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For house-training, my rule of thumb is "can I see her?" If so, fine. If not, either restrict access to other parts of the house or put back on a long line. Once you've hit a good month or so with no accidents, expand access to the house. If there's a set back, go back to last set-up where you had success.
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May 17, 2013 19:57
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| # ? May 14, 2024 00:55 |
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Hello pet owner goons! I could use some advice, but I wasn't sure where to post this and figured this was the most fitting thread. Either way, my family has never owned a dog before (household consists of my mom, dad, grandmother, and brother), but a friend of my brother's girlfriend had told us that she knows someone who has a 2 year old female husky that needs a new owner. Her current owner unfortunately has taken on an unfortunate disability or illness (was vague so as to be discreet), and she asked us if we'd like to be the family that'd take the dog in. I've personally never owned a dog myself, but would this be a good idea? My brother insists on the family getting a dog, just to help bring up everyones spirits (family is going through some rough patches with the grandparents). My brother is still at the house with my rents/grandparents but commutes to city and works late so he's not home as much, while I visit my parents often as I can to help out with my grandma. Any given week I stay with my parents at least 3-5 days, the rest at my place, so I'd be around to help take care of the dog as often as I can. I was told the dog is already trained and whatnot, but I was looking to get some insight from proper pet owners in regards to this situation. As an anecdote, I've always wanted a dog. But as said, my family never had one while I was growing up. What's even more fortuitous is I've always wanted a girl husky for some reason. Even when I was a kid. Would love to hear anyone's thoughts of what they would do in my shoes. Thanks in advance 
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May 20, 2013 02:56
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Sounds like it is the parents decision. If it is going to be living at their house, the responsibilities are ultimately going to fall on them. As much as you say you will be able to help, things will come up. So the only people who need to be asked if it is a good idea is your parents.
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May 20, 2013 03:11
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Huskies are pretty high-energy and independent. You should expect a couple of hours of exercise per day, and high fences (6+ feet) are generally recommended, with some dig-proofing. They're not an easy breed for a first-time owner, but they can be great dogs. The primitive breed here has some husky owners who might be able to answer your question more thoroughly.
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May 20, 2013 03:21
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Anyone have issues with your dog slipping on surfaces he didn't before? We've got hardwood floors mostly and some laminate tile in the kitchen that Linus has never had a problem with. Then we cleaned them (swiffer cleaner, nothing out of the ordinary) and now he occasionally slips (back paws mostly, can't get traction). Now he's a bit scared of slipping. We're working to desensitize him (helps that it's by the backdoor where he goes out) but the frustrating thing is he's often fine walking across the tile, especially when presented with a treat or when we're busy doing stuff in the kitchen and he's curious. It's only when nothing is going on that he slips. He never had any issues with these surfaces as a puppy or growing up. Only after a quick cleaning a couple of weeks back and since then.
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May 20, 2013 21:16
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I can't remember, does he have long hair? Consider trimming the fur between his toes. Also make sure his nails are as short as you can get them, and make sure you keep them that way. Other than that, I would use bathroom rugs or other mats in key areas if you feel it's getting to be a problem.
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May 20, 2013 21:24
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Have you trimmed his nails and the fur between his toes recently? That could be making him lose his traction.
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May 20, 2013 21:25
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His nails are a bit on the long side but not terribly so. He does have long hair though. I'll check out between his toes tonight and see if maybe they need a little trim. Edit: sleeping pic for your troubles. 
Thwomp fucked around with this message at 21:32 on May 20, 2013 |
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May 20, 2013 21:30
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ButWhatIf posted:For house-training, my rule of thumb is "can I see her?" If so, fine. If not, either restrict access to other parts of the house or put back on a long line. Once you've hit a good month or so with no accidents, expand access to the house. If there's a set back, go back to last set-up where you had success. This is what I did with Pippa (indoors obv). When I knew I was going to be paying attention to something else too deeply to watch her, I kept her tethered mostly, but if I was able to keep an eye on her while I did something else that didn't demand a ton of attention I'd let her off (dragging the leash though) and close the bedroom and bathroom doors so I could keep an eye on her. Obviously I took it kinda slow with a dog whose attention I can't really get from across the room, but eventually I could trust her to be fine for moderate amounts of time without supervision. I do still keep her confined when I'm not home, though, primarily because I would rather her not seizure herself off the couch or into the television if she has a seizure while I'm gone, but I think without that aspect added in I may trust her pretty well at this point.
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May 20, 2013 22:52
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Brazen Apothecary fucked around with this message at 07:28 on Jun 15, 2013 |
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May 21, 2013 19:48
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Brazen Apothecary posted:Hi, PI! Take a deep breath. Then another one. There are literally millions of owners out there who have already done less than you have. You're doing fine. The preference for soft, cloth chews is likely due to age. He's teething right now and it feels good. Continue to redirect as you have been, and if you can find a toy he wants to chew on right now, that's great, but for some of this he's just going to be an rear end in a top hat because that's what he is. Also, remember the cardinal advice of this thread is to get into puppy classes as quickly as you can. It's never too early.
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May 21, 2013 20:08
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Hey all, this isn't a puppy or a new dog owner question per se, but this thread seems the best fit for it. I've had dogs before but now I'm thinking about taking in a dog from the city shelter. She's an older mongrel that is very quiet but friendly, and very skinny. They think she wasn't violently abused but probably neglected for long periods of time; even now with regular food available she eats very little. My question is basically how hard would it be to get a dog like this used to the rules of the house without traumatising her (further)? Every dog I've had before my family raised from pups, where being rough and loud is okay. I want to take this dog in to give her a good home for the rest of her life, not compound whatever misery she has suffered already. Positive reinforcement only? What do I do if she does something 'bad'?
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May 22, 2013 17:52
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Eau de MacGowan posted:Hey all, this isn't a puppy or a new dog owner question per se, but this thread seems the best fit for it. I've had dogs before but now I'm thinking about taking in a dog from the city shelter. She's an older mongrel that is very quiet but friendly, and very skinny. They think she wasn't violently abused but probably neglected for long periods of time; even now with regular food available she eats very little. My question is basically how hard would it be to get a dog like this used to the rules of the house without traumatising her (further)? Every dog I've had before my family raised from pups, where being rough and loud is okay. I want to take this dog in to give her a good home for the rest of her life, not compound whatever misery she has suffered already. Positive reinforcement only? What do I do if she does something 'bad'? This is totally the right thread for this question. Yes, with a dog that is extra shut down as you describe, you would be very ill-advised to use any kind of punishment. We never recommend that here at all, but with a dog like that you're going to cause her to shut down even more. Do you have other dogs? Young, boisterous children? Consider whether she's really a good fit for your home first. There's a wealth of new owner and training information in the OP of this thread and the OP of the training thread. Typically our advice for unwanted behavior varies on the situation, but a rule of thumb is generally not to let them practice it if it's self-rewarding and to ignore it if it isn't and it will extinguish on its own. An example would be the mouthing and nipping advice in the OP.
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May 22, 2013 18:17
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Brazen Apothecary fucked around with this message at 07:28 on Jun 15, 2013 |
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May 22, 2013 19:02
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MrFurious posted:This is totally the right thread for this question. Yes, with a dog that is extra shut down as you describe, you would be very ill-advised to use any kind of punishment. We never recommend that here at all, but with a dog like that you're going to cause her to shut down even more. Thanks for the advice. The OP is great, you put a hell of a lot of effort into it. No other pets, no kids, I'm a writer so I'm home pretty much 24/7 and when I'm not my wife likely is. I don't want a sparring pal, just someone I can stroke whilst I brood mysteriously. I think she's a good match. It's only the potential abuse thing that is making me hesitant. My real concern is house training, she doesn't seem the type to run around tearing stuff up or biting/nipping. I have no clue whether she had any before, and if she did whether being in a shelter for a couple of months has robbed her of it. If she makes a mess inside, how do I reinforce this to her without being confrontational? Walking away as the OP suggests for mouthing seems like it might not work in this context.
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May 22, 2013 19:18
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quote:Thanks for the advice. The OP is great, you put a hell of a lot of effort into it. Thanks, glad it helped. And I have to reiterate that Instant Jellyfish put just as much work into this as I did. She's boss :3 There's a housetraining guide in the OP. It's targeted at puppies and puppy owners, but it'll work just as well for adult dogs. The difference is that they have much better bladder control at that age, so you don't need to be running them out every 2 hours, but I would be shooting for every 3-4 early on to get the rhythm going. Basically though, there's some basic management that you should be able to handle that will make the accident in the house a very unlikely situation, and once you reinforce for what you want, you're good to go. Some folks like to click and/or treat for eliminating where they're supposed to, but I tend to avoid this if I can, just because if you treat it to much it can be come an offered behavior, meaning your dog will just squat for you to see if they can work the slot machine. This can muddy the waters a little bit in the event that you're concerned your dog might have a UTI (primarily a concern for female dogs). Actual abuse (some dude beating the crap out of his dogs every night) is a lot less common than people think, at least in my experience. People are inclined to believe that because a dog is spooky around men that means that it was abused by a man at some point in its life. The far more likely scenario is that the dog has had very little experience with men at all and as a result they are New And Scary.
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May 22, 2013 19:40
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Eau de MacGowan posted:If she makes a mess inside, how do I reinforce this to her without being confrontational? Walking away as the OP suggests for mouthing seems like it might not work in this context. Ideally you set it up to minimize the chances of her eliminating inside for the first little bit: keep a schedule of outdoor breaks, keep an eye on her and take her outside if she's showing signs like sniffing the floor or circling, and put her away in a crate when you can't supervise. Praise and treat for going outside - often at first, fading to a random schedule as she seems to get it. If you catch her in the act inside, try to call her to you and take her outside immediately. If you're too late, clean it up and increase your dog management strategy. If you get angry about it, the lesson dogs tend to learn is to hide from you and then you have to clean out more inconvenient places.
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May 22, 2013 19:45
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Just got home from work, and my wife is reporting that our 10 month old mini-Aussie (weighing about 12 lbs) had "garlic breath" earlier today. I don't smell it now, but we're worried she might have eaten some and now she's starting to digest it. If she did eat garlic, it wasn't a full clove, but little bits that flew from the grill as I was chopping it up last night outdoors. From what I've read, it takes almost days for a full reaction, but in the meantime, what can I do to mitigate possible trouble? Give her lots of water or food to dilute? Exercise a lot, or avoid exercise altogether? I'll be looking out for weirdness on behavior, puking or changes in stool, but I'm mostly wondering what can be done now.
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May 23, 2013 00:43
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Day 1 of puppy training: 4 pees inside, 1 outside. Haha. I think tomorrow will go smoother since we can start from wake up and be consistent. Today was kinda hectic. Anyways, my question: Does anyone think a gravel area is a bad potty training spot? There's no grass in the back yard, so the older dog uses the 4' x 40' gravel side yard to do his business. Puppy doesn't seem to like it too much.
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May 24, 2013 02:50
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I housetrained my dogs on a snowy 2nd-story deck :/ They go stand at the sliding door now when they need to pee. Puppy should get used to it, and may come to prefer gravel. My dogs pee right outside the front door as long as there is snow, because of the snowy deck.
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May 24, 2013 05:11
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It took my GSD puppy 4 months for house training to finally click. We would take him out pretty much religiously every 30 minutes. He would still go in the house when we no one was home for a mere 2-3 hours. Haven't had an accident for roughly a month now, man was he stubborn.
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May 24, 2013 05:36
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blue squares posted:Day 1 of puppy training: 4 pees inside, 1 outside. Haha. I think tomorrow will go smoother since we can start from wake up and be consistent. Today was kinda hectic. Trust me, tether your puppy. It makes it so much easier, even if you think you can manage without (like I did for first couple of days). My yard is paving slabs, no grass, and my puppy is doing amazing with house training. If the gravel is hurting her paws and making her dislike it, could you brush aside a patch of it or something?
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May 24, 2013 07:08
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Fraction posted:Trust me, tether your puppy. It makes it so much easier, even if you think you can manage without (like I did for first couple of days). Oh, I am. She is just sneaky. I have to be more watchful
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May 24, 2013 07:19
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Alfajor posted:Just got home from work, and my wife is reporting that our 10 month old mini-Aussie (weighing about 12 lbs) had "garlic breath" earlier today. I don't smell it now, but we're worried she might have eaten some and now she's starting to digest it. I am not a vet, but I know lots of people who give chopped garlic to their dogs in the belief it will somehow repel ticks. None of those dogs has died as a result of ingesting garlic yet. I believe the amount a dog has to eat for toxicity to come up is quite big, although who knows, there may be subclinical hematological alterations. The amount your dog ate doesn't seem that big. DISCLAIMER: I think the people giving garlic to dogs as a tick repellent are mistaken at best and idiots at worst. Don't give garlic to your dog. It's not good for him.
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May 24, 2013 07:49
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I remember Linus had housetraining down pretty well at about 2 months in but it took one final weekend with a couple of accidents for it to click permanently (or for him to realize going outside resulted in treats, inside was no treats).
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May 24, 2013 13:33
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Rixatrix posted:Call your vet if you're worried is the best advice I can give. We did call the vet, they told use to call poison control if the dog started acting up. I was just curious if there was anything that could be done while we waited to see if she did have a reaction or not. Thankfully, there hasn't been a problem, so she didn't eat enough of the garlic!  I didn't give the dog garlic, I was just a sloppy chef; lessons learned.
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May 24, 2013 15:15
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Holy gently caress I hate crate training. Aussie puppy barks are incredibly annoying and painful. Shut up for ten seconds so I can then let you out!
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May 24, 2013 18:59
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blue squares posted:Holy gently caress I hate crate training. Aussie puppy barks are incredibly annoying and painful. Shut up for ten seconds so I can then let you out! Please make the crate a fun experience for your dog and realize that it might progress slowly. Play crate games (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8HNO79bZMY). Also give your dog a kong, something that smells like you, or something like that with the crate.
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May 24, 2013 20:00
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I got her an amazing dog bone thing with calcium. It's made for puppies and I tied it in the back. But I still have to sometimes close her door when I can't watch her and she does not like that. I'm not forcing her in except for last night at 11pm when it was bedtime and she wouldn't go and wasn't being food or praise motivated.
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May 24, 2013 20:09
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Try feeding all her meals in the crate with the door open. My pup isn't food motivated unfortunately but loves treats so only got treats for going in his crate or performing tricks when he first arrived
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May 24, 2013 20:12
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blue squares posted:I got her an amazing dog bone thing with calcium. It's made for puppies and I tied it in the back. But I still have to sometimes close her door when I can't watch her and she does not like that. I'm not forcing her in except for last night at 11pm when it was bedtime and she wouldn't go and wasn't being food or praise motivated. Just make sure not to "poison" the crate- the puppy is young and obviously being in the crate sucks for her. She misses you and probably would prefer to have free run. Is the crate close to you at night? Also build up duration for keeping her in the crate- don't just stick her in there for an hour at a time and then let her out. When I crate trained my older dog, I started with 5 or 10 minutes crated at a time, with me in the room. I also made sure to spend time reinforcing being in and entering the crate. Most importantly don't let he out if she's winning or barking- wait like 30 seconds (but it sounds like you get that).
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May 24, 2013 20:25
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How I crate trained puppy at night = shoved her in, verbal corrections when she shrieked, praise when she was quiet. After like three nights she'd settle after a minute or two. Now she views the crate as awesome and sleeps immediately in it at any time. She sleeps for like ten/eleven hours a night every night and usually I have to drag her out of the crate in the morning 
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May 24, 2013 20:35
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I put my dog's crate right by my bed at first. Once he got used to that I moved him just out of the room with the door open. Then I shut the door once he got used to that. He's nearly full grown and really likes his crate now. I never even shut the door of it anymore; he just goes in there at night once he feels tired and likes to sleep in it.
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May 24, 2013 20:40
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She slept great at night, it's during the day that's the issue. I'm sure it's just because she is a puppy with lots of energy and not used to be alone and confined in a small space. I'm trying to schedule any alone time as right after play and letting her start to fall asleep on the floor before she goes inside anyways, but once she is in and the door is closed she gets very anxious. I'm sure it'll get better in just a few nights.
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May 24, 2013 20:55
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Ok I'm not trying to take over the thread but I have a for real potty training issue. Sivvy, my 10 week old Aussie pup, is very smart and here on the start of day 3 she already knows that when I take her to the side yard, that's the toilet. The problem is that she won't go there on her own. I took two pictures of the spot. The first shows the route we must take to squeeze past our outdoor tent thing and the house.  Next, we have to go down these stairs. She can make it up fine but is extremely reluctant to go down them.  She is ok at following me around tethered, but as soon as I head toward that spot, she just sits down and won't budge. Today I managed to get her down the stairs without touching her at all, but it took a couple minutes and about 10 pieces of kibble with a treat or two mixed in. I am worried that until she gets bigger, she will never go back here by herself without a ton of help from me. The stairs just seem to scare her. There is literally no other suitable place for her to go in the yard. It is all wood deck and concrete. Since I am just a tenant in one of the bedrooms, I can't really do any modifications to the place, as much as I'd like to add some grass or something. Is it just a matter of going to that spot several times a day in addition to her potty times and just conditioning her to be ok with the stairs?
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May 25, 2013 17:16
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blue squares posted:Is it just a matter of going to that spot several times a day in addition to her potty times and just conditioning her to be ok with the stairs? Yes, she's 10 weeks old. Most puppies are scared of stairs. They're weird. Use higher value treats. Boil a chicken breast and cut it up into tiny pieces. Practice going up and down the stairs at potty time.
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May 25, 2013 21:09
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blue squares posted:Is it just a matter of going to that spot several times a day in addition to her potty times and just conditioning her to be ok with the stairs? A lot of puppies don't like stairs. They're small and stairs are scary and weird, basically. I don't have any experience with training a dog to go down them, since I literally did the opposite with my dog, but would it be possible for you to lean a couple of planks down them or something? Maybe a ramp would be less scary. Wouldn't require any actual construction or modification on your part. Aside from that, I think you have the right idea. I would entice her to go down them unrelated to bathroom breaks. Standing at the bottom with treats is bound to be good incentive.
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May 25, 2013 21:11
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A ramp! Thank you! I will definitely try this. edit: Wow! It helped a TON! I need to get to work creating a better ramp that is a little less slippery, but we made huge progress today. Thank you so much, Silly Hippie edit2: Finally got a chance to run to the store and get some cheesy hot dogs. She couldn't resist them, and the desire for hot dogs beat out her fear of the ramp. Started with one paw and c/t, then two, and so on. blue squares fucked around with this message at 01:47 on May 26, 2013 |
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May 25, 2013 22:07
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blue squares posted:A ramp! Thank you! I will definitely try this. I suggest you still work on getting her used to stairs (maybe not when its potty time and you urgently want her to go), because it will be a bitch and a half to teach her to be okay with stairs if she doesn't get comfortable with them as a puppy. Think of it as a very minor time investment that will pay dividends when you have a two story home, or a porch with steps leading off of it
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May 25, 2013 23:48
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| # ? May 14, 2024 00:55 |
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First time dog owner here. Just picked up this guy today: I'm not entirely set on what I want to name him, but... Kirby seems fitting. He's a Formosan Mountain Dog and Shepherd mix, brought over to Seattle (Salty Dog Rescue) from Taiwan. He's pretty anxious and shy, but very well mannered and seems like he's pretty smart. It's cool seeing how much he's changed in one day. I gotta train this little guy.
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May 26, 2013 05:09
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