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Question about barking/crying puppy. Anxiety? Kind of long.
We have a 3 mo old Rat Terrier (we've had him about a month). We are seeing progress in training him. He sits and stays most of the time when we ask him to, he goes by the door when he needs to potty and he's quiet in his crate at night. This is awesome because he had no manners when we got him and was quite crazy (he still bites at us a lot).
I don't know if it's anxiety or not, but as soon as he can't see us, he starts to cry and bark. We aren't out of his sight for very long periods of time, except when we are sleeping and during the day while we're at work. He seems to be fine at night when it's bedtime.
Example: I get up in the morning, bring him out to potty, come back in and let him run around the kitchen while I get his food and water ready. I play with him for about 30 mins before I get ready. I put him back in his crate while I get ready and about 15 mins (sometimes less) later he starts barking and crying (he doesn't have to go potty because I've tried bringing him out and he doesn't go). He also does this if we let him have the run of the kitchen (have a baby gate to block him from the rest of the house). It seems that as soon as he hears anyone make any noise he starts up with his crying and barking and jumping on the gate (which he can almost jump over now).
He cries and barks when we leave the house (I'm worried he does this the entire time we are gone), or if we put him outside on a leash and get out of his sight (he likes being outside on his leash otherwise). We try to do this in small doses so that he knows he can trust that we'll be back. We also hang out in the yard with him while he's on the leash.
We put him in his crate when we eat dinner and he's fine (we are in a different room than him for dinner, so he can't see us). I don't know why this time is any different than other times of the day.
We are getting frustrated...I know that puppy training takes time and patience and we are willing to take the time and effort needed to train him. We don't want to do things incorrectly and start bad habits. I'm afraid that we are doing something wrong and it's causing him to be in the habit of barking/crying certain times of the day.
On a differet note, we bought him a little vest/jacket type thing (looks like a horse blanket) because he was shivering in the mornings when we'd bring him out. We have noticed that he does a 180 when he's wearing a shirt/jacket. He actually goes to where we keep them and sits there until we put a shirt on him. It's like we have given him a sedative when he's wearing a shirt. This leads me to believe that he may have separation anxiety? We tried a Thundershirt, but the petstore measured it too big and it doesn't fit right. It will probably fit him in about a month or so. It's getting too warm out to keep a shirt on him and we don't want to put it on him while he's in his crate in case it gets caught on something.
Help!
Re: Question about barking/crying puppy. Anxiety? Kind of long.
Quincy used to do this when he was that age. I would say by six months he was doing it less, and now he doesn't do it at all. The only time he whines now is when I take Dexter for a walk and he's overly excited for his turn next. lol.
I'm not surprised that the shirt helps, because that kind of thing can decrease anxiety, but that doesn't mean he has official separation anxiety. I think it sounds like you're doing things right. He's just a baby and needs time to learn. Hang in there!
ETA: The PP reminded me, the Kong definitely helped when we left the house.
Quincy and Dexter, new BFFs
I used to be kris216.
He does get a kong every morning. He doesn't seem to like peanut butter though, so I use the kong brand stuff that comes in a can. I put some of his dry food in it and then top it off with that. I know it doesn't last him very long though. We put a few teething chew toys in the crate with him.
It's encouraging to know that he will hopefully outgrow this!
Thank you for the info. I know that most of this is puppy stuff, so I'm not too worried. I just don't want to start bad habits by either letting him cry and bark or going to him when he cries or barks. I wasn't sure what to do.