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WOOF! WELCOME!


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Maren

And the Paw in Hand team!



Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Help! Puppy zoomie hour!

So many new puppy owners are taken by surprise when their little bundle of fur becomes what seems like a different species - Tasmanian devil mix? - for a short period at the same every evening (and sometimes in the morning too).
It's been labelled as zoomie hour, witching hour, acid hour, and other #%$%$ names..... Luckily it usually doesn't even last close to an hour. Luckily you can almost set your watch by it too which means that you can somewhat plan ahead for it.

Very much like the children's book "Too Much Birthday" by Stan & Jan Berenstain.....   It is often the storm before the calm and then puppy is so tired she finally succumbs to a long, deep sleep.
How do you deal with this frenzied time? Puppy can barely focus for a nano-second! And those sharp teeth! This is the time when you basically put pup in a puppy proofed area and give an outlet for the physical needs.

  • Full out zooming in a wide open space (fenced yard)
  • Digging wildly and then zooming
  • Rolling and squirming and then zooming
  • Shredding something safe and then zooming
  • Pile of leaves to zoom in and out of
  • Long, floppy type tug toys to carry and wrestle and zoom with
  • Big balls to bump around while zooming at full blast
  • Obstacles that pup can negotiate at zoom speed

A certain amount of zoomie time seems to be normal and always seems to be followed by a decently long period of zonked out puppy. Zzzzzzzzzzz.... Only sleeping when exhausted isn't a great way to live the rest of your life though. Conditioning your puppy to settle on her own is very important. More on that another time...



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