“Already socialised”: what it really means

“Socialised puppies” turns up in almost every advert. Like “parents on site”, it means nothing until somebody says with what. The period when a dog learns what is normal runs from the third to the twelfth week of life. A Staffordshire Bull Terrier puppy leaves the kennel at 60 to 70 days, as Italian law and good practice allow. By then five or six of those ten weeks are gone, and the more important half of the work will be done by the family. A breeder who does things properly tells you what they did, but also what they could not do. Usually that means traffic, children if there are none at the kennel, other species and being left alone, because among its littermates a puppy is never on its own. A guide by Del Piccolo Diavolo, a Staffordshire Bull Terrier breeder in Ostellato (Ferrara, Italy) since 2013.

The window: what ethology says

This is not my opinion, it is what the studies say. The sensitive period for socialisation in dogs runs roughly from the third to the twelfth week of life. The core of it is between the fourth and the eighth. The classic reference is the work of Scott and Fuller, from 1965. Today the AVSAB position statement on puppy socialisation names the first three months as the most important period. It also advises starting without waiting for the end of the vaccination course.

During those weeks the puppy learns what is “normal”. People, noises, surfaces, other animals: whatever it meets, it accepts without effort. Whatever it does not meet, it will have to assess as an adult. And an adult assesses with caution, sometimes with alertness or reactivity.

The sum is simple. Italian law forbids rehoming before sixty days. At that age a puppy has spent five of the ten weeks that count at the kennel. Half the work is still to do.

Every extra week changes the sum. Our puppies stay until seventy days, which is ten more. Within the sensitive window that is a seventh of the useful time. And they spend it somewhere new things arrive a little at a time, not all at once on day one in an unfamiliar house.

What it may have met before leaving

Far less than the word “socialised” suggests. And almost all of it inside a small perimeter, which grows a little with every extra week.

It may have met the people of the house and a few visitors. Household noises: television, radio, vacuum cleaner, doorbell, dishwasher. Different surfaces underfoot, and here it matters a lot whether the kennel has a real courtyard or only a pen. The other dogs of the kennel, calm adults of its own breed. And being handled: picked up, turned over, touched on paws and ears.

If the kennel sits on a road rather than out in the countryside, it has also heard the noises outside, from a distance: traffic, people passing, church bells. It is not the same as crossing a town on a lead. But it is a lot more than silence.

Then there is one thing almost nobody mentions, and at this stage it counts for more than many stimuli: the dam. A settled bitch, in a place she knows, raises steadier puppies. A stressed bitch raises more reactive ones, and no protocol fixes that.

What it cannot have met, and why

This is the part adverts leave out.

Traffic, towns, public transport. The basic vaccination course ends at around three months, depending on the vet's protocol. Until then a puppy should not go where unknown dogs go. It is a health precaution, and it limits where the puppy can go. Puppies going to another country also need the rabies vaccination. It cannot be given before twelve weeks and becomes valid twenty-one days later.

Children, if there are none at the kennel. A puppy raised among adults knows adults. Children move differently, sound different and are shorter. To a dog they are something else.

Dogs of other breeds and sizes. Knowing six adult Staffies is not the same as knowing a great dane, a chihuahua or a dog that communicates in another way.

Cats, horses, poultry, if there are none. Lifts, the lead in the street, a real visit to the vet, which is not the first vaccination given at the kennel.

This applies to us too, and it is right to say so: there are no other animals here. At most a neighbour's cat crosses the courtyard now and then. A puppy leaving us has never seen a hen or a horse. If the new family has them, that work is done there.

Being left alone. At a kennel a puppy is never alone: there are its littermates, its mother, the people. Being alone is learned later, in the new home. And it is one of the things that most often goes wrong.

And what about Bio Sensor?

Whenever early stimulation comes up, so does Bio Sensor, or ENS. It is five exercises of a few seconds each, once a day, from the third to the sixteenth day of life. In litter announcements it is quoted as if it guaranteed a well-balanced dog.

There are two things to know. The first is about the promised benefits: better stress tolerance, a more efficient heart, more resistance to disease. They come from a 1970s military programme, not from independent studies checked by other researchers. The second is that the first sixteen days are not the sensitive period for socialisation. That starts later, from the third week.

That does not mean ENS does harm. It means that anyone presenting it as the reason their puppy will be well balanced is promising more than is known. We have written about it in our guide to what the research actually says about Bio Sensor.

For this article there is a practical consequence. A kennel that only tells you about the first sixteen days is telling you the least important part. The question to ask is what happened from the third week on.

So what does “socialised” mean

It means the puppy has been started, not finished. It has a base to build on, not a blank sheet. The weeks spent at the kennel, five or six of them, were not wasted.

But if an advert just says “socialised”, there is one question to ask: with what, exactly? A breeder who knows what they are doing answers with a list, not an adjective. A short list is fine too, as long as they say it.

What we do, and what we do not

Our puppies are born indoors and stay there for the first month, in the whelping box. The box is not in a quiet room but near the television and the radio. The noise of a lived-in house is the first thing a puppy has to get used to.

At around thirty days they move to the protected puppy pen, made for them. There they can move safely while their legs are still unsteady, and weaning begins.

The most important step comes at about forty days, when I let them loose in the courtyard. It is not a concrete run. There is grass, earth, plants and flowers, with different surfaces and smells at every step. When the weather allows they stay out all day, in the sun, the wind and the shade.

What goes past outside the courtyard counts even more. Cars, mopeds, bicycles, people walking by, horns, the church bells. If a puppy hears the bells at forty days while playing on the grass, it will never notice them again. If it hears them for the first time at six months in a town, it will have to get used to them.

In the courtyard they also meet the adult dogs, always under close supervision. I do not leave them together because “they know each other”. I leave them together while watching, and separate them when needed.

The courtyard does not replace the house, though. Between forty and fifty days they start coming back inside in turns, in groups of two or three, for a few hours. Not all together: in a small group each one goes through things itself, instead of watching from behind the others. Inside they learn the rest: the television on, people coming and going, the smooth floor, the kitchen.

Most of the people who come through are new faces. Families who will take a puppy come to see it several times as it grows, except those who live too far away. For the puppies that means different hands, voices and gaits, repeated over time. That is also when the odd child turns up. My own children are grown and there are no children living here: when a couple brings one along, I see it as a bonus and say so gladly.

The vet comes to us. Always for large litters, and for small ones I sometimes go myself. But the rule is that he comes. Taking unvaccinated puppies into a clinic, where sick dogs pass through, is not a good idea. The flip side is that the puppy does not travel by car before it leaves, and it will learn that later.

What we do not do is promise that the work is finished when a puppy leaves. It is not, at sixty days or at seventy. When a puppy goes, the sensitive window stays open for several more weeks. And it will spend them with its family.

The ones who stay longer, I socialise myself

Some puppies follow a different path: the ones that stay here longer. Often they are going abroad, so they must wait for the rabies vaccination and do not leave before four months.

Those puppies I socialise myself. After the second vaccination I start taking them on a lead around the village. And not on their own, but with their mother alongside. On its first outing a puppy is almost always a little unsure. The road is wide, noises come from every side, the lead is new. But if its mother walks ahead, and she knows that road and is not bothered by it, the puppy follows her willingly. What the mother teaches in three walks, no protocol can teach.

That is why a puppy that stays until four months leaves with an advantage. It has finished the sensitive window here, with a guide who speaks its language.

The first four weeks at home: the ones that decide

This is the part the breeder does not control, and it weighs as much as theirs.

Quantity is not quality. Ten short, happy experiences are worth more than one long one in which the puppy gets frightened. If it stiffens, freezes or tries to move away, the experience is not working. Step back a little and try again the next day.

You can do a lot before the vaccinations are finished. No dog park, but you can carry the puppy to new places. You can let it sit in the car, meet people at home, walk on different surfaces and hear new noises.

Being alone is taught from day one, with very short absences, made longer little by little. No fuss when you leave or when you come back.

If something goes wrong, ask for help. A puppy that is afraid to go out at four months will not “grow out of it”. That is the moment to get someone to help you, not a year later.

In short

• The window runs from the third to the twelfth week. At rehoming five or six of those ten are gone, depending on how long the puppy stays
• At a kennel a puppy meets the house, the people, the other dogs of its breed. Not the town, not traffic, often not children
• “Socialised” without a list means nothing: ask with what
• The work that remains is the heavier half, and the family does it
• A breeder who does things properly also tells you what they could not do

How Staffordshire Bull Terrier puppies are born and raised From the season to the whelping, and what happens in the weeks that follow.