I can’t, anyway.
A few weeks ago my wife and I got a standard poodle puppy. We had plenty of opinions and ideas (no froo-froo poodle haircuts for this guy!), but we realized there were plenty of things that we didn’t have settled in our minds. Even basic things — house training, for example — can get very frustrating if you are inconsistently applying different methods and ideas at the same time. We realized that, as with much in life, what we really needed was a good book.
There’s plenty of material about dog training out there, but we wanted something specific — straightforward, no-nonsense, easy to understand and apply. Books about dog psychology are fascinating, and I can appreciate the unique approach of the more esoteric puppy whisperers. But we wanted something that cut out all the unnecessary theory and boiled it down to just the essentials: some clear instructions that we could follow.
After asking around and looking at a few different books, I hit on Before and After Getting Your Puppy
, by Ian Dunbar. It’s actually two previous books (Before Getting Your Puppy and…10 points if you can guess the title of the other book) bound together in a nice hardcover format. You know how some cookbooks are bound as hardcovers with glossy boards and no dustjacket, so you can use it in the kitchen and just wipe it off if it gets dirty? Same idea here, and they managed to keep the price down to $19.95 which is great for a hardcover — especially after heading to the pet store for a new collar, leash, food and water bowls, extra puppy food, some new treats, dog toys, replacement clippers after the old one burns out, trips to the vet for shots, trips to the vet for upset puppy tummy…
The book is structured perfectly — it’s broken down into “developmental deadlines” — so you can follow along, week by week, and keep track of what your puppy (and you) should be learning and working on. Dunbar is explicitly clear about what behavior is normal (and can be ignored) and what behavior is a sign of bad things to come (and needs to be addressed quickly).
Something else I really appreciated is that the language of the book, while it is written for a committed and willing owner, never assumes an advanced level of understanding or some previous experience of the reader. I’m familiar with some of the ideas and training methods, since I grew up with dogs all my life and have read about dog training before. But I still appreciated the clear explanations — and found that some of the things I thought I understood, I really didn’t.
A new puppy is great fun, but the funny puppy misbehavior can quickly become a huge hassle and annoyance as the dog grows older…and too frequently, what results is another “bad dog” in the city shelter hoping for a rescuer. Hoping that you just end up with a good dog occasionally works, but there’s no reason to leave it up to luck — put in some good work early on and you vastly increase your chances of getting a “good dog” — because you will be a good owner.
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