gets extremely hyper when she is out of the pen with me. I've tried to keep her tied up in the kitchen and she ends up jumping up on the counters and trying to eat the wood work. Letting her roam with all the doors in the house closed, she tries to find anything but her toys to chew up. I play with her and train her to try to wear her out, but she just gets increasingly hyper. She is getting to the point where she is jumping and biting and I can't calm her down. Ignoring the behavior doesn't work, but as soon as I put her in her pen she passes out. Is it possible that she's just cranky from being tired and hasn't grasped the concept of sleeping in the living room? I would really like to avoid keeping her in the pen while I am home. Any advice or success stories will be helpful as she is really trying my patience at this point!
Your puppy isn't hyper, just a normal puppy. From your post I'm guessing you are out all day so when you're home your puppy wants your attention and interaction and also gets overtired which keads to tge buting, jumping etc but quickly goes to sleep in the crate. You Don't have to use a pen/crate in the evening just play and train and train a settle so Ivy settles and sleeps by you. Ivy is chewing everything in reach as she is probably teething so make sure you always have a suitable chew toy to hand to distract from inappropriate chewing.
Hi Jojo83...could you please explain the best way to train a settle? We have the same problem with Maxx....
We used a pen when we could not watch the pup(s). When Tilly and Cooper were 10 weeks or so they only had the run of the Kitchen when we were able to watch them. By around 16 weeks they had the run of the house if we were watching, but not just loose. I depends a lot on what floors you have and how well you can puppy proof the house.
This is my 5 step plan to train a settle 1. Make cup of tea or coffee 2. Select reading material. 3. Sit in comfy chair 4. Place foot on dog lead allowing enough slack for puppy to sit/stand/lie down 5. Ignore puppy/dog When puppy settles you can quietly tell them they are good and praise their 'settle. You can practice this several times a day and they soon learn to settle and with a little practice you will be able to settle in the big wide world when out and about with your pup
Thanks Ski-Patroller and Jojo83 I just had a phone call from DH (he works from home)...we didn't realise our darling fur-child was suddenly tall enough to reach the outdoor plants. He brought down 5 herb plants in pots that hubby had nurtured from seeds. He was in the middle of destroying them when hubby saw him and went to grab him away from them. He apparently side-stepped and ran straight through a big poo that he had just done and raced into, and all around, the house with poo-paws. My ears are still ringing from the cursing I heard down the phone!
Hi @Miss_Ivy, I know it's hard when they're young and crazy, but the only way to reduce the mad excitement in new places (living room etc) is by exposure to that new place. Clear all surfaces, hide remotes, remove cushions etc, and eventually she'll calm down and see it as just another boring room. Do some settle training. The jumping up on the counters drove me absolutely bonkers when mine was small, but I worked through it by praising and treating 4 paws on the floor. It works! Eventually lol. Ah @Maxx's Mum the dreaded poo paws. We've all been there/done that! It's hard when you've got carpet, such a pain to clean cos you can't always see where it is!
Thanks! I'm too scared to go home tonight! Maybe a big pizza (for hubby, not Maxx) will help. And I've promised that I will look after Maxx all weekend to the point where he will not even know we have a dog so he can get some work done. Wish me luck....
He's not getting enough exercise and stimulation(you said you play with her, but I suspect that play is not just plain exercise). A tired puppy is a happy puppy. Even though I take my 13 week old out for walks around the property many times a day, its not until he gets to chase a ball and bring it back(or a whole supply of toys, since he doesn't always bring them back) for about 10 minutes that he is tired enough. An 18 week old needs between 20 and 25 minutes of something that will get him just a little bit out of breath total a day split into two 12 minute sessions(stop when that happens). Sometimes they need more than that. If you don't give him enough exercise and stimulation which is essentially a job(like tricks to do for treats), then he will find his own job---like your new gardener(which you already saw), or your new home decorator, or your new demolition man. There are no ifs, ors, or buts on this. A tired puppy is a happy puppy. A stimulated puppy is a happy puppy, since a lab is sometimes smarter than you are. I can always tell when my 13 year old needs a "bout of exercise". He gets ramy, can't sit still, keeps bugging me for something that he doesn't know how to tell me and doesn't actually know, and its not potty or food or tricks. Its just plain exercise.
@Bettie Unfortunately exercise like running after a ball and bringing it back only creates a fitter dog in the longer term as you have to do more and more of the exercise to tire the puppy. The same is true of walks - more and/or longer walks creates a fitter dog that needs more and more to be tired out physically. At the same time you haven't necessarily been challenging him mentally. If you've ever had the misfortune to have a young dog on severely restricted exercise, try 3 x 3 minutes a day strictly on lead, and crate rest you will know how tiring training and mental games are and create a tired puppy without running around chasing balls.
I agree - exercising your dog lots leads to a fitter dog that needs more exercise to become tired out. It's not a bad thing - a fit dog is something that we should all aspire to, but exercise alone isn't the cure-all. Mentally stimulating your dog is definitely a lot more tiring. The problem is that mentally tiring the dogs out can sometimes leave us tired out, too, and that's sometimes not what we want when we're already frazzled enough by everyday life! But, for those days when you just can't think anymore (I have them often!) there are lots of other games that can wear your pup out that you don't really have to think about yourself. Things like scattering treats in a rug or special snuffle mat for him to hunt out. I've also just had a session with my three with a "noise box" - essentially a cardboard box with a few treats in it, hidden under all sorts of noisy objects - crinkled up tissue paper, a couple of small (sturdy!) glass jars, spoons etc. This game is good for building resilience towards noises, too - something my two older dogs can do with. They're all sleeping soundly now after two goes each with it. I play the scattering food game frequently on walks, too. For me, walks are a time for me to interact with my dogs rather than just getting as many miles as possible under our belts. We play lots of fun games together that wear their brains out as well as their bodies. Again, when I'm too frazzled after a hard day to think too much, playing things like hunting for treats in the snow, under leaves or making a sausage tree are really stimulating for the dog and easy for me to wrap my head around. Sometimes we don't cover more than a couple of kilometres in an hour, but we are playing all the time - and that's without throwing a single ball
Thanks @snowbunny for adding all the extra games we can play - suddenly realised them time and had to grab dog, car keys, house keys and doggie blanket/coat and run to make our hydrotherapy appointment on time
I just want to add on Snowbunnies premise that dog walks are for dogs... not people. Let them enjoy it. Distance is irrelevant, fun is key.
Our dogs wait on our pleasure so much of the time, I like to think of their walks as their time. It's solely for them I concentrate on them and stuff they like to do. They like it and I do too. I play lots of hiding things for Rory to find that's his favourite.
