FloatingDivider
Member
(Sorry for the long ass post)
What's up GAF friends. I need some help raising a dog. I've seen the threads, and some of y'all seem to have awesome dogs so I figured you could help me out.
My fiancee bought a 12 week old french bulldog puppy and I don't know the first thing about raising it. The extent of my knowledge in dog training is catching some Cesar Millan, the dog whisperer, on NatGeo, while high on a buddies couch, half a decade ago.
I've mostly had cats as pets my entire life and they're the set it and forget it version of pets. You teach them where their litter is, spray some water at them if you catch them peeing anywhere else, put some food down, and everything else works itself out. My cats have all ended up responding to verbal commands and hand signals with no issues or real effort on my part.
I'm not a cats or gtfo person though, so I wasn't opposed to the concept of owning a dog. My fiancee has wanted one for years because her family has had dogs for most of her life, and since my very old cat recently died (R.I.P buddy) I figured I'd stop crushing her dreams. So after researching breeds and breeders (she was really particular about getting a good breeder she trusted) we ended up purchasing a french bulldog who's currently 13 weeks old.
I told her I'd be okay with it only if she made sure to train the dog immaculately. Because I like well trained obedient dogs, but I'm not a big fan of the run ram-shot through a house barely under control type dogs. You know the dogs that charge at you on the street, won't stop barking, etc... I was kind of an asshole, regretfully, in retrospect, because I thought I could just put it all on her, and have her figure it out.
Now we've owned the puppy for a week and I've quickly come to the realization that I can't put this all on her because we're a family, and I love her too much to make her fly this mission solo. The issue is I know fuck-all about raising a dog. She knows more than I do, because she read up on it prior to purchasing him, but her previous dogs came from the pound and were effectively pre-raised. So she's never really trained a dog either and I can tell she's pretty insecure about her knowledge because she's trying to bounce ideas off of me. Unfortunately I don't know anything either and am at best guessing based on that whole calm assertive thing Cesar Millan preached about.
Now I've been furiously googling for the last few days trying to figure this out but there's so many things out there and differing opinions and I'm feeling like I know even less about things now. So I'm kind of wondering if you guys have any good online resources you'd recommend. I'm essentially looking an online how to raise puppies for dummies, or dog training the ELI5 edition. (Shameful admission: I have already ordered the dogs for dummies books and they're currently on the way)
I also have some concrete issues I need advice on:
Also don't get this list wrong because I think it's been going well in general. He's already super cool with being crated for the night as long as he's in the bedroom. And we're making pretty good progress on getting him to walk besides or behind us without pulling on the leash until we reach the dog park. And he doesn't really seem to bark a lot so far so that's a big +.
TL;DR
My fiancee bought a 13 week old french bulldog puppy and I need tips on how to raise it properly and would appreciate it if you guys could give me some.
Thanks.
Edit: Oh shit picture, I don't have one right now because my fiancee is camera master supreme, will update when she gets back home later tonight. She's taken him to visit his grand-ma.
What's up GAF friends. I need some help raising a dog. I've seen the threads, and some of y'all seem to have awesome dogs so I figured you could help me out.
My fiancee bought a 12 week old french bulldog puppy and I don't know the first thing about raising it. The extent of my knowledge in dog training is catching some Cesar Millan, the dog whisperer, on NatGeo, while high on a buddies couch, half a decade ago.
I've mostly had cats as pets my entire life and they're the set it and forget it version of pets. You teach them where their litter is, spray some water at them if you catch them peeing anywhere else, put some food down, and everything else works itself out. My cats have all ended up responding to verbal commands and hand signals with no issues or real effort on my part.
I'm not a cats or gtfo person though, so I wasn't opposed to the concept of owning a dog. My fiancee has wanted one for years because her family has had dogs for most of her life, and since my very old cat recently died (R.I.P buddy) I figured I'd stop crushing her dreams. So after researching breeds and breeders (she was really particular about getting a good breeder she trusted) we ended up purchasing a french bulldog who's currently 13 weeks old.
I told her I'd be okay with it only if she made sure to train the dog immaculately. Because I like well trained obedient dogs, but I'm not a big fan of the run ram-shot through a house barely under control type dogs. You know the dogs that charge at you on the street, won't stop barking, etc... I was kind of an asshole, regretfully, in retrospect, because I thought I could just put it all on her, and have her figure it out.
Now we've owned the puppy for a week and I've quickly come to the realization that I can't put this all on her because we're a family, and I love her too much to make her fly this mission solo. The issue is I know fuck-all about raising a dog. She knows more than I do, because she read up on it prior to purchasing him, but her previous dogs came from the pound and were effectively pre-raised. So she's never really trained a dog either and I can tell she's pretty insecure about her knowledge because she's trying to bounce ideas off of me. Unfortunately I don't know anything either and am at best guessing based on that whole calm assertive thing Cesar Millan preached about.
Now I've been furiously googling for the last few days trying to figure this out but there's so many things out there and differing opinions and I'm feeling like I know even less about things now. So I'm kind of wondering if you guys have any good online resources you'd recommend. I'm essentially looking an online how to raise puppies for dummies, or dog training the ELI5 edition. (Shameful admission: I have already ordered the dogs for dummies books and they're currently on the way)
I also have some concrete issues I need advice on:
- House-breaking
We're currently kind of still struggling here. He's only pooped indoors once, but he's had several urination type breaching events. Currently we're immediately taking him outside and cleaning it up out of his sight with an anti bacterial thing that's supposed to not leave a smell. He does pee more outside so we're ruling it as accidents. He essentially seems good for about 2 hours right now. Anything over that is a risk, but we're wondering if we should try to slowly increase the time because clearly every 2 hours is unsustainable for a long period of time. He manages 6 hours without accidents every night though, and when he's ready to go in the morning he clearly indicates it. - Humping
We've caught him humping the shit out of a stuffed animal we gave him. We've had to confiscate the thing. After a repeated test to verify if we weren't making shit up the humping is immediate and rather vicious. Is this normal for a 13 week old puppy? I have to mention he's not neutered because he's apparently a pedigree dog with a contract that has that as a clause so he could be used for breeding in the future. He hasn't tried to hump anything else but I'm kind of worried about it.
- Separation Anxiety
The puppy is imprinted on my fiancee and will follow her anywhere (except the elevator). But now we're worried this is going to lead to separation anxiety when she has to go back to work. Any tips on preventing that kind of behavior or nipping it in the bud. He already whines when she leaves him in an enclosure and goes away. We're trying to make her leaving as uneventful as possible so she doesn't say goodbye or anything but he still starts whining.
- Fear of the elevator
We're moving out to a house pretty soon but currently we live in apartment that has a fairly loud elevator and he seems to be scared shitless of it. He will loyally follow right up until the point when he makes visual contact and will literally freeze when he sees it.
No amount of coaxing will get him to enter it or even take a step towards it. Currently my girlfriend is picking him up and carrying him while in the elevator, while I'm lifting him over the lip and setting him down.
I can tell my girlfriend feels really guilty about doing this because he apparently starts shaking. I however feel like she should stop carrying him because I think it's adding to his fear, but I'm unsure. I'm just theorizing he's essentially treating being picked up as a thing that indicates the elevator might be dangerous or something. Any ideas on how to get him over that fear? I've thought about just elevator training him by riding the thing for half an hour a day or something but I also wouldn't want to terrorize the shit out of him. I personally try to act like it ain't no thing because it isn't and he should know that.
- Obedience training
Currently we're working on sit using a treat and waiting for 5 seconds of sitting before giving it to him. But I kind of feel like we should figure out how to do it without using a treat because I don't want him to be food driven. In my opinion he's also not responding to the sit command as much as the food being held over his head is forcing him to sit down to look up at it. So any tips would be cool.
Also don't get this list wrong because I think it's been going well in general. He's already super cool with being crated for the night as long as he's in the bedroom. And we're making pretty good progress on getting him to walk besides or behind us without pulling on the leash until we reach the dog park. And he doesn't really seem to bark a lot so far so that's a big +.
TL;DR
My fiancee bought a 13 week old french bulldog puppy and I need tips on how to raise it properly and would appreciate it if you guys could give me some.
Thanks.
Edit: Oh shit picture, I don't have one right now because my fiancee is camera master supreme, will update when she gets back home later tonight. She's taken him to visit his grand-ma.