Play
Importance of play
- It develops brain function, muscle strength and dexterity in growing puppies.
- It is a way for puppies to learn proper social interactions.
- It can serve as a motivator and alternative reward in place of treats.
- It is a great way to grow the bond between you and your puppy.
Excessive play biting, destructive chewing, ankle chasing, barking, out of control zoomies and other hyperactive behaviors may be signs your puppy’s need for play is either unfulfilled or not properly structured.
How to encourage Toy Play in puppies
- Buy the right toys. Find your puppy’s preference based on type of toy, the texture, the hardness or softness, etc. Toys should be durable, appropriately sized and made of non-hazardous materials.
- Interact with your puppy. Don’t just buy toys and leave them with your puppy. Get down on the ground with your puppy and move the toy around to make it seem alive and fun to chase. The quality of play is more important than the quality and quantity of toys.
- Don’t leave toys out. Chew toys can be left with the puppy in confinement, but play toys are usually put away so that the puppy doesn’t get tired of them. They also won’t be chewed up and destroyed by the puppy
- Play should follow your rules, not your puppy’s rules.
- Decide when to start and when to end play.
- Avoid playing “Keep Away”. This is when puppies try to get you to chase after them and the toy they have in their mouth. It encourages undesirable behaviors like stealing random items and running away. Teach your puppy to bring toys back so you can play with them together.
Handling Exercises
Teach your puppy to accept being handled for grooming, health monitoring or disease treatment, or during emergency situations.
Purposefully and regularly engage your puppy in fun handling exercises in preparation for those times when actual handling is necessary.
How to practice handling
- Aim for cooperative handling rather than forceful, fear-inducing handling.
- Simulate situations where handling is necessary and introduce them to your puppy slowly. Pair the exercise with treats or keep your puppy occupied with a lick mat while you handle him.
- Allow your puppy to choose to move away and end the interaction if he feels uncomfortable.
💡 Handling exercises should be practiced long before the need for actual handling comes up. This allows your puppy to learn what to expect and to trust you throughout these scenarios.
Socialization
Puppy socialization refers to the process of introducing your puppy to a variety of people, places, experiences, etc. – collectively called stimuli (singular: stimulus) – that the puppy might encounter throughout life.
This is done so the puppy does not become stressed in the face of every new stimulus, because continuous stress has the following effects:
- It can be bad for the puppy’s health.
- It can reduce a dog’s focus and affect response to training.
- It can lead to fearfulness and aggression in a dog, which makes them difficult to handle, and makes routine tasks such as grooming and health checks a challenge.
Control the distance, intensity, or level of interaction between the stimulus and your puppy during socialization experiences.
Pre-planned set-ups, structured meetings or interactions, and environments that are already familiar to you are best for beginning puppy socialization activities.
Safe Puppy Socialization
Many veterinarians will, understandably, favor safeguarding the puppy’s health, and caution you against taking your puppy outside while his vaccinations are still incomplete. It’s good advice for disease prevention, but it is not favorable for the puppy’s behavioral development, and puts the puppy at risk for social retardation.
Puppy socialization can be accomplished in safe ways that will minimize the risks to the health and well-being of your puppy:
1. Provide socialization activities at home
In the safety of your own home, set up activities to begin your puppy’s socialization:
- Invite friends or family over to meet and have fun but guided interactions with your puppy.
- Slowly introduce your puppy to household items like home appliances, different textured surfaces or materials and other odd-looking objects found around the house.
- Use a specially recorded sound CD to socialize your puppy to outdoor ambient noises.
2. Arrange socialization activities with other puppy owners
Organize a puppy meet-up with friends who also have puppies and rotate the venue moving your puppy parties from one home to the next. This way your puppy can socialize in safe environments outside of your own house.
3. Attend puppy socialization and training classes
A good puppy socialization class is structured and supervised by the instructor at all times. These classes sometimes provide opportunities for puppies to meet well-mannered adult dogs and puppies of different ages.
Early Basic Obedience
Beyond teaching your puppy home manners, use reward-based training to teach your puppy to also perform basic obedience behaviors on cue and under various conditions.
Apply these principles of Reward-Based Training:
- Manage the conditions under which you train to prevent mistakes and set the puppy up to succeed.
- Teach the puppy how you would like him to behave, and
- Heavily reward the behaviors that you want to encourage in your puppy.
When you commit to these reward-based training principles, you will find that the need for corrections or punishment is hardly even necessary.
Behaviors To Train
Here are some important foundational skills and basic obedience behaviors that should be taught early on:
Attention and Name Recognition
- An important foundational skill for any dog is to immediately direct his attention towards you when cued or called by his name.
Impulse Control
- Your puppy should be taught to wait to be given food instead of impulsively grabbing any food within his reach.
- Your puppy should be taught to wait at entryways or other boundaries instead of impulsively rushing out.
- Your puppy should be taught to politely wait to be greeted instead of impulsively jumping up on people to demand for attention.
- Your puppy should be taught to calmly wait for permission to say “hello” instead of impulsively running up to other dogs or animals.
- Your puppy should be taught to walk with you instead of impulsively forging ahead and pulling on leash.
Recall (Come when called)
- On top of giving attention, your dog must also learn to immediately return to your side when called. This is important especially when the dog must be called away from danger.
Going To Crate
- Going to crate on cue is a good behavior to train together with crate conditioning your puppy so it is easy to send your puppy to his crate or confinement space when needed.
Sit, Down, Stand and Stay
- Sit, Down and Stand positions practiced with Stays around distractions can keep the puppy settled while being handled such as during veterinary exams, and can curb impulsive behaviors such as jumping up on people.
Following and Loose-Leash Walking
- Long before you start walking your puppy on leash outside the confines of your home, you should have already invested time in reinforcing the behavior of following you around.
- Puppies who will grow into large and powerful dogs in particular, should be taught early on how to properly walk with you while on leash.