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Hi,

It's a bit of a long story, but my wife and I are currently fostering 7 puppies and a mother dog that were abandoned. We're working with a local org to get them adopted, so we do have some support there, but they are pretty overwhelmed.

The puppies are about 8 weeks old right now. When we found them at 5 weeks old they were malnourished, full of worms and fleas and pretty weak. We've got them back up to health in the last few weeks and they are doing great! My questions are really about best practices for puppy raising and socializing. I realize we wont have them for long, but I know that the 8-12 weeks time period is also crucial socialization time for puppies, so we want to do the best we can to set them up for success.

Here is what we're doing now. Any critique is welcomed:

• The puppies are in our (very nice) air conditioned and heated detached garage.
• Their main pen is about 12x 20ft. About 3x per day we open the garage door and they have an extension to the pen that gives them another large space to play outside.
• we're feeding 4x per day. Currently using 3 large bowls for this, but thinking we should move to individual bowls? They have access to fresh water.
• their main pen is lined with sheets that we swap in the morning and evening. We try and clean their poop throughout the day to keep them clean and keep them from eating it. Any alternative methods to this would be helpful. Its a lot of work.
• we try to give the puppies lots of human attention and affection.
• Mom still wants to feed them, and they still want to feed, but she isnt producing much milk and they're pretty much on dry food.
• we let mom in the pen throughout the day to feed and play with the pups. She is very gentle with them and they love rolling around and playing with her. I wonder if keeping mom more separate is good or bad? Eventually they'll be adopted out, so they'll have to separate at some point.

I'm happy to answer any questions or take any advice anyone has, either for puppy well being or tips/ tricks to help us handle this many puppies without going crazy. This is our first time with puppies and we're doing our best!

Here are some photos of the pups: https://imgur.com/a/UOOdcCp

Hi guys. I have an almost 6mo old black lab, and he’s always been a bit leash reactive (pulling on the leash to try to play w other dogs) which we were working on. But recently he has started barking and growling at strangers. He has been socialized since a puppy and went to a “puppy school” where they teach them basic commands and socialize them to sounds/ scenarios because we live in a busy city. He would be out and meet different people/kids. He went there for about a month after we got him. Now his routine is he goes to a daycare 2x a week and the rest is at home (he’s not alone at home we go on walks and play fetch at the park). I first noticed him growling at strangers a month or two ago where he did it at a homeless person (to be fair, he did have blankets all over him and it was still dark out) but since then he’s done a small growl maybe two times at people that have surprised him. Yesterday I picked him up from puppy daycare and I saw a friend (male) on the street and once I got closer and we started talking he started to bark at him. This morning, our neighbor was getting into their apartment when same thing happened, he started to bark at them. I definitely think it’s coming from a place of fear or uncertainty more than anything else, and I have heard they can regress and become fearful around this age. I am already looking for trainers to help us a bit more with this problem but I wanted to post just in case there’s something helpful I could be doing right now or if anyone has ever dealt with anything like this before. Also vet said we can neuter at 6 months, so he might be doing that next month.

We have a 4 month old golden retriever and she she doing good with training and we work with her everyday. However, we do independent play also and was wondering if anyone had good toys or enrichment ideas for that? She will chew through soft toys pretty fast (teething problem?). She is very food motivated. A puzzle game we got her, she figured it out in 5 mins and now she can just do it instantly. Anyone have thoughts?

I was wondering if there is any dog breeds with 1 or 0 known dogs in it, for example say a person mixes two rare dogs and gets one. Does it exist?

I have 2 very anxious chihuahuas who suffer terribly with separation anxiety and will bark continuously if they hear any slight noise outside. Their walks are also full of reactivity if they see a dog or a person. Behavioural training has really helped the eldest dog and he is a lot better on walks but not much has changed his anxiety indoors if we go out or if he hears noises. I read somewhere that cold pressed hemp seed oil in their food helps and so I bought some and have just been putting one small pump in their cold pressed dry kibble each day. So far it seems to be working and they seem to be calmer and more sleepy in the day. I just wondered if anyone else has used this and whether it’s worked for their dogs? Thanks