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Originally Posted by flybear  I wonder how others have solved this problem ..
Our new Morkie baby Yuki is supposed to go to puppy class ... both for training and socialization ... She lives currently with 4 other small breed dogs ages 17 all the way down to 11 months. She has good social skills so far but we want to introduce her to other dogs and training away from the pack. She is a healthy 2.7 lb at 9 weeks ... which isn't super tiny for a 3/4 yorkie mix but VERY tiny in comparison to most other breeds.
My issue is that most dog/puppy classes offered here have primarily large breed puppies ... a few dog schools here put puppies between 8 weeks and a YEAR old in the same class ... and the trainers assure me that this practice would be totally safe  - I watched the socialization part ... they let the pups of leash and let them " socialize" for about 15 minutes lol ... Even with 100% supervision and very well trained dog owners a - 10 months old Great Dane puppy is NOT safe to play with an under 3 lb baby-just my opinion - it seems lunatic to me... but a few trainers told me that I am being totally silly and that my dog needs to socialize with dogs of all sizes asap- they'll keep her safe ... hmm ...
My solution in the past has been a puppy preschool class where all puppies are under 16 weeks ... draw back is that most are not fully vaccinated and completely unruly and that there isn't a whole bunch of training happening...
How have you handled socialization and group classes of very small puppies ? Any extra ideas?? |
Hi I haven't been on here for awhile but just dropped in and saw your posting. I hope I can help share our experience with you. Today our Bella is 4+ years old. She's healthy very obedient and well socialized. Anyways we were excited to own a pet after we retired and got Bella from a Canadian Kennel Club Registered (CKC) breeder at about 12 weeks. The owner and trainer of the dog school said to get her into socialization class right away. So after she received all her puppy shots from our vet. Her 1hr. weekly classes with other puppy dogs large and small turned out fine. We were concerned about the dog sizes too but it turned out okay. We watched her carefully. Most of the dogs were less than a year old.Yes some were a little more agressive while playing but the owners are there to monitor their dogs and helped out if it got too playful. Notice our little Bella, the small black furry yorkie, she was the smallest size there less than 3 pounds. She did great because she didn't know any fear yet, haha. However she tried to hide under people's chairs and feet when she got timid. Just sharing our link to a couple of videos here. We enjoyed being there. Hope this is helpful. All the Best of Luck!
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_oD...ew?usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/file/d/1JG1...ew?usp=sharing