Nicola Clark

Hi Adrienne, (wednesday 25th) I'm definitely not in the "you spoil the kid by going to it" school I'm into attachment parenting with babies! Most of her whining has been fairly low key kind of attention grabbing but can be a bit ow, ow, ow, ow, if she's got going a bit more, It's not been for more than a few minutes (unless we're eating a meal) I'm there waiting for her to stop so that I can let her out, but should I ignore her and not look at her atll while shes whining? or should I talk to her (give her attention) and try reassure her with my voice? (this is what I've done with her at night, if needed the first few nights I would go and open the crate and fuss her and stroke her to sleep again then close the door again). I'm just starting to read the handling articles you mentioned so I can work out what to do with the leash at toileting time, and yeah you're right about her getting a run up, Im generally keeping the line short enough that its not full but enough there to have slack and her not feel like I'm on top of her while she's sniffing around to find somewhere to toilet, and to ensure the lead doesnt get pooped or pee'd on! but after she's done her business she wants to explore and she got a bit of the zoomies which I've been trying to get the right stimulation balance for those not to happen! But yeah I try to make sure she doesnt just go from slack to tension in one go and I call her and try to get her to chase me (rather than her thinking I'm going to chase her!) Have used some higher value treats today when toileting her so I was able to get her attention enough to reward her when she pee'd and poo'd, she's getting the hang of sit, I just want to get her comfortable with the collar and leash and make progress with the crate a little so I feel like our daily routine is manageable then I'll feel able to relax enough to start working on other things but yeah I'm not trying to do big training sessions just using the opportunities in the inevitables like toilet food and play to try set her up to be right but she not really susceptible enough to the lure yet! Was trying to use some of her kibble allowance so that I dont overfeed her. but maybe I need to mix it up a bit more! Regarding the crate and duration, -in terms of the videos I watched I guessed they meant most of the time because they sleep so much when they are small! I always put her in there to sleep.. a couple of times a day she'll fall asleep on one of our laps but we put her down once shes had a cuddle and been asleep for a bit, its about the balance of how much when she's awake.. my routine at the moment is to always take her out straight away when she wakes up from any sleep, if she doesnt go we come back in and I try to get some play to stimulate her and then we try toileting agains this usually ok we keep her out and play with her a little I try to watch she not getting overstimulated too we use tug to try tire her but only a few minutes not ages, we've got a lick mat and have soaked her kibble then sqaushed it in there and frozen it and/or put a little peanut butter in there to try keep her busy at our meal times. She's usally awake for an hour or two at a go sometimes less all depends but she sleeps a lot in between she gets up around 7 if last time i toilet her is around midnight then she's usally up until 09:30 ish then sleeps till lunchtime then similar although she might have a few shorter naps in the afternoon and more shorter stints of being awake and asleep then longer sleep in the evening after evening play its 22:52 now as I type she was asleep for at least an hour while ive been doing something and she woke up about ten minutes ago. (Thursday 26th May) I've read your crate article. What are the signs early signs that the puppy is getting uncomfortable or frustrated? ie before the whining starts? I've felt that since she's been unhappy with me about the leash and being scolded a couple of times that she is less engaged with the food lures although using the higher value treats since yesterday has made her a little more interested again. She was an escaper at the puppy mamma's house (her and another were the escapers) so she is obviously very clever! I'm concerned that she wants to escape again, today when we went outside and she has done her business she wanted to rip up my plants and bushes and dig, I try to distract her with a stick which only works a little even though she loves chewing sticks.. she went to my front gate and keeps trying to squeeze her head under the gate to see if she can get out or she jumps up at the gate to peer over the board I've attached to it to ensure she doesnt just walk through the gaps in the gate. I feel like sometimes its possible to lure her with food but not always! I have managed to reward all her peeing today although not her poop as she wouldnt take the treat she was so busy sniffing... She is very lurcher.. I know you have some articles about digging too so I will go and look at those. Today I've done a little tugging on her collar and rewarding, I say tug each time I tug, do i treat each tug? or can I give several little tugs and just treat once? should I build up how hard I tug? and what is the hardest I should tug? I dont want to hurt her but I'm guessing I'm looking to desenstise her to the kind of force she exerts on the leash... oh and I have one more question how do i guage the right time for attempts at training? I'm just incorporating small things that fit with the routine of taking her outside for the loo and playing with the tug toy. It says when she's calm and quiet but I feel like she's only really calm like this when she's tired and then will she be too tired for training! I'm feeling like a bit of failure today, it's been hard to interest her/engage her this afternoon, she wasnt too bad this morning, but this afternoon she just whined to go out a lot but each time I took her out she didnt want to do any more potty just play and I'm trying to limit that outside until we've got the nag of the leash a bit better... I did throw a stick and encourage her to play with it, but brought her in when she started trying to eat my honeysuckle and get her head out under my garden gate.... Anyway thats probably a load more questions from me lol!

Hi Adrienne, these are useful links but.... why does every article assume the dog has been introduced to a collar and leash? How come your advice to Robert didn't include this? why are there not any articles in your website that discuss how to do this? I searched the word leash and there only seems to be one article that comes up - about pulling on the leash (when out walking we nowhere near ready for that yet!) .. nothing about how to safely introduce the leash!! surely the collar and leash introduction is the most basic training next to the crate training when a new puppy comes home? We got a puppy last week (mostly lurcher 3/4 although bit of staffordshire bull terrier 1/4 in there too) she was 9 weeks old and not trained to a leash or collar when we got her.. although we have managed to train her to sit for a treat she still doesnt really understand the verbal cue that goes with it too much yet (which is fine!) ..but the training videos i have watched all seem to have the puppies noses glued to the lure our puppy not as keen as those in the videos I've watched.. Today is her 10th day with us. The first week seemed to be going ok except that she had way too much freedom in my garden and I had no control over her because no collar and leash.... last time I had a puppy was 30 years ago and that dog was trained off a leash and never wore one so this is new territory for me. This puppy belongs to my 15yr old daughter and this is how she wants to train it. We are trying really hard to use positive reinforcement but.. it still feels like there have been more times than i would like when she has been scolded (nothing too awful just a loud no where neccessary a physical removal of puppy from whatever bad decision she has made/is making no physical punishment ... we've been following the advice about using kibble to train them as well as some higher value treats... (actually most of the last 5/6 days I've just been using the kibble to lure her but she seems to be losing interest in that now..) shes either not that food motivated,easily distracted or we're getting it wrong! So, given what I've just said about the use of food to train, the biggest problems I seem to have at the moment is two things.... the leash and whining in the crate. To take the first issue... after the first week of too much freedom in the yard I got a collar onto her a few days ago, I did it gradually and left her for a day or so with just the collar no leash to give her time to acclimatise, she's largely not bothered, although here and there she falls onto her back scratching at it! So far so good.... yesterday I started to give little tugs on it accompanied with a reward (bit of kibble) to try and get her used to the collar being tugged to desensitise her to it as much as possible. I also got a long line for a house line (which just arrived yesterday) and cut the handle off so it cant get caught on anything.. this I have started to put on her every time she is taken out of the crate so that she has it on at all times when not in the crate this is that we don't have to lunge at her to get her or stop her getting into mischief.. in the house its not too much of a problem.. as its largely trailing behind her shes tried to chew it a few times but she is well managed and suervised and so not had a good chew at it (she'd probably demolish it in no time !) she seemed a little subdued yesterday cos she didn't like it, I keep giving her a treat every time I take the leash on and off her.. the real difficulty is when we go into the yard... it s a long line and I try to keep it slack so I'm not pulling her about at all... I'm just trying to keep it slack and follow her where she wants to sniff my aim is to use it just to ensure it limits her reach (ie she cant just go running off in my garden and 'exploring'/getting into trouble) my difficulty is that as soon as she creates tension in the line (by running off further than extent of the line) she then starts bucking and freaking out when she hits the limit of the line. I dont want the leash to be a traumatic experience for her! What do I do? I feel a lot like this has to be our main focus before we can start on other things, as most things seem to need leash training to have been done before we can start on other things.. We are playing tug with her to tire her out and Im using treats to reward the dropping. But I have to say she seems a lot less food motivated this week than she did last week and once I'm outside in the yard forget it! there way are too many distractions outside so once she is bucking I can't get her attention, I just hold onto the lead and get myself to her to pick her up (whilst trying to reassure her verbally) I am not pulling or dragging her towards me, just taking up the line as I approach her.. but the problem is she clearly feels punished by this thing that has got her by the neck and it has now started her to try and run from me when i approach her to pick her up when she's panicking, whereas when shes not on a leash i dont have too much trouble apporaching her (unless she has something she shouldn't!)... My 2nd question is about the crate, we were doing not so bad most of the first week(or so I thought) we had the crate door open and had put a bed in there for her (a wicker one witha cushion in) she liked this bed very much but... she started to chew on it and I felt it was causing us to scold her too much so i took it away and just put blankets in the crate, (last night was 3rd night with just blankets she tries to dig at them here and there I try to ignore her doing this) we move the crate around one of us sleeps in the lounge with her in the crate at night presently so that we are nearby to reassure her or attend to her if she wakes, the overnight is not so much of a problem but the daytime is more difficult.. although I'm trying to give her 3 meals a day she doesnt ever eat all of it at once and we are using half of a meal as lures so effectively she is just grazing.. I'm feeding her in the crate but she doesn't eat all her food at one go. When i put her in for a nap she might whine a little but i ignore that knowing shes been fed, toileted, stimulated, played with and tired out and she goes to sleep fine. I was watching some training videos (not yours from before we signed up to your course) and these trainers were managing to leave their puppy in the crate a lot more from day 1 and they said the dogs shouldn't have the run of choosing when to go into the crate but should be in there most of the time apart from when you take them out...This made me worry that we were doing loads of things wrong but when I tried to do keep her in there more she didnt like it so much so we had to go back a few steps... my question is if you shoudn't take them out when they whine and you have to wait for them to quieten down how do you ensure that they dont get stressed out and it make the crate a negative experience? so specifically I mean if she is just waking or if I have just randomly put her in there for a bit to relax in the daytime? I have watched everything I can find of yours about crate training and I saw what you said about building anticipation so I'm going to start using your suggestion about putting her food in there and closing the door before letting her in there to try and build some anticipation. Is there a fine line between her whining in the crate and being traumatised in the crate? When she wakes up I assume that she will need the loo and take her straight out, one of the moments when I'm abit unsure is if I'm pottering about my house while she is sleeping in her crate I mightnt know shes awake until I hear her whining... so then what? If she's just woke I assume that she probably needs to pee, Am I supposed to wait for her to stop whining? or do i take her out toilet her and put her back in the crate so that she just assocaites her whining with me taking her to the loo? (is this positive or negative?). Anyway sorry for such a long thread but I've had a really good look through your website (ive not managed to read everything yet obviously as we only joined yesterday) but am desperate to get some good advice about this so we don't do the wrong thing! I also understand everything takes time and i certainly dont expect instant results with such a young puppy I just want to do the right thing with introducing these two devices I've never used with a puppy before - leash and crate! Thanks Nikki