Category: Top Dog

My 3 month old puppy gets pretty crazy any time anyone comes home, but he calms down relatively quickly, however, when my gf shows up, all hell breaks lose. Biting, jumping, barking, crying, you name it, he has NO chill, and it's not even that he wants to play or anything like that, he wants pets I guess but he obviously won't get it if he is acting like this, he usually gets this, but with her it's really hard for him to calm down.

At his best, i've gotten him to chill for like maybe 10 minutes while she is in the room, she has to be sitting and not interacting with him, and he is going crazy with a toy or something by himself, the moment anyone says his name or calls him or anything he is right back to it and doesn't chill.

I think this might have started because the first 2 times my gf came home, she has been the visit that gave him the most attention, most other visits pet and played with him a little but quickly went on to just chill and largely ignore him. Also she would pet him a bunch and speak with a high pitch to him while he was jumping and going nuts which we told her to not do anymore as we were trying to get him to chill with visits.

I don't really know how to address this, he is not responsive to commands unless I have treats when this happens, with treats he is immediately attentive and will be extremely chill, so he obviously knows that he is supposed to chill, he just can't help himself I guess (Or just doesn't want to be chill in those moments I suppose). Anyway he is a pretty relaxed puppy in most other situations (as far as puppies go) and has been making incredible progress since we got him at 6 weeks old (Too young I know, probably contributes to the behaviour, I know, didn't have a choice).

He also calms down pretty quickly after she leaves, he doesn't just whine, he understands she's gone and moves on to do something else. it's also kind of hard to get a gauge on how much better he's gotten at this because since he's been at our house my gf has come maybe 4 times, and she doesn't come that often, and we obviously don't just spend her entire visit with him because, well she's my girlfriend, I want to be able to hangout witb her and not have to try to discipline the dog literally every second and get covered in scratches and bite marks.

I have a soon to be 6 month old Golden Doxie and we got her when she was 5 month old.

Her precious person did a pretty good job with her as she slept in her pen from the first night she came home. She does however have some separation anxiety when she can sense us in our own room while she’s in her pen in the living room.

So on her second day, we started to just let her be with us in our bedroom while we work and she’s been pretty content playing on her own and still getting into her own mischief.

What I realise though, is that if I put her in her pen while I lay on the bed in my bedroom (she can see our bed from where her pen is) she’ll whine and cry and bark. But if I let her into our room and I take a nap, she’ll nap below the bed around my side of the room.

It’s super cute to me but I’m not sure if this is good training? Or should I really just put her back in her pen to get her more used to being in there in the afternoon?

Hi all,

Dog: Poppy, maltipoo, female, 3lbs, dob 10/13/2025

My girl Poppy is turning four months old on the 13th this month, and I am under the impression that she has perhaps started her teens early?

Yesterday from 4-6am she suddenly began crying/barking and scratching in her crate. I took her to potty but she just sat there and stared off. She has not behaved this way in several, several weeks as I thought we got crate training down wonderfully. At 11 weeks she was sleeping through the whole night and it stayed that way till last night. Now, it’s 11:30pm as I type this and she’s been crying/barking and scratching the same way. All of her needs have been met, there are no problems in the crate; she is simply busting my chops. And it doesn’t help that her bark literally pierces my ear drums, it is absolutely deafening. Moreover, earlier today she was laying in there just fine while I was away (watched her through the camera).

To some, two nights in a row might mean nothing, but for a pup that would automatically shut off once she got in her crate to suddenly act this way, I’m not wasting any time.

Did I get a girl with the case of early teens?

Hey all! For those of you with small breed puppies, what time are you feeding them?

I have a 4 month old Shih Tzu/small poodle/Chihuahua puppy. He's about 6lbs. Previous owners were only feeding him twice a day due to their jobs (also the reason they gave him to me). I've been feeding him 3 times a day at 7:30 am, 1:30pm and 7/7:30 pm. Is 12 hours too long between his last and first meal of the day? I keep reading stuff online that the last evening meal should be around 5pm but also that small dogs can become hypoglycemic very easily so I'm not sure how I could feed him dinner meal earlier without risking hypoglycemia.

He goes to sleep around 8:30/9pm and it's impossible to keep him up later than 9pm. He wakes up around 5:30/6am but tends to cuddle with whoever in the family gets to him first with zero attempt for food and I haven't noticed signs of hypoglycemia.

I took my puppy out to potty at our apartment complex and there’s cement mixed with grass in the area. He got the zoomies and was tangled up in his leash so he’d jump and fall on the cement that happened twice and then on the third time he rolled over and fell on his head. He doesn’t seem to be in any pain but I’m so worried he’s about 13 pounds. Should I take him to the vet tomorrow morning or Monday morning or just monitor him?

Our pup loves to have a collection of things out in the yard. Most of the things he has right now def do not belong outside. Any recs for relatively weatherproof, durable stuff?

I have a 1 year old shih tzu-poodle and we’re having a hard time with her. She is house trained/potty trained fine, sometimes she doesn’t hit the pad though but it is fine. I’ve also taught her tricks before and she did well knowing a lot of them though she still forgot them easily. Then more recently something happened where she got startled and jumped down and ran full force into the wall and was disoriented after hitting her head on the wall pretty hard. Though soon after she seemed fine. (For added context, when she was a little puppy I accidentally dropped her from a height of about three feet). Ever since the wall incident she really doesn’t remember commands or tricks and if she performs them it’s just to get the treat and then forgets them immediately after. Some other concerning habits she has are the following: she has very intense shifts in behavior even when the environment or people have just been the same in a room, she would be suddenly very aggressive and irritated, then very sleepy and affectionate, then seemingly very sad for example. She doesn’t know when to stop doing something even after a long time even if it would cause her own discomfort. She sometimes suddenly drops things while she’s walking. She has a tendency to timidly yet aggressively mess with or almost pretend to “fight with” some still object on the floor for a long period of time. And another unusual thing is that she was just spayed so she should be sleepy and restful I assume, but she is only sleepy after the medication for about 30 minutes and then all of the other time she is usually extremely hyper and barking non stop. However, most of these behaviors she exhibited before the recent head trauma/for as long as I’ve had her. I really can’t afford to take her to any sort of specialist other than a regular vet. Does anyone have any advice or recommendations for how to manage this? Or any opinions on what might be the problem? I’ve wondered if she could possibly have “dog autism” and I see that head trauma could also be a possible cause. I have already always been very consistent with her in routine and balancing her all of her needs and wants – as I saw that is important when managing this.

I have an 11 month old mini dachshund. He’s slept in his crate ever since we brought him home at 8 weeks and it’s never been an issue. However, all of a sudden he will cry and whine as soon as he’s locked inside at night. During the day he spends 3-4 hours at most in the crate and at night, he’s in there for about 6-7 hours so it’s not like he spends a whole of time in there. I make sure to take him out to potty before crating and his crate is in a quiet area with a blanket over top. He’s never ever whined when being crated at night but all of a sudden these past few nights he’s started crying non stop the second he’s locked inside and I don’t know what to do. I can’t leave him out to free roam because he will tear shit up, or get into something he shouldn’t. Is this just a phase he’s going through? Is there something I should be doing to retrain him? What do I do?! I can deal with 20-30 minutes of whining but this is 2-3 HOURS of nonstop wailing until I just eventually let him out and sleep on the couch with him because I feel bad (which I know is just giving him what he wants and reenforcing this behavior) I just don’t know what else to do.

Hey everyone, I recently got a Cockapoo 2nd gen a little over a week ago and man it has been a trip 😭. I honestly just been so overwhelmed because it’s my first time having a puppy (even though my parents are there to help out) and I just trying to be good puppy parent and a good college student at the same time😭.

In the very beginning he was fine he was much calm mostly because it was first time being at the house and trying to get adjusted, but once he was more adjusted he started playing bitting a lot and even start tugging on my pants and stuff to get our attention to play with him, and we obviously I love him so much and unknowing started babying too much.

And when I went to the train today, my puppy would not leave my side (being a true Velcro dog) he did explore a bit but eventually sat next to me. And the train noticed and started explaining separation anxiety to me, and after the training, the whole situation shocked me but now I’m just worried, it all sinking in and I just worried about him becoming an aggressive dog because of my poor training skills. I really love and cherish him but this puppy period is really giving puppy blues and unexpected regret 😞. Do u guys have any advice also I’m sorry if I have grammar issues😭.