Why your Golden Retriever is crazy

If your Golden Retriever acts crazy then you’re probably wondering why and what you can do to stop it. This post will give you a number of reasons why your Golden Retriever might act crazy and will show you what you can do to stop it.

So, why does your Golden Retriever act crazy? You’ll often find that it is because it is not getting enough exercise and it is causing it to act a bit crazy. Other possible reasons include a lack of training, seeking attention, boredom, being in a new location, encouraging the behavior with attention when it is crazy, separation anxiety or illness or injury. 

And, what can you do about it? The first step would be to give it more exercise that you are at the moment. Teaching it to play fetch would be recommended since it will wear it out quickly. You should also spend lots of time giving it training on a variety of tasks. You can also try ignoring the behavior, giving it distractions and crate training.  

Your Golden Retriever might be acting crazy for a number of reasons and it could be due to a combination of reasons. However, there are also a number of things you can do about it depending on the most likely cause.

Why your Golden Retriever is crazy

Below, I will show you a number of reasons why your Golden Retriever might be being crazy and what would make them more likely to be the main reason.

Insufficient exercise

Golden Retrievers are a breed that is meant to get daily exercise. When they do not get enough exercise it can cause them to behave abnormally and it could be why yours has been acting crazy.

Generally, it is recommended for them to get at least an hour of exercise per day as healthy adults. If yours has not been getting that much and it is a healthy adult it would help to make sure that it does.

Attention seeking

The reason why it does it might be that it is trying to get extra attention from you. This would be more likely if it does it more when you have not been giving it much attention and if you tend to give it more attention when it does it.

Instead, it would help to give it attention throughout the day by training it, playing with it and exercising it and to follow the other tips below. But, it would help to avoid rewarding it with extra attention when it starts being crazy and to reward it when it is being well behaved.

Boredom

The cause of the craziness could be that it is bored. To prevent this it’s important to give your Golden Retriever lots of exercise, training, attention and toys to play with on a daily basis.

A new location

The behavior could be due to you being in a new location. Just because you can get your Golden Retriever to pay attention to you and be well behaved in one location it doesn’t mean that it will in another.

The distractions and excitement of being somewhere new can be too much for it to handle and cause it to forget its training.

To prevent this it is important for you to make sure to train your Golden Retriever in multiple locations.

The behavior is being encouraged

It could also be the case that you have encouraged the behavior by giving it things it wants when it does it. Instead, it would help to reward it when it is being well behaved and to follow the other tips below.

Separation anxiety

The reason why your Golden Retriever acts crazy at times could be due to separation anxiety. This is where your Golden Retriever does not like being left alone and it causes it to behave in a crazy way when you are about to leave, when you are gone and when you have recently returned.

Illness or injury

The cause could also be that it is ill or injured. This would be more likely if it has started doing it suddenly and if it has been showing other signs of it such as vomiting or limping. In this case, the best option would be to take it to a vet.

Nature

It could simply be that your Golden Retriever is genetically predisposed to act in a crazy way. Even if this is the case, you can still get your Golden Retriever to behave more calmly by giving it lots of training, exercise and ensuring that it is getting the right diet.

Diet

The cause could be that there is an issue with its diet. This would be more likely if it has started being crazy since a change in its diet. The issue could be that it is eating too much or that it is eating things that it should not be.

It would help to make sure that no one else has been feeding it without you knowing and it would help to talk with your local vet about its diet when you next see them.

How to stop it from being crazy

Below are some options you have when getting your Golden Retriever to act less crazy.

Training

It would help to give your Golden Retriever lots of training in order to get it to calm down.

The training method that I would recommend is positive reinforcement training. This is where you encourage certain behaviors by rewarding your Golden Retriever when it displays them and avoid rewarding it when it does not.

To use it to get it to be less crazy, you would reward it when it is acting calmly and stop rewarding it when it starts being crazy.

Exercise

It is also important to make sure that your Golden Retriever is able to get daily exercise if it is a healthy adult. Generally, it is recommended for them to get at least an hour of exercise per day.

One way to wear it out, even more, would be to train it to play fetch. You can watch the video below to see how it is done.

Don’t reward it

If you think that your Golden Retriever might be acting crazily because it wants to get attention from you then you should try ignoring it when it acts crazily and then reward it with your attention when it calms down.

When you ignore it it’s important to ignore it completely and not to even give it negative attention as that would still be attention. You don’t have to ignore it for long. You just have to do it for long enough for it to stop acting crazy and then you can give it attention.

Calming chews

In addition to the above, you could also give it things such as calming chews that are designed to get dogs to calm down. However, it would be important to take measures such as to make sure that its diet is correct, that it is getting enough exercise and that you are training it correctly as well.

Distractions

To get your Golden Retriever to calm down you could try giving it lots of toys to play with so that it doesn’t put its attention on something that you don’t want it to like a sofa.

Crate training

If your Golden Retriever is misbehaving while you are away then you might want to consider crate training. When done correctly it will give your Golden Retriever a place where it can go that will make it feel calmer.

Things to consider

Its age

It would help to consider the age of your Golden Retriever since it will have an impact on the most likely reason why it is being crazy.

If your Golden Retriever is still young then it is likely that it will be less crazy when it gets older. Despite that, it’s still important to give it lots of training while it is still young since it will make it easy to manage as an adult.

Be patient

When training your Golden Retriever it is important to have patience. It is not likely that you will be able to get it to behave the way that you want it to with just one training session. But, you can get much better results if you train it consistently over the course of weeks and months.