jacques8989
New member
Hi everyone,
My SO and I adopted a 7 month old lab puppy a month ago from a rescue. Recently, he started lip curling and biting at us over things such as keeping him away from the tree so he can’t eat the bark. He has continued biting at us more lately at our arms and legs and is doing it in a rough manner while we’re walking, petting him, working at the desk, etc. Due to this, I decided to reach out to the person I worked with at the rescue to see if I could get contact information from the foster parents so I can get more information about his needs in case there was something we were not doing that worked well for them.
The rescue employee replied that they no longer worked at the rescue due to the mistreatment of dogs and inhumane conditions she witnessed. They said our puppy was never in a foster home and was actually staying in a pop up kennel for months. There were some days where they were never let out. Apparently they were directed by the Director of this rescue to lie about things such as this.
This news definitely brought context to how our puppy has been acting. I thought he was just a high energy dog that needed to learn how to relax and while that still may be true, he also simply has no idea how to live in a house and with people (in addition to being a teen puppy, if he’s even 7 months).
We had a call with a trainer scheduled for next Friday, but I’m going to try to see if we can move it up. I feel a little over my head working with a puppy who was a stray and didn’t learn much else like we were led to believe. We currently work on the basic commands like sit, lay down. Reverse time outs when not being nice. “Drop it”, “off”, “leave it” for things he shouldn’t be getting into. He has been responsive to crate training and has been taking at least 2-3 enforced naps a day. All with positive reinforcement - mainly training treats and some high value treats. We have been socializing him plenty with people and other dogs and he has knocked it out of the park in that area.
I would appreciate any advice for how we can make it until we get a trainer in the fold. Thank you in advance!
My SO and I adopted a 7 month old lab puppy a month ago from a rescue. Recently, he started lip curling and biting at us over things such as keeping him away from the tree so he can’t eat the bark. He has continued biting at us more lately at our arms and legs and is doing it in a rough manner while we’re walking, petting him, working at the desk, etc. Due to this, I decided to reach out to the person I worked with at the rescue to see if I could get contact information from the foster parents so I can get more information about his needs in case there was something we were not doing that worked well for them.
The rescue employee replied that they no longer worked at the rescue due to the mistreatment of dogs and inhumane conditions she witnessed. They said our puppy was never in a foster home and was actually staying in a pop up kennel for months. There were some days where they were never let out. Apparently they were directed by the Director of this rescue to lie about things such as this.
This news definitely brought context to how our puppy has been acting. I thought he was just a high energy dog that needed to learn how to relax and while that still may be true, he also simply has no idea how to live in a house and with people (in addition to being a teen puppy, if he’s even 7 months).
We had a call with a trainer scheduled for next Friday, but I’m going to try to see if we can move it up. I feel a little over my head working with a puppy who was a stray and didn’t learn much else like we were led to believe. We currently work on the basic commands like sit, lay down. Reverse time outs when not being nice. “Drop it”, “off”, “leave it” for things he shouldn’t be getting into. He has been responsive to crate training and has been taking at least 2-3 enforced naps a day. All with positive reinforcement - mainly training treats and some high value treats. We have been socializing him plenty with people and other dogs and he has knocked it out of the park in that area.
I would appreciate any advice for how we can make it until we get a trainer in the fold. Thank you in advance!