Hi all,
First off I want to say how thankful I am that these boards are here. There is so much good, common sense advise available here, I really appreciate it.
My question is this. I just got a 10 week old Golden Retriever puppy. Don't laugh,goldens are good dogs even if they aren't GSDs. Anyway. So many books and websites push the idea a puppy needs to have "positive interactions" with at least 100 people by the the time it is 12 weeks old or else your doomed to having an unsocialized aggressive dog. (rolling my eyes here) I always thought that a puppy needed to have a lot of neutral interactions, with me calling the shots, over the course of its whole puppyhood and adolesence.
Which is correct, what is the best direction to take?
I ordered the your puppy 8 weeks to 8 months dvd.
If anyone wants to share their most important piece of advise re puppy raising/training I would love to here it.
Can't wait to be part of the board.
Thank you.
Jodi

If I had to interact with a hundred people in twelve weeks I'd be unsocial and agressive. everybody loves Goldies, I'd get Ed's puppy vid.

First off, welcome!

Secondly, what a bunch of crap. 100 in 12 weeks??? The problems we have w/badly temperamented dogs have to do with our shoddy breeding programs, not "socialization."

Not to say you shouldn't take your pup places and let him/her learn about the world, but just to give you some perspective....temperament is genetic. You can tweak, train, skew, mask....but not change genetic temperament. You will not take a perfectly stable dog and create a monster b/c you don't introduce it to 100 people in 12 weeks. Hell, I don't think mine have met 100 people their entire lives.

My friendliest, most social GSD ever was my puppy who (for experimental purposes) I kept completely isolated from other people as part of an experiment on nature/nurture. He went places w/me, but no one but me ever touched him. He SAW the world, from my car mostly...but the world was not allowed to interact w/him. He is entirely stable and a happy, friendly, outgoing dog, despite a complete lack of textbook "socialization." Raising him this way was a pain, but it was a very interesting experiment and I'm glad I did it. Anyway...that sounds like a very "Petsmart" view on socialization and you are correct to roll your eyes at that. They do not need to be molested by strangers on every street corner to end up well-adjusted.

YOU DO call the shots. It's YOUR puppy! You only get one shot to raise them how you want them raised.

 Quote: Dennis Jones

If I had to interact with a hundred people in twelve weeks I'd be unsocial and agressive. everybody loves Goldies, I'd get Ed's puppy vid.

This is exactly the reason I rolled my eyes. If I forced 100 people in 12 weeks on myself, or any member of my family, we would be very cranky and anti-social.

Thank you for this evenings smile

Jodi

Interesting experiment. Thank you for the response.
Yes it is a very Petsmart type of statement. Two of the trainers I read this from were the Petsmart training gods Ian Dunbar and Jean Donaldson. It just didn't make sense to me.

I plan on getting puppy out and about. Exposing him to the world makes sense to me, forcing him to intercat with everyone in the world made no sense.

Thanks again
Jodi

Jodi,welcome!
First off, please post some links to pix, or introduce yourself in the bio section and post a photo of you puppy.

I will second getting Ed's puppy dvd. He goes into some detail about who can and can't pet his puppy and it makes a lot of sense. (and there's a ton of helpful info there for new puppy owners)

Unless your pup is terribly shy and fearful of people, I would take the approach that Jenni is describing (ie lots of exposure, but not necessarily lots of direct contact)

I have to say that when my puppy was very young I didn't let people (strangers) pet him or play with him and I didn't let him play with other dogs. I thought I was training him to ignore people.

Now he is 22 months old, barks at everyone (hackles), and if someone tries to pet him on a walk he shrinks away and tries to hide. (I should mention he had one bad experience with a rude jogger when he was 5 months old.) He is clearly nervous being walked around people if they look at or approach us and he is dog reactive. He is friendly and calm with people he knows. He was confident and calm as a young puppy.

His mother is extremely friendly and has rock solid nerves. She is a certified therapy dog.

Would he have been like this had I shown him when he was a baby that people are friendly and aren't out to hurt him? Who knows, maybe or maybe not.

I think if I had to do it over I would have allowed people to briefly pet him under my supervision. Maybe he hasn't overcome his bad experience with the jogger. (Heck, to this day he hates joggers). I think he needed more positive (controlled) interactions with people as a baby.

I do NOT advocate letting anyone and everyone pet him. I do think that you should control the situation and let a variety of people give him positive experiences.

What about a pup (10 weeks) who seems to get really excited with strangers? Is that the kind of pup you would recommend not letting too many people pet?

Lisa, are you addressing me?

Well, here's how I think I would handle the situation. I think I would teach the puppy that it has to be calm before it can have what it wants (access to the person for example). So let's say your child's friend comes over after school and the puppy gets all excited. The puppy would be on leash, and the child would simply freeze until the pup can sit calmly. When the pup is calm, the child can briefly pet him. If the dog gets excited, the child stops petting. I do this with my dogs who get worked up over food. After a brief introduction you remove the puppy and give him a fun toy and play with him. Thus the puppy has learned that being calm gives him success.

I still think it's best to limit the pup's interactions to those you are in control of. That way you can ensure that he only gets to greet people when he is calm and people won't get him too excited.

Now that I am done crying after reading Joyce’s post… Here is my take on the puppy socialization stuff…

I do let people pet this pup that I have now. Hav is a VERY stable pup that likes people but prefers me. I let him be pet by children and adults AFTER the excitement has calmed down and he is calmly lying at my feet. Children I let walk him around as he is really good on a leash and I feel it is good for this little guy. Adults I allow to pet him briefly and in an almost absentminded manner. And when they are done, I give him the extra fun attention that he really wants. I am the one that brings all the fun in life. I didn’t allow ANY stranger to pet him until very recently (six months) and the friends that did were told the rules.

Now, it is in this pup’s nature to be social, calm and aloof at the same time. Had he been hyper and excited about other people, we wouldn’t have allowed anyone to pet him until he had learned to be calm in the company of strangers, and I would likely keep him to very limited contact so as not to bring back the hyper, over excited pup from before.

Had Havok been of the type that was shy and nervous, I would have slowly desensitized him to strangers’ presence, then slowly had them drop treats to him, and slowly had them offer treats in an offhanded manner, then slowly had them talk to him in a normal voice but without eye contact while handing him a treat, etc… I would do it slowly so that the pup learns through MANY POSITIVE experiences that strangers can be good and that there is no reason to fear them at all. AFTER this pup is accepting strangers, I would back up and just ask him to be neutral with random stranger treating him at very random intervals should he start offering avoidance behaviors.

Through fostering I have had pups that were socialized in a normal manner by their owners that were typically friendly pups turn into everything from very aggressive to very shy. Socialization does not change the pups’ temperament. Bad experiences (or good) will teach them how to react in a given situation and what was successful and owners and their skill level can help or hinder this process, but none of it will change the basic temperament of the dog.

All I want is for my dog to be attentive to me and have socially acceptable manners while in public. This goes for my dominant dogs, my shy females, the happy puppies and the aggressive punks. Be who you are, but follow those two rules. I am the only one that can show them how through the situations I set up and allow to happen to them and around them. Jenni controlled it by keeping the pup in the car and not letting the bad happen, and on the opposite end of the spectrum, some have no idea what control they do have and allow things like dog parks and stupid strangers to happen their pups. We all fall somewhere in between.

Figure out what the basic temperament is of the dog in front of you, and go from there…