Category: Top Dog

First let me say that this subreddit has been terrific during the last 6 months we've owned our lil 'ol rescue, Bella. Thank you to everyone for answering my many, many questions.

So, my 73 yo retired husband and I (still working full-time) have had Bella almost 7 months now. We are a very nice daily routine. She eats pretty regularly (she didn't always) and she willingly goes on walks and she loves going to the dog park.

I was just wondering when she might relax a bit and maybe even trust us some. She still flinches at sudden movements and or loud noises. She's learned the command "sit" very well, and we are working on "come." She is super afraid of all people except my husband and I. Any of your ideas and experiences would be appreciated.

She loves jumping on things and can easily jump 4 feet with no effort. I think she'd really enjoy agility training and I would too. I know I should not rush her, but can I help her along?

So it's been a while since I played guitar and I wanna try to introduce it to my 10 week puppy since it's the socialization period so I can play again more while I keep an eye on her without she giving me the look of "what you doing hooman".

But since she is an active pup(like a lot of 10w old pups), and quiet bitey and wants to play a lot, how do I approach this?

I really do invest time in her and I do play with her that's absolutely not the issue. But like watching a show while I play with her sometimes, I also want to be able to play guitar for couple minutes while she plays by herself so I can do something for myself while keeping an eye out on her but I feel guilty if I don't spend time with her while she is awake. we have a puppy pen though for longer times to do things in the apartment but I want to let her explore freely while having a eagle eye on her if I would play guitar. And between naps I be as quiet as I can so not a great combo with guitar. I have a GF so I could play a bit while she is here but it's also for the times I am alone with the pup but just don't know how to do it right though?

It's not for every time she is awake, but more to just relax a bit between the landshark attacks sometimes

My dog turns 1 tomorrow and the past couple of days I have tried putting his harness and maybe a leash on him inside when he shows annoying teenage behaviour. It instantly clams him down and stop any barking or unwanted behaviour.

Does anyone have any suggestions as to why? And how I get this behaviour graduate into not requiring him to wear his harness?

Mostly I am just confused about how it is working but definitely not mad about it haha! And just to clarify he has no problems with wearing his harness so it is not because he is uncomfortable or anything😅

NOTE: Accidentally posted this yesterday afternoon without the actual body, my mistake 😅

While this question is specifically directed towards those who have owned/trained (American) Cockers, it could also extend to show-line English Cockers. I've posted this to the cocker subs, curious what you guys' input is!

Recently I've been looking at potential future dog breeds (more out of hyperfixation than current necessity), and two breeds I haven't managed to cross off my list are the American and English Cocker Spaniels. However, I did have a couple of questions about training. While both breeds are described by a multitude of sources as being "very eager to please," I have also seen quite a few owner/trainer accounts talking about what ditzes their dogs are. I'll admit that my standards might be a tad high (current dog is a Standard Poodle 😅), but I was curious what you guys thought. I will admit that this seemed predominantly targeted at American Cockers (all described as very sweet, and trying their very best to please), but most shining reviews of ECSs were about field-bred lines.

For reference: When reading about Brittanys, I saw one comment that summed it up: "Simultaneously extremely smart and dumber than a bag of hammers." While that didn't quite sound my speed (keeping in mind that maybe I'm not a spaniel person), I've also fallen in love with Cavaliers. Not a poodle by any means, but the absolute sweetest things (and quite intelligent).

Where do American Cockers and bench-line ECSs fall with these examples? Curious to hear you guys think!

We have an 11 week old puppy and he is not fully vaccinated yet. We do not take him out very often and when we do, we go to the forest where we do not meet many people. Once a week we visit a puppy training school where he meets some other dogs, but that is pretty much all the contact he gets for now.

Today on our forest walk, we met a lady with her dog/puppy. I guess he was around one year old. He was barking at our pup and she asked if he could come closer, saying he is not bad, just barky. We agreed because I thought she would let them look at each other first and maybe play later. Instead she let her dog rush straight at our puppy (he was very larger than our pup). He got very loud and our pup got really scared. She did not pull the leash at all, even when we picked our puppy up, and she still let her dog climb on us.

Luckily, her dog did not hurt him, but our pup was clearly terrified and even tried to fight back at first.

I am worried this could hurt his socialization. Maybe it is good that he learns not all dogs are friendly, but this felt way too much for him. I will not let dogs that look poorly behaved near him again and honestly I should have just said no to her request. I think we will wait for more random dog encounters until he is fully vaccinated.

Do you think this was a seriously bad experience for him and should we do something to balance it out, or should we just let it go and I am being too cautious and worried?

As the title says, my two year old lab mix will not stop peeing on the sofa. She was house trained by about 6 months old and then went through a brief phase of peeing on my older dog's stuff. She went months without an incident but now she pees on the sofa every couple of weeks. Just the sofa. I tried leaving pee pads in the living room and she ignores them. She almost always does this in the evening when I'm in the shower or otherwise not paying attention to her. Any suggestions would be very welcome. Thanks!