Category: Top Dog

Hi everyone, just wondering if anyone has any tips for navigating and surviving the "teenage" years? Our training was going extremely well however we are finding now that with some things we are starting over again. His adult teeth are still coming through so I anticipate that has something to do with it, however the sudden resurgence of jumping/biting at arms and mittens and my coat on walks is driving me crazy! Overall he seems to suddenly have higher energy, impulse control is kind of going out the window, and he's getting a bit more reactive on walks (excited reactivity with people and dogs).

When he gets like that on walks I put him in a sit/down/stay until he calms down a bit and then we proceed. We are also staying consistent with our training and not caving in when he pushes boundaries.

Any tips would be greatly appreciated because holy this is hard! It is deep winter where we live so its feeling extra exhausting raising a young puppy.

4m old female husky mix. Thought it was strange she was spayed so early but it was prior to us adopting her.

Shes been going good with the potty but she randomly leaks pee when she’s excited. She rolls over on her side lifts her leg a little and a tiny pee comes out.

She also pees on us when we try and pick her up sometimes.

She still pees normally outside and poops. But if it weren’t for the dribbling she’d be potty trained.

I hear so many people say it is bad to have my puppy (he is just eight weeks old and I have him the third day today) and you should have the puppy with you all the time. But I thought having them with me would overwhelm him?

I seriously do not know what is right anymore and I truly want to do it right! So, how long did you put your pup in a play pen or crate?

So admittedly this is my first dog – we didn't set out to get such a large dog but instead ended up finding a stray and when we couldn't find his owner/people in the area claimed he was dumped we gave up and decided to keep him. When we found him he was about 30lbs – we've made it to the 7month mark of having him and he is now 60lbs. He looked full grown when we got him but he had a huge growth spurt. He's presumably only a year old maybe slightly over a year (barely)because looking back he was definitely still a puppy maybe like 5-6months old. Anyways- we are unsure of his breed we're thinking lab pit? He is BIG and VERY PUPPY and still has so many puppy behaviors even at his large size and age. Did anyone else with a big dog like this experience a longer puppy period? I just see a lot of people claim their dog calmed down at about a year and he has definitely improved but is still very puppy. It just feels like there's no end in sight to the crazies. I'd love some insight from anyone who raised a larger breed of dog and how they behaved/when they finally started to get some sense/calm down.

I need to travel from Los Angeles to Miami for a week and a half and will have a 5 month old puppy at the time. Do you think a 5/6 hour flight is too long for a puppy of that age? I'd love to bring him, but not sure if that is too much flying? Should I still to boarding him?

We’re about to go on a month-long trip and leaving our one year old puppy with capable friends. However he’s never been away from us both for more than a weekend, and me for two weeks. During the two weeks, my fiancé said he was lower energy and seemed a bit confused/anxious. I work from home so we spend a lot of time together, and although our friends are great and our puppy has met them, he’s never spend this long with them. I’m wondering how we prepare him/say goodbye to him in the best was that will leave him with the least anxiety and confusion possible. I hate that I can’t explain to him what’s happening but we’re going out of the country for our wedding where my fiancé is from and I felt that it would be too much to bring him.

Hi! My girlfriend and I just got a new 3 month old puppy two days ago. I work from home 4 days a week and go into the office one. Bonnie will be going into the office with my GF the one day I am at my office. Any advice for crate training during the day? Originally I didn’t even think about this as we were strictly crate training at night so far but my dad and one of my co workers recommended it to me as a way to also help with potty training. Any advice on how we should approach this?

My husband and I have an 11 week old female Boykin Spaniel pup. We took her home at 8 weeks from a reputable breeder. We were very prepared for the puppy insanity, and overall things are going really well. We're doing lots of training, and are especially dedicated to the prevention of possessive tendencies/resource guarding after a really traumatic experience with a previous dog.

However: I'm worried that our past experience and trauma has made us too careful/paranoid around potential guarding situations, and I don't want to inadvertently cause guarding issues because we're over rotating on the prevention.

My main question: how should we be handling low- to mid-value bones and toys around the house?

So far, we've been keeping toys out of reach unless we're playing with one together. We want them to be high value items so she's excited to play with us. We've got a good game of tug trained, with a pretty reliable "out" where she drops the toy (as long as we have cheese for a trade). We've been keeping bones out of reach unless one of us is holding it for her to chew, and we have 1-2 crate safe bones that live in her crate. For meals, we hand feed/train or feed her in her crate, and we're doing exercises with the food bowl to create positive associations with us being near it. All of that is going great.

In the last week or so, we've been letting her play with bones (Nylabones and Benebones, nothing super high value) around the house on her own. I realized that by keeping them all out of reach, we were potentially increasing the value of these bones…and that maybe if they're available all the time, they'll be less valuable (and she'll be less likely to guard them).

As for toys, we have 1-2 softer tug toys that we play tug with. I never leave her alone with these, mostly for safety because I don't want her to chew them and swallow small pieces of fabric. But she's started to figure out where we keep these, and definitely took note today when I put her favorite purple cow tug toy away after a game of tug, and I can feel that she's like: "but wait a minute, why can't I have it all the time?"

I also know Spaniels are literally bred to hold things in their mouths…but after watching her carry a few of her Nylabones around the house, I am just so paranoid now that she'll start guarding one. I also know that dogs can smell adrenaline/tell when someone's nervous, so I don't want to accidentally cause guarding behaviors because I'm freaking out over nothing.

Are we going about things the right way? Should we take these bones back and keep them exclusive (available only in the crate or with us), or does that just make them more valuable and increase her chances of guarding?