Puppy Culture Potluck: Ep3 - Is Puppy Culture for Rescue Litters?

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I'm Jane Messineo Lindquist

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and this is a Puppy Culture

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Potluck podcast.

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You bring the topics,
we bring the conversation.

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Today's question came to us through the
With Open Arms discussion group,

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and that's the discussion group
for our puppy course.

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And it is a puppy owner question,

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but it's something that breeders
also struggle with.

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So I'm going to address the question
from the puppy owners point of view

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and then also give
some breeder tips at the end.

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So here's how the question goes.

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I would love to pick your brains.

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Ten week old puppy.

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She gets put into her pen
with an open crate for the night

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in our lounge, food,

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water and treats to keep her entertained,
should she wake.

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But 5a.m., she started barking, howling
the house down to get out of her pen.

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How do I stop it?

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So far
we've just been ignoring the behavior.

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And don't go down there
or let her out till she's quiet.

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But I just don't think she's learning
not to.

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Do we just persevere with ignoring

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the undesirable behavior?

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So there's a lot to unpack here.

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But I want to put

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one thing on the table that in follow up
discussions, we've established

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that the this puppy is okay
with confinement in general.

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So the Area P meaning to say her playpen
area is a comfortable place for her.

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So this is not a general confinement
issue.

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It's not a training issue for confinement.

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It's the waking up at
what seems like an odd hour in the morning

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and howling her
head off that that is the issue.

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So there are two questions
that we're going to approach here.

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And the top level
question is the question of the puppy

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waking up at an ungodly hour

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and then, you know,
the more profound question that underlies

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it is helping puppy owners approach
any kind of

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behavior issue like this. So

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what I'm
going to say, what I love about this post,

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what I love about this post,

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is that I believe that the puppy owner
is doing a good job

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of trying to establish whether this is an
“I want” or an “I need” something.

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Okay.

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This is something we talk a lot about in
all of our courses is establishing

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when the puppy is is being demanding,
kind of displaying these behaviors.

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Does the puppy
have some kind of unfulfilled need

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that you really need to address,
or is the puppy just saying,

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yeah, I would really just actually
prefer to be a different way.

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And you know she said I've, I've,

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she's established
that the puppy is comfortable in the pen.

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She's given the
puppy food, water and treats.

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So she feels like, hey, you know,
the puppies needs are met.

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So I'm going to lean on the side of this
being an “I want” and

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not an “I need”.

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And so, you know, she's
given this good recitation of the steps

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she's taken and she's again,
the puppy is comfortable in the pen.

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So she's well within reason to think

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maybe
we should just put this on extinction.

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So I want to compliment her on her
going down the punch list this way.

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It's so happens in this case,
that is not the answer.

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This is probably not
something that is an “I want”

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it's probably more of an
“I need” at this point

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and/or not a behavioral problem
that you have to solve.

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So let me talk about this.

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Let me break this down.

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First of all,

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I'm going to cut to the chase and tell you
it is very normal for puppies to wake up

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very early in the morning
and not want to be alone,

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especially a ten week old puppy
that has not,

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by all assumptions, been

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in their house,
their new home for very long.

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It's a developmental thing
and it will pass

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if you gently support the puppy
through this.

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So let me break this down further.

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First, I'm going to explain why your puppy
does this, because it is a thing.

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Then I'm going to address
what you should do about it.

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And as I said, I'm going to address
the puppy owners angle first

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and then I'm going to talk
about considerations for breeders

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with litters.

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So the reason puppies get up

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out of

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sync with the rest of the household
or what we think should be in sync with

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the rest of the household
is that they do not have

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an established circadian rhythm.

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And I'm going to step back on that
and explain to you exactly

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what a circadian rhythm is.

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A circadian
rhythm is the body's internal clock

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that tells us when we should sleep
and when we should be awake.

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All mammals have this.

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A healthy and mature circadian rhythm

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is aligned
with the cycles of day and night.

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So we feel awake when the sun comes up
and then we start getting sleepy

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when the sun goes down.
Same thing for dogs.

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We're tied to that sun cycle.

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Now just to dig down into
a little, a little bit more,

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the circadian rhythm is controlled

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by specialized collections of neurons
in the hypothalamus,

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and the hypothalamus is a gland

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within the mammalian brain.

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So that gland,
when it's when the puppy's born,

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it is not programed yet.

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It actually has to learn
how to sync itself up with day and night.

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When the puppy is in utero

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or any mammal, a baby in utero,
it gets input,

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it gets maternal
input about sinking up day and night.

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I mean, believe it or not,
the whelps as they're in the uterus

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are already learning to sync up day
to night by the rhythm of the dam.

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Then once they're born,

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they get input from the milk
that they nurse on.

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The milk quality and content actually

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changes over the cycle of the day
to give the puppies

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input about when they should be awake
and when they should be sleeping.

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The milk is actually different
morning and night,

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but once those puppies are weaned

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and then taken away from their littermates

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once again
they're sort of on their own right.

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They have to establish their own
circadian rhythm.

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So whatever routine rhythm
they got in utero, and then from the milk

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and then just sort of being
with their other littermates,

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they don't have that anymore.

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Okay, So now they're in their new home
and they have to establish

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their own circadian rhythm.

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Now, this has not been studied
a lot in dogs

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other than to establish that puppies
don't have a circadian rhythm.

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But the two things that we know
about puppies that have been studied

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are that puppies have a shorter sleep
cycle than adult dogs.

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So, again, you know,
the fact that maybe you're putting them

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to bed at at 11, 10-11

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and they're getting up at 4 or 5 a.m.,
that's normal.

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They have a shorter sleep cycle.

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Also, puppies become active about 2 hours

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earlier in response
to first light than adult dogs.

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So that sun comes up.

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Puppies actually are coming alive,
sort of 2 hours

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earlier in response
to the sun than your adult dogs are.

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So again, this is just a way of saying
that these puppies

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are coming by this honestly.

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Okay. This is a developmental process.

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And this is absolutely right
that they would be awake at 5 a.m..

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Four or 5 a.m. very normal.

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Just as an aside, that

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circadian rhythm,
it takes about a year, okay.

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That first year
that the puppies of the puppies life,

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the circadian rhythm takes about that full
first year

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to establish to something
approaching an adult circadian rhythm.

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That being said, it actually

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the circadian rhythm evolves
continually through life.

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Okay.

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And then there are profound changes again
at the end of life

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as as the animal reaches geriatric stage.

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So in this puppy hood to juvenile
stage up to a year,

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there's kind of a dramatic change
in circadian rhythm.

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And then also there's a dramatic change
when they reach the geriatric stage.

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But what this all boils down to for you,
okay, is particularly in this early

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juvenile stage, in this puppy hood stage,

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this is a developmental phase.

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It's not a problem you have to solve.

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You just gently are going to
support the circadian rhythm

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and then the problem's going to go away.

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So what does that look like?

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If she wakes up at 5 a.m., number one,

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you're not,
you can go in and let her out, okay?

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She's within her rights.

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It's normal for her to be awake
at that time.

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Wake her, wake up yourself,
Let her outside to void.

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Let her toddle around a little,
give her a snack, put her back to bed.

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If the puppy is not freaked out, okay,

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if the puppy's been established
in your house for a couple of weeks

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and you know
the puppy's comfortable in their Area P,

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and this is just really a like ...

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Hey, I'm awake. Wouldn't it be great
if we did some stuff?

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You want to make this a business trip,
what we call a business trip,

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meaning to say you're not mad,
but you're dispassionate, You're not going

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to, you know, make this
a woo-hoo, really fun time for the puppy.

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But it's just like, yeah, you can get up,
you can walk, stretch

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your legs, go outside, void, have a snack,
go back to bed.

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That's all it's going to take.

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Okay, then that puppy's
going to go back to sleep.

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And eventually that waking up bubble
at 5 a.m., it's just going to smooth out.

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It's just going to smooth out
and it's going to go away.

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You don't have to worry about it.

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Now, if the puppy is truly freaked out,

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if the puppy wakes up and is scared
or you know

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not hasn't been in your house
for that long, we're going to error

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on the side of caution with that

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and we're going to go
ahead and comfort that puppy.

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Now, I also want to mention

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and we'll talk more about this
when we talk about what some of the other

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members of the discussion group said.

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I mean, as a rule,

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I just find it easier
to have the puppy in my room with me.

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I think that being in there with you,

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hearing your breathing,
that your own circadian rhythm is going

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to start to help that puppy establish
a sort of a circadian rhythm.

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Okay.

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So I am always all for a set up

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next to my bed at night.

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That way also

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you can get up early
and let them out before they wake up.

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Or if they do wake up at 5 a.m.,
it's just super easy to get up.

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Just let them out, let them, you know,
get them a snack and put them away.

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I do think generally speaking, a set up

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next to my bed is is always going to be
my preferred way to go with this.

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So that is a suggestion.

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Also, I would not really expect

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a puppy at this age
to sleep more than 5 hours at a time.

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I mean, that that would be about,

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you know, 5 to 6 hours
is what you're going to get.

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And even then you may have random wake ups

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at two, three in the morning,
although usually

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by the time they're ten weeks old,
that that has sort of passed.

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That's more of a thing
that breeders deal with because, you know,

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the puppies are even less established

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in their circadian rhythm
when the breeders have them.

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But again, I think that

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interpreting it,
how can I say as an I want and not an

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I need at 5 o’clock in the morning,
waking up,

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being alone ten weeks old,
you know, I'm going to say it's

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okay to error on the side of caution
and say this might be an “I need”.

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Again, I like the way

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the the
querent was going through the punch list

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and trying to figure this out and saying,
okay, I'm going to guess this.

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I thought that showed commend-ability
in this situation and, you know,

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trying to extrapolate the circumstances,
it was good.

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But I'm just going to say that for me,
I think I would error more

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on the side of caution and call this
a need and move that puppy into my room

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and go ahead and just let the puppy
be with me at night.

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You know, another thing
that a viewer wrote in

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that I think is a very good consideration.

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At ten weeks old, her puppy, she says,

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would always prefer to go outside
rather than use the inside litter area.

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Now I'm just going to sidebar here in our

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With Open Arms puppy course,

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we have a whole house training protocol
with behavioral markers.

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Okay, so as you reach
each behavioral marker you moved,

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you sort of move down the list of set ups.

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But what I'm going to say,
I'm just going to pull this one piece out

238
00:14:15,320 --> 00:14:16,200
is one of the key

239
00:14:16,200 --> 00:14:20,240
behavioral markers we have in there
is that once the puppy is showing you

240
00:14:20,240 --> 00:14:22,800
a definite preference for going outside,

241
00:14:23,280 --> 00:14:26,360
you should always be trying to honor that.

242
00:14:26,360 --> 00:14:28,840
Okay. So again, this

243
00:14:30,000 --> 00:14:34,800
club, this discussion group member said,
you know, my puppy prefers to go outside.

244
00:14:34,800 --> 00:14:36,640
So I always am listening for her.

245
00:14:36,640 --> 00:14:41,240
In fact, I try and get up
before she wakes up and get her outside.

246
00:14:41,960 --> 00:14:45,320
So this is going to become very important
for you and it's

247
00:14:45,320 --> 00:14:48,960
going to really facilitate
that house training process.

248
00:14:49,280 --> 00:14:53,840
So again, an argument for moving the puppy
next to you so you can hear them as soon

249
00:14:53,840 --> 00:14:57,600
as they start stirring and get them out
so they can go to the bathroom outside.

250
00:14:58,320 --> 00:15:01,720
So I would say on the whole,
the people that wrote in,

251
00:15:01,720 --> 00:15:05,120
you know, the suggestions that they had,
I would say four or five

252
00:15:05,120 --> 00:15:08,880
people wrote in and some of them
are very experienced breeders.

253
00:15:08,880 --> 00:15:11,920
And everyone said, Move

254
00:15:11,920 --> 00:15:15,720
the puppy into your bedroom,
get up before they get up if you can.

255
00:15:15,720 --> 00:15:19,280
Or as soon as they get
up, let let the puppy out.

256
00:15:21,120 --> 00:15:23,520
Now, if

257
00:15:23,520 --> 00:15:26,640
you're afraid that you're going
to be reinforcing the behavior

258
00:15:26,640 --> 00:15:31,200
of getting up early and screaming
to be let out, don't worry about that.

259
00:15:31,880 --> 00:15:34,640
It's a developmental phase
and it will pass.

260
00:15:35,400 --> 00:15:38,800
And, you know,
if you just look at the number of people,

261
00:15:38,920 --> 00:15:42,720
some of them very experienced breeders,
literally, who have done this

262
00:15:42,720 --> 00:15:46,880
scores of times will tell you it it

263
00:15:47,400 --> 00:15:51,880
if you just smooth this bump over
with just a little, you know, get up food,

264
00:15:51,880 --> 00:15:54,720
walk around, go outside, piddle,
go back to bed,

265
00:15:54,720 --> 00:15:57,320
the puppy's going to go back to bed
and it's going to pass.

266
00:15:57,800 --> 00:16:00,200
Now, I just want to revisit

267
00:16:00,600 --> 00:16:04,200
the very beginning of this conversation.

268
00:16:04,200 --> 00:16:06,840
When I said

269
00:16:07,880 --> 00:16:12,600
that this puppy owner was making a decent

270
00:16:12,600 --> 00:16:17,120
guess that this is something
that could be put on extinction. But

271
00:16:18,160 --> 00:16:21,400
as it
turns out, it wasn't the right answer.

272
00:16:22,960 --> 00:16:27,240
And I realize that that's sort of
not a very satisfactory thing to hear

273
00:16:27,240 --> 00:16:31,080
from an experienced person because like,
how the heck do you know the difference?

274
00:16:31,080 --> 00:16:35,280
And, you know,
we talk about some differences, but

275
00:16:35,280 --> 00:16:40,800
I think there is something very specific
that she mentioned that can be a metric

276
00:16:41,400 --> 00:16:45,560
for whether extinction is an appropriate

277
00:16:45,560 --> 00:16:48,520
approach under the circumstances.

278
00:16:49,640 --> 00:16:51,000
And here it is.

279
00:16:51,000 --> 00:16:53,640
This is the line that I think gives us

280
00:16:53,640 --> 00:16:58,800
some important information.

281
00:16:58,800 --> 00:17:02,160
So far
we have just been ignoring the behavior

282
00:17:02,160 --> 00:17:05,160
and don't go down
or let her out till she's quiet.

283
00:17:05,960 --> 00:17:11,440
But I just don't think she's learning
not to.

284
00:17:11,440 --> 00:17:16,480
So here's the thing about this.

285
00:17:16,480 --> 00:17:19,760
It is a mantra of positive dog training

286
00:17:19,760 --> 00:17:23,560
that we ignore
undesirable behaviors, right?

287
00:17:23,560 --> 00:17:26,760
And we put them on extinction.

288
00:17:26,760 --> 00:17:28,040
But I always think you have to look

289
00:17:28,040 --> 00:17:32,120
at the dashboard of circumstances
surrounding the behavior

290
00:17:33,720 --> 00:17:34,040
and the

291
00:17:34,040 --> 00:17:38,040
dashboard of circumstances
surrounding this behavior with a ten week

292
00:17:38,040 --> 00:17:42,320
old puppy, the puppy is newly transitioned
into their home.

293
00:17:42,320 --> 00:17:43,000
They can't, you know,

294
00:17:43,000 --> 00:17:46,880
I would assume, not been in that home
for more than a couple of weeks

295
00:17:47,600 --> 00:17:50,640
and probably shorter than that
if it's a Puppy Culture breeder.

296
00:17:51,240 --> 00:17:55,880
They just are an age where
they're really not meant to be alone.

297
00:17:55,880 --> 00:18:00,080
I mean, no ten week
old puppy is ever meant to be alone.

298
00:18:00,800 --> 00:18:03,280
And when I say never meant to be alone,

299
00:18:03,560 --> 00:18:08,760
what I mean is from an evolutionary
point of view, everything in that puppies

300
00:18:08,760 --> 00:18:14,000
evolutionary DNA says
I have to stay with the pack to stay safe.

301
00:18:14,600 --> 00:18:17,320
We do teach crate and confinement

302
00:18:17,320 --> 00:18:20,640
training
starting at this age and younger. But,

303
00:18:20,640 --> 00:18:24,200
you know, again, you have to understand
it's foundational at this point.

304
00:18:24,200 --> 00:18:25,040
Okay.

305
00:18:25,240 --> 00:18:29,840
The bottom line is that everything,
every fiber of that puppy's

306
00:18:29,840 --> 00:18:35,560
body is saying, I need to stay
with the pack to stay alive.

307
00:18:35,560 --> 00:18:38,840
So, you know,
there has to be some significant training

308
00:18:38,840 --> 00:18:43,240
that goes into making the puppy
comfortable alone.

309
00:18:43,240 --> 00:18:47,280
It's not a natural thing,
I guess, is what I'm really trying to say.

310
00:18:48,000 --> 00:18:53,880
And they are naturally going
to be awake at that hour. So

311
00:18:55,000 --> 00:18:57,880
when you
have that dashboard of circumstances

312
00:18:58,160 --> 00:19:04,320
and also you've put it on extinction
and it has not gone away

313
00:19:05,040 --> 00:19:09,560
in two trials, maximum
three meaning to say you've ignored it

314
00:19:09,560 --> 00:19:13,720
three times, haven't gone in
and reinforced it, otherwise

315
00:19:13,840 --> 00:19:17,640
ignored it three times
and it doesn't go away.

316
00:19:18,480 --> 00:19:23,560
I mean, I'm going to say there is a deep
emotional need that has not been met here.

317
00:19:23,560 --> 00:19:24,000
Okay.

318
00:19:24,000 --> 00:19:26,920
There's something else
maintaining that behavior.

319
00:19:27,440 --> 00:19:31,600
And again,
with the dashboard of circumstances here,

320
00:19:32,000 --> 00:19:35,040
I think it's it's very dispositive

321
00:19:35,040 --> 00:19:37,200
that it's not being extinguished.

322
00:19:38,920 --> 00:19:40,480
And I really give this puppy

323
00:19:40,480 --> 00:19:44,640
owner kudos for sort of doing what

324
00:19:44,640 --> 00:19:47,760
she has learned and thinks is right.

325
00:19:48,480 --> 00:19:51,520
But sort of also reading
that, is something's

326
00:19:51,520 --> 00:19:54,960
not really working here.

327
00:19:54,960 --> 00:20:00,600
I just want to say in contrast, okay,
there are times in situations where it's

328
00:20:00,600 --> 00:20:04,840
a different dashboard of circumstances
with this same exact behavior

329
00:20:05,360 --> 00:20:07,360
where it will extinguish quickly.

330
00:20:08,240 --> 00:20:12,120
If you go to Madcap University,
we have an article there,

331
00:20:12,120 --> 00:20:15,560
I wrote an article called
Attention Monsters

332
00:20:15,960 --> 00:20:20,120
and I have a video up
there, five week old litter of puppies.

333
00:20:20,760 --> 00:20:25,240
I went in the first time,
I went into their room and ignored them.

334
00:20:25,600 --> 00:20:26,600
Oh my gosh.

335
00:20:26,600 --> 00:20:28,680
I mean,
you'd think I was sawing their legs off.

336
00:20:28,680 --> 00:20:32,880
And the outrage, the screaming,
the howling every time

337
00:20:32,880 --> 00:20:36,000
previous to that, I had gone in there
and paid attention to them.

338
00:20:37,320 --> 00:20:38,120
The second

339
00:20:38,120 --> 00:20:43,720
time I went in there the next day
and ignored them, they barely whined,

340
00:20:43,920 --> 00:20:46,560
they whimpered a little
and just went back to sleep.

341
00:20:48,080 --> 00:20:50,160
Now there's a lot of antecedents

342
00:20:50,160 --> 00:20:53,240
to that in the sense of
I set it up for success.

343
00:20:53,240 --> 00:20:59,320
But my point here is that if it's truly
just a habit or an “I want”,

344
00:20:59,640 --> 00:21:03,280
it's going to extinguish quickly
at this age in puppy hood.

345
00:21:03,680 --> 00:21:07,600
But the dashboard of circumstances
those five week old puppies

346
00:21:07,600 --> 00:21:09,520
is they were still in their litter.

347
00:21:09,520 --> 00:21:12,040
They were still in their familiar pen.

348
00:21:12,040 --> 00:21:16,160
They you know, nothing was changed
except me ignoring them

349
00:21:16,920 --> 00:21:20,240
for this puppy at ten weeks old, newly

350
00:21:20,240 --> 00:21:25,240
transitioned to a new home
alone, 5 o’clock in the morning.

351
00:21:25,640 --> 00:21:27,960
It's a different dashboard, okay.

352
00:21:27,960 --> 00:21:31,680
So I think when you add to that again
the fact that it doesn't extinguish

353
00:21:31,680 --> 00:21:37,440
quickly, that's your tell
as a puppy owner, that this is an “I need”

354
00:21:37,440 --> 00:21:42,520
and you need to go in there
and do something for this puppy.

355
00:21:42,520 --> 00:21:48,680
By the way, one thing that puppy
owners commonly think is,

356
00:21:49,920 --> 00:21:50,200
you know,

357
00:21:50,200 --> 00:21:54,320
on that dashboard
as a very telling factor, but in fact is

358
00:21:54,320 --> 00:21:59,800
not is the sheer drama of the puppy.

359
00:21:59,800 --> 00:22:00,240
Right.

360
00:22:00,240 --> 00:22:06,080
I mean, puppies can sound literally like
their legs are being sawed off.

361
00:22:06,080 --> 00:22:07,720
I mean, they can wail.

362
00:22:07,720 --> 00:22:10,920
It's part of it,
it's part of their evolutionary act.

363
00:22:10,920 --> 00:22:13,080
Okay. They know how to get our attention.

364
00:22:13,080 --> 00:22:18,200
The loudness of the puppy
is not necessarily

365
00:22:18,480 --> 00:22:24,160
related or relative
to the emotional need of the situation.

366
00:22:24,440 --> 00:22:29,120
That is something very much
that can be a learned behavior.

367
00:22:29,120 --> 00:22:32,040
Exactly how loud that puppy is screaming.

368
00:22:32,760 --> 00:22:35,040
Again, everything is relative. Okay?

369
00:22:35,040 --> 00:22:37,840
So it's not like we completely ignore

370
00:22:38,560 --> 00:22:42,120
how loud or hysterical the puppy is.

371
00:22:42,560 --> 00:22:47,160
But oh, all I'm saying
is that generally speaking,

372
00:22:47,520 --> 00:22:51,560
that is not a very reliable indicator of,

373
00:22:51,560 --> 00:22:54,600
of how distressed the puppy is.

374
00:22:55,080 --> 00:22:59,840
You really have to look at the totality
of the surrounding circumstances

375
00:23:00,400 --> 00:23:03,640
and whether you've gone down
that checklist of meeting

376
00:23:03,640 --> 00:23:08,280
the puppies needs to know
whether that vocalization

377
00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:13,440
is something that needs to be responded
to or put on extinction.

378
00:23:13,960 --> 00:23:17,120
But the actual loudness
of the vocalization

379
00:23:17,520 --> 00:23:21,600
is not the most important clue
when you're trying to determine

380
00:23:21,600 --> 00:23:24,960
how to deal with it.

381
00:23:24,960 --> 00:23:29,200
Now, I'm going to talk a little bit more
about the earlier parts of the puppies

382
00:23:29,200 --> 00:23:35,000
lives, probably more at the age
where breeders have the puppies.

383
00:23:35,000 --> 00:23:39,720
Breeders see exactly this behavior,
but we tend to see it

384
00:23:40,200 --> 00:23:43,760
more in the true wee hours of the morning.

385
00:23:43,760 --> 00:23:46,760
So 1, 2, 3 a.m., 4 a.m.

386
00:23:46,760 --> 00:23:48,320
in the morning.

387
00:23:48,400 --> 00:23:51,320
And again, it's just it's totally normal.

388
00:23:51,320 --> 00:23:55,360
The puppies just have not established
a circadian rhythm.

389
00:23:56,160 --> 00:24:01,040
And we do get the question a lot
on the Puppy Culture discussion group

390
00:24:02,360 --> 00:24:05,640
and almost always it's in that five week

391
00:24:05,640 --> 00:24:09,520
old range
that is by far the most common age.

392
00:24:10,320 --> 00:24:13,000
And if you think about it, it makes sense

393
00:24:13,520 --> 00:24:19,040
because what happens with most puppies
at around five weeks, their mothers

394
00:24:19,040 --> 00:24:23,720
are just about done with them,
so they're not nursing regularly.

395
00:24:23,720 --> 00:24:27,600
They're not getting that input
from the milk that we talked about.

396
00:24:27,600 --> 00:24:29,120
Remember how we talked about that?

397
00:24:29,120 --> 00:24:33,600
The milk itself is sort of programing
the puppies circadian rhythm.

398
00:24:33,600 --> 00:24:36,960
It's giving them cues
and it's sending them messages

399
00:24:36,960 --> 00:24:39,240
about when to be awake
and when to be asleep.

400
00:24:40,080 --> 00:24:43,200
So when they're weaned, they've lost that.

401
00:24:43,200 --> 00:24:46,360
And again, they have to stand on their own
with their circadian rhythms.

402
00:24:46,360 --> 00:24:49,800
And it's not it's
not a pretty picture at first,

403
00:24:51,160 --> 00:24:52,880
but what can you do?

404
00:24:52,880 --> 00:24:56,680
Well, number one, if,
if your bitch will tolerate it,

405
00:24:57,360 --> 00:25:00,720
if you can get a feeding
in as late as possible

406
00:25:00,720 --> 00:25:03,880
before they go to bed,
that can be very helpful.

407
00:25:05,040 --> 00:25:08,280
Again, putting some food in with them

408
00:25:08,560 --> 00:25:11,040
so that if they wake up, they have a snack

409
00:25:11,360 --> 00:25:13,400
sometimes that will pacify them.

410
00:25:14,280 --> 00:25:18,320
But you know, saving that
if it doesn't work,

411
00:25:18,680 --> 00:25:21,480
there's really you know, you can ignore it

412
00:25:21,600 --> 00:25:24,680
and that's fine
because they're in their litter.

413
00:25:24,680 --> 00:25:29,080
It's not like it's not like they have
they're afraid or they're miserable.

414
00:25:29,080 --> 00:25:32,920
They're just awake and having a party.

415
00:25:32,920 --> 00:25:36,080
If it's just really loud
and you can't take it,

416
00:25:36,600 --> 00:25:39,160
you can put in a food puzzle or a new toy

417
00:25:39,160 --> 00:25:42,920
and that should pacify them
and put them back to sleep.

418
00:25:42,920 --> 00:25:46,000
Or if you want to go in
and just let them out for a minute,

419
00:25:46,440 --> 00:25:48,040
that can expedite the process.

420
00:25:48,040 --> 00:25:50,760
You just can go
in, pay a little attention to them,

421
00:25:50,760 --> 00:25:53,760
let them out, put them back
in, they'll go back to sleep.

422
00:25:55,080 --> 00:25:56,680
Again, you need

423
00:25:56,680 --> 00:26:00,440
not worry that you're going to train them
to wake up in the middle of the night.

424
00:26:00,440 --> 00:26:04,400
I mean, they're going to start sleeping
as their circadian rhythms

425
00:26:04,400 --> 00:26:07,760
start evening out.

426
00:26:07,760 --> 00:26:12,200
So those are my extra tips for breeders.

427
00:26:12,200 --> 00:26:17,840
So for everyone, breeders
and puppy owners alike, the bottom line is

428
00:26:18,440 --> 00:26:22,200
let's not try and solve problems
that we don't have.

429
00:26:22,760 --> 00:26:23,440
And your puppy

430
00:26:23,440 --> 00:26:27,600
waking up in the middle of the night
or early in the morning is not a problem.

431
00:26:27,960 --> 00:26:31,200
It's a developmental period
that's going to go away

432
00:26:31,440 --> 00:26:42,240
if you just gently support it.

433
00:26:42,240 --> 00:26:46,640
If you have a question for me or a topic
you'd like me to talk about on air,

434
00:26:47,160 --> 00:26:48,600
head over to the Puppy Culture

435
00:26:48,600 --> 00:26:51,800
discussion group on Facebook
and drop your question there

436
00:26:52,640 --> 00:26:55,440
or reach out to us
through one of our websites;

437
00:26:55,800 --> 00:27:00,720
madcapuniversity.com, madcapradio.com

438
00:27:01,160 --> 00:27:03,280
or puppyculture.com.

439
00:27:04,200 --> 00:27:06,840
If you're interested in learning
more about the puppy course,

440
00:27:07,320 --> 00:27:11,240
you can check it
out at madcapuniversity.com.

441
00:27:13,080 --> 00:27:14,640
Thanks for listening.

442
00:27:14,640 --> 00:27:28,920
Bye bye.