Dog advice
BUILD YOUR BOND t hrough play
Part Two
Toys are valuable learning tools and can help you to forge a trusting relationship with your dog, says Carol Price.
ast month we looked at the critical role play has in dogs’ lives, in both preparing them for real life, and in building social bonds. From playing with each other as young puppies, dogs move on to their new ‘human’ homes, and it is then that we can take over their ongoing social development and training, with the use of games and toys. When people first get puppies, playing with them in some way or form may seem the most natural thing in the world. But not everyone appreciates the way toys can also become valuable learning tools, in terms of what dogs learn about us when we use them in play, and what we can teach them.
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Building the bond
It is important to spend as much time as you can playing with any new puppy you get, as this is the way he learns to build his primary social bond with you or other family members. Remember that in leaving his former home, mother, and littermates behind, he has lost all his past primary social connections and now has to build new ones. And you want to make this process as pleasurable and rewarding for him as possible. Further, the more you invest in forging this early social bond through play with your puppy, the more trust and goodwill you will build up in him, which will really help when it comes to his future training.
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The same applies if you get an older dog, like a rescue. Making this early bond through play gets your new relationship off to the best possible start. If you have existing dogs, and get a new puppy or dog, it is also very important to spend regular time playing with the puppy one-to-one, every day, so he builds his primary social connection in life with you and not with your other dogs. Dogs in a home who are allowed to bond more strongly with each other, rather than you — such as littermates — can be that much harder to train later on.
leave any room you are in with a puppy if he persists in trying to nip you. Also be aware that more exciting, rough and tumble play of any kind with your puppy will always trigger greater use of his teeth. You can use a specific command, like ‘Stop!’, to tell your puppy all play is now going to be abandoned because he has touched you with his teeth, and over time this command should be enough in itself to make any nipping stop. However, I personally prefer to use the ‘Off!’ and ‘Back!’ commands, as they can have so many other uses later.
The ‘no teeth’ rule
Ongoing play and learning
When playing with puppies, bonding apart, the next important thing to consider is what do you want to teach your dog through toys and the whole play process? The reason for this is that puppies will carry on doing what is most instinctive for them to do as dogs when playing, unless you give them better direction. The way, for instance, people want to play with puppies is not how puppies tend to play with each other, where there can be a lot of wrestling, barging, and tugging, and the use of teeth. So, one of the very first play lessons a puppy needs to learn when he comes into a new human home is the ‘no teeth’ rule. In other words, the instant his teeth touch any part of the human body all play and social interaction will stop. You may also need to immediately
Playing should also be an ongoing habit between you and your dog, with the dogs and owners who play together more regularly always having the closest bonds. Just about every important future life lesson or training command I teach my dogs always begins with their earliest play sessions, whether this is better recall, or retrieving things, or dropping down on the move when I ask them to. As some dogs get older, they may become less interested in play, or even toys, but they still won’t forget what they learned from these things when they were younger. So, take the time to teach your dog what you need to through play, when they are young, or even older if needs be, and the effects it will have on their future behaviour will always be worth it.
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