Dear Val,
I have seen your posts for puppy play and classes and I am confused about taking my puppy out before he has had all his shots??? I was told firmly not to take him anywhere until around 16 weeks. Can you please let me know what your take is on this?
Concerned puppy parent.
Dear Concerned,
What is your biggest concern? Disease. The Parvo virus to be more specific. This is a virus that affects puppies and young dogs and is highly contagious with a 50% survival rate and an expensive vet bill.
Safe socializing can be done in a way that you can raise a well socialized pup, and keep your pup safe from disease as well.
I could write about this everyday, and maybe I should. Puppies are one of my work related specialties. The areas that I like to get new puppy parents started on are:
Safe and early socializing
Preventing unwanted behaviors as an adult dog
How to manage mouthing and those piranha teeth
Basic puppy manners
Crate training
and Potty training
Lets focus on item No. 1 for the sake of the concerned puppy parent’s question.
Safe and early socializing should begin as soon as you get your puppy home. 8 weeks is usually when a pup can come home from the breeder.
Socializing is a process of exposing your puppy to as many things as you can while they are receptive to new and novel stimuli. The list of things to introduce your young puppy to is long and should include, but not be limited to the following:
- Children (Tons of them)
- Men (Many of them)
- People in hats
- People of all ages
- People of different ethnicity
- People with walking tools
- Noises and sounds:
- Trash trucks
- Cars
- Motorcycles
- Fireworks
- Gunfire
Etc.
This is a short list of examples.
Basically anything that your pup will be exposed to as an adult dog and things you don’t want your pup to be afraid of later on in life.
You have a short window of time to introduce your pup to all these items. Why? This has to do with the early puppy developmental phases. You are familiar with the first 5 years being critical for early childhood development, right? Well, the first 12 weeks is the critical social phase for puppies. What happens after 12 weeks? Your puppy enters a new developmental phase that includes a fear imprint phase. During this developmental phase it is more difficult to introduce your puppy to new and novel stimuli because they are now fearful and can imprint upon their new exposures. If they are introduced to a screaming 3 year old running amok with a noisy toy and the puppy has entered their fear imprint phase, they may associate this child with something unpleasant and the unpleasant experience may become imprinted or stick with them a lifetime. They may grow up to dislike children. It is not recommended to introduce your pup to new things during a fear imprint phase.
How do you safely expose your pup to people and things and places if you are told to not take your pup anywhere for the first 16 weeks you ask?
You carry them, cart them, drive them, stroll them, trailer them, put them in a wagon and expose them.
—Do not put them down on the grass or the ground
—Do not put tthem on dirt.
—Do not put them on sand.
Basically, do not put them down anywhere except your own personal yard providing you can confirm that your yard is safe and from from Parvo.
Parvo and injuries are your number one concern with young puppies.
Although it is not guaranteed if you don’t expose your pup they will not be social dogs, but it is to your pups advantage to give them a great head start verses take the chance and be disappointed in the long run.
Hopefully this will clear up some of the questions you may have about the how’s and why’s of early puppy socializing.
If you have a question about training or behavior, please email me @ HappyLabLady77@Yahoo.com
Make it a Pawsitive Day!
Val S Elliott CPDT Behavior Coach
Wags of Wisdom:
Handle stressful situations like a dog. If you can’t eat it or play with it, just lift your leg on it and walk away.
If you would like to send a cute photo with a description or short story about your favorite furry friend, please send it to HappyLabLady77@yahoo.com
