Re: New pup - updated with progress The diary idea sounds good! Will be helpful for other puppy owners to see what they might expect or might be able to achieve too
Re: New pup - updated with progress There's no new pictures I'm afraid - you make me feel bad. you've seen the last picture i've taken! If I'm doing this as a diary, I ought to explain Eevee's breeding etc. Eevee's father is a FTCh, her mother a bitch that works hard but she's only 2 or so herself. Two of her grandparents won the IGL retriever championships. I've gone strongly working bred and now i hope i can live up to this. I'm hoping to do the gundog club grades and really enjoy myself with her. from the beginning i've tried to follow the puppy gundog club right start and have lots of rules in the house about what i can and will allow the children to do with her. if they want to throw something for a dog, it's far more interesting to throw it for honey dog anyway as she'll go out really fast and although she won't return it to hand it comes normally within a metre or so of them to do it again. also she retrieves to hand with my eldest daughter when she wants her attention. so thankfully this ensures that the rules around retrieving are kept for Eevee (that is not to throw things for her). they aren't allowed to chase her or to call her name (that's hard!) but as she's the size of a handbag dog then they just pick her up! it is meaning that she's carried more than i'd like but they just can't resist it! she's still making a lot of noise and squeaking a lot. doesn't like being on her own without honeydog who has taken a lot of the early settling in problems on the chin for us. only time she gets properly told is when hd's got a bone or such like. then she wont let eevee near her. the rest of the time she's happy for her to swing on her ears, climb all over her and constantly bite her. crucial to try to stop the squeaking. it's very annoying! i like mute dogs. don't even have barking at the doorbell. in my first post i mentioned that they like to play tug etc. between them and hd liked to take things off eevee. i've now stopped this when i see them and hd knows now that i don't allow it as she looks at me waiting to get told off for it. so, all in all things are going well. i want to take her out daily after her second injections and get her used to lots of different sights and sounds and smells including livestock etc. looking forward to that! the only other thing i'd like to teach her now is a strong 'leave it'. she needs to learn this one as it's been so useful with honey and crucial with two children around who leave things places without thinking. Once she's thoroughly toilet trained and has a leave it command in her i can let her in the rest of the house as at the moment she's a kitchen and garden dog! sarah
Re: New pup - updated with progress Ok, along with the things I mentioned earlier, the thing i am most focused on at the moment is the squeaking or howling which is truly annoying and really needs to stop. I am not sure what is causing it. She's making a right racket in the car, which we are working hard with clicking and treating. But just every day walking round the garden having a squeak-fest for no flipping reason. I am ignoring her when she does it, desperately trying to make sure she isn't rewarded with anything whilst it's going on but I haven't seen a very quick improvement and was hoping to have done by now. Am I expecting quiet too early? Other people's experiences of removing annoying whimpering is gratefully received. Thanks Sarah
Re: New pup - noisy dog question sorry i cant help never experienced the whimpering you will get advice......hope you get answers
Re: New pup - noisy dog question Would it be possible to take and upload a quick vid of the squeaking/howling/whimpering? That might help to give a few clues as to why she is doing it... Some dogs are more vocal than others. But she sounds especially chatty.
Re: New pup - noisy dog question Charlie is noisy, but it's part of her personality. I haven't tried to stop it. Your pup won't know it's annoying to you, I think she'll grow out of it in time. She's still very young, sussing things out everywhere she goes, maybe she just thinks out loud like Charlie here! And Charlie does a lot of 'thinking'..
Re: New pup - noisy dog question Not had a lot of problems with noise....bit of whining when we got off back off holiday wanting to be let out of his cage at 4.30 am .......but after a couple of these early mornings,he got a firm Quiet Dexter!......problem solved ;D he was trying his luck as I think it worked with his Pet Sitter. When he was 5 months ,there was a lot of whining and yelping in the car when we took him out,it would start a couple of minutes into the journey.was dealing it with C&T but that only works when there are 2 of you. I had a think about it and realized that I was encouraging it by talking to him.A couple of minutes into the trip I would say his name and my usual enquiries about if he was ok ,giving him attention... and the yelping would start....so I stated to ignore him totally and I don't hear a peep out of him now!Not saying its the right way to do it but it might be worth a try as it worked for us.
Re: New pup - noisy dog question Riley was only ever noisy as a pup in the car. We tried treating him for being quiet which worked a little but is impossible unless there's two of you. Ignoring worked for us too, he just got used to the car in the end. I think it was easier once he was tall enough to see out the window - he always rests his nose on the little ledge so he can watch the world go by
Re: New pup - retrieiving update and Questions HD is absolutely silent. doesn't bark at anything, including the door bell. she doesn't whine either. the little one needs not to whine. just don't want it. also when she whines, it has made hd whine a couple of times as well. although a sharp intake of breath from me and a stare soon shut her up. i've been watching extra carefully today to see whether i can catch it on camera but it lasts for about 2 seconds and then stops and then just starts again. my husband similarly hates it so i can't / won't put up with it. an example of a few today * walked up to me in the garden, whimpered and walked off. didn't seem to want anything. perhaps a slightly unfulfilled 2 seconds. ??? * waiting for food. this i accept as an over-excited puppy and will slowly go as she gets older. food never goes down until she's shut up. if she squeaks, i pick it up and wait for quiet. * howling in the car. this i accept too and figure training and patience will get rid. C&T definitely working although i get what you mean about being on your own with her. i cant' really drive on my own with her at the moment as she's only just 5kg so isn't big enough to go in the boot on her own with hd. * walking up to hd. whimper, squeak. lie down next to her. go to sleep. * everyone ignoring her, wander round. look at everyone. whimper, squeak. walk off. we've had her 3+ weeks and I did think she'd have reduced the noises. writing this and it sounds like a dog that's expecting us / HD to be her amusement park and is trying to convey that. her breeder knew she squeaked - he told me how lovely and quiet she was as he listened to her doing it. :-X i suspect patience here is the key but sometimes better when you write it down. It just can't become a habit long term.
Re: New pup - noisy dog question I think you're right you will just have to find a bucket of patience and use it all up whilst being ever consistent with your ignoring ;D Hopefully she'll just get over it as she grows up and get's no reward, I did see Victoria Stillwell actually teach silence on command with C&T to a dog that barked. Might be worth a try if she persists so you can at least tell her to be quiet with a specific command.
Re: New pup - noisy dog question I wrote a big reply, but then deleted it. I genuinely don't want to offend anyone. But I feel I have to say that you're asking a lot of such a young pup. Also it reads as if you don't allow your older dog to make any noise either? I find that unusual. Saying that you 'can't/won't put up with it' and 'just don't want it' comes across as harsh I thought. Sorry.
Re: New pup - noisy dog question Charlie makes all sorts of funny noises all of the time, grunts, whistles, etc. Love them. OH says he sounds "like a beast". I guess we've encouraged it though. Perhaps it's because he doesn't bark, I love hearing him make any sound. He howled his head off in the car for about a month - nothing stopped or improved it, tried everything. Then he went in my landrover (instead of my little run about) and was fine. Then he was fine in my little run about too. I think he just needed a bit of time to get used to things.
Re: New pup - noisy dog question Just reading round the site and came across an article if you've not seen it yet called Vehicle Manners.....might help you out in the car http://www.thelabradorsite.com/?p=3462
Re: New pup - noisy dog question I don't allow my other dog to make any noise. i don't like noisy dogs. i don't think that makes me horrible. it wasn't hard for me to do - Labradors are, after all, designed as quiet dogs. her squeaking isn't awful, just annoying. i think patience and ensuring she's never rewarded for it is the key. ham and a clicker are working in the car. i think it was starting as a habit rather than anything else so the treats are something to focus on more than anything. she can see out of the window.
Re: New pup - noisy dog question Noise in a gundog can be a real problem. Even the tiniest of squeaks in a competition will be instant disqualification. A small amount of noise in a working gundog might be slightly annoying but is not going to stop anyone working their dog. If it was my pup I would stop the click & treat for quiet, and just ignore any noise. When the pup whines outside in the garden just walk away, same thing in the house. I have never known anyone who managed to eliminate noise through clicker training.
Re: New pup - noisy dog question I have to explain that the noise in the car (the only time we're doing C&T for noise) is not safe to continue. It prevents any concentration on the actual journey and the final straw was a journey to work where i had two of my staff in the car and no one could hear each other. there was full on longleat style wolf howling. if it doesn't work permanently, it doesn't but i could have killed us all as it really wasn't safe to drive under those conditions. we're now at hte point where she gets a treat for every 0.6 miles (this is a really really rough estimate!) and allows safe driving. if it doesn't cure it, it won't kill her or me ;D heidrun, i don't see a trialling career ahead of us but i would like to raise her to the best of my ability.
Re: New pup - noisy dog question [quote author=hd link=topic=1920.msg18613#msg18613 date=1374693729] I don't allow my other dog to make any noise. i don't like noisy dogs. i don't think that makes me horrible. it wasn't hard for me to do - Labradors are, after all, designed as quiet dogs. her squeaking isn't awful, just annoying. i think patience and ensuring she's never rewarded for it is the key. ham and a clicker are working in the car. i think it was starting as a habit rather than anything else so the treats are something to focus on more than anything. she can see out of the window. [/quote] I don't think it makes you horrible either, I think I said it was unusual. Sorry, I had genuinely hoped not to cause offence, but never mind.
Re: New pup - noisy dog question Riley is a quiet dog but he did make quite a lot of noise as a puppy in the car. He outgrew that with no input from us other than ignoring him.
