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New, worried owner seeks advice and help



 
 
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Old November 9th 03, 09:03 AM
Adam and Gimli
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Default New, worried owner seeks advice and help

Well, to put things simply, I am feeling quite overwhelmed, worried
and frustrated right now. I'm a first time dog owner with his first
puppy and I'm trying to do everything as best as I can and I'm having
a pretty tough time. I've been thinking about getting a dog for years
and have been seriously planning things and preparing myself for about
5 months to try to really do things right. All my life growing up I
had cats but always wanted a dog and when I recently graduated college
and got a job where I only work mornings I decided now might be a good
time to try to spend with a dog. I've read about 10 books on dogs,
puppies and obedience including Patricia McConnel, Ian Dunbar, Pat
Miller, the Monks of New Skete, Matthew Margolis, Barbara McKinney and
others. I've also watched a few videos, and spent a good amount of
time reading up on training and obedience on the internet. I also
took the past few months to work on the house a lot, building a new 6
foot gate, patching up the backyard gate and around the patio, routing
cables around the house, reorganizing shelving and in general trying
to puppy proof and prepare as much as possible.

Well, to just jump right into it, after months of research and
searching, talking to breeders and going to a dog show and reading and
buying things, I finally got my little Brittany puppy last week
Saturday. I picked him up at LAX and began my foray into the world of
dogs. The first week has gone by and honestly, I'm pretty much a
wreck right now. I've been feeling guilty and worried that I don't
know what to do and am setting things up poorly, and my roommates and
friends who had dogs growing up can't seem to offer me too much advice
as all their puppy memories are from when they were children. I'm
trying to steer my course on a positive training route and chose to
forgo the training collar and jerk/release methods in favor of luring,
rewarding and using a lot of positive reinforcement. So far, some
things have gone well. The house training is going quite well with
only 3 accidents in the first week, and night time has gone well. The
two main problems that I'm trying to deal with though and that have me
pretty concerned are biting and crate training.

Gimli is all about mouthing and biting everything. I've never had
much contact with puppies before, but this little guy seems to
experience the whole world with his mouth. And unfortunately besides
trying to bite or chew everything in the whole house, he also has been
biting hands, wrists, ankles, and feet and snapping a lot. So far
what I've been trying to go with is to develop good bite inhibition
and also try to redirect him to his toys. For the bit inhibition
thing, I have been making a loud yelping noise and immediately walking
a few steps away from him when he bites me hard, I then give him one
of his chew toys and encourage him when/if he starts playing with it.
After a week though, he is still biting a lot, and biting hard. How
long, and after how many loud yelps should he be expected to tone
things down.

I'm trying to get him in a puppy playgroup but the one that seems to
be the best shot for me might not start for another week or two. I
also have been trying to get him to meet a lot of people and have had
a lot of friends over and try to be consistent with the yelping with
them, but I think they might not always be loud and consistent enough
with their yelps. I'm also worried about taking him places to meet
other people and especially children, but I'm worried about him
hurting someone. He has made lots of little scratches that break the
skin on my hands and I'm worried that he could do that to a kid too.
Does anyone have any suggestions or experience with this technique
that they could share? Other ideas I've read are mainly for trying to
stop the biting like sticking my fingers down his throat, flicking his
nose or pushing his gums onto his teeth. From what I've read, it
seems bite inhibition is really important and I'm worried if I try to
just stop the biting I might run into problems in the future.

The other biting issue is his biting and chewing of stuff around the
house. When he runs around the room trying to chew everything he sees
I try to distract him, either trying to call him over, waving around
one of his toys or hit something in the room, trying to make a loud
noise to startle him and stop him from what he is doing and then
immediately hand him one of his toys and say "chew toy" to try to
focus him. I am also leaving his toys including a Kong I stuff with
kibble, peanut butter and treats, a rope toy, nylabones and pieces of
towel with treats tied in knots in his crate during the night and day
when he is confined to try to encourage him to chew them.

He is getting a little better with this, but lately he seems to just
work himself up chewing and running around until he gets really
aggressive and I can't to distract him or get him to redirect toward a
chew toy. He gets all growly and starts going off on my comforter or
the carpets, vertical blinds or curtains. If I try to hand him his
chew toys or toss them near him, if he stops what he is chewing, he
seems to often go after me or my hands. Any advice or experience
anyone could share with this?

The other main concern I have is with the crate training I am doing.
From all that I've read, it seems like crate training is the best way
to go and I'm doing my best to make it as smooth as possible for the
little guy. At first I tried using the airline crate that he came in.
I cleaned it out real good with deodorizer as he had made a mess
during the plane trip and put in a towel and a blanket, toys and some
treats in it and left it in my bedroom with the gate open the first
two days. I would move him into it when he was sleeping and would
direct him into it when we came inside, using the word kennel as he
entered it. He would often look for the treat inside and I would
praise him as he entered, sometimes closing the door for just a few
seconds and giving him another treat if he stayed quiet. As I began
to try to lengthen the amount of time with the door closed though, he
began to get really upset. After about 30 seconds or so he would
begin to panic, making lots of terrible noise and pawing, and pacing.

I was worried that the crate might already have a bad association from
the airplane trip and decided to try to start over with a wire pen. I
got an adjustable wire pen with 2ft by 30inch panels and made a 2x2
box for him and draped a blanket over the top. I had been having him
sleep tethered to the bed foot by my head in a little bed which he had
been doing very well, so I put the pen around the bed where he seemed
to be comfortable. I did the same thing with toys and treats and
short closed door times with him and it seemed to go a lot better then
in the airline crate.

I closed it for the first long period of time at night and things went
very well with only a very little bit of whining. Oh, and I was also
giving treats when I began, when he would stop whining and settle down
as I sat next to the crate or lay down next to it. He now seems to do
pretty well if he goes in and I close it while I am in the room with
very minimal whining every once in a while. However, when I leave it
is a totally different story. Shortly after I am out the door he
breaks into a total fit, barking, yelping and whining, making all
kinds of noise that make my skin crawl and makes me feel really
guilty. I have tried leaving for very short periods of time, going in
and out of the closet or the door and coming back during short breaks
in the crying. When I had to start going to work this week though,
things have not been getting better. I've had roommates and friends
come over about 1.5 hours after I leave and 3 hours to let him out to
go to the bathroom and play with him a bit, and I get back home a
little after 4 hours from when I leave in the morning. He has not
seemed to get any more comfortable yet though and barks most of the
time I'm gone.

This morning when I left him sleeping to go eat a bagel he began
totally freaking out as he heard the sliding glass door close. (I
live in a sort of back house that is connected by the patio to the
main house with the kitchen in it) I'm really worried that I'm
instilling a lot of anxiety in him and that things are not going to
get better but worse as time goes on. Is this normal, and how long
can I expect it to go on? My friends and roommates can continue to
help me for the next few weeks, but I am unsure how to proceed with
this. Can people please share some opinions, advice or experiences
that they had to try to help me out. Any reassurance or advice would
be very helpful in making me feel better about things. Thanks in
advance.
Adam
 




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