Before you start raising a Labrador, you need to learn a simple set of rules for the dog owner. And follow it strictly, always without exception.
Before you bring home a Labrador puppy
we need to prepare properly. You must remove from the reach of the child everything that can gnaw, tear, spoil. It is especially important to hide electrical wiring and household chemicals.
Children do not immediately get used to cleaning. For the first few months, the Labrador will leave puddles and piles in abundance. If you have stone floors in your house, tiled or covered with linoleum, you will only need to stock up with a bucket, shovel and mop. And if the floors are parquet, they can be badly damaged. In this case, it is better to cover the floors with thick plastic, oilcloth or restrict the freedom of movement of the child.
However, active and inquisitive puppies are often limited by the size of the playpen or home cage. At the same time, the cage should be spacious enough so that the baby can sleep in it, play, do his business on an absorbent sheet, eat and drink. There is no cruelty in such a restriction — this is a normal education. Of course, when you are at home, your child should be able to run freely, play and chat with you.
If you are going to keep a Labrador in the house with a texture, you need to prepare a texture for the appearance of the dog:
In addition, you will need an endless supply of patience, strong nerves and a lot of love. By nature, the Labrador is unimaginably energetic and active. Sometimes it can be tedious, especially if you don’t know how to properly raise a Labrador puppy, how to train a Labrador in commands and make his behavior more socially acceptable. Labrador Nutrition
Puppies are given to new owners when they already know how to feed themselves. At first, babies are fed 5-6 times a day. With age, the number of feedings decreases, and the volume of each serving increases. At the age of 2, the dog switches to two meals a day, and in summer one meal a day is enough.
If the breeder did not consider it necessary to advise how and what to properly feed a two-month-old Labrador puppy when buying, ask your veterinarian. For puppies of large breeds, you can buy special ready-made feeds or feed them with homemade food: cottage cheese, kefir, beef, vegetables and cereals.
Labradors tend to gain weight, they almost always have an excellent and insatiable appetite. But overweight dogs invariably have health problems, so you need to make sure that your pet does not overeat throughout his life.
There should be no lumps or additives between regular feedings. It is unacceptable to feed the dog from the table at lunch alone. Never do it alone and don’t let your family. First of all, we are talking about unnecessary pampering, which spoils the character of the pet, turning it into an eternal boring beggar. Secondly, human food is harmful to dogs, as it contains unacceptably large amounts of salt, sugar and seasonings. Do not give the labrador sweets — they are harmful to dogs. It is best to replace sweets with simple dryers, crackers or special dog biscuits.
What and how to feed a Labrador retriever? Breeders usually give advice on how to properly feed a Labrador. Someone prefers to eat natural products, someone likes the BARF feeding system, many prefer ready-made dry food. Disputes between adherents of a particular system never subside and do not subside, because there is no unambiguous and firm answer and there cannot be. When choosing your favorite food for a Labrador, focus on your pet and your abilities. Feeding a Labrador retriever usually does not complicate the life of owners with tantrums and problems, since dogs have a good appetite and eat everything in a row.
The most practical way to feed a dog is dry food. It is also convenient because they are balanced in vitamins and trace elements, and you do not need to give extra vitamins. However, it is recommended to use at least a good premium food, which is quite expensive. But even the most expensive food can be allergic.
Homemade food usually includes:
Food should be cooked separately, with a little salt and without spices or without them. It is not always possible to accurately balance home nutrition, so you also need to give your puppy mineral and vitamin supplements from time to time.
Education and training of a labrador
The upbringing of a dog implies its socialization, habituation to existence in human society and behavior in accordance with its needs. The training is designed to develop specific, team-controlled role models.
If you have no experience in breeding and training dogs, you can contact a professional instructor who will personally work with your dog or advise you how to properly train your Labrador retriever. But in fact, it’s not so difficult to train a Labrador at home and even those who have absolutely no experience can do it. Labradors are excellent trainers, they love to learn and are happy to master new commands and techniques.
Character traits and bad habits of labradors
Labradors take a long time to mature. While most dogs acquire fully adult characters by the age of 2, the Labrador does not psychologically mature until the age of three. They remain jokers and tomboys for a long time, prone to pranks, pranks and hooliganism.
Labradors need a lot of physical activity. They absolutely need to move around a lot, otherwise the dog will get bored and she will start looking for something to do to have fun. And this activity usually turns out to be destructive. Labradors tend to spoil and gnaw everything they can reach. They can gnaw through the door, peel off the wallpaper, dig a huge hole in the middle of their favorite flower bed. You can avoid these problems: you have to walk the dog for several hours every day, giving her the opportunity to use her exuberant energy.
Labradors tend to wallow in mud because they like everything wet and moist in their blood. If swimming is impossible, the dog will at least try to lie down in a ditch with liquid mud. Then he will run up to you and happily shake off the dust, splashing spray in all directions.
Some believe that the bad habits of Labradors include their incredible sociability. They are immediately ready to make friends with the whole world, including other dogs, passers-by, cats, children in strollers and janitors with brooms. The world does not always reciprocate, so one of the tasks of education is to moderate the desire of your Labrador to impose other people’s friends on friends.
It is believed that Labrador and children play well together. This is not entirely true. Yes, a Labrador will never intentionally offend a child, but he can cause accidental injuries to a child — hit in a game, fall, scratch, trample with his rather large weight. While the children are small, it is better not to leave them unattended with dogs.
Common diseases of labradors
Labradors are a pretty tough breed. However, they also have some propensities of the breed to certain diseases. They have:
There are still some eye diseases.
Reproduction
The first thing to understand and learn: only representatives of the breeding breed can participate in breeding, in accordance with the breeding plan drawn up in the nursery. If you have purchased a pet dog, it is better to sterilize it immediately
The widespread opinion that a dog needs to get tied up at least once in his life “for health” is a harmful myth. After you untie the dog, you will need to provide it with regular mating, which only makes sense if the dog is good enough from the point of view of the breed. The sterilized male does not suffer from the absence of testicles at all, retains a lively, energetic character and mobility. But she does not suffer from hormonal storms when she appears in the area of a bitch in heat, gets rid of the stress associated with it and lives longer. Males are sterilized upon reaching physiological maturity.
a sterilized bitch is guaranteed not to mate and will not get pyometra or ovarian cancer. The absence of leaks will make the dog calmer and your apartment cleaner, since the heat of this breed is quite abundant and leaves traces all over the house. Sterilization, as well as binding in labradors, occurs after 2 years, when the dog’s body is already fully formed.
If your bitch belongs to the breeding class and you are going to tie her up to get puppies, get ready for the subsequent renovation of the apartment. At the birth of a Labrador, 5 to 10 puppies are usually born, and these little terminators are able to turn the most well-groomed apartment into something completely obscene.
The first estrus in Labrador females occurs at the age of 8 months to one and a half years, but mating occurs only in 2-4 estrus. During this time, you will have time to decide whether to knit the dog or sterilize it.
Labrador Care
How to care for a Labrador puppy? Feed, caress, walk, wash paws, teach to command
The general care of an adult Labrador also does not cause much difficulty. The dog needs to be combed with a stiff brush, shampooed once or twice a year. It is also necessary to wash after a walk in dirty weather, but just rinsing your paws and stomach with warm water from the shower, without soap.
Periodically it is necessary to inspect the ears and eyes, check and, if necessary, cut the claws on the paws.
With such a simple and easy care, keeping a Labrador on the street or in the house, judging by the reviews of the owners, does not cause problems