People Prepping Puppies - Page 1

Here is a question for breeders. What do you do to prep your puppies and why? I often see many adds with so many things said about what people do with there puppies from birth to sell.

There has always been a debate over what is more important, nature or nurture, or in other words, genetics or environment.  The Lackland Airforce base developed a training program for newborn puppies that actually physically enhances the brain and builds strong nerve in puppies beginning at three days until twenty one days.  They call it superdog or biosensor. 

The idea is to strenghten nerve connections.  Holding the puppies in various positions, rubbing toes, and stimulating them has shown through double blind studies to increase their brain size and the military can tell when the dog is full grown which dog was enhanced and which dog was not.  If your goal is to have a dog that has no phobias, then exposing them to many things before the fear periods begin, is the easiest and best way to build strong character.  Example:  dropping garbage can lids while puppies are eating to desensitize against loud noises.

Mike Suttle has a really incredible website where he works really young dutch shepherds and has a really high success rate for his dogs actually being used in police work and military work.  He puts alot of time into his puppies.  He gets out what he puts in.

Picking them up and touching them within critical periods I believe is part of the Pfafford method.  Everybody has a theory.  I think that the earlier you begin, the better the dog will be.  From day one, the pup responds to touch by grunting and humming, just like if you were getting a really good back rub.   I don't want the puppy getting trampled by mom having her next puppy.  I like to towel dry the puppy and hold it to keep it warm. I am communicating in touch, and making a favorable impression in the first few moments.  If the puppies eyes first focus on a human face, and if the first sound they hear is a human voice, then the dog will have a greater capacity to understand humans.  The puppy is compfortable with humans.  Talking to it and holding it, and having facetime is important.  Their brains are like little computers, and they take it all in, and compile more and more human factoids, and become better and better at reading humans.  One on one interaction is important.  You are initiating them to understand human communication.

If you don't handle a kitten within a certain time frame they are feral, for life, and birds have to be hand fed or they will be wild, for life.  I think that as the branch is bent, the tree grows.
Everyone wants to believe that if you breed two personalities, you will get a similar personality.  Not necessarily so.  If you haven't socialized by 16 weeks, the window is shut.

I guess if your breeding for pets that makes sense to me. I would prefer that a puppy be socialized and not messed with on a continus basis. I would rather see a puppy for what it is not what someone has instilled in it from birth. Genetics are key, excuse this example but I think it will get the point across, you can mold crap into a bowl but it is still crap. I believe that puppies should be puppies not experiments. If you are breeding good genetic characteristics then that is what you get. Breeding bad genetic disposition and nurturing them only covers the problem like a bandaid it is not a permanent fix. On the topic of the 16 week window, I believe that is a falsity, unsocialized dogs over the age of 16 weeks are more than often rehabilitated and turm out fine. As a breeder I feel that people should get what was bred not something created on the basis of a nonproven experiment. Genetics always proves itself to be key. I have another topic to discuss with you. Why would you vaccinate your puppies twice within two weeks and administer pyrantal every week? Just so you know a very effective way to deworm you puppies is interceptor. Research also shows that a puppies immune system is not even fully developed even at 8 weeks. I typically do not vaccinate prior to 10 weeks unless requested by the person purchasing the pup.

These pups are being prepared for sale but not till they are 12 months- if I didn't put work into them they wouldn't live up to their genetic potential-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXa00-i9wsg

A friend of mine and I have had the same conversation on several occassions. I think exposing puppies to different stimuli at a young age (weeks 0-16) not only benefits the puppy for later experiences but also gives the breeder a more thorough evaluation. i don't believe this exposure will change a genetically nervy dog to exemplify the highest level of confidence.

Now if we were talking about 2-3 year old dog in the hands of a top trainer it wouuld be a different story. I do believe many top trainers can hide many genetic faults through good training and have the dog perform at high levels.

A vet friend of mine sent me a recent study out of Norway that tested the biosensory program, with pups that were just held but not stressed, but both groups were raised in environmentally rich environment after 8 wks of age over a 2 yr period of time. The biosensory group did not result in more dogs meeting benchmarks along the way to the succeeding in goals, over the other group that was just held. Both groups received the same rich environment after 8 wks.

However, the biosensory group did excel in recovering from stress quckly and were quicker to move on.

We have set up our own pups with situations to problem solve and these pups hit the ground running when going into new working homes, and provide their owners with loads of satisfaction.

Genetic limitations will show through regardless of biosensory or allowances for early problem solving.

I'd rather start with a pup like this than one that is still taking in the world or worse, one that is developmentally delayed.

 

I have two puppies left from my outcross Belgain Malinois breeding ( I think that line breeding cousins together is what ruined German Shepherds by permanently setting recessive genetic faults, but that is another hot topic), and they were both raised in the exact same circumstances, so genetics, not environment would be the reason for their differences.  Same mother, father, gene pool, whelping time, area, etc. and both have different dispositions. 

National Geographic Magazine had this article about genetic experiments with foxes in Russia concerning being social with people and anti social to people.  It was totally illegal what they were doing, because of what happened with Germany claiming to be the master race, so Russia outlawed genetic experiements altogether, but these scientists raised generations of foxes, breeding the social together and antisocial together for forty generations, and found that even if they took an antisocial kit and had it raised by a social mother, genetics prevailed and the fox was still hostile to humans.  They have actually domesticated these foxes who have molted color patterns and wag their tails, and are being sold as pets. They did the experiments with rats, too, and the photo of the angry displaying rat on his hind legs is downright scary.

That said, my dam is a drivey bitch who was not very devoted and did not have enough milk, so I ended up supplementing with formula and bottle feeding them, which was quite a bit of handling and burping and cleaning with a wet washcloth.  You would think that with all this desensitization to touch they would all be cool with being handled.  However, out of nine, there is one, who does not want his space invaded, does not like to be held down by his brothers or bothered while sleeping, and would not be suitable for a household with children.  Did he benefit from being socialized with humans in a human environment?  When he was hungry and he opened his mouth to signal to feed him and he was nibbling on my fingers, did it hurt him?  Or did it prepare him for his future home where he will depend on humans?

The other puppies immediately took to their new families and the other one I have left, solicits attention, paws at me and plays with his toys, and ran at the vet, jumped up on him and pulled his shoelaces.  He investigated every inch of the examining room and tried to tip over the trash.

The questioneer does say he wants his puppy to be "socialized", but not "messed" with.  I don't see how you can have it both ways.  Would you rather have your puppy afraid of water, plastic bags, slick floors, loud noises, men, and everything that moves including burlap, or would you rather have it "messed with", desensitized, "socialized" and gripping a rag?  Don't tell me none of the other breeders have never introduced a burlap rag.

Locking a puppy in a darkened room and letting it out at eight weeks would be cruel, but the only way to prove your thesis. This kind of neglect would damage the dog for life, just like the girl in the window, Dani.  She was horribly neglected and although genetically was fine, developed "environmental autism" from being locked alone in a room until age 5. They just had an update this month in the St. Pete Times and the girl is severely delayed at 12.  She will never be what she could have been.  Barely can say a word and is in special ed.  Forever.

The best dogs come from the breeders who put in the time and play with their puppies.

I agree, we set of various types of loud noises around the pups to make sure there not afraid. If you want a dog for personal protection especially if its going work you down want him to coward down and tuck his tail between his legs because hes afraid of shots fired.