Puppy Training - How old to start?
Hi everyone, we brought Orion home last Friday and thanks to all the great info on this site we've been well prepared. I was hoping you guys could lend a little bit more advice.
Orion will be 13 weeks old on tomorrow (Thursday) and I was wondering when would be good to start working with him on basic commands.
It's been less than a week but he already knows exactly what to do when we go outside to his "spot" and starting yesterday he has even come to get me and barked on a couple occasions when he has had to go out.
I'd like to start with at least sit and maybe wait because I've never seen a dog this crazy about food. I read that Corgi's are food motivated, but WOW! He goes berserk when he sees me grab his food bowl. He's already learned to run in his kennel to eat but I barely bend over and he diving into the bowl and sucking it down.
He's good on the leash for the short strolls around the complex especially if we go at his pace haha. There are SO many good smells though that it's hard to get him to come sometimes.
We're going to do an obedience class once he gets his shots and is allowed but I thought we could start working early. I just don't want to overwhelm him.
So what do you guys thinks?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Jane Christensen on
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Sit is an easy one so I would start with that and slowly add others. Have fun with your new one:)
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Permalink Reply by Paul, Carrie and Orion on
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Thanks Jane, we're already having a blast! He's such an awesome little guy.
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Permalink Reply by Anna Morelli on
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You can start right now. Puppies are learning all the time at a very fast pace, so they might as well learn the things you want them to. I would recommend you check out the books and videos of Dr.Ian Dunbar at : http://siriuspup.com/ You can probably get some of his stuff through your public Library as well. Enjoy!
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Permalink Reply by Julia on
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Since he's so food motivated, teaching him sit by the lure method should be a breeze. You slowly move a treat back over his head so as his eyes and nose follow it, his body goes into the sit position. As soon as his bottom hits the floor he gets the treat. At first you don't even use the word. Eventually that hand movement will turn into a gesture, so you won't need a verbal command. Just search out dog training with positive reinforcement and you should find a description of this. Patricia McConnel has several dog training books that cover this, such as "Family Dog Training" and "The Puppy Primer."
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Thanks for the book suggestions. Looks like we have some fun things to work on ahead of us.
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Permalink Reply by Ludi on
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For starters, I wouldn't even try to go for "tricks" like sit or shake. I would teach him good manners with regards to how he approaches food. A puppy who's allowed to dive for the bowl and start inhaling it is not going to learn to be a gentleman about it. Look up videos on Youtube on how to keep your puppy from mugging your hand/bowl for food, and to be patient and calm before he is allowed to eat.
It's very important that he learns from the get-go that being impatient and frantic about food is NOT what you want.
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Permalink Reply by Beth on
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I agree, BUT puppies are frequently genuinely very hungry by feeding time and they have all those weeks of fighting each other for food to overcome. It's natural, normal, and healthy for pups to dive for the food bowl. They had to fight for the teat while nursing, then frequently they are fed in groups out of large shallow bowls as they transition to solids. The breeder will make sure they all get enough, but they do all jockey for position (and in a feral situation the weaker ones would not make it, so pups instinctively see it as life or death).
My preference for food-mugging pups is to physically keep them away (crate or pen) til the food bowl is down and then let them go, then gradually teach manners over that first six months to a year as they learn some self-restraint. I don't necessarily want a baby puppy to see me as the thing that keeps him from food, when all his instincts are screaming "Eat or die, eat or die!!"
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Okay, I didn't think that one through enough - I saw 13 weeks and figured Orion would probably be old enough by now to have lost a little of that "EAT OR DIE!" mentality. Maybe not! I got Ace at 16 wks so he was quite developed already.
I know what you mean about working gradually, though. I feed raw to Ace at night and some days, when he's particularly hungry, he gets quite worked up over his food. If I put it on the cat tree next to a cat, he gets a crazy look in his eye and I need to wait a good 3-5 minutes before he finally settles down and stops panting. It's a long process. :)
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We've only just brought him home at 12 weeks so we've had Orion for a week. He was still with a few sisters from his litters a multiple other dogs since our breeder also shows. He got in to a scrap with one of his sisters when he was still with the breeder over food because he laid across the bowl to keep her out haha.
Hopefully he'll calm down over time and with some mandatory waiting until the bowl is read for him. I thought if we worked on Sit/Stay that could be used as well to keep him from diving head first into the bowl.
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Haha, what a silly little boy. With time and patience, yes, he will become more of a gentleman over his food. :) The ideas in this thread are all really great, and the most important thing to keep in mind is to be patient! He's still a young little dude, and needs time. Keep training light, fun, and happy and he will be really responsive to anything!
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Ludi, I agree that this is important. For those who may want to do this, it's very easy to teach a young pup to sit for the food bowl because he will be looking up and his butt will naturally go down if you wait a few seconds. Once he does this consistently ( they can start at 8 wk.) I add a leash and the word "wait", after putting the bowl down as far from the pup as my arm length will allow, followed by a release word. The leash needs to be loose, and you need to be standing up, not leaning over the bowl, before giving the release. Once the help of the leash is no longer needed ( a few days) I add "watch" and wait for them to look at me, before giving the release word. When they've gotten good at this ( a month or so ) you can teach any child age 4 or older to feed the puppy or dog and it's a great way to establish the child's superiority in rank in the dog's eyes. Of course, if the child is young, supervise...
If you have a puppy who is too excited about the food ( beyond what any pup would be ) you can practice this with a treat before doing it with the food bowl.
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Yeah, I believe there is a natural progression into "tricks" once it is established that there needs to be some calm behavior before receiving the reward. A puppy thrown into a frenzy over food is not going to be paying attention to visual or auditory cues; he's going to be zeroing-in on the food. I started with calm behavior rewarding, then morphed that into "Watch Me", asking for eye contact before presenting him with a reward. It worked very well to establish a working relationship between Ace and me.
On the other hand, if he is still a bit young to be totally calm (I have no experience with a puppy of 13 wks, Ace was 16 and my Basenji as well), then even just a brief respite from the crazy can be a good thing. :)
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