Please forgive 3 questions squeezed into 1 post - as you all know, life with a 9 week pup (plus cats and kids) is busy and I only have a minute! Nugget will be 10 weeks on Friday. Just wondering exactly what I should be doing at this point in terms of training? We have been working on 'sit' - he sits to say please and I have been pairing the word with the action, although we haven't got past that point yet - he won't sit when asked to yet. Other than this, what else is it important for me to be doing? I don't want to find that I've missed a good window of opportunity for a particular aspect of training. We've worked on socialization too and he's happily using his crate. Q2 - he sometimes cries whilst eating his kong. I don't freeze the food yet, but I do soak it, so it sometimes needs some work to get out. Am I making it too hard for him? Or should I just ignore the crying? Q3 - We've just had new decking put in. It about 24cm high. Is it bad for him to jump up on to it? Should I restrict his access to it until he's older? If so, at what age would it be safer? Sorry for all the questions and thank you for your help. These forums have been wonderful for me as a new puppy owner
You have your hands full there With the training side of things, other things you can start to train are recall (running to you for a treat when called), drop (lie down), getting used to walking with you and staying with you as you change direction (important precursor to lead walking), being comfortable with having ears, paws, teeth checked (anything a vet might need to check), sitting quietly for a pat and not jumping up when meeting people. I'd say that recall would be right up there as my priority and now is a great time to start building this as pups are keen to stay with us and not be left alone - take advantage of that desire to be with you. What sort of methods are you using to train? Are you using treats given as a reward after you get the behaviour you asked for? I'm on my phone right now otherwise I'd get you some links to articles on the main site on training the things I've mentioned above. With the Kong - the crying is probably a bit of frustration. Personally I wouldn't worry about it much but do make sure the Kong filling is east enough to get out so he's not having to work for a long time for a morsel. Otherwise I'd say it's good training in coping with delayed gratification! You must be enjoying your new deck! As far as the pup goes I'd just encourage walking up onto and off the deck, rather than leaping at speed. If you're worried he'll slip then maybe some non-slip mats would be a good idea. He'll pretty soon be big enough so that 24cm is not too big a height to manage at a sensible pace.
I would be training (in no particular order) recall, sit, down, stand plus being touched all over body, touch, leave, drop or give, no jumping, door manners, loose lead walking, stay. By my reckoning 24cm is around 9 or 10 inches so quite a bit higher than I would be happy to have my young puppy negotiating for some months and I would be training a controlled up and down steps as well.
Recall is definitely a good thing to work on. Do you have Total Recall? It's a great method to work through. For your sit, here is a very detailed article on how to achieve a strong sit/stay: http://www.thelabradorsite.com/how-to-train-a-dog-to-sit/ Other than that, I agree with lots of handling, and other than that the earlier you can work on impulse control exercises, the better. You've done a great start with a sit for please. Here's another - door manners: If you've not already done "no mugging": A default leave it, where your pup doesn't take a treat until you tell him to. A cued leave it. No pulling towards people/dogs/things when on the lead. I think this is important, because people often call puppies in for a fuss when they're young and cute, but it sets you up for having a full-grown dog that pulls towards people. You might need to set up situations with people you know, or else be very firm with strangers to train this. I ended up shouting "STOP!" or "NO!" or "DON'T TOUCH MY PUPPY!" a lot. It would shock them, and then I'd explain why and how they could help. They'd often think I was being anal about it, but now I have two dogs that are praised for being (generally) well behaved in public, so I don't really care what they thought back then.
With the step up onto the deck...it's important to take into account the frequency and speed with which your pup is tackling the step. Occasionally at a walk - I would think that'd be fine. Often at a run - I would think that's not fine. I don't think there is a need to try to avoid the step totally though. If your pup develops a habit of running and leaping up it while still a baby then maybe see if you can manufacture a wide half-height step and train him to use that. The most important period for being careful about hips is thought to be up to three months (while muscles are developing that will keep the hip stable). Slippery surfaces, and going up and down flights of stairs before that age are best avoided. But it is also important to give your pup a range of experiences on different (non slippery) surfaces, and regular free-running on undulating surfaces has been found to have a protective effect on joints. Being overly cautious by restricting them to flat surfaces and low level exercise is not the best approach (e.g. see this piece of research http://avmajournals.avma.org/doi/abs/10.2460/ajvr.73.6.838?journalCode=ajvr) Different species but similar issue - there is also quite a lot of research on foals showing that free exercise in an environment with varied surfaces, including hard surfaces, produces the best bone, joint and hoof development. In contrast, soft, flat ground and limited exercise contribute to the development of limb and hoof abnormalities. This is because growing joints need to be used and to have feedback about the environment in order to develop properly.
Thank you everyone for all your wonderful advice. And I think constructing a temporary half height step for the deck is a great solution.
