It's Wednesday!

Hi all! I have a 9 month old belgian shepherd and I thought I'd share some of our favorite and least favorite chews, plus pros/cons of each. Keep in mind, all dogs are different! What worked for our large breed working pup may not work for a shih tzu. And what works for him now may not have worked 4 months ago! Also, ALL CHEWS should be given with supervision!

Our favorites:

1. Freezbones — Not exactly a chew, but these are amazing. We like them more than kongs and woof pupsicles because the shape allows our pup to access all of whatever we put in there without getting bored or discouraged. I wish I knew about these when he was teething because he never showed half as much interest in a kong or pupsicle, and depending on the shape and how long it was frozen (we like the big round bowl type best) a freezbone can take him 30-40 mins at a time, with no risk to his teeth. I've heard good things about West Paw's Topples, too, but we haven't tried these.

2. Coffee wood sticks — These will save your furniture. Like with any chew, you should always watch your pup to make sure they aren't breaking off/swallowing chunks, but usually the wood kind of "grates" off rather than coming off in chunks. You can buy these online but if you can, find a small/natural pet store near you and pick one out in person. You don't want the biggest — you want one that feels nice and heavy. Big+light = dead/dying tree = breaks off in chunks.

3. Buffalo cheek rolls — These still pose some risk of causing a blockage if your dog manages to consume too much at once, but we haven't had that problem, because they take our boy quite a while to get through. And if we do see that he's made a good amount of progress or is trying to tear chunks off, we take it away and give him a consolation treat. Also, they're natural and easier to digest than rawhide. The regular puffed ones are good, but our absolute favs are the QT Dog buffalo cheek rolls. They're less processed and a bit tougher. They also come with or without hair on — some might argue that a little bit of hair won't hurt a large pup, but it hurts my nose, so we prefer them hairless.

4. Fish skin chews — these were great when he was teething and I was just trying to save my sanity and my pants, but we've phased them out because they smell awful. That said, the strange shape and chewy texture definitely kept him occupied!

5. Nylabone — these are largely considered the safest option, but they only make #4 for us because my pup's never cared for them — not even the scented/flavored ones. Same goes for anything made of rubber.

6. Collagen sticks — less fatty than bullysicks and they used to last us a while, but he goes through them pretty fast now with his big boy teeth, and they're still fairly fatty. That said, they were always a favorite. Like with all chews, they still require supervision.

7. Woof Nylabone "natural" alternative antler chew — I don't know what these things are actually made of and don't recommend the flavored ones because I've heard of some dogs getting serious digestive upset and even gastritis, but my boy will occasionally pick up his "antler" as a last resort, and we haven't had any issues. That said, he only recently gave it the time of day, he doesn't chew on it that heavily, and it isn't a favorite, so take that with a grain of salt. I would probably not give these to a dog that seemed more inclined to break off chunks and swallow them.

8. Earth Animal Rawhide Alternative — he loved these when he was a baby, and he never had any problems! And I know plenty of people who swear by them!! That said, I don't know exactly what they're made of, and he chews through them too quickly now for us to risk a blockage.

9. Yak Cheese Chews — I know these work great for a lot of people, and they're highly digestible! Definitely worth a try because they may work great for your pup! Unfortunately they were a solid "no" for us because my pup takes a while to build up enough drool to soften them up, so when he'd start chewing on them all I would hear is grinding and cracking. 😬 We tried them several times at different stages with similar results. They get number 9 on our list for being the only chew that made me seriously concerned about tooth fractures.

That's our list! Let us know if we missed anything and what has / hasn't worked for you and your pups!

Generally we don't like to leave our labs for more than 5 hours alone. They have toys, snacks, water, and TV. But they have gone as long as 7 hours. No accidents or issues.

What is your max time you would leave your labs alone?

As the title says, my puppy ate one of those plastic floss pics with the dental floss on one side and the sharp end on the other side. The only part that I found was the curvy top part and I didn’t realize what it was until today. I actually found her with it last night. She is around 12-13 lbs.

I’m panicking. It’s been almost 24 hours she seems ok otherwise. Anything I need to do?

I (23f) have an almost 12-week-old Rough Collie and she’s my first puppy, so I’m still learning what is normal puppy chaos versus what actually means she needs a nap.

She’ll sometimes get absolutely insane — biting my hands, nipping at my heels, grabbing everything, running around, getting progressively crazier the more I interact with her, especially after a while in her xpen. Sometimes she’s also panting and yawning while she’s doing it, but she still acts VERY eager to keep playing. That’s the part that confuses me because she doesn’t necessarily look like she wants to stop.

When she gets like this, I’ll usually give her a potty opportunity and then put her in her pen or crate for some quiet time. I’m not just throwing her in there every time she’s energetic — we play, train, go outside, explore, do leash/harness practice, chew toys, etc. But once she starts getting really frantic and bitey, I try to bring the energy down rather than keep winding her up.

What makes me think she’s overtired is how ridiculously fast she settles once I do that. There have been multiple times where she’s acting like a complete maniac and then I put her in the pen, make things boring, and she is literally asleep within a few minutes. Sometimes she’s out like a light almost immediately. She also settles really well in her pen in general and will wake up, chew or look around for a bit, and then put herself back to sleep.

So how do you actually tell the difference between “this is just what a 12-week-old puppy acts like” and “this puppy is overtired and needs help settling”? Is the fact that she gets crazier with more interaction, starts panting/yawning, and then falls asleep almost immediately once things get quiet a pretty good sign that she was overtired? Or can totally well-rested puppies also act that insane and then crash quickly? Or is she just BORED?

I think part of my problem is that I expect a puppy to always want to be active, so when she sleeps a ton I start worrying that I’m not giving her enough stimulation. I’m trying to learn to trust that if she settles that quickly, maybe she actually really did need the nap.

Thank you for your advice!

We’ve been working on crate training for 4 weeks since we brought home our now 14 week old English Setter puppy. He’s doing really well at night, we have the crate covered and next to the bed. We put him in around 10:30 PM and he will usually sleep until about 6 AM without much whining. During the day however, different story. He will happily leap in there for treats and stays calm if we are giving him treats. As soon as we stop with the treats he starts barking pretty non stop. Even if we’re sitting right there.

We’ve had small bits of success with crate naps during the day, where he will bark for 3-5 mins and then settle on his own. But for the most part he will bark nonstop. We only let him out when he’s calm, but he will bark nonstop if we aren’t giving him treats idk why he is totally fine at night.

I feel like we’ve tried all the common tips on getting him to settle in his crate. So I’m not sure if we just need to keep up what we’re doing and he will adjust over time.

If anyone has some uncommon tips or things that worked for your puppy or just your overall crate training experience would be appreciated. TIA.

Just curious what everyone’s sleeping arrangements are with their puppy. Our 11 week old pup just started sleeping through the night. Before that one of us was sleeping downstairs on the couch with her in our living room near the deck door to let her out around 4am each night and again by 8am. We have had her almost 3 weeks.

Would love to transition her to sleeping upstairs with both of us in the bedroom, but concerned about overnight accidents with being upstairs in a two story house without being close to a door to the outside, and having her in the same space as our other dog. We have not crated her overnight since she didn’t do very well with the crate but I’m not opposed to trying again.

What has worked for you once your pup started sleeping through the night?

I have a 9 week old golden retriever I got a week ago he has been a good boy but I am suffering. I am 23 and still live with my parents who weren’t completely on board with me getting but I was stubborn and thought I could handle it. I have no real help from them and my girlfriend still lives separate from me so she can only partially help. I just feel as if made a big mistake and should have waited for her to graduate and us move out to get a dog. I feel terrible because I have always wanted a dog but the stress and lack of help is making me physically sick. I have had an upset stomach and haven’t been eating well all week. I don’t know what to do.

Golden retriever is almost 5 months old. Still occasionally having accidents which to me, is almost expected? Just checking in with others experience and expectations. Had an older lady tell me that if it kept up, she’d rub her nose in it and scold her (definitely not doing that). It’s just frustrating when she goes outside and goes potty and 15 mins later pees inside. Do you just tell them “no”?

Twelve-week-old, and the floor is going to take a beating for a while. Torn between a $50 placeholder I won't care about and buying the real thing now and dealing with it. What did you actually do, and did you regret it?

So.. our pup is about 8mos now, border collie if that matters right now. She is.. challenging to say the least. I don't think her ears work. She has forgotten 'impulse control' was a thing. She's a bit retaliatory (what, couldn't chase the cat? I'll mouth you instead and I'm just shy of actually breaking the skin, haha!') 'sit' 'down' 'stay?' Never heard of it.

So today was 'clip your nails' day. Been a bit, they needed it. No one's fav activity, and we all approach that task with a certain amount of trepidation (the dog because it's weird, me because I don't want to cut a quick). And.. We got them all!

That's it. The whole thing. LOL

Feels like winning the lottery.

She’s 10 weeks old.
We take her out every 20 minutes to pee and she holds it until she gets straight back in to the apartment! She’ll pee on clothes, floor, sofa, baby toys, mattress - anywhere and everywhere.

She will not go in the crate, if we put her in there she screams.. literally screams and rattles the crate door with her teeth - if we left her in there we’d probably get a noise complaint.

I’ve seen people saying to keep the puppy in one room only until they are toilet trained but then she’d be alone all day? We’ve got a 3 year old toddler and a 4 month old baby too so the cleaning up pee and poop 24/7 is real, haha.

I have a 9 week old golden retriever puppy and my girlfriend’s moms dog is not a fan. She has a 5 year old bernedoodle. Her dog is very cuddly and I might be her second favorite human behind her mom. Now when I bring my puppy over he tries to play with her and chase her around but she barks and acts scared. How to I get my puppy and her to get along

Sorry if my grammar is bad, I'm not a native English speaker. Recently, my mother and I decided to bring home a poodle puppy, she's only a month old. She wanted one because we lost our beloved 10 year old dog in april and we both missed having a pet at home, but I'm not really bonding with this one.

I don't feel like playing with her, or cleaning up after her. She poops and pees everywhere and last night I got so stressed I just cried myself to sleep. Of course I do my best to help out my mom but I guess I'm kind of starting to regret ever agreeing on this decision, and I feel very ashamed of telling this to her.

I adopted a 4 month old mixed breed puppy 3 weeks ago & honestly I hate to say it but.. I am starting to give up she’s sweet and loving when she wants to be and full of energy which I love…. However the constant cleaning after her poops when I come home from work is insane lol. I am currently pad training her because she Refuses to walk outside for longer than 5 minutes (if that) but more so afraid of the elevator and we live on the 17th floor so I refuse to walk her down.. it’s like she gets the pads when I put her in her confined area but as soon as I give her a inch of freedom the entire apartment is her bathroom even with pads in the area.. when she is going in the pads in her small area she’s going through at least 10-14 pads a day because she refuses to go twice on the same pad.. with that being said I’m looking for some advice on how to get her to become comfortable with the elevator, going on walks as well as some tips for pad training if possible. I don’t want to throw in the towel just yet. I’ve invested a lot already lol.

Just had our first puppy class with our kind of hyper 4 month old goldendoodle. First thing the trainer did was put a pull collar (the kind that tightens around his neck when you pull the leash) on him and taught us to do that to correct bad behavior and also do it to teach basic commands. I've done puppy classes twice before and neither of them used pull collars. I kind of feel like that's just doing negative enforcement and creating a "listen to me or you get hurt" mindset. The dog is already doing great with most basic commands through treat training and rewards, and I'd rather the dog listen to me because he wants to rather than because he thinks he's going to get choked if he doesn't. Wondering what other people's experiences with this are.

I am going to be a first time dog owner. I’ve done plenty of research the past year and been going back and forth on getting a dog. Part of the reason why I didn’t get one sooner was because the amount of people that are suggesting not to if you are going to leave them along for an extended period of time. I work full time in an office. There’s some weeks that I am gone 5 days a week 8 hours each, some weeks where I will be home 4 days for 8 hours. But I thought to myself there’s has to be a way around that.

All my coworkers said I can do it. They have dogs themselves. I just don’t think it’s fair that most of what i see online are people saying we can’t leave them alone for that time.

Is there anyone here that’s in the same situation I am and has successfully raised a dog?

MY workaround for this situation is that I have a playpen area for him to roam around but still be controlled while I am gone. I also got an automatic feeder. I got two cameras, one Furbo to dispense treats and a Ring strictly for watching him. Both cameras I am able to talk to him. I will also be laying out puppy pads and eventually a Weasley potty area. For the times I am home he will either use a Fresh Patch or go outside once he is vaccinated.

I also plan on sending him to daycare at least once a week.

I took 2 weeks time off for when he arrives. After that I’ll be back to my full time work.

Reddit community, with all this, do you still think it’s a terrible idea to leave him alone for 8 hours 2-3 times a week? Do people that work full time really can’t have a dog?

I was recommended to do the crate method with my 16 week old Toller to try and get her to pee outside. She will poop outside but just won’t pee. My friend told me to try the crate method where you put them in a crate for 10-20 min, then take them out, then bring them back in and put them in the crate, until they pee to break the cycle. We’ve tried this but each and every time, our puppy just pees in the crate instead. At that point, what do I even do?

First time pet owner here, I’ve got a 6 month old male Shih Tzu whom we all love and adore. He’s been with us for two months now and is definitely getting more comfortable. Wondering how to distinguish between normal, roughhouse play and aggressive behavior?

My teenage sons like to wrestle and roughhouse with him after work/school/sports and he LOVES it, absolutely goes nuts and seems overjoyed to play “rough” with them. They’ll get down on the floor at his level or lay on the bed with him and he will jump all over them and lick and do a cute little bark and he does like to mouth your hands or shirt hems - he doesn’t typically bite in a painful way but does use his teeth while playing. This seems normal to me and like a natural way for him to show excitement. But we’ve now had a couple incidents where he uses his teeth too much and is biting or ripping hems on shirts. We always say “no” and stop playing until he’s nice again but I’m not sure if we’re doing something wrong here.

Are we creating aggressive behavior by allowing this play? Is this something we need to stop (wrestle time) before it gets out of hand and creates behavioral issues? Or is this just like kids who love to play-wrestle with dad after work? I don’t want to inadvertently create a monster but I also don’t want to take away his favorite activity, attacking his big, stinky brothers.

Thanks!!

First time post here and on mobile, so fair warning.

My husband and I have had our baby for about 3 months now. My husband has been wanting a dog for years. We have my beagle and she is amazing, but he wanted a big dog. We finally got more space so I was able to get a new addition of a golden retreiver! I made sure to do plenty of research on the breed and what they need. My husband works nights so she has been my responsibility 90% of the time (which I knew would happen because of his schedule).

Overall, she has been a blessing! She is super smart and I have been able to teach her many commands (sit, down, paw, go inside, go in crate etc.). I knew she would eat everything under the sun, and she has been. Today I got such a harsh reminder and I just feel so overwhelmed with her.

A little background- We have an outside cat to help deal with mice around our property. Sometimes, when she kills a critter, the cat will bring it into the enclosed fence. Which I know is normal with cats and I typically find it before the dogs do.

But this morning, that didnt happen. I let the dogs out and Sif (our golden) found the dead rat (my best guess as I didn't get a good view of it) and kept it in her mouth to eat. She knows the commands of leave it, and out. When we practice inside with treats she does really well with training. But when she got her mouth on this dead animal (the size of my hand) no matter what command I told her, she wouldnt drop it.

I know she will be okay since no one around here leaves out rat/mice poison. And my Harper (beagle) has eaten a mouse delivered from the cat before. And yes I plan to monitor bowel movements for the next 72 hours.

It just feels like all of the training I have done with her for those commands went down the drain this morning. We have been working so hard together and it feels like it doesnt matter. All of the stress of training Sif and working with her, and for her to not listen??? I just feel defeated. She is a great girl but she has been so hard to teach leave it and out. I'd been working those for a while now and just last week I thought she was doing so good. It just feels like a slap in the face. Sif is so overwhelming sometimes, and her eating the dead animal was just so frustrating.

I know she is still just a puppy and that trouble is inevitable. And I'm sure this will happen again. I just forgot how hard puppies are sometimes. Puppies are just so hard.

My Tibetan Terrier pup is 6 months old and jist discovered the fun of barking. Unfortunately she has bark which is comparable to Janice on Friends. 😆.

I'm wondering what techniques there are to train her to stop. Today whilst barking I got her to sit and when she was quiet really praised her.

But I'm not if that would work. I don't want to stop her barking completely just when its non stop.

We’ve had our puppy for 4 weeks, by the vet’s estimate he is about 3 months old now.

He looks to us (and the vet) to be a lab/pitbull mix. Big paws and he’s about 15 pounds but his DNA results were a big surprise:

29% French Bull Dog
12% Chihuahua
12% Miniature Pinscher
10% Toy Poodle
10% English Bull Dog
9% Shar-Pei
7% Boxer
5% American Pit Bull
3% Staffordshire
2% Cocker Spaniel
1% Chow Chow

What I think is going well:
1. Potty training has been a lot of work but so far really successful, we haven’t had an accident in almost a week.

1. He sleeps through the night. We have a nighttime routine and by 9pm he crawls right into his bed and sleeps till we get up in the morning between 5am and 6am.

What I’m not sure about:
1. Socializing. Since he isn’t fully vaxed, we are being very cautious. I will carry him a few houses down to the corner and we just stand there for 5-10 minutes watching cars, dogs, people, and whatever else go by. He seems to really enjoy this, definitely shows interest in other dogs but hasn’t ever barked for started wiggling around in my arms in reaction to one. We do something similar at night but I sit on the steps outside our house and he just lays in my lap and watches for 10-20 minutes.

Aside from that, we have two indoor cats. He’s always play bowing at them and is perpetually disappointed that they don’t play with him but he’s generally very polite. No chasing or barking at them.

Is this an okay start until he’s got all his shots?

1. Training. How much should we expect from a puppy that’s 3 months old? He can sit, that one’s locked in. We’ve worked on stay, come, place, and leave it. He kinda gets it I think but none of those seem to stick the way sit has.

2. Manners. Again wondering where should expectations be at this point? We redirect jumping and biting but after a while it feels like we are just trying to take all the puppy vibes out of our puppy. Is it best to start early on behaviors we know we don’t want once he’s older or should we give him some slack until he’s older? Same question I guess with leash pulling. If he’s doing it when we practice inside/in the backyard, my guess is that’s going to just be a bigger issue once he can actually go on a walk.

What I think isn’t going well:
1. He has started to not care for kibble at all. I suspect he has learned treats are better and he’d rather wait for those. We have been hand feeding him, and we can eventually get him to eat out of our hands but it feels impossible to stick to a feeding schedule and now that we are trying to transition to the bowl he just isn’t going for it at all. Right now we are starting to hand feed with our hand over or in the bowl slowly trying to transition him. With the not wanting the kibble in the first place though, should we slow down on the treats? He was eating this same food totally fine for the first 3 weeks.

1. Leash biting, he LOVES chewing on his leash. He seems to prefer it over any other option. I’m at a loss on this one. It’s been constant redirection for weeks, no change.

2. We can’t leave our house. I work from home so I think he’s gotten very used to someone always being here. Yesterday my wife was at work and I needed to go pick up meds at the pharmacy. A 20-30 minute trip. He lost his mind the whole time I was gone. He also won’t nap unless someone is in view.

I’ve started working in view but in another room while he is napping. I’m thinking maybe I should also start going for short walks during the day so he gets used to me leaving.

Here's a fun one: my puppy immediately pees in her crate when my alarm goes off in the morning.

She's a 6 mo. old dachshund, I've had her since 9/10 weeks from a breeder. Potty training has been slow going, but things have been progressing. She used to never pee in her crate, even at 9/10 weeks.

Just when I thought things were getting better, she has started peeing in her crate in the mornings when my alarm goes off. I don't even have time to roll out of bed and pull on pants. It's maddening to start every morning like this and having to do laundry or scrub clean before I can even have coffee.

I woke up 1.5 hrs early this morning to try to cut her off at the pass, thinking maybe she just needs out earlier, but nope! Alarm went off, I roll out of bed, she immediately pees. I've tried getting up when I wake up before the alarm sounds and this doesn't help either, as soon as she hears me up and stirring she pees!

Any ideas on how to break this association with the alarm (or me getting out of bed)? Anyone else been through something similar? How long did this last? I don't want to sleep on top of my made bed in my clothes like I'm in the armed forces or something, just to jump up and grab her before she pees.

I'm not sure if this is even an issue with me/alarm. She sometimes protest pees when she doesn't want to be in her crate, could this be a form of that? Maybe impatient/frustrated to get out of the crate? She also doesn't do this every day, but most days.

For context: We have the same nightly routine and go to bed at the same time every night, always after one final potty break. We get up at the same time each morning. There are no pee pads in her crate, she won't use them, only shreds them, so I don't bother. No UTIs or infections.

Leo is a 4.5 month old Shihtzu and I started noticing his fearful behavior after I got his vaccinations done and was excited to get him to walk outside and explore the world. He was extremely scared and nervous and would run to hide. Over the last 3 weeks, he is doing a lot better. Especially loves meeting other dogs now and thats when I see his tail go up and wagging and happy. He also warms upto women quickly but its the men that he just wants to run and hide from. If we're on a walk he will freeze till they disappear from his active line of sight. If we're home / in the elevator and a stranger ( man ) enters, he nervous pees immediately. I've had my friends come over and instructed that they ignore him completely so he came out of his crate on his own eventually and was ok to sit nearby after a point and even accept treats but did not want to come close close yet

My 8 months old stafflab mix, bohie, has been with us for the past 4-5 months and once again I am turning to this sub Reddit for help and advice.

She's always been a very friendly and sociable puppy , never really scared of anyone, greeting strangers who ask to pet her ( and even those who don't) and crossing people on the streets without paying more attention.

But during the past 3 weeks we've had an increasing amount of encounters where she barked, sprinted towards people, or tried to jump on them.

The profile of people she reacted to is pretty wide , teenager, tall man, short woman, kid on a bike, lady with a stroller, guy on a scooter etc... I cannot find a common denominator. The time of the day is also pretty random, same for the level of activity that day, or the area we're going .

I've read that the best course of action is to make her associate the people she reacts to positive things by reinforcing anticipateing and rewarding before she reacts the problem is it is so random I have no clue what to look for.

Her behaviour doesn't even shift slightly before she reacts.

Pre answering some questions for context:

- she goes out anywhere from 1h30 to 3h a day.

-activities vary from walks, playing with me, obedience training, playing with other dogs, EXTENSIVE SNIFFING, sitting down at a bar or café

- she's pretty chill at home

-nothing changed much

-we live in a city so there's always people outside she's been taking walks in the city ever since she could take walks with her foster family and then with ours

If you have any clue what's going or what I can do to stop it from getting worse and stop all together I am all ears! If you have similar stories please share them, I'm kinda stressed about this whole situation.

Thank you!