Puppy Care

Housebreaking can be done quickly with consistency. 

A kennel is a safe place for your dog to spend time when you are not home or a safe place for him/her to sleep.

Golden retrievers are around 50-90 lb full grown so teaching your puppy to walk nicely on a leash at a young age can make walking or even trips away from home so much more enjoyable for both you, your puppy, and other people. 

Exercise is very important for both physical and mental health, but like anything in life it is important to find a healthy balance.

What is best for you and your Golden puppy

A well socialized puppy will grow into a calmer, more easy-going adult that is less likely to get stressed out.  

There are a few simple manners that you can teach your puppy that will not only make day to day life easier but will also make everyone your dog meets fall in love with him/her.

There is a difference between a chewing puppy and a puppy going through teething.

Being prepared before your puppy comes home will make the home change easier for your puppy and more relaxing for you.

Letting your puppy out often is key.

Let your puppy out every 15 min when he/she is in the house for the first couple weeks will lessen the chance of a accident.

Setting up a x-pen play area for your puppy to be in when you can not keep a close eye on him/her will allow your puppy to still be around the family wile developing good habits. 

Set your puppy up for success by making your house smaller in the beginning of your housebreaking. Shut doors to extra rooms and use baby gates to block the puppy from having access to the whole house. As your puppy learns where he/she should go potty you can slowly add more rooms to his/her living space.

When you take your puppy home for the first time, take him/her to the potty area BEFORE you take him/her into the house. wait to take him/her into the house until he/she has gone potty.

Pay attention to your puppy's body language. if he/she stops playing or wakes up from a nap and starts sniffing and/or passing take them out.

I like to give a "go potty" or "hurry up" command wile my puppy is going so when they are older they will go practically on command.

 A kennel is a safe place for your puppy/dog to relax and hang out wile you are not able to be with him/her.

 It is also nice to be able to use a kennel wile traveling with your dog/puppy.

Your puppy will  have already been introduced to a wire kennel.

All of our puppies have access to kennels in their play pens most of the time the puppies will choose to take their naps inside the kennels. 

It is impotent to set your puppy up for success from the very beginning. We do this by only shutting a puppy into a kennel when we know he/she is tired and has recently gone potty outside. We do not open the kennel while the puppy is crying or pacing. When just starting we wait for the puppy to be calm and quiet for just a few seconds before letting them out. As the catch on we can go for longer. 

We start to teach a puppy how to go in their kennel on command by luring them into the kennel with a treat. As soon as the puppy is in the kennel we give the treat and say "go kennel" or "go to bed". As the puppy catches on we lure the puppy in the same way while giving our command "go kennel" but don't give the treat until the puppy has turned around. Next we repeat this process but we ask the puppy to sit in the kennel before giving the treat. We continue to do this exercise while asking the puppy to sit calmly in the kennel for more time before he/she gets the treat.

The first step in teaching your puppy to walk well on a leash is making sure you have the right leash/collar, and that you know how to use it properly. 

Before we take a puppy on a walk we play a game to teach them to give to pressure. (Pressure is tension on the leash) We start by having the puppy on a leash/flat collar in a familiar environment. We slowly put more and more pressure on the lead until the puppy takes a step towards us. As soon as he/she steps toward us we release the pressure and praise the puppy. We repeat this slowly asking the puppy to move more and more each time.

The key to teaching any dog or puppy anything is consistency. It is important to prevent any pressure on the leash at all times. If the puppy  is allowed to put pressure on the leash he/she will grow up used to feeling that and will not think twice about pulling. However if you teach your puppy to give to pressure he/ she will prefer to walk without pulling.

 Remember if you let your puppy go see every dog you encounter on a walk he/she will assume even as a adult that every dog he/she sees needs to be greeted. This can be dangerous if the other dog is not friendly or if the other dog is caring a sickness. When we see other dogs on a walk (unless we know them and their owners) we do not let our dogs touch the other dogs we continue to keep our dogs in a heal position. By doing this as a puppy we get well behaved dogs that do not bark, lunge or get crazy when they see other dogs. 

This also applies to people. It is great for your puppy to meet new people of all ages but he/she doesn't need to great everyone he/she walks by.

All puppies need physical exercises but the amount and intensity depends on the age and individual  puppy.

Check out AviDog's fit for Life course for age appropriate activities.

While physical exercise is important, mental stimulation may be just as if not more important. 

Teaching a puppy to think  and learn at a young age and continuing to challenge him/her can help you develop a deeper relationship with him/her.

It is important not to do to much or the wrong kind of exercise. 

We limit the amount of steps your puppies use. We also do not allow them to jump on or off furniture or in and out of vehicles before they are a year old.

We feed puppies three times a day until they are about 12-14 weeks old. We like to feed at approximately 7:00 AM 12:00 noon and 6:00 PM.   After they turn four months old we feed them twice a day approximately 7:00 AM and  7:00 PM.

Our first choice diet is a BALANCED RAW DIET.

When it comes to treats we like to stick to one ingredient treats. There are many high quality dehydrated or freeze dried one ingredient treats available now. Check out our favorite treat brands below.

It is impotent to realize puppy's go through fear stages. If you recognize it and understand it, you can help your puppy learn and grow through it. During these fear stages we try to keep everything positive. If we introduce something new we are careful to take it slow and keep it positive.

Puppies also go through phases where they will soak more up and learn more quickly than other times.

So pay attention to your puppy and go his/her pace.

Keeping things safe while socializing is key to successful socializing. We do this by only introduce our puppies to other dogs that we know are good with puppies and not going to pass a sickness to our puppies. When interdicting puppies to a new dog we like to do it in a large yard with a safe place for each dog to get away from each other if they choose to. 

If the puppy or dog is intimidated by the other one we take them on a walk. We like to start with the more confident dog in the front and the more intimidated one in the back. At first we keep several feet between them, but as the walk progresses we move them closer. 

By allowing the intimidated dog to walk behind the other dog they can see theirs no threat and will worm up quickly.

Remember when allowing your puppy or dog to meet another dog while he/she is on a leash KEEP THE LEASH LOOS! If there is tension on the leash while your puppy/dog is greeting a new dog it can create tension in the meeting.

If your puppy shows fear of a object such as a dumpster, building, parked vehicle, etc. don,t force him/her to check it out. instead incurege them to check it out with praise and/or treats. We like to walk around the object and let the puppy see us touch it. If you or your friends have a confident, puppy safe (that your puppy has already met) dog, have the dog checkout the object  and praise the dog heavily in front of the puppy.

Golden's are known for their loving friendly nature but if they are not properly socialized they can be shy.

We like to introduce our puppies to as many different people in different outfits as possible in their first year of life. We do this by keeping it positive and taking it at each individual puppies pace.

If there is a puppy that shows fear of people or a specific age for instance kids we find some kids willing to sit with the puppy and give him/her treats and praise.   After the puppy has grown confident with these kids we take a walk where there are other kids. We instruct the kids that want to pet the puppy to sit down and let the puppy come to them, we also pass out treats for the kids to hand out. We would do this a few times a week until the puppy has outgrown his/her fear. 

If the only time your puppy ever gets to go on a car ride, he/she goes to the vet or somewhere he/she doesn't like, he/she will associate the car with that negative place. However if you take your puppy for rides to the park to go for a walk or on a ride to visit a friend he/she will learn to love the car.

The first year of our puppies lives we take them everywhere we can! running errands, getting groceries, or just a drive on a old country road. We make sure to LIFT THEM in and out of the car for the first year to help their developing joints. After a year old we still take them everywhere we can but its more because we love to have them with us.

We are very blessed to be able to live with a variety of pets. This makes it easier for us to socialize your puppies with a variety of animals.

Just because you don't have a cat or horse doesn't mean you shouldn't  socialize your puppy to them. Chances are your dog will run into a variety of animals at some point in their life.

We find the best way to teach a puppy to be calm and not to overreact to new animals is to never encourage them to overreact to the little things. While it might seem innocent and cute for your puppy to chase a butterfly or bark at a rabbit through the window if they get used to chasing these small things now, in 3 years when you move to a new home they may go after the new neighbors cat.

If you don't have access to things like a horse or rabbit start by going to the pet store. and practice keeping your pups focus on you while walking past the rabbit, bird, and reptile cages.We allow our puppies to investigate these pets through the cage as long as their calm, bet we always end the training with their focus on us.

We recommend playing it safe even though you titer test their are lots of other scary things that can be past from dog to dog.  

It is important to socialize your puppy with other dogs however be sure you know the other dog is not only puppy safe but also healthy and hasn't been exposed to other dogs recently. 

Practicing walking past dogs you don't know while out on walks will not only make your walk more enjoyable but also reduce the risk of your dog catching something from a dog.

When you visit the vet with your puppy carry them in or have them in a kennel. In the exam room lay a towel from home on the table keeping your puppy off the floor will reduce the risk of them catching something brought in on the Dr. shoes from the room down the hall. 

 We like to wait in our car rather than in the waiting room at the vet office so that our dogs are not exposed to all of the stuff coming in and out of the clinic.

 We also like if at all possible to be the first appointment of the day, as a good vet will do a deep cleaning of every exam room at closing  the night before.

We start teaching our puppies not to jump up at a very young age. We do this by only giving your puppies attention when all four feet are calmly on the floor.  If you continue this and ask everyone that meets your puppy to do the same you will not have to worry about having a 60-90 lb dog jumping on you and your friends. If the puppy does jump up we turn away and ignore them until they put all their feet back on the floor.

We like to place train our puppies/dogs, it comes in very handy when we are traveling or just working around the house. It allows a safe way for them to be with us when we cant give them 100% of our attention, without having to have them tied up or in a fence.

 Place training is teaching your puppy/dog to stay on his/her place, we use a cot (check out our favorite things).

Check out our training page for more details.

It is not uncommon for Golden's to want to great people with toys or treasures. This has been bred into them as a retrieving dog.

Some puppy's may try to mouth guest hands or grab sleeves when they greet them. To set your puppy up for success watch for this and if he/she starts to be mouthy place a toy in his/her mouth.  

Golden's LOVE food! Their high food drive has also been bred into them for several years. This is one of the reasons they can be so easy to teach tricks to.

Start establishing rules the first day you get your puppy. We do not allow our dogs/puppies to jump up on any counters or tables including coffee-tables. We also practice teaching the puppy (leave-it).

Check out how to teach (leave-it) on out training page.

Just because the door or gate opens doesn't mean your puppy has to or should go through it!

We only allow our dogs to go through a door or gate when we invite them through. 

It is very normal for a puppy to want to carry and chew things he/she finds in their world, it is how they explore and learn. It is our job as a breeder and your job as a owner to be sure they do this in a safe way without picking up bad habits like chewing up shoes, news paper, etc. We do this by replacing things that we do not want the puppy to have with toys that we do want them to play with. We also recommend setting your puppy up for success by puppy proofing your home and yard.  

Puppies start teething around four months of age. They usually get more interested in chewing toys than throwing them around. When our puppies go through this we keep a close eye on what they have access to chew on, we try to detour them from chewing up toys and anything else they see by keeping them mentally and physically stimulated. We also offer them ice cubes to chew on to help numb their gums. 

Puppies explore their world by chewing and mouthing things, while teething puppies chew on things as a result of new teeth coming in.