Category: Top Dog

Is this okay? I’ve been doing it for my puppy and it seems to calm him down in his crate at night.

hi!

we recently adopted a male frenchie puppy at 6 weeks, he is now 9 weeks. (early, i know but he came from a friend who was emergently moving and needed to home the babies)

we live in a mostly carpeted apartment, save for the kitchen tiles & bathrooms. at the advice of our vet, puppy is on “house arrest” while he completes his vaccines schedule (18 weeks— so 9 more weeks to go…) as all the grass areas in our complex are high dog traffic areas.

i work from home and am home with him all day long save for the hour or so while i go to a workout class (he stays gated in the kitchen tiled area)

at first he was doing well with puppy pads in the kitchen, but within the last week or so his 80% accuracy on the pad has fallen to basically only one time a day. we immediately praise and reward with treats when he goes on the pad, but within the last week he’s taken to going anywhere except the pee pad; carpet, tile, the kitchen mat we stand on at the sink.

if i catch him squatting, i interrupt and immediately bring him to the pee pad, but he will just sit or lay there (for upwards of 15-20 minutes) until he can run off to play again and eventually try to potty elsewhere.

any tips or tricks to get him back on the pee pad?

i did order one of those faux grass pee pads which should be here tomorrow, to put on our patio to make the eventual transition to outside easier.

I have a new chihuahua/italian greyhound mix puppy that is 7 months old. We have only had her a few days but so far she really doesn’t like my cat. She has lunged at her a few times when the cat was walking by the puppy’s food which is understandable but she just tried to go after the cat 2 more times in other parts of the house. Can someone please tell me how to break this behavior so it doesn’t become permanent? I can’t leave them alone to even shower because I’m afraid something will happen so I have to wait until my fiance gets home everyday at midnight.

Hey everyone,

I’m looking for some advice on puppy food brands. Our breeder started our pup on Purina Pro Plan Puppy (Lamb & Rice), and while it’s been great for him, it is definitely getting expensive to keep up with.

We really wanted to switch to a Costco brand to save some money, but our local warehouse only seems to carry the Lamb & Rice formula for Adults, not puppies.

For those of you who specifically use a Lamb and Rice puppy food:

• Which brand are you currently using?

• Have you found any high-quality options that are a bit more budget-friendly than Purina?

• Is there a specific "Kirkland" or "Nature’s Domain" version at your Costco that I might be missing that works for puppies?

We want to keep him on a lamb-based diet if possible since he's doing so well on it, but the price tag on the Purina bags is starting to add up.

Would love to hear what brands you all swear by! Thanks!

My 4 month old male Field Golden Retriever is resourceful guarding. From what I’ve seen in comparison it’s quite mild, he ONLY resource guards high value treats (like frozen pupsickle, frozen peanut butter treats, anything that takes awhile to get to that he can also eat) he doesn’t resource guard bully sticks, or chew toys. I can pet him and take them and he doesn’t care at all. His food is a little weird, he doesn’t growl often with his food but he does tense up a lot and sometimes freeze or try and eat it as fast as possible. The weird part is, both with high value treats and food, he doesn’t care if you grab the treat or food, he can watch you walk up and take it and he won’t tense up or growl 90% of the time, it’s only when I touch HIM does he growl and tense up. If I pet his head or back, even gently, while he’s chewing his treat or eating his food he tenses up a lot and growls a lot with his treat. Things I’ve tried so far: when I first noticed it obviously I thought it was a control thing so I made sure to lightly grab his flank and take the treat away, trying to enforce the idea that he doesn’t control it. I’ve sense read up on it and heard that might not be the best way to go about it. Right now I’m feeding him by hand, and when he has a treat I will make sure everytime I walk up to him i offer him another treat of equal or higher value like a training treat, and take the one he has for maybe 10 seconds, pet him and give it back I’ve only just started this so he still growls when I pet him while he has it but not once I’ve taken it. He’s only tried to bite me a few times and that was when I first got him at 10 weeks and the resource guarding was worse especially with food. Now he rarely shows teeth and normally just a low growl and tenses up. I don’t want this to become a worse problem. He’s great in every other area, crate trained, potty trained, loves other dogs and people, place trained, super smart dog.

I have a pup that I adopted three months ago. He is a large breed mutt, estimated a year old, who I absolutely love. I am sending him to a board and train in four weeks from now (which will last 3 weeks) while i am attending an important family event overseas.

I really love the woman who runs the board and train in my community. She is absolutely wonderful, and people around here call her the dog angel because she is so amazing and gentle with dogs.

She said she recommends that I crate train my dog before she takes him. So for the last three weeks, as per her advice I have been feeding him in his crate twice a day. Despite it being three weeks that I’ve been doing this, he is still very nervous to walk in….he gobbles his food while his back legs are extended out of the crate, and then dashes away right after he finishes eating.

Overall, let’s just say he is not aloof toward the crate.

I am anxious that it’s only four weeks until I have to leave him, so today I pushed his butt into the crate during breakfast and dinner today. And quickly closed it up. I only left him in the crate for maybe five minutes, and both times he started to pant and whimper which was stressful for me. Once he somewhat stopped, I let him out.

Is what I’m doing correct?

All the YouTube videos I watch seem to suggest that at some point the dog will just walk in and you casually close up the crate, not the case for me.

Any advice in crate training a large almost adults dog? I am so nervous he won’t warm up to it.