You’ve heard the old phrase, “Let snoozing chihuahuas lie,” but is there any truth in that?
In this article, we check why you shouldn’t bother a chihuahua even as he’s slumbering. We also examine why you shouldn’t take a canine’s meals away from him when he’s ingesting. Both these problems are particularly vital if you have youngsters for your household.
Sleeping domestic chihuahuas can get startled while woken, and it could make them just as worrying as while there are different loud noises like noisy holidays. Let’s find out greater.
Sleep Cycles
To understand why you shouldn’t trouble your chihuahua even as he’s asleep, we want to learn greater approximately chihuahua’s sleep patterns.
Your average own family pet canine desires load extra sleep than you do. In fact, chihuahuas sleep for between 14 and 16 hours each day. Despite that, your chihuahua has identical sleep cycles as you do. Those sleep cycles are:
- REM (fast eye movement)
- SWS (short-wave sleep)
So, does your canine dream?
On average, it takes your canine around 20 minutes to go into the REM sleep cycle. That’s whilst your chihuahua starts offevolved dreaming, and you’ll see your slumbering puppy reputedly chasing something, twitching, yapping, or maybe barking.
So, yes, puppies virtually do dream.
Research also suggests that chihuahuas dream greater as children and seniors. It’s also thought that the sounds and moves that your canine makes while he’s dreaming correlate directly to the sports he’s enjoyed throughout his waking hours. For example, in case your canine likes to chase a ball or pursue squirrels, you’ll frequently see him “running” in his sleep, and he may even yip in exhilaration too.
Waking a Sleeping chihuahua
The phrase, “Let slumbering puppies lie,” became coined with the aid of the extraordinary author and poet, Geoffrey Chaucer in the 1300s. The cutting-edge interpretation of this usually used expression means that you should forget about trouble, rather than address it and hazard causing greater troubles. However, in case you take the word literally, you ought to wonder why Chaucer chose that specific analogy.
Well, there are good reasons why you have to now not wake a napping chihuahua.
Waking a canine from a deep sleep may want to startle him if he wakes. That should purpose the canine to react aggressively by way of biting the hand that shook him awake. Even the most placid, good-tempered canine can turn on you if he’s startled.
If it’s essential which will wake your canine, use the handiest a mild voice to wake him. Keep your fingers and face nicely away from your canine, just in case he reacts badly to being disturbed.
When your chihuahua wakes, give him masses of affection and cuddles, particularly if he had a bad dream.
Waking them from Bad Dreams
Although it might be slightly scary to observe your chihuahua whilst he has a bad dream, maximum vets assume that having a nightmare is a regular manner that needs to be allowed to come back to a natural conclusion. Dreams can allow your canine to explicit and work via his mind and feelings, permitting your pet’s subconscious mind to sort thru his latest studies and repair equilibrium.
So, if possible, you must let your dreaming canine lie!
However, in case your canine has recurrent night time terrors while he appears to end up extraordinarily distressed, you ought to have a chat with a chihuahua behaviorist who can be able to indicate a solution.
Seizures vs. Normal Rest
The enormous majority of the twitching, spasms, and involuntary moves that you study while your canine is dreaming are pure because of your puppy’s dreams. However, if your chihuahua suddenly goes rigid and stiff whilst he’s asleep, he could be having a seizure.
Signs of a seizure in a sound asleep canine include:
- Labored breathing
- Problems taking a breath
- Rigid limbs
- Stiff, prolonged neck
- Seizures can be indicative of an underlying health problem that you can no longer be aware of, inclusive of epilepsy.
If you suspect that your canine is having a seizure while he’s asleep, don’t try to wake your pet. Instead, touch your vet right away.
Bothering chihuahuas While Eating is a Bad Idea
Wild puppies and wolves defend their possessions, particularly their food, territory, and mates. That’s necessary survival conduct that domestic puppies regularly mimic in a domestic scenario.
What does your chihuahua do if you attempt to do away with a fave toy? Some chihuahuas will clutch the toy and run away with it. Others will growl and flatten their ears. In extreme cases, the canine can also chunk you or even chase you away! Many chihuahuas most effective show resource guarding conduct closer to strangers or specific own family participants.
chihuahuas protect something that they keep in mind to be of value, inclusive of toys, chunk bones, objects of your clothing, even stolen meal wrappers out of your kitchen trash can. However, by far, the maximum usually guarded thing is meals.
Chihuahuas that Food Guard
If you get your canine when he’s a puppy, you must teach him to just accept having his possessions, such as his meals, taken far from him. You need to educate your puppy which you are the alpha inside the family. That means that you may get rid of any of your pet’s possessions each time you need to without fear of reprisals.
However, if you have a grownup canine who thinks he’s in charge, you’ll want to use the following suggestions to address the trouble of meal guarding. If you have children to your family, it’s specifically vital which you educate them NOT to hassle the circle of relatives chihuahua whilst he’s consuming.
Always go away your chihuahua alone while he’s consuming.
- To permit your canine overall privacy even as he’s consuming, recollect feeding him in a separate room, in a canine crate, or at the back of a physical barrier which includes a chihuahua gate. That strategy can assist to save you guarding behavior against turning into exaggerated and doubtlessly risky.
- Make sure that your canine has lots of meals. A chihuahua that’s constantly hungry can be extra inspired to defend his meals than one who is nicely fed.
- If your chihuahua guards meals on counters and your dinner table, or in case your pet scrounges leftover meals on dishes on your dishwasher, you’ll need to control these conditions carefully. Shut your chihuahua out of the room during the circle of relatives’ meals, be sure to easy up spills, don’t depart food out for your kitchen countertops, and hold your dishwasher door shut.
- Preventing Food Guarding
- If you undertake a chihuahua from a shelter, there are some sports you may do to prevent your new pet from developing undesirable guarding conduct.
Start by feeding your chihuahua by hand a few times. Sit along with your chihuahua and feed him his kibble one morsel at a time. As you feed your chihuahua, stroke him, and communicate gently on your pet. If the canine is cautious or appears uncomfortable, stop feeding him.
If your canine is satisfied and calm with hand feeding, positioned a few kibbles into his bowl and keep the dish for your lap while he eats. Repeat the technique some times, and then area your canine’s bowl on the ground. As he eats, attain down from time to time to drop a morsel of something tasty into the bowl. Repeat the exercise over the first few months of your new chihuahua’s time with you. Your canine ought to stay comfortable and calm for the duration of this method because he won’t feel threatened.
Eventually, you should have the ability to cast off the chihuahua’s bowl of meals from him without protest. However, be sure to go back the meals in your chihuahua proper away, ideally after you’ve delivered a small deal with to his dish.
Exercises to Break Food Guarding
So, what do you do when you have a chihuahua who guards his food?
The remedy that animal behaviorists use to cure puppies who showcase meals guarding conduct includes counterconditioning and desensitization. The following sporting events should be achieved in stages. Only pass on to the following step when your chihuahua is relaxed and shows no signs of turning into aggressive.
Before you begin, cut some tasty treats which include chicken, cheese, or hotdog into small chunk-length pieces. The idea is to show your chihuahua that you have something especially tasty for him that’s much greater interesting than the contents of the bowl.
Stage #1
Allow your chihuahua to consume some dry kibble from a bowl on the ground. Stand away from the chihuahua and don’t flow towards him.
Talk on your chihuahua in a friendly, conversational tone, and at the equal time, throw a unique deal with in the direction of your puppy’s dish. Continue to do this till the canine has eaten all of the kibbles.
Repeat the exercising every time you feed your chihuahua for at least ten food in a row till he’s totally comfortable.
If your chihuahua procedures you for extra treats, ignore him. Wait on your pet to head back to ingesting his kibble earlier than you throw him extra tasty treats.
Stage #2
Repeat the Stage #1 exercise however this time, take a step closer to your chihuahua and throw a deal with close to the bowl. Immediately take a step back. Keep repeating this exercise until your canine has completed his bowl of meals.
Every day, take a step in the direction of your canine earlier than you throw your puppy a special deal with. Keep that up until you’re inside a couple of ft of your canine’s bowl.
Keep repeating the workout for at least ten meals until your chihuahua stays completely comfortable.
Stage #3
This time, you’re going to walk right up to your canine’s bowl, drop a treat proper into it, and then right away stroll away.
Continue repeating this workout until your canine has finished his meal. Once your canine stays comfortable for at the least ten meals in a row, move onto the next stage.
Stage #4
As in the previous stages, method your chihuahua even as he’s eating a bowl of kibble. This time, stand proper subsequent for your chihuahua and bend down slightly to provide him a unique deal with from your hand. Encourage your chihuahua to prevent eating and take the deal with you.
Once your canine has taken the treat out of your hand, stroll away. Keep repeating this exercise until your chihuahua has finished ingesting the bowl of kibble.
Every day, bend down a little more to provide your chihuahua a treat, moving your hand an inch or two toward the bowl of kibble. Repeat this procedure until you could keep a deal with right next to the dish of meals.
Once your canine has eaten his meals and stayed comfortable for ten food in a row, flow onto the next stage.
Stage #5
Approach your chihuahua at the same time as he’s eating from the bowl of kibble. Bend down and touch the bowl, presenting your puppy a treat together with your different hand.
Repeat this technique until the canine has eaten all the meals inside the bowl.
After your chihuahua has eaten ten meals in a row without displaying no signs of aggression or tension, circulate onto the next stage.
Stage #6
Approach your canine, protecting a unique deal within a single hand. Standing subsequent for your chihuahua, choose up the bowl of food, raising the dish only a few inches off the floor. Drop a special deal with into the bowl. Immediately update the meals dish on the floor so that your canine can consume his meals.
Repeat the exercise, elevating the bowl a little higher off the ground each time until you could lift it right up on your waist and stand upright.
Repeat the exercising, but this time, take the bowl to a counter and location a special treat into the dish.
Return for your canine and placed the bowl down in the same region on the ground.
Stage #7
Finally, you want to have all the contributors of your family work via stages #1 via #6.
Don’t make the error of assuming that your canine might be happy for absolutely everyone to eliminate his food bowl from him. Your puppy desires to study that these rules work inside an identical manner for each member of his human “pack.”
Troubleshooting Tips
Here are three critical pointers to bear in mind while working to discourage food guarding behavior.
- Never leave bowls of meals out to your canine. If your pet exhibits meals guarding conduct, you ought to not allow your chihuahua free to get entry to food. Only feed your chihuahua at ordinary times every day.
- Do no longer try and scold or punish your canine if he guards meals. chihuahuas defend meals due to the fact, inside the wild, they would clearly compete for this valuable resource. If you attempt to dominate your chihuahua, you may purpose the meals guarding to get worse, and the situation ought to come to be dangerous.
- Change your canine’s behavior via using systematic, affected person desensitization, and conditioning sporting events as we’ve outlined in advance in this article.
- If your canine persists in guarding his meals, you have to are trying to find the advice of a professional chihuahua behaviorist.
Final Thoughts
Waking a chihuahua whilst he’s sleeping and seeking to take his food faraway from him may be risky and every now and then leads to human beings being bitten.
Be positive to educate your youngsters and different participants of your family about the importance of letting a sleeping chihuahua lie. Also, if your canine displays guarding conduct round meals or different possessions, undertake a software of desensitization and counterconditioning to help address the issue.
If you hold to enjoy issues with your canine’s behavior, refer him to a specialist chihuahua behaviorist.
