The Puppy Diaries – The Eleventh Month
This is the eighth instalment of our puppy diary, featuring Murdock the lurcher puppy, with candid insights and practical tips on welcoming a dog into your home.
Birthday on the beach
Since the last blog, Murdock hit a big milestone in his life. He turned one on the 30th April! To mark the occasion, we had a meet-up on the beach with some of his family members and it was tremendous fun. As a lockdown puppy Murdock can be a little nervous around people and dogs that he doesn’t know but he didn't seem to mind anything or anyone on this occasion and had a great time running around with his mum and his brothers and sisters. It’s really interesting to see how different they all are too. He was one of a litter of twelve pups born locally and most of them went to local homes. Their mother was a black lurcher and their dad was a tan coloured pedigree whippet and all the pups are either brindle like Murdock or blue-grey.
Growing and chewing
We think Murdock is almost fully grown now and despite his dad being quite small he is turning into a nice medium-sized dog. He is still chewing a lot of things around the house and really destroys his toys in the way that a more powerful dog like a staffie might do. He rips them open and pulls out the stuffing and squeakers or rips them into pieces. He destroys tennis balls and he has chewed through a few of the children’s toys. He also loves to go rummaging through the recycling bins and helps himself to cardboard and plastic bottles too, although we try to discourage this.
Out on walks, his recall is really good now and he often stays quite close by and walks to heel. His favourite place to run is out on the salt marsh, where he tends to do zoomies and races round in circles.
Murdock has been a little nervous with people he doesn’t know and will bark and run away but I think this is something that will improve over time as we come out of lockdown and he begins to get out and about a bit more.
He is learning not to jump up at people and we are able to leave him alone at home for short periods without distressing him, which was one our biggest concerns. We were worried that he would develop separation anxiety as he had not been left alone due to us working from home and home schooling during lockdown, but he is coping OK.
Out and about
We have been getting out and about a bit more as lockdown eases and Murdock recently enjoyed a ride on the cliff railway at Lynton and ate his first doggy ice cream, which he loved. We have a short family holiday booked in August and are looking forward to introducing him to the sights and sounds of Cornwall. So many tourist attractions are dog friendly now and he is such a big part of our family we can’t wait to take him on the beach and visit some of our favourite places.
The Blue Cross has some useful information on their website for anyone making plans with their dog, as we come out of lockdown.
Want to read more about Murdock and his progress? You can find all of our puppy diaries here. Got any tips for raising a puppy in lockdown? Let us know in the comments section below.