3 REASONS YOUR PUPPY ISN’T TAKING TO TRAINING THE WAY YOU’D LIKE
Author: The Meat Eater
Published: February 24, 2023
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“A new pup is a living, four-legged promise. Tucked deep inside of the adorable awkwardness is a future full of rooster flushes and limits of greenheads. All you have to do to do is train it to listen and understand its role at home and in the field.
It’s simple, really, yet so many people get it wrong. Or, they give up before their dog matures into the finished product it should be. These shortfalls often begin with the puppy phase, and just as often, are the result not of the dog’s faults, but ours.
One of these faults, that nearly every new dog owner will deal with is impatience and unrealistic timing.
Keep the Training Wheels On
Josh Miller, who owns the Wisconsin-based River Stone Kennels, is an accomplished trainer and breeder. He has worked with hundreds of dogs in his career and has identified one common flaw in most folks’ training styles.
“People go too fast with puppies,” Miller said. “Six-month-old dogs should not be doing advanced work. They should still be working on basic obedience, and leash work, and all of the foundational elements that have to be there long before you move on to harder skills.”
This issue stems from two parts, typically. The first is that we are biased toward believing our pups are really something special. Of course they are, but just because we love them and are pretty sure they are the canine equivalent of MENSA members, that doesn’t mean they’ll fly through any training drills we throw at them while they are still super young.
Just like you don’t see too many first graders winning chess matches against adults, puppies need time to build their problem-solving skills and learn the behaviors necessary to build to more complex tasks. This takes time and doesn’t happen on a schedule.”
The full article can be found here.
Photo Credit: Original Author
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