Puppy Daycare Suspension

[imagebeastmarkbeast]

@honestsisterinchrist Another item that could be worked on at home is rapidly transitioning from an exciting game to laying down and resting. This helped with our guy alot!

Another thing to consider is that doggy day care is an extremely stimulating environment (loud barking, lots of toys, lots of friends). Work up your dog zen on a towel slowly starting inside your house and slowly increasing distractions. Eventually working up to being inside the daycare and being able to calm down when asked to by presenting the matt!

I'm sorry your day care couldn't handle this better, she is probably an awesome friend/playmate to have!

 

[milleyvanilli]

@honestsisterinchrist I'm so sorry - that's very frustrating, especially since she's not aggressive.

Seems it would be great if you could find a training partner - another dog who needs to work on impulse control and calming. Can you call a few local trainers to see if they've got a prospect you can team up with?

Give your girl a pet from me - she's doing her best, as we all are

 

[bbgg]

@honestsisterinchrist Our trainer has “puppy play and train” for different age groups up to a year old. You might check around to see if someone in your area offers that. It was very structured play time where they can practice their manners with trainers helping direct.

 

[cbt]

@honestsisterinchrist My GSD puppy failed an assessment at a daycare two months ago all because he tried to hump her dog a couple of times (and her dog correctly told him off with a growl each time). No fight was even close to happening but she was worried as "her dog has never growled before" and that my puppy would push the buttons of her other dogs without realising it and get attacked by another dog. Her daycare had only been open a few months so I took it down to her not having the experience to deal with anything but a placid dog. This happened when he was 7 months old too I think a lot of dogs that age don't know how to behave with other dogs and need correction from an adult dog. A couple of months later and the day care down the road from me can finally take in tact males so we went for an assessment this week and he passed! Their process was a lot better and he passed it with flying colours. You could tell the staff really understood canine behaviour and set him up for success. My puppy is now 9 months old and seems to already pick up on social queues a bit better then he did back when he failed the other assessment earlier this year. I'd advise that you take some time to look around there may be a day care with better qualified staff that your puppy will thrive in.

 

[praisejesus420]

@honestsisterinchrist We had the exact same thing recently!

We were also stumped because he only acted that way there, never with us. We spoke to our vets behaviourist about it and they basically said what we were thinking - if he's only doing it there, the only people who can do anything are the daycare staff.

IMO daycares that accept puppies have SOME responsibility to teach/encourage good manners in puppy groups. Equally, they aren't their dogs and they can only spend so much time handling one dog before they become a detriment to their care of the others.

Our solution in the end was to ask their behaviourist (who does consultations) to work with him whilst he's there. It would mean there's the standard member of staff looking after the group, then an additional behaviour specialist focussing purely on our pup and reinforcing good manners. It would mean paying an extra £20 for an hour of her time on top of the £20 daycare charge, but you can't put a price on a well mannered pup in my opinion! Especially if it's the difference between being able to keep using daycare not.

So that's one option if they have their own behaviourists, or see if they would let a private one go in with them?

In our case, just as we were about to try this, they moved him out of the puppy group and into the high energy dog group... and he's been perfect since. So I think it was just frustration at being around other lots of other dogs who had no interest in playing as much as he wanted to. So if they have a similar set up, seeing if he could go into a higher energy group could work?

Finally, are you sure about this particular daycare? Some daycares are better than others, and them going from "he's a puppy it's normal" to "don't come back here" so suddenly without offering options or solutions or trying to work with you at all feels like a bit of a red flag to me. I was given several "he's starting to get a bit difficult, we'll keep an eye on it and let you know if he becomes unmanageable" type warnings.

 

[honestsisterinchrist]

@praisejesus420 It would have happily paid the extra for a behaviorist, but they unfortunately don’t have that as an option. I selected the daycare because they were well reviewed, have very nice staff, and it is super close to the office.

Usually the conversations at pickup went one of two ways. Either nothing was brought up and we went home, or they would say that she’s showing a lot of energy and she has a tendency to not “listen” to other dogs (particularly older dogs) when they express disinterest in play. But they’d always finish with “but that’s completely normal puppy behavior, and she’ll learn from the others dogs as she gets older”.

We always sort of left with a “weeeellll, ok then?” feeling. If it’s so normal, why are you bringing it up? What we observe is a puppy in progress. She is extremely social, and gets excited to meet people and other dogs. She’s a little socially inept right now, but we have been seeing her get better and better at that when we bring her to dog parks. She’s only ever gotten in 1 serious tussle at the dog park, but like 5 people came over to us after to tell us that they’ve had problems with that dog and owner too (and that was months ago, with her being incident free since).

She has an assessment at a new daycare today that’s the opposite direction from my office, but they have cameras in all the play areas. Hopefully if she has a repeat at this new place, we’ll at least be able to see what they’re talking about.

 

[praisejesus420]

@honestsisterinchrist Well I hope it goes better at the new place!

It sounds like you're doing the right things with training etc, but she's a pup! They do take a while to become well rounded doggy citizens and as a labxhusky I imagine she's very full of beans!

Good luck today

 

[pellebroekveld]

@honestsisterinchrist That's pretty strange to have a 90 day ban. My daycare will only ever take a dog out if there's a serious fight or bite of any kind. They also work with all the dogs there on manners while they play. So the watchers are constantly engaging with them.

I would possibly look into another daycare especially if they wont do anything on their end you dont see it yourself. You cant train your dog if you're not with them.

 

[maeve]

@honestsisterinchrist Sounds like my pup! Wish they could play together lol. She just doesn’t get when other dogs are done playing, she keeps trying to engage them. She’s pretty young too though, just turned one.

 

[sweetelisum]

@honestsisterinchrist She might act differently in an enclosed space with multiple dogs than she does at a dog park. Have any friends with multiple dogs that she can frequent to learn how to play inside??

 

[honestsisterinchrist]

@sweetelisum We’re new to our current city, so we don’t have many friends :-( We set her up on play dates with my wife’s friend from work and they have a blast. They’ll run around the backyard, play in the kiddy pool, and play fetch while we grill and socialize. They even go to the dog park together and they stick together like glue, though ours has a little more energy and will at least go great other dogs.

We let them play inside the last time because it started to rain, and they just sort of did their own things in the living room while checking back in each other. To be fair though, they had been having a ball outside for over an hour first.

 

[sweetelisum]

@honestsisterinchrist She might act differently in an enclosed space with multiple dogs than she does at a dog park. Have any friends with multiple dogs that she can frequent to learn how to play inside?? It’s also a totally different schedule from what you guys do at home & it could be stressing her out, so she acts differently.

Teaching her to let go & stop might be useful for future daycare visits, so the babysitters have a command to control her if she doesn’t stop.

 

[depressednobody]

@honestsisterinchrist To be honest considering you say she is part husky that's where most the energy is coming from. Huskies are extremely social and energetic dogs with personality of their own. To me it sounds like normal husky behavior at that age

 

[blee321]

@honestsisterinchrist My dog gets like this if he's overstimulated. At that point, he plays rougher and it's almost like his brain shuts off and he doesn't listen. I spend a ridiculous amount of our time trying to avoid him getting to that level. Your pup is young, that's very much so normal behavior. I wonder if that daycare just doesnt have the people/room to give your dog a "time out"? I give my dog breaks all the time to refocus and calm down, it's normal but important for high energy dogs.

 

[honestsisterinchrist]

@blee321 They said she was getting timeouts, but I don’t think they were very long; just enough to where she would regain her composure and then she’d be let back in with the pack. They did have her drop to half days for the last couple weeks, but it sounded like she wasn’t really resting in the kennel.

 

[blee321]

@honestsisterinchrist Yeah, it may just be too much for her. We haven't done daycare but if I take my pup to a dog park that's too small, he sometimes gets too rough cause he's overstimulated. If he has room to run, everything is fine. Regardless, you're doing a great job w your pup and I wouldn't take it personally! It may get easier as she gets older.

 

[allaloneuk]

@honestsisterinchrist My Lab's favorite playmates at the dog park are Huskies, so yours and mine would probably get along well

The daycare I used when my dog was young had a break for all dogs from noon-2pm. Everyone was crated for a nap. This was because it's just really hard for most dogs to spend a full day actively engaged with other dogs. In the case of your dog, she becomes overstimulated and loses the ability to control herself. She would likely do better either at a different daycare that has a more proactive break protocol for all dogs, or only going half-days, or going to a dog sitter's house where she can be crated for a nap as necessary.

Similar to your puppy, my 2.5-year-old dog does very well at the dog park. (He did have issues between 10-18 months because he was still intact then.) It's different there than daycare because the dogs have plenty of room to wander and choose appropriate playmates, and most are only there for maybe an hour max. I also work hard to ensure that my dog remembers that he came with me, and we move around the park quite a bit.

Contrast that to last week when he was being boarded for 8 days. The place I use is an outdoor daycare during the day, and then takes a certain number of overnight boarders who come into the owner's house to sleep. My dog had to get occasional timeouts and breaks because he was mounting other dogs. He NEVER does that at the dog park or on playdates. But spending a full day playing with other adolescent dogs of similar size led to overstimulation. Next time, I will ask that they proactively give him more breaks. At home, he sleeps all morning on the couch!

TL;DR: Try not to worry. It's pretty normal behavior for high-energy, social adolescents who play too long. I don't think your dog needs extra training, but a different daycare situation.

 

[cherivee]

@honestsisterinchrist I think sometimes day care teaches some dogs to be over social maniacs. My Aussie gets along great with dogs but he can get over aroused with to much play. He kept getting moved to rougher and rougher play groups which just made him play rougher and rougher.

 

[john_brown]

@honestsisterinchrist Ah yes, our girl “graduated” from doggy daycare pretty quickly. Sounds pretty similar to yours except she sucks at social cues at the dog park as well. It’s a shame because we’d love for her to get some socializing in and learn from other dogs, also it’d be good for the whole family if she could have a day away from the baby! Looks like it’s play dates for the moment until she develops into a sophisticated young lady...

 

[sonlit]

@honestsisterinchrist Out border collie started to learn how to read a room at around 1 and people around 1.5y. I would suggest a different kind of daycare. We used to use a large outdoor one but now used a climate controlled indoor one (Camp Bow Wow). He loves it there.