**Leigha - pup update

megs1383

I've been meaning to follow up on this for a while now. For the most part, Dillon has been doing great! Since we added the "sit and stay" prior to getting his food and going outside, the unsightly displays of dominance stopped (within a day or 2!!).

Though the last few days he has been acting like a real teenager, just being difficult, and showing me his new strength. He literally pulled me to the ground last night when we were outside. He noticed his puppy BFF out on a walk and yanked as hard as he could to try to follow her. I had my hand in the loop of the leash and I resisted as hard as I could but still went down to my knees, then he had another spurt and I was sprawled across the grass.

That and he keeps eating through his leashes... the bitter apple spray no longer phases him.

But luckily for him, he is still cute

(sorry if these pics are huge)

 

 

Leigha12

Yay! Glad the dominance issue is clearing up. Food is always the key! At least with our little guy.  How much does he way?  Rufus is done growing at just under 40 pounds, so luckily he?s not strong enough to get away from me (but it?s darn close). There is one house we walk by that really riles him up if their dog is in the yard and my hand is raw after those walks! And I totally feel for you on the teenage rebellion. We?re still going through that. Rufus has destroyed not one, but two plastic crate trays (and one tray liner mattress).  The last one was just last week (and he?s already 11 months old!). My dad cut us a piece of plexiglass for his crate liner so we?re hoping he can?t destroy that!  As much of a pain the puppy months are, they?re worth it. You can?t stay mad at them for too long when you?ve had them right from the start! Like you said, they?re lucky they?re cute!
I can?t wait to get home and see the pictures!

megs1383

The last time I weighed him (a few weeks ago), he was around 37 pounds, so I'm thinking that he has probably hit 40 by now. Our trainer thinks that he won't go over 50 considering his age and that his growing has slowed down quite a bit. Hopefully she is right!!

Wow, Rufus ate through the crate liners? We have one of the big plastic carrier/crates and just use blankets in the bottom now (which he likes to chew a lot), so I've been afraid to invest in one of those fancy cushions, for fear he will just shred into it.

But I do think I am going to get him one of those huge chunks of real bone to put in his crate during the day to give him something to do... He can pretty much devour a small rawhide bone in a 1 hour sitting.

Leigha12

Yup, he's destroyed two plastic liners so far. We got him the cushion to try because it was about half the cost of a liner and we couldn't get a liner in a store, had to buy online. So we gave it a try. 3 minutes after we went to bed it already had a chunk out of it.

He has towels in his crate to lay on and they look like swiss cheese!   I know he'd be less destructive if I put a nylabone in there when he's crated during the day (well, evenings really are when he gets destructive), but I'm afraid of him getting dehydrated. And we can't put his water bowl in his crate anymore because he likes to play with it too much and spill it.  He's a mess. A freaking adorable mess!

ETA: Oh, if you haven't tried it yet, Petsmart has what they call a Galileo Nylabone. A normal nylabone for their size was lasting Rufus less than a week. The Galileo bone is a couple dollars more, but it lasts about a month to 6 weeks.  It's been great!

megs1383

oooooh, I'll look into the Nylabones next time I'm at the store!!