Category: Top Dog

my puppy, and yes I know she's not a puppy anymore since she'll be 7 soon no longer plays with toys. she used to only play when she had another dog to play with whether it was a stuffed animal, rope, or whatever other kind of toy. had anyone else had this happen? I have several toys for her around the house and she still only chews on them every once in a while and they acts like they don't exist.

I'm wondering if she's lonely and just wants to share?

Hello! I live in the UK in a terrace house with a back garden.

New neighbours moved in 2 doors down about a month ago and they have 2 cats that are constantly in our garden. The back gardens are separated by a big hedge with chicken wire along the bottom and then some more branch hedges. We’ve blocked off as many gaps as we can but they’re still getting in.

This is causing issues as we can no longer let our dog (staffy, 10) out for toilet breaks or run around without throughly checking the garden first and throwing the cats back over the hedge if they’re in our garden. He will chase smaller animals and obviously I don’t want him to harm a cat but also I want us and him to be able to use our garden as and when we want to!

Is there any kind of deterrent we could set up to stop the cats coming in? I’ve seen alarms but I don’t want these to impact wildlife or my own dog. Any suggestions would be gratefully received!

My spouse got our aussiedoodle a year and change before I came into the picture. I know, not my choice of dog either but this is what I got. She’s honestly a fantastic dog. She’s fully trained, extremely well behaved, and never sets a paw out of line. I don’t need to leash her (obviously I do, but I wouldn’t need to), she doesn’t bark, doesn’t beg, doesn’t dig, doesn’t chase after anything etc. You’d hardly even know she’s there. She’s like the unicorn of doodles.

I will say she loves on us both equally. She really enjoys spending quality time with us and doesn’t have a favorite.

Over the last year she’s gotten more sassy and more vocal about my spouse and I showing each other affection. It’s been even worse since I got pregnant. I’m almost 7 months along. My spouse will give me a kiss on the forehead, a hug, literally anything and our dog just whines and moans. She will paw at us, cry and bellow like an idiot, try to get in between us and say “MAMA.” She acts like someone shot her. She’s legit a human in a dog suit it’s freaking weird. She doesn’t stop unless we ignore her for long enough or stop touching each other.

She also tends to follow me around more and will nose her way into the bathroom no matter what I’m doing in there, just to check on me. She will often lay down right outside the door if I close it.

Has anyone had an experience with a well-trained adult female dog switching up her behavior like this? She is spayed. Males are fine too but I am unsure if her sex has anything to do with it. The only other thing I can possibly think of is that she might be bored. She has a hip issue that we are working to mend currently, so her walking and play have been modified so as to not exacerbate the injury. The injury doesn’t make her cry or complain at all, she just has an abnormal gait.

Thank you to anyone who can offer any insight!

TLDR; my well-trained, well-behaved spayed adult female dog started getting sassy and vocal about my spouse and I showing affection to each other over the last year. Any idea why?

Like the title says, I’m currently living in an apartment with a 2.5yr old Pomeranian. Every time I pick up the harness and leash he runs away.

Before I brought him to the apartment, I was at my moms house where he had a yard and could do his business there so we worked on desensitizing the harness and leash and he’d let me put it on and off with no issues in one specific room only (where I would do mini sessions of treating him heavily to change the condition of the harness). I thought it worked but never actually took him out with the harness and leash since I didn’t have to force it.

But now in the apartment we HAVE to go out to potty and he is back to running away from it. I’m not sure what to do as now there’s no where for him to potty if it’s not outside on leash. He doesn’t mind the harness once it’s on and the leash he’d still prefer to not have it but he’s generally okay once they’re on and we’re outside. It’s the getting it on part that’s a struggle.

I don’t know what to do. I’ve tried doing mini treat sessions with the leash and harness when we don’t have to go outside but then there’s times when I absolutely have to take him or he won’t get a potty chance and it’s like all the work is undone. In the apartment he has slowly gotten close to the harness with treating but doesn’t let me put it over head. I have to corner him to put it on when we HAVE to go out. Any advice is appreciated!

I got a 5-6 month old puppy almost 3 months ago. He had never been outside the home and yard he was in before I got him, and he has been very difficult to train. I live in a busy and dense city. He hates walks, he's scared of everything and everyone, and is not food motivated at all. It's actually very difficult to get him to eat the amount of food he's supposed to eat. He does get ong very well with my cat though which is nice.

I wfh, and he constantly needs attention, even with our cat playing with him. He goes on walks every 2 hours for about 10-20 minutes for potty training, I do training sessions with him after walks to help build his confidence (I heard it's like CBT training), but he needs to either be in my lap and licking me constantly, or needs to be in the same room with me while playing with our cat. I'm around constant noise.

On top of that, when I try to get space from him he just whines every 2 minutes. I've gotten collectively 4 hours of sleep the last 8 days (one night I got decent sleep) and I'm actually having a meltdown from sleep deprivation. I put him to bed in his pen in a room far from my bedroom at around 12 am when I go to bed, and he wakes up at 5 am barking (and I have to get him to stop because neighbors) to use the bathroom. I give him just a little water when I put him to bed to try to help, but he just has such bad seperation anxiety.

I've tried not getting excited when seeing him, practicing being away from him, and it's like he's getting worse. I can't work with him around and I can't sleep. I can't afford dog boarding either. I feel like a bad dog owner not being able to handle this. What do I do?

I just rescued a GSD retriever mix several months ago. The foster family estimate him to be 1-2 yo. He’s a really good dog. But one quirk I noticed is that he doesn’t squat when he poops. We would be taking him on walks, then suddenly mid walk he would pause, tense up, million mile stares, and start pooping while he’s in his walking position, he would often times pees at the same time.

This is a minor inconvenience because we would often leave poop stains on the sidewalk since he would not go to the grass. We would like to train him if we can but I’m not seeing anything online. At this point if I can get him to poop in the grass or dirt that would be a huge improvement. Is it possible to even teach him to get into the squat position?

I’ll admit, since getting my Brussels griffin, consistent training has been difficult to sustain. He has some basics down and listens for the most part, but I’ve came across a couple griffs in the wild and they are usually off leash in metro areas staying at the heel of their owners.

I’m not sure my boy will ever get to that point. I don’t think I have the time, funds, or experience to consistently invest in training that comprehensive. However, I would at least like to get him to a point of loose leash walking and being a little more attentive on me. He is about 16 months, definitely rebellious, and my partner and I transitioned him fully to a harness. We originally doing slip leash work for the first maybe couple months after we got him but after one too many lunges, a couple dreaded honks, and not learning his lesson we simply couldn’t risk it. We learned that brachycephalic breeds are more prone to tracheal collapse and with the slip seemingly leaving him unfazed despite some very obvious strain to his airway, we hung up that tool permanently.

Have any small dog owners successfully used a front clip harness? I know that with the front clip, there’s still a worry about joints even if it’s properly fitted, but I feel like this could potentially be really beneficial for my boy. He’s become more of a “gentle puller,” meaning he doesn’t just dart to the end of the leash anymore but rather slowly gets to the very end of the leash and then starts putting his weight in to try to pull. Once he gets to this point, I can’t really redirect him or even get him to focus on me. I feel like a front clip throwing him off balance might help prevent this behavior and then as he learns to walk loose to reinforce the loose walking?

He does great when distraction free and has some frustrated greeter behaviors that we’re working through. But loose leash is what I’m struggling most with mainly because I feel (and other trainers have told me) that it’s because we transitioned him to the harness which almost encourages a dog to pull. But I simply refuse to do anything that can potentially hurt my dog. I was deeply saddened the couple times I heard him honk and he just wouldn’t stop hurting himself.

My male dog, J, gets aggressive when he seems scared. For example, when he is sleeping or dozing off, he may react aggressively if a person or another animal comes near him or jumps onto the area where he is lying.(both seem to be when he doesnt really notice) My main concern is recently we had a family friend (Jessie) thats a vet come over, because his dewclaw was broken at a weird angle and needed to be taken off. During the struggle of getting him to stay still so Jessie can look, he ended up giving it a clean break by himself. Jessie had wrapped his paw/leg and then went to put a liquid medication in his ear because of an infection. Well, J never likes his ears being touched (even before the infection) during the process she had to put a muzzle on him because he was starting to panic and get aggressive. That wasn't enough, and she had to completely restrain his legs and keep him still so we could get the medication in his ear. The process was very rough to watch because of the state of panic he was in: Involuntary anal gland release, Red eyes, Excessive drool, Panting, Whining, pacing, and hiding. Is there any better way that he can get the treatment he needs (in a short time) and without him being this scared? If there are any fast working tips id really appreciate it, and if theres long term tips I would greatly appreciate those aswell.

Hello, I have a one year old dachshund mix. He is pad trained for poop and will go on his pad if he doesn’t go outside. I’m starting to run into a big problem with the pee though. He refuses to pee on the pad, he will randomly pee on the carpet for no damn reason whatsoever it seems. He goes out every 3-4 hours. Actually whats making me write this post is the fact I took him out just like 2.5 hrs ago and I just walked into my room and there’s piss on the floor. He is on a pretty consistent schedule. Meals are at the same times and potty breaks are typically around the same times too. I do know he has separation anxiety so I put a diaper on him before we leave the house, or else there will be small piss spots all over the house but for whatever reason he will still go sometimes when we are home, after we’ve taken him out and while we have him on a schedule. I’m starting to lose it lol