Paws In Motion

Paws In Motion Pet service based in Berkshire and surrounding areas. Offering dog walking, pet sitting and dog trai

24/03/2021

Today is
Puppies are adorable, but they're a lot of hard work.

Puppies require 18-20 hours/day to sleep as they're developing. They easily tire out or become overstimulated. If your puppy becomes overstimulated or doesn't have enough sleep they will increase mouthing behaviours, which they also do as they're teething and exploring the world. Puppies aren't being naughty when they mouth/nip, it is a normal behaviour that indicates that they're not comfortable, being mishandled, are overtired, are unable to think (over the threshold), overstimulated, their gums hurt from teething and so much more.

Toilet training needs to be a consistent routine. A puppy's bladder is not yet fully developed, and what goes in always goes out and fast!!

According to a 2019 PDSA study on dogs and exercise, puppies need 5 minutes of exercise per month of age twice a day. So 1 month = 5 minutes 2x= 10 minutes.
https://www.pdsa.org.uk/taking-care-of-your-pet/looking-after-your-pet/puppies-dogs/exercising-your-puppy

Too much exercise as a puppy can lead to joint damage. Provide your puppy with enrichment sessions as outlets and also to create positive associations to different textures, sounds and objects that they'll experience as they age.

Puppies need training to learn calmness, leash work and alternative behaviours that maybe we don't find appropriate like jumping and to help them with handling for future life situations like grooming and the vet.

Puppies are wonderful, adorable and cute but are oh so much hard work. If you have a new puppy and need to learn the foundations, check out our Puppy Power courses online or in-person!

21/03/2021

🤯Aggression Ladder

🧐There is so much to behaviour than meets the eye. I often hear clients distressed, saying that their dog has never behaved this way and don’t understand where it’s come from and that they are normally so good. Obviously there are events that trigger behaviours but they don’t just come from nowhere, and can be prevented if you know what you’re looking at and know how to interpret it.

🙈When a dog behaves in a way that a human being finds inappropriate or rude, we forget that dogs are not human. They behave in a normal manner that’s natural for their species, and we as humans have unrealistic expectations of our dogs. We both ‘speak’ different languages. We mainly use vocalisation and dogs mainly use body language.

🎢The ladder of aggression is what can help you understand how a dog can escalate from what seems like a normal relaxed dog, to all of a sudden barking, growling, being reactive and biting.

🥺You may first notice your dog sending something called calming signals. This is not only to help them stay calm but to indicate to you that the dog is not a threat, and the messages the dog is sending should calm down a situation the dog is not ok with. This can be in the form of lip licking following a sneeze, excessive blinking, yawning, head turns and avoidance behaviours. These behaviours will appear out of context and are to ideally defuse a tense situation.

🖐If the messages the dog is sending are being ignored the next thing you may see are displacement behaviours. This is when the dog redirects their attention to something else so the don’t have to deal with the ‘scary thing’ or situation. It can be a form of a self soothing behaviour that can give the dog a moment of relief. It can be random ge***al checks, eating grass, randomly scratching, or over sniffing in the environment etc... The dog is now exhibiting stress signals.

😳The dog may now move to more intense behaviours if he/ she has not shut down and gone into a learnt state of helplessness. You may see your dog is barking and their breathing has rapidly increased. The dog most likely is trying to deter the threat. You may even notice the dog dips their head down, snarling with excessive lip licking. At this stage the tongue will be going right over the nose with every lick. The dog’s teeth may be bearing and even growling. In between these behaviours you may still notice more calming signals.

😤If the dog gets to the stage where their behaviour is highly reactive and they are lunging out, barking and growling, teeth bearing, snarling and or quite still in between while exhibiting these behaviours, then this is a dog who is completely over threshold and not coping. It’s their last resort before they follow with a bite. Their body is in overdrive and they are in fight mode as their other behaviours of freeze, fidget and flight did not work. The dog is in SURVIVAL mode and the next step is to bite to protect/ defend himself/ herself.

✌️Behaviours can escalate quickly. Within a blink of an eye, your dog can go from being ok to nervous to flight or fight. Identifying body language, facial expressions and signals is an incredibly important step in PREVENTING unwanted behaviours and making your dog feel safe.

12/03/2021

It's National Dog Bite Prevention Week. Learn how to read a dog's body language and to teach your childen safety around dogs.

Milo the explorer 🐶🐾🌳This clever boy has now finished his puppy training! He is such a good boy and loves learning, his ...
04/03/2021

Milo the explorer 🐶🐾🌳

This clever boy has now finished his puppy training! He is such a good boy and loves learning, his family have done so well helping him along the way 😁

I look forward to seeing him for some dog sitting when his Mum returns to work 🦮🐾🤍

03/03/2021

Graeme Hall has been a more recent addition to our TV's, no doubt a particular interest during lockdown. Unruly dog? Graeme appears to be able to provide advice and help for owners struggling!
But wait...
There's one error here. I don't condone it. ❌
So why this post? 🧐
My job and duty in my industry is to provide clients knowledge on how to appropriately address behaviour issues they are experiencing; NOT make them worse; and what I saw on TV last night utterly disgusted me to the point I feel a need to express myself, this is my personal opinion.

If anyone tuned in to last night’s episode, Graeme was there assisting a family with a seemingly aggressive looking dog that kept attacking the family and causing a lot of tension between the humans and dog. Graeme’s solution? Roll up a newspaper and STAND YOUR GROUND. The owners did as they were told and the dog eventually slunk away under the kitchen table, “WHO’S BOSS NOW?”
Some of you may be thinking why do I have a problem with this? Please allow me to explain and please read on 👇
Teaching dogs ‘who’s the boss’ by forcing them into some mythical state called ‘calm submission’ is precisely the opposite of what they actually need in order to learn effectively and overcome behavioural issues.
Instead, it’s been proven time and time again that it’s better to teach your dog what to expect from them (no different to a young child). Using training attitudes that incorporate an ‘alpha’ or ‘dominant’ status from the human causes your relationship with your dog to disintegrate, making it very hard for them to want to listen to you in the future.
If I kept getting something wrong, I would learn much more effectively through praise and positive reinforcement as opposed to someone bullying me or shouting at me, even worse if they were holding a ‘weapon’ of some description to intimidate me and make me more worried! Are you the same?
Unfortunately, just because someone has air time on national television, does not make them good at what they do. But what is most unfortunate, is the thousands of people tuning in that will genuinely believe these ‘training solutions’ will save them, when merely they are a very quick route to further problems developing and absolutely crushing your relationship with your beloved dog.
Graeme’s website shows no information on any training qualifications he has nor does his website state anywhere what training methods he uses. One thing I know from the work that I do, is I can spend many appointments going around ‘un-doing’ all the awful methods people like Graeme have misled people to believe to ensure you get back on the right training track and have a wonderful, enriched life ahead with your dog. After all, is the reason we got our dog in the first place to enjoy how magnificent they are? 🐶 😇
If you can do one kind thing today, remove Graeme from your TV planner and share this post so I can spread the word that kindness in the dog training world wins, EVERY time. I love all my clients and their dogs dearly and would never put any dog or family in a situation like I see on Graeme’s TV show. Love your dogs and they will love you 100% more. Holley 🧡

19/02/2021

Dinner time = fun time 😋🍪

The adorable Milo is now 13 weeks old and has ventured into the outside world! 🌎 Looking very stylish in his coat and ke...
18/02/2021

The adorable Milo is now 13 weeks old and has ventured into the outside world! 🌎
Looking very stylish in his coat and keeping warm in this cold weather ❄️🥶

He is getting used to new surrounding and meeting new people and dogs 🐩🐕

He is very keen to play with other dogs so we’ve started to work on focus and recall, he’s a clever boy! 🐶🤍


11/02/2021

A quick snippet of little Milo’s session today 🎬🐾

Milo has lots of built up energy that he isn’t sure what to do with... this causes him to be frustrated and can lead to unwanted behaviours, including lots of puppy biting 👎🏼🙅🏼‍♀️

We set up a few enrichment stations for him to explore and search for treats 🍬
These include things like snuffle mats and destruction boxes!

Mental stimulation is very important and will help to avoid having an over excited and frustrated puppy! 🐶🐾

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SL6

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