Does Your Dog Play Too Rough? Avoid the Mistakes That Create an Over-Excited Dog

But unfortunately, the problem with rough play with dogs is, while it can be a good experience, you have to be aware of what is happening at all times and what typically happens. What I run into typically with people who play rough with their dogs is they get very involved in the game, and they only stop the game when they don't like what's happening. And what happens is a lot of times they miss out, not only on whether or not the dog is now getting past the place of being able to control their impulses, but they also sometimes play in a way, in a manner that's rough, and they start to kind of scare the dog a little bit.

From Fun to Functional: How Teaching Dogs Tricks Builds Confidence

There's a lot of fun that you can have with trick training. If you take your dog somewhere and he's little uncomfortable, and you can start putting him through his little repertoire of tricks it does two things. It makes others receptive to your dog, which is a good thing, and it also gives your dog something to do that he's confident doing, because basically, there is no wrong response to a trick. You know, when you start trick training, you're teaching a dog to do something, and it's not like you're trying to take a problem behavior away. So it's a very confidence building thing to do.

dog socialization, dog training, dog training podcast, dog confidenceLaura BourhenneSeptember 14, 2025dog tricks, dog training, dog behaviorComment

Dog Socialization: More Than Just Public Outings

“ But you want to try to give your puppy, your young dog, and certainly if you're raising a litter of puppies, you want to try to give them a variety of experiences. One of the hardest things when people first whelp a litter, let's say, well, one of the worst things is that people do it and they don't give any don't give any thought to it ahead of time. But if you're going to do that, and you've taken all the necessary precautions, and you've done all the things that you need to do medically, and you've really thought it through, then you're also going to think through the process of giving that dog, those babies, a lot of experiences when they're young. That means not just keeping them in one room. You can't just keep them in one room the whole time, because they've got to get out, and they've got to have different experience and put their feet on different surfaces, absolutely different smells.”

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