Introducing People and New Dog Friends.

 

Invite calm, friendly friends to visit.  Your puppy needs to experience visitors to your home.  Winter puppies suffer most because the days are shorter and we don't have backyard BBQ's with friends.  Take him out and sit on the porch to wait for the mail carrier or watch the kids walk home from school.

 

While we shouldn't be taking our not-fully-vaccinated puppies to public places, it doesn't mean our puppies can't go safe places!  Aunt Martha is probably lonely and would love to puppy sit while you go shopping!  The home and fenced backyard of someone with no pets or healthy, vaccinated, pets is safe.  Visits and sleepovers are really about being in a new environment with all the unfamiliar smells and sounds and becoming confident and relaxed wherever they go.  Walking on new floors and stairs and meeting new people.  This will set them up for success when you leave them behind to go on vacation later in their life.

 

Play dates.  Do you have friends who have vaccinated, healthy, social and friendly dogs who are good with puppies?  There is nothing better than a good mentor.  Of course, you will choose your puppy's friends wisely and be sure that they are safe from bad experiences and bad examples!  The best play dates are hanging out together, sniffing around the yard, interspersed with fun romps, not constant revved up knock-down wrestling matches.  He's not there to play, he's there to feel safe, practice good manners, boundaries, and learn to share. 

 

Passive socialization rather than direct puppy-to-dog / puppy-to-human interaction. The ultimate goal of all socialization is that the puppy remains neutral, focused on their owner, not over-excited wanting to jump on everyone and everything.  Your puppy is learning to be calm instead of over-stimulated in new situations and around new people and animals.  There is a benefit to not allowing your puppy to rush up to every dog and human squealing, "Can I pet your puppy?"  Of course, pups DO need to see and sniff and say 'hello' to a wide variety of humans, big and small, but in a SAFE and polite way.

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The best thing about passive interaction is the cautious puppy gets more time to observe and acclimate without being swarmed or overwhelmed.  He has the choice to say 'hello' or not and leave when he's done.  Appropriate social distance is the length of a 4-foot leash, plus your extended arm.  Direct people who want to meet your puppy to sit so the pup can come to them.  Give him time.  Allow your pup to venture to the end of his leash to go see someone if he'd like and congratulate him when he retreats back to his own comfort zone, without being followed.  If he doesn't want to right now, that's fine, too.

 

Practice CALMNESS. 
It's ridiculously easy to teach your puppy to act like a loon. 

 

People will say "I don't mind" and they will pet and fuss over your puppy while he is jumping all over them and mouthing their clothes.  It's cute now, but it won't be in another month.  Teaching polite greetings will require vast amounts of dedication to help your visitors get it right.

 

The overly-friendly excitable puppy needs space in order to learn to pass calmly and not jump on everyone he sees. Learning to be calm is really hard.  He needs LOADS of practice NOT saying hello right away.  Behavior that is practiced gets stronger.  

Can I pet your puppy?  Wait a minute!  If yours is an excitable puppy, keep your distance to keep him from jumping all over the person.  Allow him more time to acclimate and his emotions to settle down before letting him say hello.  You can take this time to explain how you would like them to greet your pup so he will be more successful when you do let him say 'hello' to that person in the park.  Keep meetings short, at a polite distance, and move on.