Hi all, first time dog owner here with a 10 week old cavapoo. My wife and I have had her for two weeks, and overall she's been a lovely puppy. One area of concern we had is the amount of time she's sleeping, and her difficulty settling and relaxing. I'll give some details on what we do below. It's a little lengthy so I appreciate anyone who taking the time to read it. I guess I'm hoping to learn what we can do better, or if some of it is simply normal puppy things that that will eventually sort itself out as they mature.
Sleep
She's sleeping 15-16 hours a day on average so far, compared to the 18-20 hours range we see online (not sure if cause for concern). 8PM – 6:30AM she is a great sleeper. During the day she wakes up for 40-60 min, then we put her in the crate, and she'll nap an average of 1 hour. We've tried leaving her in for longer, but she doesn't go back to sleep. She's most fussy between late afternoon to after dinner. She has a really hard time settling to sleep, so she can get overtired during this time. All her sleeping is in her crate.
Crate
Located in our bedroom walk-in closet. Dark, white noise machine, quiet fan in case she's hot. She has a chew toy, and a snuggle buddy (night only – during the day she just bites on buddy and it gets her aroused). We do live in a smaller apartment so she would hear sounds, but we try our best to be quiet while she's sleeping if we need to do anything. It's a larger crate we got for her to grow into, so we wrapped a towel around a box and snuggly fit it in the back. Her bedding is just a towel. If she's having a hard time sleeping, she'll dig and chew her towel, or try to get at the towel wrapped around the box. We don't like the towel chewing, but also unsure how to handle it. It seems like anything more interesting than a towel simply gets her excited and keeps her awake even longer. My assessment may be wrong here though, would love to hear more insight/tips on this one.
We've also tried leaving her kongs, but we find that she just gets really excited about the food and doesn't go to sleep. Any food item like lick mats, kongs, or bully sticks seems to keep her occupied, but doesn't help her relax.
Outside Crate
She is basically unable to really relax or sleep outside of her crate. We're trying the whole capturing calm routine when she's in her pen or tethered to us, but I think she's learning how to appear calm for treats. We try to give her a mix of activities – brain games, taking her out for short outings to socialize – early on we realized that we may doing too much and overstimulating her so we've pulled back and are working to find a better balance for her. Would love tips on the "wake" routine, I think this is where I'm most unsure of. Is this normal? Are we doing something wrong? Or is it just a matter of being persistent and trusting the process?
Food
We upped her intake of kibble a couple days ago. 130 grams excluding treats she gets during the day. Recommended range on the package is 100-150 grams. What do y'all think? Should it be higher? She's food motivated for sure, seems hungry all the time.
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