As some of you may know I have had Charlie 6 months and have really put a lot of effort into trying to get him to behave normally around other dogs including seeing a behaviourist.
Anyway I take him to a local park every day for his walk and I regularly meet up with the same people, there are a couple who think they know best and try to offer me advice ranging from belt him one, take him to see a psychic, send him back etc. The latest one is a guy who walks a huge husky type (I'm not too good on breeds) said Charlie is only the way I am because he is on a lead and I am making this worse. My reply was "so you are suggesting to let him off" and he said Yes even though I had told him last week that Charlie on the 2 ocasions he had got off went for other dogs. He said his dog was more than capable of looking after itself and would sort Charlie out.
Every day with Charlie in the park is getting more and more stressful due to filthy looks of people and comments like the above. At first I could ignore it but I suppose I'm also thinking what they are thinking, this has been going on for 6 months with no improvement, if anything his behaviour towards other dogs is worse.
He seems happier in the park, picking up sticks, sniffing the ground more but not when other dogs come on the scene.
I put a post on here last week but it dissapeared due to people mentioning electric collars so PLEASE NO MENTION OF ELECTRIC COLLARS.
All I want to know is Should I really be seeing an improvement by now or am I being unrealistic? (4 months on behaviourists programme)
Has anyone had similar experience with it taking so long?
Don't get me wrong I am not considering taking up anyones advice as mentioned above and am certainly not going to give up on him or changing his programme without discussing it with the behaviourist.
I suppose I am getting a bit disheartened as I am sticking religiously to the rules and not getting anywhere.
I have mentioned this to the behaviourist and she just says give it time.
Sorry if I have waffled on but my friends etc. aren't really dog people and can't understand why I am putting myself through this stress for a dog.

First of all, everyone is an expert, especially those who have only had one dog, read a book and watched a few tv programmes.  They are, IME, no better at controlling their own dog than anyone else! :D

My first dog was extremely unsociable however he was under very good control; unfortunately the same could not be said for the Major R Soles who allowed their dog to run up to mine with the famous last words of "he only wants to play".

When I explained that my dog did not, they riposted with "they will be much better off the lead" to which I would reply "If I let this one off the lead, only one dog will be coming back, and it won't be yours" to which of course you get the "then such a dangerous dog should not be out".  Like cars, he was NOT dangerous except when other people were reckless.

It is very tempting to let your dog off when these "know it alls" suggest that it would be a good idea and that their dog can look after themselves. Do not be led down that path.  I got so fed up with one twerp who made this suggestion repeatedly that I did, and of course his dog could not "look after himself" and subsequently he changed his tune AFTER the event, despite him "knowing better".

If you are happy with your behaviourist's advice, who no doubt is reputable, then I would suggest you just ignore those less versed in your dog than you.  It is pointless worrying what other people think about you unless of course their opinion actually matters...........

Hopefully your behaviourist has indicated that not ALL dogs ever get to be sociable and whilst it would be lovely to see all our dogs rompiing together in the park for some dogs this is never going to happen; it does not mean however that they can not live perfectly happy lives and that you cannot enjoy your relationship.

My first dog, although not interested in dogs or people was a brilliant working dog and probably the best I have ever owned to date; I just had to spend a lot of time "training" other inconsiderate dog owners............

yes give it time,be patiant & consistant. try to make friends with other walkers who have STEADY dogs that you can just stand close too,chat with & try to keep yoiur dog cam & chilled out, & remeber to praise him for the good bitsl

Is he neutured?  My Dally was like this until I had him neutured at three.  It wasn't a decision I took lightly, but he was so much better afterwards, I just have to watch him with entire dogs now.

Hi  Spottydog, yes i have been in the same situation, and there have been times when i have come home from the park and cried, hated having to take her for a walk,people give you such dirty looks, i have spent a fortune on behaviorists getting  differant advice from every one.
We now go out early, to a place where you dont see many people ,this allows her to have a free run. sometimes a friend will come with us, whose dog she will tolerate, and will not let her be a bully. Try and make friends with someone who will allow you to walk with them, keeping both dogs on a lead,till your dog gets used to walking nicely with another dog, and try and ignore any bad behaviour from your dog, if he starts to lunge and snap then distract him with a sharp "NO"and pull him into your side again till he behaves himself, them allow him a little more lenth of the lead again.

Dont give up i can only say that my dog is slowly getting better as she is getting older, we can walk past a dog now and she does not turn herself insideout trying to eat it.When we do road work and dont have much space to move around, I think people think i am mad ,because i distract her by showing her a treat and waving my arms shouting (not to loud)  "oh look what i have got, " to get her attentoin on me and of the other dog. Make getting a treat and some praise,more interesting than the other dog.

Just keep going and try not to get to stressed.  Goodluck

jackie

I cant find a post of yours last week on this, are you saying it is aggressive? what breed is it ?

My post got taken off last week because of electric collar advice. There are approx 5 people in the park who I walk through with regularly who Charlie is fine with, he's fine with most dogs he has met on two or three occasions. The behaviourist(apbt member) said that Charlie would change and he would be fine in approx 1 years time. I did ask if I was always going to have him on a lead as I didn't think at the time that was the best solution for both me & Charlie & Casey (my other dog) and she said no he will be fine.
I just feel like I am getting nowhere with this.
I am not pulling him away and shouting NO as this is what I was not told to do.
Charlie was neutered 6 month ago when I first got him.
I have no intentions of following the advice of people I meet in the park who think they know better.
Four months in my opinion seems a long time to be sticking with something which isn't working.
I am going to phone her and discuss this again to see if another method should be tried.

THe APDT is very different from the APBC.................

oops I meant APBC

I think your best option is to go out really early in the morning before anyone is about.  Let him off then assuming you have a recall. 

He might well learn to relax when he learns there is no one around to pick a fight with,  Trouble is this sort of behavior becomes a habit and they walk into the park on their toes hackles raised looking for trouble.

Summer is coming so the mornings are getting much lighter, you may just have to adjust your routine for now.

I do sympathise, I know what it is like.  Walking your dog should be a pleasure, not something that you dread.

Sandra

Hi Spotty Dog,
Update on our situation. Angela Stockdale has told me that she does not work weekends, so looks like my OH will have to take time off work to go. I think he will take the week off and turn it into a holiday with our caravan. I like you dread taking Gabi out. We are lucky in that now and again there are dogs in the park that Gabi will play with so long as I let go of the 30' lead. These times are rare and Gabi is like a prisoner on release. Recall is not possible untill she has tired herself out. On reading your comments and those of others I am beginning to wonder if anyone ever has success. I like you would expect to see some result in 4 months. Have you not seen any improvement atall? Is there anyone out there who has had a successful result from seeing a behavourist? 

There are no short cuts to desensitisation and counter conditioning.

If a dog has spent a long time rehearsing/practising bad behaviour it is going to take a considerable time to change it.  There are no magic wands!

4 months is really nothing timewise.

After all think how difficult it is for nicotine/drug/alcohol addicts to give up and how long it takes to become "natural" behaviour!

oh Gaby!if you are coming near to minehead come & see me in my shop!!!!

Hi Michelled,
I am waiting for Angela to get back to me with dates. I did a return email to her 2 days ago that was returned to me by the system so I put another one on. I noticed that her reply to me came from a different address so I put one on there also. If I don't hear anything today I will phone as must be something wrong at their end.Previous emails were responded to the same day. Where is your shop? Are you near to Wheddon Cross? Do you know any caravan sites nearbye?

Many Thanks
Pat

spotty dog
said that Charlie would change and he would be fine in approx 1 years time.

davedee
Unfortunately exploiting pet owners in this way is its an all to common utter disgrace, if your dog does something which you do not want it to do, or which you are trying to stop it doing and you do not stop it then your dog is POSITIVLY reinforcing the behaviour, if you have taught what "No" means and it ignores you have taught it that "No" means 'ignore me and do what you like'.

That is what you are paying your behaviourist to teach you and he/she seems to have secured at least 11 months income for him/herself by feeding you codswallop, if its not codswallop your dog would be responing by now.

There are SERIOUS welfare issues keeping dogs on a lead like that and its getting you nowhere, it should not take more than 6 to 9 weeks to train someone to obedience train their dog but I don't know enough about what type of aggression is involved.

No need to mention e-collars, first just read back through your own posts and all you and your dog are going through, then, if you click the internal link below and read the first 4 or 5 posts you get the gist,the best way is always comparison,
then scroll to post marked > Daren 01.03.03 11:55 GMT -
he came back to give the results, people like your behaviourist are terrified of loosing money, that's what all the fuss is about.

http://www.champdogsforum.co.uk/board/topic/15861.html

wheddon cross is about 20mins away. Minehead is the nearest town by the beach. its only a little town & my shop is on the main street in the town,near to the co-op,post office & shoe shop. its called avenue fotostop. you cant miss it because there are loads of collie pics in the window.
there are caravan sites EVERWHERE. im sure youll find one near Wcross

Thanks Michelled. Will certainly call in with Gabi. She may not be friendly towards dogs on leads but is lovely with people and kids.

Hi gaby, i can only go on my own expereances. I have seen so many behaviourists ,all recommended by vets. All giving different advice. I dont meen to offend any behaviourists. there have been times when i felt like giving up , then you think, "i`ll just try another one."Ican only say since i have become resigned to her problems, and i surpose, have become a lot less stressed, things are getting better,maybe its because she is geting older and can feel i am less stressed, so she is less stessed.

Sometimes now if  dog of lead comes running up to her, she will let it sniff her, then if it won`t go away or gets to boisterios then sometimes she will snap at it , i do not shout at her for this ,just say " come on millie lets go" and make a fuss so she does not get uptight,may be some people will not agree with this but it works for me

I really feel for you.
I got my dog from a rescue centre and after a couple of weeks he started trying to bite peoples hands when they went to stroke him. I went to see a behaviourist that did absolutely nothing so I had to try and resolve the problem myself. I put him in a muzzle and it took 3 years to get him to the soppy dog he turned out to be and then no one in the park was scared to stroke him anymore.
I hope that you find your own solution, but I would agree that it does take time and patience.
Good luck.

Something that is really getting to me & did before I even saw the behaviourist was that we met at a veterinary surgery. Surely it would have been best to witness this behaviour when it happens (out walking) not sitting in a strange location after a half hours drive which had him stressed to start with.
My son has behavioural problems and his problems were more evident in school due to learning difficulties so the psychologist after visiting him at home visited him where the problems were, at school.
I might be doing something really trivial wrong that isn't evident sitting in a vets.

If you don't trust your behaviourist then perhaps it would be better to change as you obviously do not have confidence in her.................

I would agree with you completely. When I took mine about his aggression towards people, my behaviourist gave him shock therapy to stop him going near sheep. I do not have a sheep problem where I am, in fact there are no sheep in my local park. He also talked about barking in the house and tried to get me to look at that. My boy hardly barked, only if someone walked past the house or came to the door. I told the behaviourist that I wanted him to bark then. He didn't really look deep into the issue and to be honest, wanted to sell me products that I really didn't need and this was one of the top behaviouists in the country... I left there no better off and £500 poorer.
I took him home and made my own diagnosis that he had been abused before I got him and he was scared of hands coming towards him. It was hard work, but with love and affection, he changed.
Some dogs are not good with other dogs and maybe you can't change that, maybe try to keep him with the dogs he does like. I am lucky that we see the same people everyday so the dogs get to know each other, but its hard when other dogs come bouncing towards you.
Have you tried using a muzzle?

There  are people who have followed advice from behaviourists and had improvement but let's also face the fact that, much as we would like it to be, dog training and behaviour is NOT PRESCRIPTIVE as each dog and owner is totally different. The truth is that not all dogs will "make it " to being happy with other dogs esp. if they have good reason for being afraid (eg they have been attacked or bullied as a youngster).

I agree Angela is very  good and will assess a dog expertly so she can at least tell for sure if a dog is bolshy, genuinely fearful, etc :)

Dennis'(DD) suggestion re the 11 months income is very incorrect and misleading - normally one gets a session which is paid for, then telephone/email back up which is FREE.

I used reward based training to help my dog who became defensive off lead after being attacked several times entirely unprovoked. The methods i used are similar or the same as a reputable behaviourist would suggest, so as i say, yes, it does work - but again, all dogs are different, all owners are, and not all dogs will get to the stage where they can relax and chill out with other dogs.

I also suggested very basic methods for someone who was concerned his husky mix was aggressive on lead and his dog changed almost overnight - not often that happens, but a great feeling when it does!

I would suggest that if you are concerned, you check your behaviourist has plenty of hands on experience and ask for details of aggressive dogs he/she has helped so you cna speak to their owners :) That's what I would do.

Lindsay
X

It seems to me that the advice to "check with a behaviorist" has already been followed for many months and hasn't had any significant results.  Every day that this dog is at the park is an invitation to a disaster!  I realize that people don't want to cause their dog any discomfort but to keep one in a muzzle when he's out of his house for three years, as one poster wrote, I think ranks up there in the "discomfort" level. 

Nothing that you do with your dog should take one year's time (unless you're talking about preparing for some types of competition.) ESPECIALLY something that's as dangerous as aggression to other dogs. 

I haven't seen any message from the moderators that Ecollars can't be discussed here, although most of the threads that discuss that topic seem to be locked.  Some are "waiting to be branched." 

I'd stop this behavior in less than one week using that tool that you don't want discussed.  And with only about the same level of discomfort as that inflicted by a flea. 

Earwigo earwigo, earwigo.......

Lou - Spotty Dog (the original poster) wrote : I put a post on here last week but it dissapeared due to people mentioning electric collars so PLEASE NO MENTION OF ELECTRIC COLLARS.

I would take it that your input is therefore not welcome

Margot

The orginal poster thought that earlier threads had been deleted because Ecollars were mentioned.  That's why she didn't want them borught up.  But she's not the only one reading this thread and not the only one who may take the advice that's offered. 

While you may not welcome the advice, others may. 

Remember, it's her thread, and replies should ideally always be directed at the original post, and not go off at a tangent for whoever else might be reading. If the OP asks 'don't mention Ecollars', then it would be good manners to respect her wishes ...
:)

People don't "own threads."  They belong to the Forum and anyone who wants to read them, can. 

This isn't going off on a tangent and the original poster may decide at some time to realize that what she's been doing isn't working and to explore other avenues.  Even if she doesn't, others may. 

Perhaps the thread title suits you ... ?
;)

So start a thread of your own if you think you have a message people want to hear and then those of us, like the OP, who don't want to hear it again can leave it alone.  But if a poster specifically asked for something not to be raised have the decency to respect their wishes.

Lou
My boy didn't mind the muzzle at all and at least he had a good run around and I felt safe that he wasn't going to bite anyone. I thought I was being responsible and so did everyone else in the park. If he bit someone, then the thought of having to have him put to sleep because I didn't take the right action, was preventable. If he bit you would you say, 'Its oK as long as the dog is comfortable'? He was great with other dogs and wanted to play with them.
He used to get really excited when he saw the muzzle because he knew that he was going for a walk. If we were on the lead, then of course I did not have him muzzled. But for the sake of 45 min walk, I was doing the right thing.
I see dogs in muzzles for lesser thing than biting, some use the muzzle as their dogs will eat anything in the park that has to be worse.
Don't be too judgemental about how someone does things, it worked for us...

Exactly, it's also important to remember that some dogs do take months of work to get right. Anyone saying "I can sort this for you in a very short amount of time" is not to be trusted! It's the emotions you have to work on changing, and that, as Tohme has already said I believe, does not happen overnight. Muzzling is sometimes necessary here (and there is nothing wrong with an open basket muzzle where the dog can breathe perfectly well) due to the DDA.

Lindsay
X

If you're talking about something like an OB title or some other form of competition when you say it "takes months of work to get it right" I'll agree.  But since we're talking about just one behavior, aggression towards other dogs, I'll strongly disagree.  Others have stopped this problem for a dog's lifetime in less than a week.  Occasional reminders may be necessary every few years, it depends on the dog, why the aggression is present and how long it's been going on. 

To make such a statement "Anyone saying 'I can sort this for you in a very short amount of time" is not to be trusted!' " is to just show that you're incapable of doing it.  I've done it hundreds of times and so have people who have followed my instructions. 

It's NOT necessary to change the emotions.  After the behavior has been stopped it's great if people want to work in it, bit it's not necessary to stop the behavior. 

When a dog wants to sniff something, or go in a direction and it is stopped by a lead pulling owner each time it is stopped THAT is a punishment to the dog, punishment means something is removed, this dogs freedom is removed and this behaviourist, who is being paid to give the dog its freedom has sentenced it to at least a year on the lead.

In terms of punishment and reward that means in real punishment terms this dog is being punished thousands of times per exercise, the only one who is being rewarded is the behaviourist who has talked the owner into employing her and paying her wages for another year.

Each sniff at a blade of grass is an immense reward to a dog, each inquisitive change of direction is also an immense valued reward to a dog, the walk in the park is the greatest reward of every day for a dog.  No one needs to pay a behaviourist to be told to keep a dog on a lead year in year out, anyone can achieve that without paying anyone to be shown how to do it and that's all that is being achieved here.

This dog is being seriously damaged by the way the owner is instructed to keep it. The breed and a description of the aggression is missing from this post, but, almost all 'apparent' aggressions are nothing more than rank territorial snapping. It's only when defence drive is involved that dealing with it takes a long time and if a lot of learning experience by the dog has taken place the most you can do is stop them being predatory, even then you can never control someone elses dog..

Now Lokis Mum  you have offered Lou advice he did not ask for so I think its fair you offer spotty dog a solution to get his dog off that lead ASP, dogs are NOT prisoners, which is what many people here are supporting.

By the way, there is nothing in the rules here about not mentioning e-collars and if there was admin will deal with it not a run of the mill poster such as myself. What's your solution for spotty dog, THAT is what is important here NOT what OTHER posters write.

Please read the link below I fel it is appropriate for many of your postings.

http://www.champdogsforum.co.uk/cgi-bin/board/topic_show.pl?tid=59496

There's nothing in the rules Dennis, but it is common courtesy  not to take over threads when someone has specifically requested it doesn't happen.

Lindsay

Unfortunately 'common courtesy', like 'common sense', aren't common any more, Lindsay.

All too true sadly, here we have the lack of it being demonstrated yet again... :rolleyes:

Lindsay
X

More than likely while he learned to accept the muzzle, he never enjoyed it.  Your comment that he "used to get excited when he saw the muzzle because he knew that he was going for a walk."  is interesting.  It's the same thing I say about the Ecollar and dogs properly trained with the tool; but no one accepts it then.  But when you say it, it's accepted by all.  Interesting double standard.