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My border collie puppy has been going on walks every day. On my days off we go for a 1 hour walk up the forest where she roams free - general, sniffing around, no ball play). then in the night we go to the park. After work I take her for a walk Around the park, where we play fetch with her ball which she loves for about 30 minutes. She would go on for longer if I let her but it’s continuous fetch which can’t be good for her joints. Then we make our way home. Then I had a week off work, Chance was very ill with a bug and I spent all week looking after her. We went on a short walk occasionally. Then the trouble started when I went back to work. On our way home from the park she has now started to pull on the lead when we try to walk home. If I walk off, she jumps up on my back and legs which hurts like s*** and I get really annoyed. I try telling her no. I’ve ignored her only to start walking and she does it again. point is she’s NEVER done this up until about two weeks ago. I feel so pissed off on the walk back home I feel guilty because she’s my baby. I adore her, I give her the world. But this new bad behaviour is ridiculous. Can anyone help/provide advice please? TLDR: puppy has developed bad walking behaviours after playing fetch for 30 minutes in the park. Tugs on leash, jumps up. Never done this before until two weeks ago.

Hi, I am glad that I found this board, it has already been so helpful and I love reading the posts. I hope that you guys can offer some reassurance and advice based on some of my worries, concerns/questions Background: I live in a village with my husband, close to woods and not too far from the Lake District. My husband and I love going on local walks and enjoy going for hikes in the lake district. We have always said that we'd like to get a dog, and a border collie is my favourite breed, so when for health reasons I decided to take a long career break, we decided to get our puppy - I have lots of time to be with her and train her. We bought our black and white border collie puppy home on Saturday (9 weeks, now 10 weeks), from a local farm. Initially I wanted to do lots of research and carefully select a breeder but when we visited this farm, owned by very welcoming family, we fell in love with our puppy and generally got a good feeling about the place. Unfortunately, although she was chipped, flea and wormed, their vets advised against giving these puppies their first vaccination (as they had with previous litters) until they went to their new homes. I was told that this was due to different vaccine strains. Also having lived in a barn with her litter mates and her mum, seeing very few people or traffic she has had very little socialisation. After a few days of settling in, I took my girl for her first vaccination on Monday. It wasn't a good experience for her because she was scared due to the traffic on the way in, scared by a large dog that came too close in the waiting room, causing her to bark, and then because she was so spooked she barked at the vet aswell. Overall a stressful experience, and one that I so wish had gone differently for her. Generally I have been amazed by her, at how fast she has seemed to settle with us and how quickly she is picking up toilet training. I have a crate for her, so at night (or during the day when she's tired/ needs to calm down) I place her in it, close the door and cover it over with a blanket. I leave her with a night light, and although I feel now she could go through the night, I do get up at about 3am to take her out for a wee. I wouldn't say she is "crate trained" as she doesn't go in there of her own accord to go to sleep, but I do feed her in their for positive reinforcement and when placing her in I always reassure and praise her. Putting her in her crate is met with some whining now, but she soon settles down. In the day time, over the last few days, I have tended to spend most of my time with her. At the moment she is confined to one room, and I have a blanket that I have placed at the foot of the settee where she plays either by her-self or more often than not with me. She has soft toys, chew toys and he odd ball, but I tend to only allow a few toys out at a time and rotate them so shes not bored or over-stimulated. When I feel she is calm I do some basic command training like sit and down, with treats, which she has picked up quickly, and we have a good routine for toilet training, where at the same time I'm teaching her to sit on a mat to wait whilst I put my shoes on, and not bite the lead when I attach it. She is doing really well. My worries/anxieties are first her lack of socialisation, especially with other dogs (I have had people over to meet her and she has been really happy and affectionate), and cars. I have started carrying her down my quiet road every day, giving her reassurance but she does get very scared as we approach the main road. Is this normal for this age? Also I'm not sure how much time to spend with her. She goes in her crate when I am not there and have to do other things for myself and chores in the house. I feel that the crate gives her a safe place to be when i'm not there, and she can't be destructive when not supervised, and also at times I feel that she does get abit overstimulated so I feel her crate is good for calming her down. When I'm not giving her attention, she has started to push the boundaries and chew on things she shouldn't - like chair legs, and furniture. I tell her No firmly, or say down and place her down. I do also distract her with something else but its like its something that's stuck in her head that she wants to repeat again and again to test me. Is this normal, and am I doing the right thing with preventing her from being destructive? I would appreciate your advice going forward. I love her, she is a lovely pup, I just want her to be happy, and grow up confident with good manners. Thanks

Hi! This is my first post on the site. We have had Bran for two months now, he is a gorgeous (teething!) four month old Border Collie puppy. I have found this site incredibly useful when looking for info, so thought I would see if other's can help me with this one. We have one major behavioural issue with him that is driving me crazy! When he is too excited or tired (usually they seem to line up!) he goes mental when you try to pick him up. He rolls onto his back with his little paws in the air, eyes wide, mouth open. You try and get him and he bites (not hard, just puppy play biting) and rolls all over the place so you can't pick him up. Usually we are simply trying to remove him from a situation and then he goes mental like this, and what point we put him into his crate to calm down and he falls straight asleep. We have tried to calm him down by holding his collar, but he just responds to that in the same way, and doesn't calm a bit, no matter how long we do it for. Once he does get into the crate he falls straight asleep, leading me to think that perhaps he is simply being a tired toddler whose behaviour is effected by being too tired. Or he doesn't want to go into his crate (though he has no problems with it at other times). Or he thinks we are just playing. Any other ideas for what might be causing it? Is this puppy behaviour that he will grow out of? Or is it something that needs to be disciplined, in which case how do you do it? Any ideas would be very helpful!

I rescued a stray border collie x a year ago who has been a delight to have and is almost 6 months into his training as an urban search and rescue dog. He is progressing very well and is 2.5-3 years old. Three weeks ago, my husband was using his laser measuring tool inside when the dog kept chasing the spot. It was a bit of a laugh and it got put away. He kept looking for the spot and eventually stopped. This was, however, replaced by staring at lights, light fittings and reflections on the walls every time he's inside. He's massively distracted, staring and waiting for something to happen, and gets very excited if using utensils makes reflections dance on the ceiling. All the intense staring not only gets on my nerves, but he's also less obedient when he's staring. Outside, he's ok, which means it hasn't affected his search training. But the behaviour is obsessive, and I'm not sure how to remedy it without introducing behaviours that will affect his search training. I've tried saying no, I've tried showing him what causes the light, I've tried putting him on his mat, nothing's worked. I don't think he realises what he's doing, so he doesn't know that there's a behaviour to correct. He's been checked out by a vet just prior to this, and he's in excellent health. I'd like to get through this without medication. Any help or advice would be great.