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....Enough barking at me - how about a round of applause for taking the dog in and making a huge adjustment of taking care of this pup??!!

<img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> Pat, you are new to the dog-training world, so you don't realize that what you just got was a HUGE round of applause and some of the gentlest advice ever proferred here. Grab it and run!

Everything posted is true. This will require commitment and patience. You can do it, and it will be worth it.

Do you have friends with healthy easy going dogs? Dogs who are in circumstances like this through no fault of their own often develop pretty serious behavioral issues with other dogs because it is right now when they are getting weaned from Mom, but they shouldn't leave the litter as they learn pack lessons from their littermates about who is in charge, bite inhibition, that sort of thing. If you know some healthy, gentle puppy friendly adult dogs, having them interact will at least partially help make up for this very real deficit. Make certain that the adult dogs are gentle because the last thing you want is for the adult to attack the pup. A correction is one thing, an attack is another.

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<img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/ooo.gif" alt="" /> I don't have any vacation time left and as far as taking my dog to work???? Don't know where you work but this is not an option. My daughters have jobs and live out of town. I only have a half hour lunch and I work 10 miles from home. Everyone would like to have all of the time for their animals - but I'm doing the best that I can. Better than letting the original owners put her in a burlap bag and throw her in a pond!!!!!!!!!

Enough barking at me - how about a round of applause for taking the dog in and making a huge adjustment of taking care of this pup??!!

oh, my, pat! no criticism was intended or implied at all! brava and kudos to you for taking in this pup. it is wonderful.

if you are new to dog ownership, there is much to discover. i'm trying to help you raise a pup that will give you back so much, you'll never regret for a minute the sacrifices you have made for her. sure, it is a huge adjustment. dogs are very different from cats and have totally different requirements.

you are doing fine. but a five week old puppy needs more attention during the day than she is getting. please just take what i'm giving you as straight information, not criticism. they are just facts of life.

i hope you'll be able to find someone to be with your pup during the day for the next few weeks. perhaps there is a responsible teenager in the neighborhood who would like to puppysit? a kid who is experienced with dogs?

here's a suggestion: why not contact the local 4-H group leader, or a girl scout leader and see if they can refer you to a responsible teen who would just love to spend their summer hanging out with a new puppy, and maybe could be helping with training, too. ? what do you think?

of course it would be best if you were there, but i do understand you've got limitations in your life, we all do, and this puppy wasn't a planned acquisition.

best of luck with her!

fwiw, i never had any behavioral problems with the dog i raised from five weeks old. he was great with all people and other dogs, and i did not make a special effort to socialize him with other dogs.

i would get this puppy socialized as soon as she's had all her shots, though. take her with you to the hardware store, to the dairy queen, to the post office, to the garden center, everywhere you go, and let people make a big fuss over her. she's a lab cross, so she's likely to enthusiastically love all people. since you are not raising a working dog, that is something you want to encourage.

but get the OK first from your vet so she doesn't pick up some deadly disease, like parvo.

I advise people pretty frequently who got a puppy at 4-6 weeks from situations like this and many end up really dog aggressive or just plain out of control simply because they haven't learned dog etiquette from their littermates. From my experience, the vast majority of people have no idea how to deal with this kind of situation and so they tend to isolate the pup because they feel sorry for it so it turns into a really reactive dog with little bite inhibition. Parvo is a concern, of course, and I would be worried if Pat worked in a shelter or vet hospital where parvo would be circulating pretty frequently, but in these kinds of situations, in my humble opinion, the future danger of having an unsocialized dog outweighs the danger of getting parvo or distemper. That's why meeting with other friendly, healthy dogs in a controlled setting, like their backyard or house or whatever, is a good idea.

It was indeed a good deed to take the pups away from the bad situation, but at the same time, it might have also been worthwhile to call around to the local humane society to see what could be done. At ours, they have experienced foster homes who foster the pups until they are 8 weeks old and can then be adopted. This way, they are around other healthy dogs who can help socialize them and keep them together in a litter at least. The caveat is that not all shelters have the resources to do this.

It's the constant battle between behaviorists and vets. Behaviorists know there is a critical window of socialization that can't ever be fully recovered and vets are concerned with puppy diseases. If many vets had their way, the pup would never meet any other dog until 4 months old and they've had all their shots, which to me (as someone who deals with pet owners) is a mistake.

I think you really lucked out on your pup, Alice! <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> I read an article not too long ago (I'll have to dig it up again) about the behavioral effects of taking a pup away from its mother and litter before 8 weeks. It was pretty interesting...

interesting perspective, maren. thanks for sharing it! i did indeed luck out with that pup. he turned out to be a once-in-a-lifetime dog. because he was a breed that is known for shyness, i "socialized the snot out of him"--as will would say. he was not isolated at all. i completely agree with you that isolation at so young an age is very detrimental.

getting puppies at 8 weeks and older seems to be a more modern phenomenon. 30, 40, 50 years ago, people got six week old puppies usually, not 8 week old ones. i personally have found the optimal age to be 7 weeks. there is a dog/owner bonding that seems to happen at that age that can't be captured at a later stage.

i guess it really depends on what you value as a dog owner. i value bonding and companionship very highly, so a younger pup is quite desireable to me. but you do have to know what you are doing with a very young pup, as you are shaping your future dog, and everything you do matters a great deal.

i think if you do know how to bring up a pup, getting them when they are at a very malleable young age can be a positive thing. if you are inexperienced, the pup is probably much better off staying with the litter until 8 weeks or older.

Pat,

Clap. clap. clap. I do applaud your willingness to care for a puppy.

I wish you and the puppy the best of luck.

Mike A.

I totally agree, rescuing the pup in light of what it was facing was the best thing possible! How about burlap sacking those idiot "breeders" while we're at it? <img src="http://www.leerburg.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />

Anyway, socialize the beans out of your pup. Maren had it right with exposing your pup to level headed dogs that enjoy pups. Your dog will need to learn canine communication skills and etiquette! Also, make sure you expose your dog to all sorts of scenarios- people in uniform, loud stores (like a Lowe's or Home Depot), playground equipment, kids, men, women, traffic, cities, countrysides, and especially other dogs, but it's very important that you ensure those dogs are model citizens who will teach your pup, not scare/harm it! Get dogs of varying types and sizes, if at all possible. If you're diligent, you should be able to come out with a well balanced dog. Oh, and should you find a mess in the crate, clean it up out of site of the dog and don't make any fuss over it. She couldn't help it and it happened probably hours ago (or even minutes ago), and unless you caught her in the act you should act like nothing happened.