Help with Dog Challenges

I have a less expensive way to help! My Dad is a dog trainer and would love to help with any q's you might have. He breeds Labs and is also a trainer. Kevin Tait
google kandrinwood labradors. you will see a website that reads aklabs. Click on that and you will see his sight and get the phone number info or e-mail address. Just let him know that Jamie recommended him. Hope this helps!
Jamie

My suggestion is to crate your 4 legged baby at night and you may even have to put a cover over the crate to train her to wake when you want her to. They say you have to stick with this type of training for about 2 to 3 weeks.

Good luck and take care

Hello, I am the wife of the trainer at KandrinWood Dog School, and yes, we can probably help. However, first I would suggest that you take your dog to the vet and have two tests taken. One is a urine test to determine if your dog has a urine infection and the other is a blood test to check for a thyroid issue. Thyroid issues are found in both the lab and Weimy (are you sure that you have a mix of these two??) and often times they show up around the age of 3yrs. If the thyroid is over active it will cause your dog to be as well, and thus the change in waking and sleeping patterns. Any dog who is sane and healthy can be trained. Kevin's # is ###-###-#### and he is AWESOME!!! A.

A weim/lab mix is going to be an extremely high energy dog. Weims have a pretty strong bird dog drive in them as they are still used to hunt quite frequently. Dogs like that usually need continual classes and or activites to keep their mind and body active. Even if she doesn't need traditional obedience you could look into "trick" classes or agility for her. If she is well entertained and excercised (not just out in the yard to do her business) hopefully that will help her be a little less spastic. If classes didn't work in the past you probaby didn't find a trainer that was right for you and your dog. If you are consistant with her she should learn fast, both labs and weims are quite intelligent, you just have to remind them that they are the dog. If your concerned she's not the right dog for your family, you may want to consider adopting her out. If you don't have the time to put into working with her, the situation won't improve on it's own. Remember, new babies are big adjustments to the dogs in our lives too!
Good Luck!

My parents dog does this with them too. He is a 13 year-old miniature poodle and "needs" to go out every morning at 4:30. My mother is exhausted and really would love for him to sleep through the night, but she allows him to dictate his "schedule". They have not set ground rules or "penned" him in their bedroom to prevent accidents through-out the house if they ignore him. (A dog will not have an accident in their sleeping space, unless they are confined for an inordinate period of time, or they have an infection or are sick.)

However, when my parents travel and we watch their dog at our house, he NEVER goes out at all during the night. Doesn't ask, nothing. He goes out in the morning with our two other dogs when we get up. He is an angel. He knows the rules and follows them.

Did this new routine start because of some event? Our dogs (Airedale Terriers) will sometimes get into this type of routine if we allow it.

When our oldest was sick with the stomach flu he needed to be fed 1/4 cup ground chicken pate every two hours. After he was better he wouldn't eat his regular food (completely ignored it!) and expected not only the pate, but also to be fed at the previous schedule. It took a few days of telling him no and only feeding him at the appointed times, he eventually got the picture and now behaves fine.

Also, taking them on daily walks have really helped with their energy levels. Dogs like yours and mine need time exercising with their owners on a daily basis to be happy and healthy.

Good luck with your wonderful dog! Your son will be happier and healthier growing up with a canine friend in the family.

Hi L,

The first thing you need to do, and I'm saying this as gently as I possibly can, is to wrap your mind around this: "We did take her to training when she was a puppy, but it didn't seem to do much good." You're backward. You have a people problem, not a dog problem. She gets up early to be fed and guess what? You feed her! She manipulates you to do what she wants you to do because no one is in charge - so she's assuming the role. Sweetie, your dog runs your house and the people in your house, your husband and you, are allowing this to happen. Training is only as successful as the owners who keep up with it. I understand that you have your hands full with working from home and a 14 month old. You also have a very high energy dog who requires stimulation too during the day. You've got some homework to do on this one and a change in the way your family relates to this sweet little girl dog. I suggest trying this site to start. She is a personal friend of mine and has many many free tips on her site - books to read (not 1000 pages - short books), ideas to try and even a phone number and email address to contact her if you need to. I had two dogs who used to do the same thing to our family back when our daughter was little. When we realized that the dogs were in charge, we made changes to how we related to them on EVERY level and things began to change very quickly. I don't possibly have enough finger strength to type everything here especially when it can be found already published but I encourage you to check out her site and grab a book or two. I promise you will be pleasantly surprised by what you read and discover about the dog/human relationship. Lastly, I highly recommend Cesar Millan's books or DVD's as he is a true dog whisperer - and DVD's are much more fun to watch than trying to carve out time to read a book.

Best of luck to you!!! You'll fix the problem if you put a little into it!!! Think of it as learning to play a new instrument! By learning and understanding how the instrument itself actually works to produce the sound, you'll then have to practice practice practice in order to make the sound coming out of the instrument beautiful and pure.

http://www.dogtrainingbasics.com/consultations.htm

Finally, after all is said and done and if you come to the conclusion that you just don't have the time, energy, whatever to give this little girl dog what she needs, get a lower energy dog and find this crazy little girl a high energy home where she can fall into bed dog tired every day. (I currently have my dog on the treadmill right now as I type burning some of her energy before we go on our walk this morning. She loves it!!!)

A.

My advise would be to set the alarm clock in the morning before your dog wakes up. That way you can take her out and feed her before she starts to get noisy. The only downfall to this is that you have to wake up earlier than usual.

Hi,
You should check out the Dog Wishper, either on TV or you can get his books. They may help you. I know that just from watching the show it has helped us a lot with how we trained out dog when we first brought her home about 2 years ago. It's great and we really see the differnce from out other dog. You may also be able to email him and ask him for help.
Good Luck

A tool that I found very helpful when we had a baby/toddler in the house was to run a fan in their bedroom when they were sleeping. Of course I didn't do this for the first few children, but by the time the 3rd or 4th arrived I needed to do something different than continually say, "Shhh, the baby is sleeping." It was much more relaxing to have a little white noise going on so the baby wasn't bothered by every fun sound happening in the house. So, my advice would be to run a fan in his room at night then he won't hear the dog in the morning. Out of my six children, ages 15, 13, 11, 9, 7, & 5, only one (the 13-year-old) still runs the fan at night but he does it for the cool air, not the noise. I hope that solves your problem:)
L.

We have a Weim too. I hate to tell you this, but they are one of the most hyper dogs that you can buy. With the mix of a Lab it may have calmed her down some. You have to remember that at 3, she is still considered a puppy.

My Weim is 18 months old. She is in a cage at night. She always has been. She never gets up or wants out, until she hers my alarm go off. We have 40 acers so our Weim has a large area to play and let out some of that energy.

Good luck. It will get better, the older she gets.

Ha. We have 2 dogs that get spastic when it's the usual time. You can use a crate and crate them. We put the one that is the problem in the back room for the night.

Hopefully you have a place for them to go.

We have to keep our dogs seperated until everyone is up or it's just a fun free for all fro them... lol

I know this sounds kinda funny but She may be jealous of the baby, we had a basset hound when my oldest was born and before he was born the dog slept all night in his cage without a sound. After the baby started sleeping through the night the dog started waking up to be let out. It drove us crazy, I would make my hubby let him out and he would run around the kitchen table and he couldn't catch him. This was his way of playing and getting attention, but at three in the morning we were not in the mood to play! I suggest leaving a bowl of food out for her and maybe figure out if the reason she wants to go out is because she either hears a neighbor out there or maybe she was used to you letting her out early like when the baby got up or someone got up for work etc. the are creatures of habit also, so that may have something to do with it. Maybe if it is some noise outside leave a fan or radio playing in the room that she is in to drown out noise. I don't really know what to suggest, we ended up getting rid of the Basset when my son was almost two because he was always trying to nip at him and we couldn't chance him getting bit. I know this probably wasn't the advice you were looking for but it is some other options that you may not have thought about. I also think maybe if you play with her right before bed maybe that would make her happy that you are spending time with her and maybe it would help her behavior. Good luck let us know what happens :)

Check oue The Housebraking Bible on line they have tons of good advice. You can post questions to trainers about anything dog related.

GL:)

Hi. I'm a mom to 2 children (5&2yrs) and 3 dogs :) Before I had children I worked at a veterinary hospital for 6 yrs and have previously showed and trained my own dogs. I would suggest always feeding your dogs at dinner time or bedtime. That is what I've always done because I'm not a morning person and the last thing I want is a house of spastic dogs to wake me up. They get a little crazy in the evening, but once they eat they settle down because they know it's time for bed. Dogs learn from consistent reinforcement. It might take a few days, but your pup will eventually get used to this new feeding schedule and hopefully not be in such a hurry to get up in the morning. I would also suggest having your dog sit and wait for you to say 'okay' (or whatever command you use to break from the stay position) before she eats from her bowl. That way she'll eventually learn to sit and wait for you to get her food ready instead of being crazy. If you approach training your dog like 'training' your 14 months old (by being consistent and giving positive reinforcement) you'll be amazed at what your dog can do. I know it sounds to good to be true, but it is possible. Just be consistent!! Good Luck.

Hello, Dogs I have knowledge of. Weim's are very hyper dogs, so even though yours is only half her exercise needs are going to be very high. If you have a treadmill, teach her to walk on it. Before bedtime give her a good work out,(start at a walk, every day increase the speed a little so you have her doing a nice trott in the end.) then tie her to her sleeping place with a leash. This way the dog is not dictating the waking time, you are. After her morning outing, put her back on the treadmill, it will keep her calmer around the baby duing the day. If you don't have a treadmill, maybe your husband can walk/ run her. I see that your husband has a well paying job, so buying one in the future shouldn't be a problem for you. Read the book "The Dog Whisperer" My Ceaser Milon. He tells how to do the treadmmill exercise. Good luck, sleep in very important.

Hi

Yes you have a hyper dog, (my brother has a Wiem) but nothing an owner can't handle as long as your dog knows its place in the 'pack' and YOU are the male alpha.
I haven't read all the responses so someone may have already mentioned what i write -
The exercise is important (as i have seen others mention)- we have a one year old boxer mix (needs a lot of exercise too) he goes on our treadmill - my husband taught him -he took to it easily, he runs on it with an incline too - he needs the exercise otherwise he becomes restless with boredom!

Our dog eats twice a day, small meal in the morning and then again in the evening. but NEVER before us. We eat first, including our 5 month old daughter, she eats before the dog is fed. He sometimes has to wait until 10am or beyond that to be fed, but he waits with out fuss because he knows the pecking order - we come first!

When training him we had to make a very obvious point of eating in front of him, then give him his food. We place him in the 'down' command by his food and he has to wait until he is given the 'free' command meaning he can eat.

Another tip you may find useful is your dog should never walk out the door in front of you when going out for a walk. They should wait until you have walk out and vice versa on your return.

If you decide to take time to re-train your dog then a bit of friendly advice would be its best if you do positive reinforcement training, rather than treat training!

Good luck - Hope things work out for you, it would be sad if you had to give up your dog