You have just received a bright, new addition to your family, a Telford Puppy. Here are a few pointers to help you care for your puppy and begin to teach him/her proper manners.

Your puppy has had his/her first set of vaccinations and a health exam given by our veterinarian. Please consult your veterinarian for his/her advice on a vaccination program.  We recommend that the puppy be given at least two boosters and a Rabies vaccine. The Bordetella vaccination should also be given if you will be kenneling your dog.

Your puppy is currently on Red Leaf beef all life stages food and we recommend any good puppy food that has meat as the first ingredient. He/she is being fed dry hard food and can have a little Rollover and hot water added. Fresh drinking water should be available at all times. There are two choices for feeding schedules. The first is free feeding, which is making food available at all times. A puppy will not overeat and you can follow this as long as that continues. The second method is to give regular meals. At this time, the puppy will require three meals a day, early Am, mid-afternoon, and in the evening. Give the puppy about twenty minutes to eat as much as they want and then take the bowl away. Make sure to increase the amount of food as he/she grows, there is feeding instructions on the bag of all puppy food. After four months of age, you can cut down, to two meals a day. We recommend keeping your puppy on Puppy Food for at least one year, and then you can switch to Adult food. It is extremely important that your puppy is fed puppy food for at least one-year, to insure proper bone growth and development. It is recommended that you use stainless steel bowls, as plastic can take the pigmentation out of their nose faster.

House training and crate training go hand in hand. Your puppy should learn to sleep is his/her crate, at night and for naps during the day. Make sure the puppy has done its business before bedtime. Your puppy should be able to sleep through most of the night. The puppy will probably cry for a while the first few nights, but be patient and plug your ears. We found the best solution was to cover the crate so they feel more secure. The first few nights are usually tough, but be patient it will get better, honestly.

Puppies do not want to mess in their bed, so if you start with a large crate it is best to block off part of it, so they can’t mess in one end and sleep in the other. When you put the puppy outside to the bathroom, YOU MUST go outside with them. The first reason is to praise the puppy when he/she eliminates and the second is the puppy may be frightened when alone outside. If you put the puppy out alone, he will be at the door crying and when you let him in he will remember he had to go to the bathroom and mess on the floor. After the initial trip outside, the puppy will want to eat and play, after about twenty to thirty minutes another trip outside would be appropriate. When house breaking a puppy, during the awake period it is important you take them out frequently, you will soon learn the signals of a puppy that needs to go and won’t need to take them out as often. When the puppy gets drowsy place them in their crate and when he wakes up carry him outside to where you would like him to do his business. Whenever you place the puppy in its crate you should tell it to “KENNEL UP” and this will teach the puppy to go to the crate when you use this command. The crate should Not be associated with punishment, if this happens the puppy will not want to go in it at all. The crate should be your puppy’s safe place.

DO NOT PLAY TUG OF WAR. This is the worst game ever intended to play with a dog. It teaches the animal to struggle against you and that there must be a winner. Puppies like to retrieve, so play fetching games instead. A training bumper, tennis ball or ropes are best. Teach your puppy to give instead of trying to pull away. If he/she does not want to bring it back, try running away or hiding but Do Not chase him/her. If you start to chase the puppy, it becomes a game and teaching the puppy to COME becomes impossible.

Teaching the come command. 

Keep Your Dog On Leash Until they know how to come reliably, they should always be managed. One of the worst things you can do for your recall training is to allow your dog the freedom to ignore you. Puppies are very cooperative. They often make us feel a false sense of security because they follow us around and convince us that they’re always going to! Flash forward a few weeks and you’ll start to notice that there’s a lot more interest in the big world, and the puppy who was so eager to look to you now has its own agenda. Don’t allow them the freedom to learn to ignore your come cue. Keep a leash on for control at all times!

Call Them for Good Things Only. Most dogs will sour to the recall pretty quickly if you call them to come and then trim their toenails or call them to come only when you’re leaving the park. When you are teaching your dog to respond to the come command, use the GOOD things in their day. For example, call them to come and reward them with food or toys. Call them to come and give them their dinner. Build their enthusiasm so that they LOVE hearing and responding to the word “come”. Plan to interrupt a good time like playing at the park, but give them several opportunities to return to the play before you pack them up to leave. I spend a great deal of time calling my puppies out of play only to reward them and send them back to play again. It’s a win-win!

Practise, Practise, PRACTISE!

All the hope, wishes, and love in the world won’t teach your dog a good come command, and despite the wonderful, cooperative nature that puppies start out with, that will fade and you’ll find yourself coming up short. If you want your dog to return to you despite squirrels and kids on bikes, you’ve got to put in the time to make it happen. That means setting up a training program and sticking with it for as long as it takes. Every dog is different. Some will be fairly reliable quickly, while others will take more time. Find what motivates your dog and put in the work to train their recall.

Be consistent! If you call your dog with no response, you’re sending them a message that it’s okay NOT to come. To get a consistent result, you’ve got to keep a consistent expectation. During training, if you call your dog, you want them to be in the position of getting it right unless you are proofing, which comes much later in the training process. Set them up for success and make it happen, each and every time.

Please remember that these are only recommendations and can be adapted to meet your puppy’s needs. We strongly recommend puppy classes, as they help to socialize your puppy and teach proper manners. Puppy classes also teach you how to train your dog effectively.