I was interviewed this week by a collaboration called Pet Club whose mission is to build an online community for health and wellness for all pets in local areas. The founders are Lucy Platt of easyDogwalker and Rebbeca Gough of Ziggy’s Pet Supplies. The entire video is available in their facebook group but I have cut two shorter snippets where I was talking about a few helpful strategies, based on how dogs understand life, to help your puppy settle in.
Firstly, I talked about how significant and symbolic food is within the canine world, yes even at puppy age – I have witnessed weeks-old puppies use food to try to communicate with their families. Here are the key points mentioned in the chat:
- Be curious about the simple beautiful symbolism of food in the canine world
- When you feed your pup, eat a mouthful of your own food directly before putting the bowl down
- This is peaceful communication, non confrontational, so avoid eye contact and remain calm and factual
- Leave the puppy to eat in peace
- Pick up the bowl as soon after puppy has walked away
You can see the video below:
And then, we talked about toileting – how to enable a puppy to toilet in the right place, and how to support him as it can actually be a time when the puppy feels vulnerable:
- Allow puppy outside soon after eating
- Set regular alarms during the day to remind you to take puppy out
- Gentle encouragement is fine but avoid putting them under stress
- Wrap up warm and take out a cuppa and wait… puppy may need you there to feel safe enough to squat and be vulnerable
- Ignore if puppy toilets inside and acknowledge that he might feel safer inside than out
- Have confidence that puppy will improve because he WILL if given time and confidence!
You can see the video below:
I hope you found these strategies helpful. Let me know how you get on!
