Puppyhood is a crucially important time in a dog’s life. Dogs learn more in the first 16 weeks of their lives than at any other point thereafter. If things go on the wrong track in puppyhood, it can take a lot of time and effort to fix unwanted behaviors later.
That’s one of the many reasons why we at OneMind Dogs recommend that you begin building a good relationship with your puppy as soon as you bring your new furry friend home. Relationship building happens through fun games and simple training exercises.
Did you know?
- When a puppy is trained at the age of 8 – 12 weeks, a joy of learning develops. This means that the puppy learns to enjoy learning, and is easy to train also later in life.
- Young puppies learn things effortlessly. The more new situations, environments, surfaces and sounds they experience, the easier it is to live with them later.
- By 5 months of age puppies understand what their owner controls and what the owner’s decisions are (for example: when do we eat, who do we greet, etc). It’s up to the owner to teach the puppy what is acceptable behavior in the human world and what is not.
- An extensive study (Scott & Fuller -65) concluded that puppies that played tugging and fetching games with people at the age of 8-10 weeks were more easy to train as adults, and more likely to pass tests of army dogs and assistance dogs. If the puppies didn’t play these games with humans before the age of 14 weeks, they didn’t care about playing with humans later in their life, either.
These are just some of the reasons why you should start training your puppy from the moment you begin your life together!
If you’re looking for a fun and easy training program that fits your busy schedule, check out OneMind Dogs puppy training!
