Puppy always picking up things on walks!

Hi all,
I picked up my new puppy 4 days ago and so far she's doing wonderfully. Ella is an 8 week old Lab/Australian Shep cross. She's walking well on leash except that she is always picking up sticks and other wood while walking along and then proceeds to carrying it happily. I'm not sure if I should be discouraging or encouraging this (she seems to really only like sticks and I'm always watching to make sure she's not picking up anything she shouldn't be) especially considering she does it more frequently when I reinforce her not chewing on her leash.

Should I be discouraging her from doing so? I believe her dad did the same thing and I think that's where she picked it up!

Thanks!
Jill

Hi Ellarific

Many breeds and/or individual dogs like to carry things.
Generally most people advise against letting your dog play with sticks because of all the potential dangers such as getting it stuck in her throat, splinters etc. It may be more sensible to take a toy with you for her to carry.

By the way - 8 weeks seems very young to be starting her walks. Its been a while since I had a pup, but I thought they weren't fully innoculated until about 12 weeks?

She's very young yet for walking she only should be getting 5 minutes at the most. Has the vet said its ok to take her out before her injections are finished. As for the wood, it could splinter & hurt her mouth or throat. If she wants to carry something how about seeing if she'll carry a ball on a rope.

Hi again,
I've basically been taking her down the driveway to the front yard. I've been careful to avoid other dogs until she's got her full set of vaccines.

I also don't let her chew on the sticks - she just carries them.

Thanks for the advice - I'll try to get her to carry her tennis ball around instead!

Thanks!
Jill

hi she could also carry a dog toy. PLease be careful, if you have other dogs in your area that may have been on your drive your puppy is at risk of picking up alsorts of illnesses. If you want to socialise her, try picking ehr up and carrying her to places...just don't let her go on the ground outside your home until she has had all her jabs and the vet has okayed it.

I raised/trained a seeing eye dog named Phil who was a lab/golden mix and he was like a vacuum picking up EVERYTHING in sight. It was pretty crazy for awhile and frustrating too because he would litterally put everything in his mouth and i had to correct him and get it out of his mouth. I think it's mainly a lab thing. Labs tend to be more like this where they always like to have something in their mouth. I guess it's just the retriever side of them. But he did grow out of it a little bit. He still loved to have things in his mouth but it got to where it wasn't everything in sight. He also had this habit of eating the wood chips we had in the yard. I didn't like him doing that but it seemed like I would never get him to stop and it didn't seem to hurt him or anything but yea... That is something about labs that you just kind of have to deal with. He was also a big time chewer... he would usually only chew on his toys though which was good but he LOVED to chew. Maybe I could have tried harder with the mulch eating thing though... But anyways, they do grow out of it a bit. I know I wasn't much help with my reply but I was just telling you how it was with me having a Lab mix. Anyways... good luck!