hi all!! So our lovely boy Jordy is almost 21 weeks and I have to say that apart from a few bad nights when we first got him, we have been incredibly lucky and pretty much had the perfect pooch! He is friendly, relaxed when meeting other dogs and new people. Toilet training has been great. We went to puppy classes and basic commands he learnt so well. He is as well, of course, just adorable!! He comes to work with me twice a week and has been wonderful! However, the last few days he has started to chew, everything and deaf to certain things! He ate our bed(I was literalky only in the shower for 5 minutes!), clothes, my sons shoes. And if there is water near by his recall is non Existant! ( he generally will just follow me about.) I really do get he is still a puppy, and know that I have a beautiful boy with no complaints at all apart front he above! I'm hoping to seek reassurance that this will pass, and is normal! I think we are reeling a little as he has been so easy so far!!
Our boy is a week older than your's, and two weeks ago we noticed him starting to have more of his "own opinion" about what he wants to do and when he wants to respond to cues, as well as more frantic chewing activity on his toys. We put that down to "becoming a teenager". I introduced more high-value treats (cooked chicken thigh meat) in to his routine and he responded well to that. However, a week ago we noticed some blood on one rawhide stick and found two teeth on his bed. Then things clicked, and we realised he was teething. So maybe this is the reason for your Jordy's increased chewing?
He is definitely teething! Loosing some baby teeth now bless him! Sure that's it! Great idea increasing value of treats, I took some sausage on walk and had his full attention again!!
I'd agree its time to increase the value of the rewards. We use what we consider three categories of prize; gold is tops and can be his dinner, a can of sardines or some kind of leftover protein from our meals.( ribs, chicken beef etc.).We deliver it slowly as well to prolong the enjoyment. Then there's silver which is deli meats, hot dog or high end dog treats and using more of them than the lowest reward of regular treats (Bronze) which are smaller and given one at a time for control. When we did this after he started to falter from training he came back on line. Also we noticed because he'd been doing well with training and commands we had been getting lazy ourselves. Leaving out steps to the process and losing a bit of the control we had. Keep Vigilant in your training. During teething time we got him a stuffed toy as kind of a soother which worked for us...It could be a waste of money if you have a heavy chewer.
