Who wants a Calm Puppy?

Calmness is KING!

When it comes to puppies they tend to be just so darn cute and fun that we can not resist playing with them all day long. The number one most important part of learning is Calmness and it ends up being forgotten. I to have been guilty of this myself. Even with my 4 year old dog. It is important to remember that your new puppy is learning all the time, ever interaction is a learning experience. When we are not thinking about training the association of learning through play gets lost. You can end up rewarding and teaching your puppy inappropriate behaviors. If you put the time and effort in teaching calmness behavior now it will make your puppy happier and your life much more easier.

Why do we want calmness. Simple put the behaviors that come with calmness are good choices no barking, no jumping, no digging and so on. Teaching your puppy the value in calmness will inspire more of it.

When our puppies are experiencing the emotions of excitement, frustration, fear and anxiety you can see the inappropriate behavior you do not want. These behaviors do not serve the puppy or you very well.

On the other hand when your puppy is experiencing calmness they are calm, cool and collect. They could be sleeping , relaxing, or chilling out with you. What they are not doing is making bad choices.

We want to think of calmness as a way of life not just a period of training you work on at certain time. Lets look at the "pot of value" or as you know call it our dog's daily food allowance. Everyday you take this "pot of Value" and just putting it on the floor and walk away. Instead lets take that "pot of value" and use it for rewarding Calmness.

How ?

The Calmness Triad. As a Pro Dog Trainer , Certified with Absolute dogs we use this system in our training for promoting Calmness.

Passive Calmness-

Passive Calmness is based on the fact that there are certain activities that are calming to puppies and dogs.

Calm K9 Lickmat. https://a-ok9.com/collections/accessories?ref=gooddogtrainingcalmk9 (see more in our Health Hero page) Please call & pick up if you live locally.

Treat dispensers

Chews

Scatter Feeding

Calmness

Your puppy making calm choices, being calm, staying still and being rewarded for these choices is the Calmness Protocol. How does this work. Easy! Deliver some of your dog daily food allowance to your puppy when they are acting calm. This will encourage you puppy to do more calm behaviors. Calmly walk up drop a piece of food near your puppy, no need to interact just reward and move on.

Active Rest

Here you need to understand that puppies need time during the day that they are not exposed to so many choices. Just like you ,when you have had a day of making decisions all day long with work, friends, church, kids or school you come to a point where you just feel I can not make one more decision. We all have been there sitting at a restaurant or in front of our computer and we just can not make one more decisions. The same process happens to puppies.

What does Active Rest look like.... you can put your puppy in a crate, pay pen, or a room. This is teaching them this is where calm ness happens. This is a boring no excitement chill out area where no one interacts with your puppy. Yes that mean children, visitors, and you. Active Rest should become a way of life.

During the day your puppy will be going around the wheel in the different segments.

Remember also there is a massive link between your puppies gut health and brain health. Also a link between their brain chemicals and the developing brain and the internal gut.

At around 8 weeks you can introduce calm k9 food supplement.

Calm K9

See more details on our Health Hero page. Pick up available in Mount laurel NJ.

Calm K9 has everything you need for a calm healthy puppy brain. A brain that has everything it needs to be able to make great choices and respond well to the calmness wheel. It also has a probiotic in it.

In order to do Active Rest component we have to think about how to build value in the crate, puppy pen or raised bed, we called this Boundary Games.

Check out this brief introduction on Boundary Games and all our videos on our YouTube channel. Like and subscribe !

If you live local to Mount Laurel NJ I have many of the Health Hero Products at home for quick delivery.

Check out our next post on Boundary Games.