Mossy has now had her vaccinations (last week) and is ready to get out exploring on all fours. We've been taking her out in a bag til now. I took her out to the local playing fields this morning, plonked her down in the middle and did lots of walking away from her. On the whole she followed me and got praise and tiny cubes of cheese when she reached me so it all seemed to fine. However, my question (sorry, another!) is this: as she has never worn a lead or harness before, should I avoid this as long as possible until she trots along next to me? If so, that means carrying her to the park etc. Or is now the time to try on a harness and lead? My hesitation is that I don't want to introduce a lead too early and have her think that it's great fun to pull on it all the time. (puppy class booked to start in a few weeks!).
I would introduce them as soon as possible, and do some basic work on walking nicely to heel. The more you can teach her at this stage, the better. But, the teaching sessions do need to be very short (a minute or so at a time), so for now you're probably best doing this just at home, or take the lead to the park with you and clip it on several times in her play session. She can wear the harness all the while she's there, to get her used to it. I made a point with my two to always give them a good treat when I clipped the lead on, so that they learn it's a good thing. The thing you want to avoid is associating the lead with the end of a walk, so clipping it on several times in a walk, treating her, and then releasing her after a little while will give her positive associations with it. Now, at a year of age, my two trot up to me when I take their leads off my waist (where I carry them on walks) and sit down ready to have them clipped on. It's very important, as you obviously know, to let your puppy off the lead as much as possible, to work on her recall and let her know that being close to you is really rewarding. But a little lead work mixed in with this can only be a good thing. Good luck and let us know how you get on.
I'd definitely recommend getting the lead on now, if only at home. Our girl Ella didn't like the lead at first and would spin around in circles with it in her mouth. We found that if one of us held the lead and the other tried to get her attention with a toy we slowly got her to calm down and ignore the lead. I don't think all puppies are like this but, just in case yours is, it might be nice to get her used to it before you start puppy class. Make sure you take lots of photos of Mossy's first outings ☺ and feel free to share!
In an absolutely ideal world, I'd train a puppy to walk at heel off lead first, and get that really strong then introduce the lead. But, in the real world we need a way to hang on to small puppies, and so putting them on a harness and lead is necessary. I'd introduce the harness with lots of treats and as slowly as possible. There are a fair few dogs on the forum, mine included, that don't like harnesses - many more that are fine with them though - I'm sure that I rushed it, I stuck a harness on my dog and went to puppy school. I should have taken more care over introducing the harness.
Seconded. Willow didn't like her collar (which I started with) at first, scratching at it, shying away from it etc. So, I worked with her and lots of positive reinforcement until she was fine with it. Then I decided to change to a harness, for safety reasons, and she seemed absolutely fine with it, so I just bunged it on and off we went with no thought of reinforcing it. She now shies away from it and shuts down when it goes on. Whilst it's quiet here, I've gone back to using a flat collar with her, and she loves it, I'm sure because of all the positive associations I gave her with it. I now have to start working on building positive associations with the harness so I can use it again in the winter, when it's busier, but it's a lot harder breaking the negative associations she has built with it than it would have been to start slowly and with treats in the first place.
Definitely second the above - get lead, collar / harness now & start training to avoid "misunderstanding" on first walks. My puppies went to their new homes used to collars & leads but I'm aware not all breeders do that.
