Tag: puppy training

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How Breed Characteristics Impact Training a Puppy

My son Kevin used to say “How about yes?” when he was little and was trying to keep me from saying “no.” I now ask myself how about yes when making a decision so I can see how it feels in my gut before saying noIcannotpossiblydothat. 

As a result, I’ve said yes more often which has resulted in some really wonderful experiences.

My latest “how about yes” decision happened this summer when I brought my first Beagle puppy home. I’ve always loved the breed’s looks, size, and funny temperament, but I have shied away from getting one for years because I heard they were untrainable. 

For the record, all my puppies up until now have been Golden Retrievers and a Pembroke Corgi. Regardless of breed, I always teach them:

  • Impulse control (e.g. wait before eating meals, coming out of the crate, etc.)
  • Come when called
  • Sit/down stays
  • Walking nicely on a leash

After I brought the Beagle home, I had more than a few people tell me “Beagles are not trainable like a Golden.” 

And you know what? They were right!  A Beagle is different from a Golden Retriever because Beagles were bred to do different things.  However, that doesn’t make them untrainable.

Contrary to the independent tendencies of Beagles, I’ve also learned they are quick learners and very affectionate. They like to jump and mine likes to toss his toys in the air. Beagle fans describe their personality as “merry” which is the perfect description!

Ripple @ 6 months old being his merry self

The American Kennel Club (AKC) has a Breed Trait & Characteristics chart for every recognized purebred dog breed. Understanding a breed’s purpose can help tremendously with understanding what their behavior tendencies will be, which helps in our approach to training them. 

The AKC catagorizes dog breeds into 7 groups which are:

  • Hound
  • Sporting
  • Non-Sporting
  • Working 
  • Terrier
  • Herding
  • Toy

Beagles, for example, are scent hounds bred to work in packs to help humans hunt rabbits. They have been bred for this purpose for several hundred years so it’s hardwired in them!

The question becomes, what general information can we get about our dogs from what they were bred to do? In the case of Ripple, I can glean that Beagles:

  1. are good with other dogs 
  2. work independently from humans 
  3. are going to follow their nose

I can use this information to make certain adjustments when training Ripple versus how I’ve trained Rune and every Golden Retriever before him. Ripple wouldn’t come to me when I was on the floor with my arms open like Rune would. I needed to make sure I was doing something interesting so Ripple would want to come over to investigate. For example, I might drag a stuffed toy on the ground to get him curious which works with their desire to chase small animals. 

Of course, every puppy is different. When Rune was seven months old, I would let him drag his long-line attached to his harness because he had a pretty consistent recall by then. Ripple is now seven months old but because the breed’s tendency is to follow its nose and run, I am still holding onto it. Given more practice, Ripple will also have a reliable recall.

With some background on your breed of choice, some flexibility, and patience, you can better train your puppy to meet your lifestyle needs. Follow along with the training of my Beagle puppy “Ripple” in the Life with Rune Facebook group.

Ripple @ 11 weeks old

If you dig a little deeper into a breed, you can learn about the purpose of the physical characteristics of their structure, coat, tail, ears, and size which helps add more color to your understanding.

Did you know these Beagle fun facts?

  • The purpose of their long ears is to stir up tiny scent molecules near the ground and act to “sweep” the scent toward their nose.
  • Beagles make a lot of noise called baying when chasing rabbits so the hunter can follow the pack even when they’re out of sight.
  • A Beagle’s white-tipped tail is known as a “flag” because it is easy to spot in tall grass and vegetation.

Susan Lynch is a former competitive dog trainer who has been training, competing and volunteering with her Golden Retrievers since 1995. In 2020, she founded Life with Rune, a Facebook community that documents the socializing and training of her own puppy Rune. In 2021, she was awarded the Rachel Page Elliot Lifetime Achievement award by the Golden Retriever Club of America. Her memoir Life After Kevin: A Mother’s Search for Peace and the Golden Retrievers that Led the Way is available here . To learn more, visit: www.susan-lynch.com. 

For socializing ideas and training tips go to the Life with Rune Facebook group and click on the Guides tab at the top of the home page.

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When walking a puppy, which is better, a harness or a buckle collar?

I get asked this question a lot. My answer is that both are useful, it just depends on what kind of walk I am going on. Or better said, the objective of the walk– even if it’s just to burn off some puppy energy, can help determine whether a harness or buckle collar will be best. 

A word of caution: Whatever you do, DO NOT make the mistake of letting your puppy outside of an enclosed area “naked” (meaning without some sort of leash). I can promise you, there will be a time when they’re doing well with their training and you suddenly see them initiate a game of “keep away” (dogs find this game fun but humans do not!). If your pup isn’t on some sort of long line you will have no way to stop it and get your pup to come to you. When you allow the behavior you are training the behavior. You don’t want to inadvertently train your puppy to NOT come to you!

Let’s take this past Monday. Here in New Hampshire, it was going to be in the mid-90s. I mean, most of the country has been in an awful heat wave–high 90s into the triple digits–and New Hampshire has been no exception. I decided to walk early in the morning in some nearby woods to avoid the hottest part of the day.

This was a walk to release some energy and have fun, requiring a body harness attached to a 20-foot long-line. Every time I’m taking a puppy on a walk for exploration purposes, I’m going to choose a harness and long line so I get some recall practice in. 

The critical piece here is that I knew the objective of my walk ahead of time. The objective of the walk informs the decisions around a collar/leash or harness/long-line. So, my tip: 

BEFORE you choose, think about what you’re going to work on.

If you’re going to be teaching your puppy to be right next to you (eg.: walking into puppy class or the veterinarian’s office), then choose a buckle collar attached to a 6-foot leash. 

If you’re going to take your puppy out to potty in the yard, walk in the woods, or do anything that requires some sniffing and exploring, use a harness attached to a 20-foot long-line. 

Why? They each have particular advantages. Let’s look at the benefits of each depending on what you are teaching.

HARNESS/LONG-LINE USE:

I use this combination anytime we are outside (including potty time) when I do not require them to be right next to me as in formal leash walking. 

The high points of harness use:

  • A harness distributes the pressure on their chest versus their neck
  • Gives the puppy a safe way to explore
  • Mimics off-leash walking (my eventual goal)
  • Gives me the ability to teach recalls from a distance  

When (not if!) your puppy becomes interested in a smell or some other distraction and forgets they were just following you, you have a way to make them follow through by giving a tug on the long line.

Okay, now back to this past Monday…

Later that same day, Ripple had a puppy kindergarten class. That outing would require him to be close to me while walking into the building and for the class training. This time I used a buckle collar attached to a 6-foot leash.

BUCKLE COLLAR/6-FOOT LEASH USE: 

Walking alongside without pulling is a life skill every dog should know. With a young puppy, I want to establish that when wearing a buckle collar attached to a 6-foot leash, we are walking together–meaning the puppy is to keep close enough to me to keep the leash loose.

The high points of buckle collar use:

  • Better focus and attention from the puppy (because the collar is near the head)
  • Better control when going into buildings or in public
  • Differentiates from the harness: walking close to human vs distance from human

When you know what kind of walk you will be taking, you will always know which collar/leash to use.

Like wine and cheese, the right pairing makes all the difference.

  • Harness + long-line = exploring in the yard, field, or woods and potty time.
  • Buckle collar + 6-foot leash = walking close, as in walking on sidewalks or going into buildings.

To learn the skills you need to teach your own puppy how to walk nicely on a 6-foot leash, come when called and wait when they get too far ahead, join my free Facebook group Life with Rune.

Susan Lynch is a former competitive dog trainer who has been training, competing and volunteering with her Golden Retrievers since 1995. In 2020, she founded Life with Rune, a Facebook community that documents the socializing and training of her own puppy Rune. In 2021, she was awarded the Rachel Page Elliot Lifetime Achievement award by the Golden Retriever Club of America. Her memoir Life After Kevin: A Mother’s Search for Peace and the Golden Retrievers that Led the Way is available here . To learn more, visit: www.susan-lynch.com. 

For socializing ideas and training tips go to the Life with Rune Facebook group and click on the Guides tab at the top of the home page.

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What Motivates You To Train Your Puppy?

I often hear people say they find it harder to train their puppy when they reach about six months old.

Six months is around the time when the puppy is pretty close to adult size, stronger and impulsive. 

I’ve heard it many times “My six-month-old puppy acts like she’s forgotten most of what I’ve taught her the past few months!”

“That is really common for this age,” I’ll say reassuringly and follow up with a pep talk reminding them to “be consistent and don’t take it personally”. In other words, their puppy is becoming a teenager.

They look at me, suddenly deflated upon hearing the “teenager” reference. I will then ask them to remember why they got a puppy in the first place. 

What was the motivation that made you want to get a dog?

For some, it’s the beloved memory of a dog from their childhood. For others, it’s for companionship. Some want their kids to grow up with a dog. 

These were my reasons for wanting a dog when I became an adult. 

I grew up twenty minutes outside of Boston, in Burlington, Massachusetts. Back in the ‘70s, it was a small town whose biggest attraction was the Burlington Mall. The town has since exploded with office buildings, restaurants and people but there is, however, a jewel in the south end of town that is still protected called Mary Cummings Park. 

In the 1930s, Mary P. C. Cummings donated a 216-acre parcel of land to the city of Boston (and funds to maintain it) located in Burlington and Woburn, MA. When I was a kid, I would accompany my dad and our young golden retriever, Barney, to Cummings Park to teach Barney how to work the cover to flush wild pheasants. 

Fun fact: My dad and Barney were in Yankee Golden Retriever Club’s field classes in the late 70s and because of what he shared with me as a kid, I took YGRC’s field classes with my first dog in the mid-90s and became hooked on the sport. It has come full circle as I am now one of the co-instructors for YGRC’s 2022 field classes!

According to my dad, there was a sponsored program for kids to grow vegetable gardens in the summer. When autumn came, the corn that wasn’t picked became great feed for the animals. Dad would point out the deer and fox tracks in the mud and we’d often come across large circles of grass that had been flattened from deer bedding down. Those walks with my dad and Barney made the nature around me come to life. 

Fast forward to when I became a mother, I wanted my own kids to have a love of nature and fond memories of their childhood dogs. My kids were six and four years old, so too young to take the brunt of the training that had to be done when our first puppy came home in 1995. I knew the responsibility of our puppy, Bailey, would fall upon me.

Was it a lot? Sure. Raising two young boys and a puppy at the same time was sometimes frustrating. The puppy grew much faster and weighed more than both of them by the puppy’s first birthday. I was also teaching my kids how to be around the puppy and give basic commands. 

Because the dogs were both well trained, they could come with us on nature hikes. 

We eventually got another dog, Luxa, who became Kevin’s favorite. Kevin, Luxa and Bailey Pack Monadnock 2003

Today, I find my motivation still goes back to my love of walking in nature together in the fields and the woods as I did as a kid. I want to be able to have my dog trained and socialized so I can enjoy my dog to the fullest. Somehow sharing the walk with another being who appreciates their surroundings as much as I do makes the walk even better. 

Exploring the reason you wanted to get a dog in the first place can be fuel to draw upon when you are lacking in motivation during your puppy’s all-important first year. Puppy training isn’t linear, it can be two steps forward one step backward. Remember, it’s during the first year when you are providing the social and emotional framework to help create a bond between you and your dog that you will cherish for years to come.  

Susan Lynch is a former competitive dog trainer who has been training, competing and volunteering with her Golden Retrievers since 1995. In 2020, she founded Life with Rune, a Facebook community that documents the socializing and training of her own puppy Rune. In 2021, she was awarded the Rachel Page Elliot Lifetime Achievement award by the Golden Retriever Club of America. Her memoir Life After Kevin: A Mother’s Search for Peace and the Golden Retrievers that Led the Way is available here . To learn more, visit: www.susan-lynch.com. 

For socializing ideas and training tips go to the Life with Rune Facebook group and click on the Guides tab at the top of the home page.

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Practical Tips for Having a Holly, Jolly, Accident-Free Holiday with Your Puppy

Rune – Christmas 2021

Last year’s Christmas was during Covid-19 and as a result, I decided to take the year off from decorating. 

We didn’t even put up the Christmas tree. 

Yep, 2020 was a Scrooge-kinda-Christmas, but this year we are back to hosting Christmas dinner with family, complete with a decorated tree. 

Rune is almost two and has never seen a tree with ornaments in the house so I know this will be met with curiosity.

Maybe your new puppy (or two-year-old) will be the same. 

Here are some things to take into consideration.

TIPS FOR THE TREE 

  • If your male puppy is intact, be aware that he could mark (pee) on the tree
  • If your puppy is teething, keep the lights and decorations out of reach
  • Make time to practice “leave it” around the tree
  • Don’t place gifts under the tree until Christmas morning
  • Avoid leaving your puppy unattended with the tree

CAUTION WITH HOLIDAY GREENERY & OTHER SUBSTANCES

Being prepared includes knowing about which Holiday Plants can cause varying degrees of health problems: Holly, Mistletoe, Poinsettias, Lilies, Daffodils, Amaryllis and Christmas Cactus. If your pet has ingested any of these call ASPCA Animal Poison Control phone number for instructions on what to do. A $75.00 consultation fee can apply but some of that fee may be covered if you are enrolled in ASPCA Pet Health Insurance.

When my dog Manny was a puppy, he found my son’s asthma inhaler on his bedside nightstand and punctured the container. It was animal poison control who saved the day when he was in the ER with a racing heart from inhaling a blast of Albuterol. Overnight guests should be reminded to keep any medications up high and off nightstands to avoid potential ingestion.

PEOPLE, FOOD, AND OTHER CONSIDERATIONS FOR GATHERINGS

The days leading up to the big day are busy but it is important to give some thought as to what your puppy/dog’s ability is around guests.  Have a plan as to how you are going to handle when guests arrive and when the meal is served. 

  • If you can’t do it, assign someone to be in charge of the dog when guests arrive. This can mean slipping a leash on him so the person in charge has some control over jumping up, etc. If you don’t have someone to handle the pup it might be best to crate him until someone is free to take the job.
  • Instruct your guest to not feed the pup under the table. 
  • Instruct guests to not leave their toothpicks, food plates and alcoholic beverages unattended on coffee tables. 
  • Put guest coats and purses up high and/or in a room with a closed door. Dogs can forage through pockets and purses grabbing pill bottles, etc.
  • Practice down stays and tethering the pup during mealtime in the weeks leading up to the big day. If he can’t help himself and starts visiting the guests around the table, put him in his crate. 

And just for good measure, here is an additional resource that you may find useful: 3 Ways to Survive the Holidays with Your Dog – wikiHow  

We all want to have a nice time with family and friends during the holidays. Include your pets in as much a part of the day as is safe for him and will keep you out of the ER. We want the holidays to be merry and bright for both you and your pets. 

Susan Lynch is a former competitive dog trainer who has been training, competing and volunteering with her Golden Retrievers since 1995. In 2020, she founded Life with Rune, a Facebook community that documents the socializing and training of her own puppy Rune. In 2021, she was awarded the Rachel Page Elliot Lifetime Achievement award by the Golden Retriever Club of America. Her memoir Life After Kevin: A Mother’s Search for Peace and the Golden Retrievers that Led the Way is available here . To learn more, visit: www.susan-lynch.com. 

For socializing ideas and training tips go to the Life with Rune Facebook group and click on the Guides tab at the top of the home page.

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Socializing a Puppy During a Pandemic – 18 Months Later

For the past 25 years, I’ve held the popular belief that puppies should physically meet LOTS of people during the first few months of life but my latest puppy Rune came home during the COVID-19 lockdowns so that wasn’t possible. Like a lot of my fellow puppy parents out there, I was concerned about how this would affect him long-term.  

The Golden Retriever breed is well known for its outgoing, friendly temperament and although I knew socializing a puppy is so much more than just meeting humans and canines, this was unchartered waters.

One aspect of training during the pandemic that I hadn’t considered was the benefit of my puppy not being allowed to greet every person he saw. 

To be clear, young puppies absolutely need to meet people so they aren’t fearful around people. Check out this short checklist on some ideas for socializing a puppy while socially distancing here. Rune had met people in my COVID safe circle, but not nearly the amount of people my other dogs had. Time would tell if just seeing people doing ordinary things would be beneficial toward socializing. 

Fast forward 18 months in this forced social experiment and what I’ve learned is that even though he didn’t physically meet (actually being petted by) lots of people during those first few months, it had zero effect on how comfortable he is around people. The flipside is that social distancing limited the number of opportunities to practice teaching an enthusiastic puppy how to properly greet people- but this is a topic for a different day!

Let’s dig a little deeper into why seeing people in action worked so well during the early socialization phase. 

Part of the reason is related to genetics and another part is related to the early socialization that took place while the puppy was still with his littermates. Answering these questions will provide some insight: 

  • Is the puppy’s breed outgoing in temperament? 
  • Were the puppy’s parents friendly?
  • Was the puppy socialized to different sights and sounds when he was with the breeder? 
  • Did he have ample human interaction when the puppy was with his littermates?

Another part is determined by the puppy as an individual and his response to people. 

  • Is the puppy consistently comfortable and happy to be around his human family? 
  • Does the puppy have the same friendly response to people outside the family? 
  • Does the puppy try to initiate greeting a new person on his own?  

During pre-pandemic times with my previous dogs, there were many times strangers would approach me so they could get in a puppy cuddle. Most people can’t resist a little, fluffy puppy toddling along but once that puppy reaches 40 pounds or more, the number of people interested decreases dramatically. During the first months when the puppy is small, the puppy is rewarded repeatedly with petting and attention, so by adolescence, they have learned they are rewarded for approaching strangers. 

By the time my previous puppies were around six months old I had to reteach them not to approach every person they saw. In their mind, greeting strangers had been a green light for the first six months of their life so naturally they were confused when the rules had suddenly changed.  

This story of Rune in the spring of 2020 illustrates the benefit of limited greetings as a young puppy while on a walk:

When Rune was about 4 months old we were walking on a trail in the woods. He was dragging his long line and was about 15 feet in front of me when he saw a man riding his bike toward us.

As soon as Rune saw the man on the bike he automatically sat and continued to watch the man approach. 

The man stopped and expressed his surprise at how well behaved he was for such a young puppy.

Rune had seen moving bikes previously, so I wasn’t surprised he wasn’t afraid but I was surprised that he didn’t go bounding over to the man, that is until I thought about it. The fact was, Rune had never been allowed to approach a stranger on the trail. What he had learned was to sit and stay while people passed us when walking in public. 

Raising a puppy during the pandemic highlighted an area where I could be more consistent. I never ended up needing to change the rules for Rune once he became an adolescent as I did with my other dogs. From the time he was 8 weeks old I was teaching him to sit and wait while people and dogs passed us. 

Hopefully, by the time I get another puppy, social distancing will be a thing of the past and we won’t be limited with our socializing opportunities. When that happens, I will aim to strike more of a balance when socializing with new people during those first six months. How my puppy handles the interactions will be more of a guide as to how many people he meets versus allowing an all-access pass with the public.

Susan Lynch is a former competitive dog trainer who has been training, competing and volunteering with her Golden Retrievers since 1995. In 2020, she founded Life with Rune, a Facebook community that documents the socializing and training of her own puppy Rune. In 2021, she was awarded the Rachel Page Elliot Lifetime Achievement award by the Golden Retriever Club of America. Her memoir Life After Kevin: A Mother’s Search for Peace and the Golden Retrievers that Led the Way is available here . To learn more, visit: www.susan-lynch.com. 

For socializing ideas and training tips go to the Life with Rune Facebook group and click on the Guides tab at the top of the home page.

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A Dog’s Emotional Health

I don’t like math. 

When I was six years old my first-grade teacher, Ms. T., stood by my desk and berated me in front of the whole class when I started counting on my fingers to get the answer to a math problem. She had expected me to do it in my head. 

As a result, I spent a lot of time in class being afraid of getting the answer wrong.

It wasn’t that I couldn’t learn math, or that doing it was going to physically hurt me, the problem was that early negative experience. 

My negative experience + at an impressionable age = negative emotions around math. 

And it stuck.

Dogs may never have fear around math, but they can be fearful around ordinary sights and sounds like a bag blowing across a parking lot or the beeping sound of a truck backing up. 

Most of us have seen a dog express emotions of love, joy, excitement, playfulness and contentment. On the flip side, they also can feel and express anxiety, anger, shyness and fear. 

In an excerpt from the book, Animals in Translation , animal behaviorist, Dr. Temple Grandin Ph. D, says “Fear is so bad for animals I think it’s worse than pain.”

Small amounts of short-term stress are an inevitable part of life, but when it’s prolonged or recurring, it becomes detrimental to the dog’s emotional health.

When a dog perceives he is being threatened, harmed, or attacked it sets off a physiological reaction called the “fight or flight” response. If the dog is unable to escape the situation he may switch to fight mode. The intensity of either response can vary depending on the circumstances and prior history. 

Fight responses:
– Barking
– Lunging
– Attacking/Biting

Flight responses:
– Cowering
– Running away
– Hiding
– Freezing

The good news is we have the ability to dramatically reduce what a dog perceives as scary. 

8 week old puppy + begin socializing = A happier puppy and adult dog!

Learn 3 things that will influence your puppy’s happiness here.

If my 1st-grade teacher had handled things differently, would I have grown up to have a career in numbers? Probably not… and luckily for me, dogs don’t need to learn math.

Susan Lynch is a former competitive dog trainer who has been training, competing and volunteering with her Golden Retrievers since 1995. In 2020, she founded Life with Rune, a Facebook community that documents the socializing and training of her own puppy Rune. In 2021, she was awarded the Rachel Page Elliot Lifetime Achievement award by the Golden Retriever Club of America. Her memoir Life After Kevin: A Mother’s Search for Peace and the Golden Retrievers that Led the Way is available here . To learn more, visit: www.susan-lynch.com. 

For socializing ideas and training tips go to the Life with Rune Facebook group and click on the Guides tab at the top of the home page.

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