Greetings fellow lab puppy owners. My wife and I have 12 week old lab puppies (brother and sister) who have been home with us from the breeder for 3 weeks now. These are our first labs and our children just adore them and so do we. They are behaving quite well...but just a one off question. My Male puppy is not afraid to go up and down the stairs in our house while our female is terrified. he tries to encourage her with not much luck. any thoughts on how to get her over the fear? Pretty soon I wont be able to carry her big butt down the stairs at night LOL...I've chosen so far to just let her figure it out..no dice there.
Hi swallent and a warm welcome to the forum to you and your twinnies. I think you need to be really careful with the stairs from the point of view of their developing bones and joints, as there is some association with hip knee and elbow problems in dogs that are "overexercised" as pups, including overdoing stairs. I would encourage you to carry for as long as you possibly can, but teach them how to both go up and down separately and slowly, on lead preferably and the same pace as you. Training isn't my forte, but perhaps you need to lure your wee girl onto each step with a tasty treat. You might find using a clicker to train this helpful. Conversely a treat at each step might slow her brother down if needed. You just need a tiny treat or even try with their normal kibble. Have you seen the information on website and forum about clicker training. Hope someone else pops up with more tips! Jac and Lilly (almost 7 years old and with severe bilateral hip dysplasia!)
Hello and welcome to the forum. Snowbunny is the one to help you. She has a brother and sister, so I am sure she will have lots of tips for you.
Welcome to you from Mags, Tatze and Mollie from Manchester UK Tatze is my pet dog, a black Lab and she's four years old. Tatze means 'paw' in German. Mollie is my fourth Guide Dog puppy, a black Lab who is six months old. Vv
Welcome to you and your gorgeous puppies from me and Saba, my chocolate boy. I think you're very brave (or totally nuts!) for taking on two Labs Enjoy!
Hi and welcome from me and my boy Bailey a 13 month old nutcase! Bailey when we first started him on our stairs hated coming down them, we took our time and did it slowly, one step at a time with bits of kibble and lots and lots of praise with each step taken - it took a while. We also restricted his access to the stairs and he only went up them at bedtime and down again in the morning.
Hello and welcome to the forum. Willow and Shadow are litter mates, so I have plenty of experience with the challenge of two puppies! They are now two and a half years old. I also have Luna, who is five months. Do your puppies need to go up and down the stairs? Obviously, this depends on the layout of your house. What surface do you have on your stairs? My black girl, Willow, tends to be a bit panicky on tiled stairs, tries to dig her claws in which gives her less grip, and can make her slip. So, we avoid these as much as possible, always take her on lead and make her walk slowly. If your stairs are slippy, maybe invest in some non-slip matting you can put down in the short term. This will be far better for their joints, anyway. Other than that, try training one step at a time, in other places. Find places where there are just one or two steps to navigate and give her lots of fuss and treats for going up and down them. She'll get there in time; just try not to force the issue, even if you think you're doing so kindly (with verbal encouragement, luring etc) as this can actually make it more stressful for the puppy. Your pups are very cute! Here are a couple of threads on how to post pictures inline from Imgur: https://thelabradorforum.com/threads/posting-a-photo-from-imgur.12177/ https://thelabradorforum.com/threads/posting-an-image-from-imgur-iphone-app.16289/
