.
Is that where I went wrong??? LOL

The pooch is so cute..

Do you have him now? Or is it this weekend?

Please keep us up to date.
.

Benny came home last night (Friday. It was about 9pm by the time we got back. He's a sweetheart, but... he requires a lot of attention of course! My son and fiance are "home" for a wedding this weekend, and my daughter is home from college, too~ she is staying through Thanksgiving... so the house if really full
.
. And busy!

We love him already
.
.

Cara

LOLOL...

How old is he now?

It is so exciting to get a new puppy/kitten. So I bet you will have alot of fun.

Oreo really missed her family the first days. She went all over the house calling
her littermates, then got "depressed"...but that might have been her shots.
She ended up in one of the cat trees ALOT...and I was worried for a while.
She perked up in a couple of weeks. But I was worried, that we had a
problematic kitten. She was 12 wks old then. She went thru dairy withdrawals too, since we don't give dairy. I learned that at Thanksgiving..when she tried to steal my pumpkin pie with whipped cream! (it was the whipped cream!)

I for one will be waiting for "stories"... so please provide as they come up!
.

I can't get The Dog Whisperer on tv so need to rent the DVD or read some books. I am trying to get an older dog use to staying in the house some at least. He still thinks he's a puppy and will run around nabbing pillows and stuffed toys and chewing on them. He's hyper acting and doesn't get to stay in long as I tire out to easily. So back out he goes. Anyone have any tips to get me started that might help?

Hi Zayne, one of the things that Cesar always recommends is walks. His advice is to take your dogs for long walks then to work with them to end the behavior. Yes I know easier said than done. If you can't always walk him like that maybe a neighborhood kid could do it for you. I am still trying some of these techniques with my dog so I am in no way an expert. I do give my dogs rawhide bones to chew on and that helps with them chewing on anything else. Also we saw on of his DVD's at Biglots for $5.00. Good luck with your doggie. ...Sue

What I have observed on the Dog Whisperer show, is that one must take into
consideration what type of dog you have. A hunting dog? A racer? A water lover? etc.

And then you need to exercise that "need" to defuse it.

It seems to me that a predominately outside dog would find things to do to
occupy itself..outdoors. So those behaviors may be unacceptable indoors.

Perhaps, keeping him on a leash for a while indoors may help. Then he would learn what indoor behavior is acceptable if he is leashed to you. If you find long walks too difficult (say you have physical limitations due to health), you could do frisbee, fetch outside to wear him out a bit. (Of course, you may train him to be good while you are there, but he may still go behind your back, and revert. Some smart dogs do this
.
)

Thanks for the suggestions. I will look at our store to see if they have the video. Also will try and exercise together more with him. I'll ride the golf cart and he can walk some. He loves to ride the cart too but maybe I can get him to walk sometimes. We are just on the edge of the city limits so he needs to be penned or chained all the time when he is outside. All his friends live just up the road outside the limits.

I also bought him his very own toy. My husband gave it to him outside already not knowing that I was going to give it to him for inside. I was hoping that would solve the inside chewing. If he keeps it in his doghouse outside I'll buy him another one.

Zayne,

I wish you could watch his shows, although I am convinced that Cesar has a special gift and that he being present on the scene makes a big difference. I swear he communicates on some spiritual plane with those dogs!

The leash on in the house does sound like a very good idea and may be necessary to teach him what is not allowed. Cesar gives a quick pull on the leash with a "chsh" sound to let the dogs know of unacceptable behaviour. What he would do is put the pillow in front of the dog, wait for the dog to go for it, and 'correct' him at the first sign of a lunge for it. Then he would repeat the lesson until the dog understood it was off limits, and made no attempt to go for it. Of course, underlying is that your dog needs to know YOU are the pack leader, and he gives some lessons on that as well.

You may need to spend some inside time with him, training him on leash, correcting him as he does wrong things...even if you have to tempt him a bit to be naughty... like throw the pillow in front of him. And I agree that you need to have some of his own toys/chewies in the house. Our vet is pretty much against rawhides and pig ears and such because they've done to many surgeries to remove obstructions... and our Golden would accept a few Nylabone type toys.

I hope you can find the video of Cesar. I wonder if you can get them at the local library? There are a few short clips available on the Internet. I haven't tried these yet, but hopefully there may be one or two of some substance.

.


I also have to share this. My twenty something kids hadn't seen the Dog Whisperer, but they had seen the SouthPark version of it. SouthPark is not so much my thing, but I couldn't help but be a little bit amused by this episode where they called in The Dog Whisperer to train a child when Super Nanny failed. Before they found the clip, they could only describe it...and we just had a good laugh. This is just a clip. Only view it if you can 'handle' SouthPark humor. You can find the entire episode on the Internet somewhere...but this clip shows enough.

.


Cara

Puppy stories? He was nine weeks on Nov 18th.

Heck. I should start a blog, but I don't have time! This little guy keeps me BUSY. First of all, I keep calling him her/she. Thirteen years of Ginger is hard to break. I guess you can't teach this old dog new tricks.

Today was a much better day. This dog came home a peeing machine. I was actually worried he might have a bladder infection because he peed so frequently! He is very good at peeing every time we take him out, but he also pees five or ten minutes later INSIDE. He was used to being kept in a puppy room that was lined with papers, and they all ran around and peed at will. So NO training yet. The good news is he sleeps through the night... last night midnight to seven, and has only peed in his crate once during the day, and that was my fault because I didn't believe him when he whined that he needed to "go".

Anyway, today was A LOT better over all. I think he just realized we were people and not his litter mates...lol. We have had him out a little less for play...maybe 30 minutes out of every two hours...and while he is out he gets our focused attention. I mean...our eyes never come off him. We have learned to discourage the indoor sniffing because it leads to him peeing. It is much easier to catch the poops, and the vast majority of these have been outside. Tonight he stayed in the kitchen with us for over an hour and is much calmer and not so focused on just peeing. He's learning there is more to do in life than pee (I hope!).

We also just partitioned off a small part of the yard for "toileting". We never bothered to do that with our last dog, but we now realize this also makes for easier training for them. They get to figure out exactly where they are supposed to go, so it isn't "anywhere" outside and "anywhere" inside... but "over here in this small area". I have hope. Only three spills inside today, and a near miss on the poop...but we got it all outside. He poops about 4-5 times a day.

He is very mouthy because he is cutting teeth, but this isn't so much a problem other than constant watching and encouraging the use of his toys. That is actually going pretty well.

We are also trying to transition his food, and this isn't going so well
.
. He doesn't like the new food, and isn't eating much. The first two days, when we were to expect decreased appetite..he ate like there was no tomorrow. Not sure what I will do because he only has a little bit left of the food that he came home for the transition (we were mixing half and half, then 3/4), and I can't find it locally. "Chicken Soup for the Puppy Lovers Soul". It has barley, so is not gluten free, and since these dogs are predisposed to gluten sensitivity, I figure we want gluten free food not just wheat free food (well, for our handling sake as well). I bought Natural Balance sweet potato and salmon, but she either doesn't like it or it is too hard to chew. I cut all the pieces smaller, and he doesn't like it. I tried moistening it, and he didn't like it.

He is so cute, though. He really wants to please us. It is cute to see that.

Oh... he is sleeping through the night. Last night he went from midnight to seven without waking up or messing in his crate. He loves his crate, and settles into it immediately. He really didn't cry his first night home. There has been one night he woke up at 3:30. I let him out, and then he cried when I put him in his crate. So, I laid about 4 feet from the crate with my back to him, and he fell right asleep. On the first day, he also cried/whined/barked a little bit, but only needed a tiny bit of reassurance. Now, we put him in, and he just settles into rest. It is just feet from my computer, and he is happy to be nearby even when awake in the crate. Good Boy! (Well, I'll let you know how the rest goes. My daughter read in a book at the pet store that Wheatens are on the harder than normal to housetrain list... and they may be 9 months old before being completely trained...YIKES!) I think he has shown great progess though just between yesterday and today, but the first year is tough for all pups... potty training, among other things (chewing, digging, etc).

That's about it. I haven't had much time to post on the forum since mr. pup arrived! Of course, I also have my daughter home from college, and my son and his fiance were visiting over the weekend. We'll have a full house again over Thanksgiving. I have some seasoned bread that just came out of the oven, to make my stuffing. It smells so good!

Cara