20CPCVOD

Here's a recap of the key points to keep in mind when the puppies turn 5 weeks old. True fear emerges this week, and the puppies can go through a mild fear imprinting period. You may not see an obvious fear response. But whether the puppy shows it or not, he's now more sensitive to fear than previously. Keep introducing challenging and startling things, but now you should proceed with some caution and dial back the challenges if the puppy seems extraordinarily fearful. Some examples of appropriate exercises are a tarp over an exercise pen, crinkly bags, and shiny surfaces. You want a tiny startle and immediate recovery. If you're not getting an almost immediate recovery, again, dial back the challenges. You should continue to allow the puppies to play with other appropriate adults in the household, but give the puppies a low table or chair to hide under when they're playing with adult dogs. Again, if a puppy shows strong fear, dial back the challenges, and work individually with that puppy on the particular things of which he's afraid, similarly to the way that we worked with Rocco in this section. You should not comfort fearful puppies when doing these startle recovery exercises. You should never be presenting something that's truly terrifying to the puppy, or put him in a position where he's in severe emotional distress. If something by chance truly terrifying does happen to your puppy, of course, you should then comfort the puppy. But again, the goal is to inoculate the puppy against fear by presenting very low level fear challenges. Here are the highlights of the things you should be doing with your puppies when they're six weeks old. They have the highest approach and lowest fear now, that's why this is known as a curiosity period, so introduce as many appropriate people as possible. Remember, the puppy social sensitivity is high for bad experiences as well as good experiences. One good exposure can imprint a love of something, but one bad exposure can imprint a fear of something. So always opt for quality versus quantity of interactions. A puppy party is a great way to expose your puppy to a lot of people at once. But invite only dog savvy people that can be trusted to be gentle with the puppies. The puppy party we showed in this section is a lot of fun, and if you have miniature agility equipment, you can throw a party like ours. But if you don't, you can still have a great puppy party that will be enriching for your puppies. You can just have people over to play with the puppies, or train them on simple behaviors, such as recall and landing, that don't require any extra equipment. Whatever format you use, make sure everyone stays over for lunch or dinner so the puppies become accustomed to having people in the house. It's a great excuse for a party. We like to create three stations, either three different pieces of equipment, three different people, or three different behaviors, such as sit down or recall. We use a timer and give each puppy two minutes per station. Each puppy gets three sessions where they rotate through all the stations with 15 to 30 minutes rest in between those sessions. We throw our puppy party when the puppies are six weeks old. But you can have a puppy party at any time. However, we do recommend that you hold off on a puppy party when the puppies are eight weeks old, because eight week old puppies are in sensitive fear period. Puppy owners can have a puppy party for their puppy too. Just rotate the puppy through the three stations and make sure he gets 15 minutes of rest or more in between each full rotation through all three stations. Not every breed needs to be BAER tested, but every breed should have breed specific health tests done. In the United States, the American Kennel Club is the largest registry of purebred dogs. And each AKC breed has a parent club dedicated to the health and welfare of their breed. Consult your breed's parent club's website for more information on what health tests are appropriate. Another good source is the Orthopedic Foundation for Animals, which maintains a database and recommended health tests for various breeds. It's important to note that there's no evidence that mixed breed dogs are any less susceptible to health issues. If a puppy is a cross of two purebred breeds, all appropriate health tests for both breeds should be performed on both the parents and the puppies. Here's a recap of potty training procedures for puppies under 12 weeks old. First, move the puppies to a larger pen at about six and a half weeks old. This will help them keep their living area clean and create good habits. For individual puppies under 12 weeks old, you need to foresee when your puppy will need to go and take him out before that. Here are the times when you can almost count on your puppy needing to use the restroom. ten minutes after the start of a play session, 15 minutes after eating, and immediately upon waking up. In addition, look for the signs that your puppy has to go. Any abrupt cessation in activity, any sniffing, or even a quick peck at the floor with his nose, going to the door, even just walking by the door, is a good indication that your puppy needs to go out. All else aside, a puppy under 12 weeks old is going to have to go outside at least once an hour no matter what. You're not going to have a lot of time between the time your puppy indicates he has to go and the time he actually does go to the bathroom, so keep slip on shoes and rain gear by the door. When you can't watch your puppy, put him in a puppy pen, that is an exercise pen with a crate and potty area attached. Your puppy should also sleep in his puppy pen, withhold food for three hours before bedtime, withhold water for 1 hour before bedtime, take him out just before you put him to bed, and make sure he does at least pee, and leave the crate door open. When the puppy can go four or five hours at night without using the potty area, you can begin closing the door to the crate, but set an alarm to wake up in no more than five hours most puppies will be reliable by five months old, but some will still be having occasional accidents until a year or more old. This is a physiological development issue, and there's nothing you can do to speed up the process. Punishment will only slow down the house training process, so be patient. The only thing you really can do is take a puppy out more often if he's having trouble getting the hang of things interactions with puppies should be calm and structured. Use a toy to play with your puppy. Never play with a puppy with your bare hands. If they do bite, pick them up and point the biting parts away from you. You can then keep gripping and massaging the puppy until he calms down, and you can also offer the puppy a toy or a chew object instead of your arm to chew on. Motion is a big trigger for biting. When you're walking with your puppy, if he bites, stop moving. Nine times out of 10, that will end the biting right there. You should always carry food and reinforce walking next to you without biting when the puppy is small. If when you stop moving he doesn't give up, pick him up and point his teeth away from you. At that point, you can break out the food and train him to walk next to you without biting. Or if you're too busy, put the puppy away. Puppies and children can get in a behavioral loop where the puppy bites, the children scream, which makes the puppy bite more, which makes the children scream more, and so on. Teach your children to interact calmly with your puppy. If the child is too young to understand, you have to manage the puppy when it's around the children. When the puppy's out with young children, feed the puppy and train calm behaviors while the kids are running around. If you don't have time to train the puppy around the kids, put the puppy away. This all seems like a lot of work. But if you're religious about following these instructions, it only takes a month or two of management and training for the puppy to outgrow the biting. Here's a review of resource guarding protocols for puppies under 12 weeks old. Ideally you'll repeat these protocols until you have a true, conditioned, emotional response. But even one repetition when the puppy's under 12 weeks old is beneficial. Food dish, step one, approach while puppy's eating his food and add something better to the dish. Step number two approach while puppy's eating his food, take away the dish, and give him a treat. Objects. Give the puppy a meaty bone and allow him 10 minutes to become engrossed in it. Take the bone away and exchange immediately for a treat. Give the puppy the bone back again. Repeat this with a variety of toys and chew objects. Locations. Approach the puppy when he's comfortably resting in his bed or crate. Sit down next to him and/or move him off the location and give him a treat. Lap guarding. Approach the puppy while he's in his owner's lap or arms. Pat the puppy and give the puppy a treat. Here's a review of good body handling protocols. From birth, the breeder should be touching ears, tails, toes, lips, and teeth on every puppy every day. Squeeze the paws to get the puppy used to having his feet held, and hug and restrain the puppies. The attention you give them will probably be enough to reinforce this in young puppies. As the puppy gets older, start giving him treats in exchange for body handling. However, you should keep the treats hidden while you're handling the puppy or the puppy can get frustrated. Only produce them when you're ready to deliver the food to the puppy. The easiest way to do this is to keep the food hidden in your mouth. But if that's not possible, you can keep the treats hidden on a table or shelf but you can easily reach.