Golden Retrievers are in the top 10 and most popular dog breeds. They are beautiful, charming and extremely faithful animals. To educate a Golden Retriever you need a good training, a daily dose of exercise and a lot of interaction with other dogs and people, a Golden can become your perfect canine companion.
Prepare to train a Golden Retriever
We will talk about one of the most appreciated breeds as pets, especially when there are children in the family. They also stand out as guide dogs for the blind or as support and help dogs for people with different degrees and types of disabilities, as participants in therapies and even as detection dogs (drugs, rescue, searches, etc.).
The Golden Retriever is a very docile dog, with a great capacity for learning. Of course, when you first meet a puppy, it will seem so unruly and impossible to tame, that you may feel that taming and training it will be a task, as arduous as it is difficult. Do not despair, because it is much easier than you think.
Golden Retriever Puppy Training
If you still do not have your dog with you, when you go for him make sure that your furry is with his mother, at least until he is two months (8/9 weeks). Experts argue that separating puppies from their mother before that age can have dire consequences. It is best to adopt a Golden Retriever for 2.5 to 3 months.
The consequences of a premature separation can be of various kinds. At the health level, the puppy could suffer diseases because it lacks the defenses that are only acquired through breastfeeding. Behavioral problems can also occur, complicating the training task at hand.
Golden Retriever Tricks
To train a Golden Retriever you must arm yourself with patience and resort to treats. Never hit or threaten them, because you can make them withdraw and, out of fear, they turn out to be a shy and not very sociable dog. As in any training you must go step by step and burn all the stages: from basic training to obedience.
The most encouraging thing is that, as soon as your Golden Retriever puppy arrives home you can begin to give him the most basic and important guidelines, in terms of training. For this you must bear in mind that this first learning will have three fundamental objectives: toilet training, socialization and knowledge.
How to train a Golden Retriever to go to the bathroom?
One of the first things you must achieve is for your Golden Retriever puppy to learn to control his toilet bowls, that is, to relieve himself in the place that you assign him to do so. Use newspaper or absorbent paper, which you can change when it gets dirty, but stay in place until it gets used to it.
Socialization
Nothing is so important especially when the Golden Retriever puppy is not yet 3 months old, as socialization. This implies that you have to try to get your dog to have contact with as many people and animals as possible, always in a positive environment and without aggression.
Knowledge
In the same way that it is important for your Golden Retriever puppy to socialize, he must also know everything that he will have to deal with as an adult (water, cars, sounds, nail or haircuts, baths and a long etc.) . And it is essential to take advantage of doing it before the age of 3 months, which is when what experts call the “socialization period” ends.
Extra: the bites
You should know that your Golden Retriever puppy needs to bite, it is something natural for him and you cannot deny, repress or punish him for it. Proceed in a positive and persuasive way and divert attention away from the bites, to things he cannot destroy, such as his toys or a rope, rather than to your slippers or the bottom of the sofa.
Trained a teenage Golden Retriever
A Golden Retriever dog that has been trained since childhood may seem like he is already on track, to face greater challenges, but it turns out that one day (it can be any between 6 and 11 months) he stops obeying. And this is so simple, as you are growing and developing your hormonal system, which is why you have reached adolescence.
Adolescence brings physiological changes and you may notice that it interacts with other dogs differently. To compensate for these attitudes, which are normal and predictable, continue with the positive socialization process. Go everywhere with goodies in his pockets and reward him for being friendly.
It might seem that you are giving them treats just for the sake of it, but at this stage in which their smells change and their sexual instincts are awakened, it is when you should put the greatest emphasis on their relationship with other dogs being pleasant and of the greatest importance that you actively participate in this process of change, helping and supporting them.
In that period, which luckily is much shorter than in the case of humans, the Golden Retriever will test the limits, so you may have to pay more attention and arm yourself with a dose of extra patience, but the fundamental thing is that you continue with positive training and never lose your temper.
The importance of terms in training your Golden Retriever
Opinions as to what terms should be used when training your Golden Retriever are very diverse. There are experts who argue that terms should be used in languages such as English or German, since the word to designate the same action is much shorter in those languages than in Spanish (sit versus sit).
Whatever language you choose, once you have started teaching him the commands that are associated with each type of action, you shouldn’t change them. A Golden Retriever, as we already said, is a dog that learns very quickly, so you will notice that in a very short time he knows very well what to do when you address him with certain words.
You can teach this type of learning yourself or go to a professional trainer, as long as you make sure before choosing one that uses positive methods and will never use violence or yelling, to deter or educate an animal. Be very thorough when you ask yourself: how to choose the best trainer for my dog?
Training an adult Golden Retriever
Between the ages of 2 1/2 and 3, a Golden Retriever dog reaches adulthood. If during the previous period you have worried about training and preparing him in the proper way, at this point in his life you will have a playful, obedient, extremely affectionate, sociable canine friend and a companion for everything.
The important thing is that while it may take longer or require an additional dose of patience, a Golden Retriever is capable of learning throughout its life. Even if you adopt him as an adult and he has “vices” or bad behaviors, both you and a good coach will be able to correct these problems and re-educate him.
Female Golden Retriever: sexual maturity and reproduction
Bitches of this breed have their first menstrual period between 4 and 8 months. The rule can be accompanied by pain, you should also watch that the bleeding is not excessive and that it does not last more than 3 weeks (21 days). Immediately after the bleeding stops, you will enter the fertility stage, also called “heat,” which lasts from 2 to 8 days.
If you want your Golden Retriever to be a mother, the ideal is to wait to cross her until after the second or third period, since pregnancy could influence her development. Its gestation will last about 2 months, when the moment of delivery arrives, it will surely look for company and a comfortable place, where to bring its dogs to the world.
If there are no complications, try not to intervene during the delivery except to caress her and speak quietly to her. If you are very nervous, stay away from her, since they are very sensitive animals and your stress could affect her negatively. Trust nature, although if you see that an expert does not come out, you can try to help him expel him and if there are real problems, you should call the vet.
After the birth of each of the puppies (they can be really large litters of up to 12 puppies), the female Golden Retriever will proceed to cut the cord with her teeth and will eat the placenta, which provides it with proteins, essential for its rapid recovery. Then he will clean them and bring them closer to the breasts.
Once the delivery is over, the place where the mother and her puppies will rest should be clean and dry and depending on the time of year, they will need more or less shelter. Never separate babies from their mother’s side before 2 months and make sure that when you do, they are vaccinated, for greater protection.
