Happiness is a warm puppy!!

On Friday I attended Perfect Puppy Foundations Course run by Institute of Modern Dog Trainers (IMDT). I had a great day developing my knowledge and understanding of puppies and meeting other professionals in the industry.

Key things I learnt from the course

Important questions to ask a breeder when looking for a new puppy

1. Do they perform Early Neurological Stimulation?

It can give puppies a greater tolerance of stress, greater resistance to disease, faster adrenal system, stronger heart rate and stronger heart beat. It requires breeders to perform 5 stimulating exercises once a day from day 3 to day 16 of a puppies life.

2. Where are the puppies and their mother kept?

Puppies should be kept in a high traffic area for passive socialisation not in a quiet garage. The critical socialisation period is between 3-12 weeks. Socialisation is not just visual but also smell, audio and touch. So its important that puppies experience a wide variety of different household noises, smells and people to ensure they are happy in a variety of different environments.

Importance Stages in a Puppies Development

Fear Stage

The first fear stage is between 8-12 weeks where any new experience is considered novelty and viewed as potentially dangerous. The second fear period is between 6-12 months when they reach sexual maturity.

When puppies are in their fear stage DO NOT PUNISH! Your puppy is super sensitive, so in turn you need to be super sensitive to your puppy's needs and intense development.

Adolescence Stage

Up until puberty (up to approx 12 months)

Puppies capacity to deal with change slowly diminishes. They will learn coping strategies/default behaviors. So socialisation is so important for puppies.

Socialisation is about creating as many varied, positive, safe and enjoyable experiences for your puppy as early as possible in their life to build strong social immunity and avoid future scary experiences later in life.

Whilst on the course I purchased a book called Easy Peasy Puppy Squeezy Author Steve Mann. So far I have found it very informative and easy to follow and I look forward to putting some of the training tips into practice.