Help! For no reason at all my Lab puppy stopped listening to me, what happened? Well I will need to provide some background information for you in order to present a clear picture.
Over the course of about 20 or 30 years, there were two researchers, Drs. John Paul Scott and John L. Fuller who conducted exhaustive studies on multiple breeds of dogs in order to determine the effects heredity has on behavior. If memory serves me I believe there was a breeder of guide dogs at that time who was experiencing a great failure in the dogs they bred. In fact only about 9% of the puppies they were breeding were able to serve as guide dog, that’s a 91% failure rate.
This breeder discovered Dr. Scott’s and Dr. Fuller’s research and when he applied it was able to reverse his successful puppies to 90% of those born. According to this story and the research used it is possible to selectively breed smarter and smarter dogs.
So what is this research? There is a lot on the internet about this, however, most articles seem to simply copy and paste the same information with just enough change to avoid plagiarism. I don’t think posting one of the science of puppy stages articles will benefit you any more than you searching for one for yourself and reading through it. It is mostly theoretical and you will have to figure out how to adapt the theories of each stage your self. Instead, Let me talk briefly of some of the stages and then give you concrete examples of how to act toward your puppy as they venture through the different stages to dog adult hood. The research is loosely applied to all breeds but I will speak specifically about the Labrador Retriever Puppy you brought home and I will also speak specifically to our bloodline of Lucky Labs puppies which we have been developing for 12 years now. We normally train at least one lab puppy from each breeding so we are able to see in a linear fashion the results of our work in determining which adults to mate. This allows us to make changes from litter to litter as we decide which dogs to mate in order to make the best puppies.
When puppies are born they are completely dependent on their mothers. They are blind, deaf, toothless, can’t eliminate waste on their own and can’t regulate their own heat. Between weeks 2 and 4 the puppies open their ears and eyes and begin to walk around a little. Their immune systems become active during this time.
Weeks 4 to 6 is where the puppies are weaned off of their mother’s milk as they begin to eat softened food. Weeks 6 to 8 is where puppies learn social skills of how to act with other puppies. These lessons learned usually through play biting and hearing their litter mates cry if they are hurt, are kept with them for the rest of their lives. For this reason puppies should not be taken away from their litter mates early.
Weeks 8 to 12 is a period your lab puppy will go through called the fear period. Meeting new people and objects could be met with a fear response in which they will have to realize that their expectation of the fear is not confirmed. For example, meeting a new person. Lab puppy is fearful, new person does not hurt or startle them and the puppy builds a memory of new people being friendly not a threat. There is a myth that a puppy should meet 100 people in 100 days. Don’t accept this at face value. There is no magic in the number 100, rather it is good to expose your Lab puppy to new people at a rate they can accept and build confidence. This may be 50 people, it may be 25 people or another number. It is important that they have positive experiences with each new person they meet because a scary experience could send them into their shell.
Why am I telling you all of this? Your puppy is already past the 12 week old stage? The reason understanding the importance of all of this is because even if your Labrador Retriever is older than 12 weeks, you have laid the foundation to who they are as a dog up until this point in their lives. They have the ability to remember over 200 commands and there is no way that you will be able to teach all of that to them in the first 12 weeks. If they are shy because you haven’t socialized them then you must recognize this is something you have set up and you will have to deal with in training them further. As well, if your puppy has been let go to run and do whatever it wants and has built behaviors until this point, you will have to un-train the undesirable behaviors you have reinforced in order for your puppy to make further training progress.
So, knowing the prime time to teach is between 8 and 16 or 20 weeks, how come your Lab is suddenly acting different between 4 and 8 months old? Well there are stages similar to those of humans. Think of a child growing up to an adult, they make changes…and if you’ve had a teenager you can confirm this, but they make big changes until they are around 18 or 20 years old. Some finish developing around 17 and some older than 20 and progress is individual. This is the same with Labradors, some could mature early and some late. The important thing for you to remember is that you need to know them well enough to see the changes so you are aware of them. The 4 to 8 month period is when a puppy will test its wings and test your commands. This is natural and I will address how to handle this below.
There is also a second fear stage between 6 and 14 months old. These stages can overlap so if you call your puppy and she doesn’t come, you need to determine if they are fearful or testing the boundaries. Understanding why they are acting a certain way is critical to addressing the behavior properly.
So what does this mean for me as a master trainer of my new Chocolate Lab Puppy? I can remember getting a phone call from some one who researched us as a Labrador Retriever breeder for almost a year. They talked about how they searched all over for a Chocolate Lab Breeder in Ontario and decided on us to choose their puppy. After getting their puppy home they couldn’t understand why the puppy was mouthing, not listening and basically running the show. It was only after about an hour conversation that they were finally convinced that their puppy training, or lack of it was to blame. See an infographic on depositing into your Labrador Retriever’s Obedience Bank Account here.
You see when a Labrador Retriever breeder, or any breeder for that matter creates a bloodline of puppies they work on breeding out undesirable traits and also work on breeding in traits that are missing or need strengthening in their bloodline. This client in particular thought finding a Lab puppy who already listened, stayed by your side, didn’t run on to the road, didn’t run off the un-fenced property, etc….. was possible. However, Labrador breeders only give your the genetic possibility. That means we work to breed Labs who are very well suited to learn what you want. We can’t send them programmed with your intentions, you have to make that clear to them and if you do not, they will be an untrained Labrador Retriever when you are hoping for a well behaved dog. As a further point, it doesn’t matter if you have a black Lab, a chocolate Lab, a yellow Lab or a silver Lab, coat color is simply that. The color of the fur on your dog. A dog’s ability to follow and learn commands is not held in the color of their coat.
So, as you issue commands to your Lab, and they choose to not obey those commands, ask yourself these questions:
1. Was this command well trained to begin with? This means was your dog responding right away every time you issued the command one time before now? If the answer is no, then there needs to be more work done firming up your commands.
2. Is my dog scared? For example, if you call your dog to come and it doesn’t which results in you screaming and trying to motivate your dog with fear (yes I’ve seen it), then you need to understand that she doesn’t want to come to you because they are afraid of you or possibly a punishment they are going to receive. It’s important to note that punishments and negative consequences for Labs who don’t listen are simply not effective. They don’t work. In this situation you need to become a person your dog will want to come to. If it is not fear and they are testing, you may need to bring back the 50 foot leash and reinforce that “come” means come. One command, the dog comes (maybe for a high value treat such as chicken lunch meat) and that’s that. Don’t say it again rather use the leash to show them that your command does not mean run anywhere they want to.
3. Are there distractions causing your Labrador to lose focus and follow the blowing leaf that is more fun? If so, distractions need to be trained out. This means your Lab will always choose to do what is the most fun until they are taught to do otherwise. Training should begin free of distractions and then the distractions should be introduced slowly and gradually so that your Lab can learn step by step that they are rewarded for listening to your command not chasing the leaf. If they do test you and follow the leaf, don’t reinforce that in any way by giving them any attention. What is attention that reinforces a behavior in a lab? It is any attention. It could be you scolding it and saying no or bad boy, it could be you making eye contact that reinforces a negative behavior or it could be a pet or touch of your dog. Completely Ignore undesirable behavior and reward what you want to happen.
So yes, It always, always, always falls back to what we are, or are not doing in regards to training our Lab puppies. Good dog trainers build in training techniques to avoid or even anticipate when a puppy not listening may happen. A professional dog trainer can more easily recognize the reason your puppy isn’t listening in the training class, bring it to your attention and spend time at future training sessions to avoid or prevent it. Sure it’s easy for a professional trainer but that’s because they have more experience teaching dog owners and teaching your dog good behaviors. Obedience classes are really there to train you how to recognize aspects of training and make adjustments.
When something happens that you don’t want to happen, or something different happens, then always look into your training methods, your self discipline when you are around your dog–or possibly someone in the family. A dog’s behavior both good and bad is a result of the humans responsible for training that dog. It is not the dog’s issue.
