Fear periods
Around 8 – 10 weeks of age, puppies often experience what is called a “fear period”. This is when they might react fearfully to something that previously they had no reaction to, or that they have seen every day for literally their whole lives! Some puppies can experience it earlier or later. Some, like my Labrador Voodoo, showed no signs of it.
The biggest thing to know is that a scary or unpleasant experience during this phase can affect the dog long term and be harder to overcome. So while socialization doesn’t stop, you want to be more careful to make sure the pup doesn’t have a scary experience.
Personally, I treat the whole 8-16 weeks as if the puppy were in a fear period just in case! I do my best to ensure that every encounter they have with life during that time (& beyond) is not scary or traumatic. I don’t let my pup out of my site with anyone else, including my vet, regardless of how much I trust the person until the pup is older than 16 weeks so I know what they have experienced.
Some people want/need the pup to be fully comfortable living with others that might dog-sit and want to expose the pup to that and it’s not a bad thing as long as those other people are ‘on the same page’ as you regarding training/exposure. But personally, that’s not a concern of mine and I think a properly socialized puppy (that knows change is normal) would be fine no matter who they are with later.
There can also be a second fear period between 6 and 14 months of age. If your dog experiences this, it is most likely to present as a reaction to something completely mundane that they have seen/experienced many times. Voodoo was on a walk with me and had a reaction to a leaf that he clearly thought was going to eat him if he got within 5’ of it! It was Fall, and we had just walked past MANY leaves. And I couldn’t see anything different about this particular leaf. I let him choose his safe distance and watch while I picked up and examined the leaf and talked to the leaf in a friendly tone. Then I set the leaf down. Voodoo eventually decided it was safe to come close enough to sniff the leaf and as soon as he did, he shook off the stress and then that leaf and all the rest we passed after that were background to be ignored.
That leaf, and a plastic bag caught on our fence, were the only two things he had such a reaction to. Other things he didn’t react to: full size moving dinosaurs, people in all sorts of costumes (Comic-con), all the zoo animals and scents, Universal Studios including the Happy Potter experience and LOTS of other weird stuff he probably SHOULD have reacted to LOL But thanks to all the early proper socialization by his breeder and I made him “bomb-proof” and able to handle all manner of weird like it’s just another day. And that’s my goal!
Video of Voodoo at the Pop-con. Note: My friend and fellow dog trainer Laura VanArondonk-Baugh was the one in the T-rex and she had another experienced person telling her what Voodoo was doing. She was very careful not to spook him, but Voodoo didn’t see a moving T-rex as anything to worry about. LOL
I was fully prepared to leave if I felt it was too much for Voodoo. But he had a great day!
