Tips for Feeding and Training a Puppy with a Mega Esophagus

For this Omaha puppy training session, we worked with three month old German Shepherd puppy Captain, sharing some tips to help a dog with a Mega esophagus.

Captain sure is one lucky puppy. When his breeder discovered he had a mega esophagus, they decided they were going to euthanize him. It was only because his current guardian said they would take captain that saved his life.

Most of the puppy behavior problems the guardians wanted me to address were pretty simple.

The first thing we did was discuss the importance of exercise and some creative ways to burn off captains excess energy. I suggested that they start an exercise Journal so that they can keep track of his daily exercise, making adjustments until they find the right combination of things keep this puppy from getting into trouble.

I also showed them how to stop puppy nipping, some potty training tips, the benefit of an assortment of toys, and how to set up a long-term confinement area to keep him from chewing the wrong things while developing a bad chewing habit.

I also suggested the guardians sign captain up for our puppy socialization classes. The lessons learned combined with the socialization and play time we incorporate in each class will go a long ways towards burning off captains excess energy.

Anytime you have a dog with a mega esophagus, it’s important that you make changes to meal time to set them up for success. The free dog training video below includes tips on feeding a dog with a mega esophagus as well as ways to add structure to meal time that will help the puppy see and respect the humans as authority figures.

Adding structure to the puppy’s meals will go a long ways towards curbing some of his unwanted behaviors by helping him develop self-control and simultaneously seeing the cats as having more status than he does.

Normally I would have also gone over the importance of the critical socialization period, but we cover that in our puppy socialization class and by this point had shared so many tips I was concerned I was going to overwhelm his guardians.

To help the humans remember all the puppy behavior advice I shared in this in-home puppy training session, we shot a roadmap to success video that you can check out below.