Category: Top Dog

Have a 14 week old lab puppy. She has one more round of shots (IIRC just her rabies shot). Is it ok to start taking her on short walks at the park/around our neighborhood? We live in a pretty dog-dense neighborhood/town/state.

So my guy just turned 1 on Christmas Day. He’s been an overall pretty good puppy since I got him. He’s a golden so he has an issue with mouthing/chewing and getting overexcited, but it’s been manageable puppy behavior. However, recently he’s been destroying things in the middle of the night. This past week he’s chewed up my rug and a cardboard decor box I had in my room. He has chewed a little bit on my rug, but has never touched the box I’ve had since I got him.

Helpful info:

– He gets plenty of exercise: 2-2.5 hour off-leash sniffy walks daily, a few minutes of training everyday, 3 days playing with other dogs, and sometimes I’ll feed him out of a puzzle feeder. I also run him on my dads golf cart for about 30-45 minutes 2 days a week in addition to a walk

– he’s not crate trained. He has been chewing things up during the day (a cheap rug that I don’t care about), so I’m already planning to crate him during the day. I’ve bought a crate and it’ll be here this weekend

– I really don’t want to crate him at night because he gets hot and moves so much during his sleep. I also enjoy our morning and evening snuggles too much lol.

Anyone have ideas on what could be cause this change in behavior?? I’m sorry for the long post. Just really struggling and looking for any helpful advice / similar experiences, etc.

My wife and I recently got a Golden retriever puppy that’s now coming up on 10weeks. He’s been such a joy to have, although here and there *definitely* has his moments (which is to be expected!)

One thing we’re having trouble with is leaving the house without him howling his mind away. He’s on a fairly strict schedule and has eased much better into enforced naps, about 3-4 throughout the day, but when he sees us leave even if he’s in the play pen, he sings the song of his people.

We’re trying to be better ignoring him once all his needs are met, and progress has been steady, but we feel shackled to our space. Either she leaves and I stay, or the other way around.

This weekend we have family visiting and of course we’ve established our situation but we’re trying to how best navigate when we’ll be out 1-2.5 hours out of the day multiple times and with our little guy.

For context he takes naps in the crate and his play pen, he’s easy to put down if we shush him and give him pets as he’s in his crate, but we literally tip toe around the house to ensure he stays asleep and doesn’t hear us leave if we even get a chance to!