Shih Tzu Puppy Training – Essential Social Skills
Are you bringing home a Shih Tzu puppy soon? Perhaps your little Shih Tzu is already home and you are trying to work out what you need to teach him? Well read on for essential training that any Shih Tzu puppy needs to receive in order to become a happy and healthy Shih Tzu dog.
There is a great difference between training a dog for fun whilst teaching impressive tricks and Shih Tzu puppy training to achieve good social skills and manners. In this article I am going to introduce you to the integral areas that Shih Tzu puppy training should be carried out.
Shih Tzu Puppy Socialization
Have you ever seen a dog that struggles socially? Maybe he barks at other dogs whilst he is on the leash, or hides behind his owner. Dogs are all different and some are more timid than others, however most dogs with social problems did not receive the right puppy socialization.
The idea with proper Shih Tzu puppy socialization is to introduce your puppy to as many things as possible before he stops learning about the world at such a fast rate. When they reach a year, or a little bit older, the dog has already learned how to react to most things that he encounters.
Think of it this way, if a Shih Tzu puppy at twelve weeks old meets an aggressive big black dog he has quickly learned that big black dogs are aggressive. If this learning is not carefully counteracted by meeting a whole host of friendly big black dogs, the Shih Tzu puppy will hold onto the belief that big black dogs are worrying for the rest of his life. By the time he reaches adulthood this learning is set. He may even become aggressive himself, when he sees a dog of this type, in a form of defense and trying to chase the dog away.
Shih Tzu Puppy Training – Developing Social Skills
Your job as a new Shih Tzu puppy owner is to make socializing fun for your dog. The more positive social experiences that the Shih Tzu puppy has the more positive his view on the world will be for the rest of his life.
You can do this by setting up all sorts of social situations including meeting a wide range of people, animals and other dogs. Set up situations where the puppy travels, encounters odd noises and busy environments and even take him to the vets once a week simply to be weighed. This will help him to learn that veterinary visits do not always involve needles. Similarly if your Shih Tzu puppy is going to be regularly groomed at the salon then why not take him along for a few visits first?
Developing social skills with a Shih Tzu puppy is actually far more important than teaching him to sit or lie down. It is even more important than potty training in many ways because a dog can re-learn certain behaviors at any age but he cannot ever really learn to be socially confident if the window of opportunity of that first few months is closed.
So if you have a new Shih Tzu puppy in your midst it’s already time to socialize him. Don’t let him grow up with inadequate social skills because as a Shih Tzu caretaker this is the most important area of Shih Tzu puppy training that you will ever encounter.
