Category: Top Dog

Wondered what everyone is using?

My puppy (20 weeks old) has been struggling with coming when called when she’s off leash. She has a near perfect “come” at home with no distractions, and doesn’t pull on leash except when we pass by other dogs.

If we’re at the dog park, the only way we can get her is if she gets distracted by another dog or toy and then is tricked into being picked up. I know this isn’t ideal, but there’s no way to get her to listen, and she ignores treats when playing outside is much more fun.

I need help! We tried to use a long line leash, but she is fairly small, and trips over it or will chase/bite the leash. It also seems a bit impractical for the dog park as other dogs would get caught in it.

I think this issue is stemming from her entering the teenage phase as well. This is my partner and I’s first pet, and we live in an apartment in a city. When she was younger (14-18 weeks), we’d walk her every night to the park and let her off leash and she would run back and forth between us no problem. She understands grass = play, and not to run on the concrete. I fear we gave her too much independence and now we can’t get the boundary back. How can I retrain her properly? I think we seriously messed up.

This weekend, we were at my partner’s parents’ home in the suburbs. They live on a hill and their backyard is separated by a sloped driveway. She’s usually really good about boundaries, but she ran into the street and we were only able to get her when my partner’s dad knelt like he was going to play with her and then picked her up. I think again, this is a more fun distraction than us or treats, so she was willing to go to him.

She’s a 6 month old black lab that i’ve had since she was 8 weeks old, she’s lovely.

Shes my first ever dog so i’m still learning, especially with her emotions and behaviour.

The term ‘told off’ is just me raising my voice a little with a firm tone and saying ‘no!’.

She had gotten hold of my charger this morning and in a panic i had snatched it off from her and told her off, which she then barked at me and had a little biting fit at my legs but not hard enough to hurt, and then went back to laying down for me within a few seconds.

She does this a lot when being told off and having something taken off from her.

I need help with identifying what this behaviour means, is she anxious? Does she have an issue with wanting to be in control? How do i help her?

We got our puppy mid September and he lived with us since he was 10 weeks. He’s a good boy, had a lot of improvement in separation anxiety(can now be left alone for up to 3 hours VS crying when we went to the bathroom), can do some commands, sleeps through the night in his play pen BUT he’s still not fully potty trained.

We’re still waiting for his shots, so atm he goes on a peepad and he poops there pretty consistently as long as we give a little bit of guidance but he rarely ever goes himself to pee there unless the peepad is in his playpen. I’m not frustrated with him because he’s just a baby but are we lacking behind in training? l see stories here of people potty training their dogs in weeks, meanwhile he’s still pretty inconsistent with it even after 1.5 month at our place.

l understand it’s not his fault but ours, so if anyone has any tips on how to improve potty training on a peepad or could even just say if this behavior is normal at this age, l would really appreciate it!

Hi everyone, I’m having a hard time getting my 8-week-old Border Collie puppy to eat Orijen Puppy. He refuses it completely.

He eats his wet food (Specific Dechra) with no problem, but the moment I mix it with crushed kibble, he starts hesitating and ends up picking out all the kibble pieces.

I’ve tried mixing it gradually, adding water, and even crushing it more, but he still won’t eat it. I’m starting to get really worried because I know he needs proper nutrition for his age.

Has anyone had a similar experience with Orijen? Should I keep trying or just stick with wet food for now and try again in a few days?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated — I’m honestly getting desperate.

Thanks in advance!

Me and my partner adopted a 2 month old puppy. I was gone for 3 weeks so our puppy got used to following my partner around the parts of the house we allow him in. At the beginning we tried having him in a playpen but he quickly realised if he moved enough he could jump over it and escape.

So for now we are doing enforced naps (a godsend, really) and for the hours he is up he’s with us. Pretty soon he will be needing to sleep less hours of the day and we are trying to get him used to a bigger wired crate so that he can’t escape.

He LOATHES it. He stresses himself out so bad that, even given the opportunity to go potty twice before he goes in there, he gets himself worked up to the point where he soils the crate and then splashes around, bouncing off the wires. We can’t leave anything else in there besides a toy. He destroys peepads, towels, even his water bowl.

He’ll settle eventually if we are in the room but if we are still in the house in another room he loses it.

I’m doing Susan Garrett’s crate games, giving him his meals in there, I play with him there, covering the big crate but nothing seems to stick as a positive enforcement.

I should add that he gets mental and physical stimulation at least twice a day everyday.

He is settling really nicely on his small crate where we have him sleeping for every 1-1/2hs he is awake. If I leave his sleeping small crate inside the “playpen” big crate he starts chewing it out of stress.

We wanna make our boy comfortable but it feels like he can’t be trusted with anything nice in there because he will get in the habit of destroying things when left alone.

Any owners or trainers in here that have any advice?

We have a gorgeous 7 month old cocker spaniel girl called Daphne. In general, she's done well with her training, so affectionate and she's wonderful with everyone she meets. Our garden is her domain, she loves hiding toys and treats under the bushes and she's dug numerous holes all over our lawn and flowerbeds!

But since Saturday, her behaviour in the garden has really changed and we can't for the life of us work out what is wrong. She's constantly whining to go out there, and then when she does, she's instantly nose to the ground and running in loops frantically. She's jumping at the bushes and barking at them incessantly too. She also will not come back in when called like she used to. She will stand in the middle of the garden and stare at you when you call her.

We've been under the bushes and shaken them all, but we can't find anything she might have lost. But it's also the frantic searching she seems to be doing across the whole garden with the occasional bark thrown in there too that's confusing us.

She has a walk around our local woods off lead every day, her recall there is good and she has a wonderful time. She has a ton of toys, we play with her, she has snuffle mats and puzzle toys to occupy her brain. She's still her usual affectionate self, especially when she's tired, and although I can sense adolescence starting, she is still doing okay with her training indoors.

Has anyone got any advice or an idea what this could be please??