KEEPING THE PUPPY SAFE

There is nothing any more loving or more adorable than a white German Shepherd puppy! The first weeks of your puppy’s life are critical for socialization and long-term health. While you’re with your puppy as much as possible, there are times when you’re not by his side because of work or social outings that involve humans! In these cases, you have to take steps to make sure your little friend is as comfortable and safe as can be until you return home.     You need to remember this is an animal that is unlearned to the ways of our lives. You need to look at your home and think safety for the puppy. In other words you need to puppy proof your home.  

   Be sure to secure cabinet doors that hold cleaners and other household chemicals with latches and locks.

   Toss out ant traps and rodent baits that may be tucked in corners. Under furniture.

   Remove any mice or rat traps that you may have setting around.

   Install safety plugs in electrical outlets. Be mindful of lamp cords and computer wires that can be chewed or tugged. Chewing into an electric wire can kill the puppy instantly so make sure all electrical cords are not in the reach of the puppy. You can run electric wires thru PVC pipe keeping them away from where the pup can chew the wire. 

Commands the pup should Understand

 There are a few words that the puppy should fully understand to be a good behaved k-9.

  LEAVE IT

  NO

  HEEL

  EASY

  WAIT

  KENNEL

  COME

  SIT

  DOWN

  STAY  

 Use these words every time you are around the puppy. Make sure he understands the meaning of the words. You will need to show the pup what each command means. Once he has learned the meaning of these TEN commands it will be easy to teach the dog new things every day. 

Foods   

It is a must for you to feed your new puppy a good healthy feed. We use Puppy Diamond Premium or Diamond Adult Maintenance. The only supplements we use are a mixture of vinegar and honey (mixed 50/50) We put a tea spoon full on most of the feedings. We keep the puppy on this feed until it is at least five months old. Then we will switch to a high energy feed. (We use Diamond High Energy)  I suggest you stay away from the can dog feeds until they get all the poison problems solved.     If you wish to feed a wet food and spoil the heck out of your pup, then have the family cook make up a big batch of cooked rice and hamburger meat. The pup will love it and it is also good when the pup may have diarrhea or is sick with an upset tummy. You might go to your computer and look up the benefits of vinegar and honey for a health food.  

Chocolate is toxic to dogs and can kill them.  Even if you want to share with your puppy, its best not to with chocolate. Chocolate contains chemicals that can be harmful to dogs, and the darker the chocolate, the greater the risk.

To develop the desire of the pup to want to travel with you in the auto, we stop at an ice cream place and get our dogs a treat of ice cream but we make sure it is vanilla and has no chocolate in it. When doing this do not over feed the pup with ice cream and remember it is cold and can freeze his mouth if he licks too much.

Be careful in giving to many sweets to the puppy. After the pup is three or four months old we sometimes put honey on their dry feeds.

Socializing the pup with strangers   

We always carry with us some good tasting treats so we can have strangers pet and give our pups some food treats. Most of the time we simply use bologna cut up in real small pieces. We want all our dogs to like people. We do not allow them to bark or growl at strangers while we are out. If there are children that are old enough to play with the pup, we have them run and play using a toss toy.    It is great for the puppies to learn to play with young children. Our pups learn at a very young age to be around all ages of people.  Older folks that may be in a wheel chair, we have them pet and give treats to our pups but we stay with them to make sure they do not jump on the older person. The pups learn that they must be calm around older folks. This is how we train them to be therapy dogs.

When The Puppy is Home Alone.     

Your puppy loves to be entertained when you’re away from the house. If you don’t take care he will entertain himself being destructive by chewing and tearing up things, turning over waste baskets and so on.   There are some things you can do to teach the pup to be a good pet when you are away. For one leave the radio or TV on.  Make sure the sound is not too loud as you want it to be at a   comfortable listening level for him, which is barely above a whisper. Plus, shows with squeals and yelps like soap operas or the news can have unpleasant sounds but the pup will learn to adjust to this sound and help him over come fears of loud noses. You will be leaving him in a shipping crate, so turn the crate to where it is facing the TV so the pup can watch and hopefully understand what is going on.    Better to let the puppy learn and enjoy noises around him. We want him to learn the ding of an elevator bell down the hall, the growl of a delivery truck, the roar of a jet overhead, the ring tone of the phone.    

    The ring of the door bell is a problem with some dogs. You need to take your time and teach the pup not to start barking every time the door bell rings. You must scold him when he does this. Then open the door and let him see the person ringing the bell. You can use the family to teach him to keep his mouth shut when the door bell rings. These are sounds the puppy needs to be familiar with, which will help him become completely comfortable in his new home with you.

First of all you need to train the puppy to go into a kennel on command. We get one hungry puppy and set a chair in from of a shipping crate, the crate the pup will be spending time in. We have the pup on a short lead so he cannot get away from us. We have very small pieces of bologna cut up for treats. We give the pup a treat letting him know we have it. Then we put the pup into the crate using the word kennel.  Once he is in the crate we give him a treat of the bologna then using the word stay, telling him he is a good dog. We shut the crate door for a few seconds, then tell the pup ok and let him out of the crate. We will give another treat, and then tell him to kennel and point to the open crate door. You may need to gently force him into the crate, but once he is in there give another treat and tell him to stay.  Do this until he is going into the crate on his own when you say kennel. Don’t forget to always give praise when he does well.  Now he is going into the crate on his own and we are going to teach him to stay in the crate when the crate door is open when he is told to stay.

Have your chair close enough to the crate so you can open and close the crate door easily. Tell the pup to kennel and have him facing the crate door. Once he is inside the crate, shut the doors. Then tell him to stay and open the door slightly a few inches. He will try to come out but do not let him. If he does try to come out use the word stay. You may need to slap him in the face with the crate door very lightly until he is staying in the crate without trying to come out. If he stays give him a treat and leave the crate door open a little bit more. Do this until the pup is staying inside without trying to come out. Then tell him. Ok and let him come out of the crate. Pet and praise him, then tell him to kennel again and repeat the stays until you can leave the crate door open and him not want to come out until you tell him to.

I recommend a wire crate because it allows for proper ventilation and visibility. If a puppy cannot see where strange noises are coming from, it may become frightened and develop bad habits. Wire crates are also easily moved and will fold flat for storage. 

You will be leaving the pup for a few hours at a time in the crate so find him chew toys (we recommend American made, not China made) that you can leave with him to appease himself. You also need to have a large enough crate that you can put in a water and food dish for him.  It would be much better for the pup if you have an outside kennel or large fenced in yard for him to run in instead of a small shipping crate. If you live in an apartment then you will have to use the shipping crate, but please have a large one. (A size 500 or larger).  We purchase crates that will house our dogs when they are full grown.

Lead Breaking The puppy 

There are many different methods of lead breaking a puppy. Often times, even members of the same litter will handle the restriction of a lead and collar differently. I tend to use a combination of whatever works. Note: It is best to lead break your puppy in the privacy of your yard where no one else can see you. It avoids the puppy playing his distress up in front of an audience.   

I start my puppies with a non-choke leather collar. No pench collars or choke chains. More than likely the best place to start training the puppy is in your back yard. If you will take a lead that has a chain on it that will snap into the collar, use it. It should not be over three feet long. Snap it into the collar and drop the lead and let the puppy drag it around. At first he will run from it thinking something is chasing him, but he soon will stop and look at it to see what it is. Just stay with the pup while this is going on. When he has stopped and is looking at the lead, go up to him and talk to him letting him know there is no reason to be scared. Sit down beside him and pet him. Give him a treat. Then get up and start walking real slow encouraging him to follow you. Give small tugs on the lead until he is coming with you. When he does come to you, give him a treat of your bologna.  Do this for about 15 minutes, then put the puppy in his crate for a rest of 30 minutes.  

Then get him out again and put the lead back on him before he comes out of the crate. Then call him to you.  With a lot of praise. Make several turns so that the puppy realizes that there is a limit to his freedom. It does not matter what direction you walk, just make sure that you are choosing the path rather than the puppy. Distribute treats liberally to reinforce this as a positive experience.

Of course, your puppy may not be so happy about losing his freedom. He may do the mule stop routine, or even worse; he may throw a full blown tantrum. My telling you to ignore this behavior may sound good here, but when you have your puppy doing back-flips, it is a hard rule to follow. Be strong! The more you react to your puppy’s negative behavior, the worse it will become. Simply stand quietly and let your puppy get his bad actions out of his system. When he has settled down, tug lightly on the lead, show him a treat, and try to encourage him in come with you. If he has planted himself so deeply that you swear he is glued to the ground, switch directions and walk away from him and force him come with you. Do not let him win the battle.  Always end on a positive note. Even if that means that you puppy only walked a few feet. Persistence is the key.

If you are having trouble lead breaking you puppy, work a little longer each session, several times a day.. Just remember, you will need to be more stubborn than your puppy but at the same time be understanding with the pup as you train him. You should be able to teach the pup to follow you with a lead on in two training sessions. Stay with the training until the pup is trained to follow you using small tugs if need be.