My 7month GSD pup Indy has this manic desire (and I mean manic) to arrive somewhere in a massive hurry. For example, when we arrive at the training class hall he becomes like a maniac, he looks like he's climbing the north face of the Eiger, but horizontally! He will pull me and knock anyone out of the way to get in....it's like he's desperate. He will do the same if we arrive at someone elses house, and even when we get back to our own car after a walk. It isn't like he can't walk nicely, our lead walks (on a training harness) are really quite good. I really haven't yet fathomed a way to solve this. Even with a piece of fillet steak (yes, fillet) I couldn't get his attention. I'm sure there is a simple way to solve it, but at the moment for the life of me I can't think of it!
In all other ways he is a really good pup, quite laid back, attentive, has a good wait (mostly, except for this situation) and recall, good with other dogs and people, well behaved and quite a little charmer. He lives with me, OH & China 3yr old shepherd who he adores.
Any ideas anyone?
Kat

If your dog walks off and does its own thing its because you are not important enough to stay with. Dogs do this as a way of letting you know they are in charge. When someone is at your door is the dog jumping up and wanting attention "look at me not him" kind of attitude?? It needs to respect you as pack leader. And at present doesnt. Thats the simple truth.

I know now I will be slated for my opinion but I never treat train my dogs. I want them to work for me not the treat. If a dog only does as its told for food it is learning nothing. Your dog needs to know when it is doing wrong and it needs correcting. NEVER try to get your dog to do something by giving it food it simply isnt doing it for you.

NOW I appreciate there are many here who do treat and if that works for them OK. but it isnt working for you as you said. I am not trying to get anyones back up or start an argument, I am merely giving you my opinion on what works for me.

Good luck and remember be strong with your commands, you will be suprosed what a loud NO can do with a correction. It must remember YOU ae the most important person in that room.

Thanks

Mike

Mike, Sorry, but to put it bluntly you are wrong.  Training with rewards is an excellent way to train, it helps to develop a rapport between owner and dog, and it creates a real motivation for the dog to want to get something right.  In training you MUST use something your dog likes, whether that is food, toys, tuggy or even praise.  There are SOME dogs out there who will work for praise, but they are very, very few.  Certainly much fewer than the number of owners who only want to use praise, if you get my drift. 

Quite honestly a lot of what you say is incorrect and is now recognised by the vast majority of trainers to be a 'myth':

"Dogs do this as a way of letting you know they are in charge"

Nope, they do this because there is somewhere else they would prefer to go.  Dogs do what works.  If you are not providing a motivation which is higher than whatever the other thing is, they will obviously go and try to get the other thing. 

"It needs to respect you as pack leader. And at present doesnt. Thats the simple truth. "

Sorry, that "truth" is actually false.  You are a person, a dog is a dog.  You do not belong to a dog or wolf pack.  The best relationship to aim for with a dog is a partnership, a co-operative partnership, where your dog _wants_ to please you because then it gets something it likes.  That's all there is to it.  'Respect' is a human emotion.  Dogs don't 'respect'.  They are afraid, yes.  But most trainers today don't work by making dogs afraid of them, because that damages the relationship between trainer and dog and the dog develops hang-ups about all kinds of things.

"I want them to work for me not the treat. "

Sorry again but no dog works for a person, full stop, and not for anything else, ever.  A dog will work either to gain a reward or to avoid a punishment.  People who claim their dog is working 'to please' them yet give no rewards _valued by the dog_ are most times training by punishment.  Personally, I don't want to train that way and fortunately most training classes have now moved on from that.

"If a dog only does as its told for food it is learning nothing."

Rubbish!  Of course it learns that what it did to gain the food is right!  It's quite incredible how you can make such statements, having as you say never used food yourself and when almost every top dog in almost every discipline these days is trained with food, or rewards of some kind!

"Your dog needs to know when it is doing wrong and it needs correcting"

And what exactly is 'correcting' if it's not training by punishment?  And why not tell the dog when it is doing RIGHT?  Isn't that a nicer way to train?

"it isnt working for you as you said"

No, the poster didn't say that, in general, it's not working.  She said that in this particular _context_ food wasn't working.  Obviously this is because the dog wants to get wherever it's going more than it wants the food. 

"you will be suprosed what a loud NO can do with a correction"

You'd be surprised what a piece of sausage can do, Mike.

Hi China Blue
I have 2 GSD one of 7 and the other just coming up to 5 months.  The eldest one has always done this, she is always glad to go out but much more happier to go home.  She is extremely well behaved and very laid back, BUT she has always pulled like mad when we are going back to the car, even off lead she will race back to it.  In all other ways she is obedient, she passed her bronze, silver and gold good citizen dog awards easily (I might like to add she was trained with treats!), but why she does this is a mystery.  The younger one has now started it (Take them out separately) but the last couple of days I have been really firm with him and he seems to be catching on, I now refuse to budge an inch if he pulls so I think he is getting the message that he is going nowhere until the leash goes slack.  Fingers crossed he will keep it up.

Well at least he's enthusiastic!

Looking at say, going to training.  From his point of view: it's exciting to go to training, it's fun, he sees his friends and he gets steak!  So he gets manic, pulls and presumably gets there faster because of this, so it has been rewarded and he'll repeat this behaviour the next time.

Perhaps you could discuss this with the trainer.  They might suggest that you don't actually bring him in next time until he's walking a bit more calmly.  Standing still or even turning and walking back away from the hall door when he pulls are ways to get this through to him.  It might take ages when you first start trying this and you might miss some of the class but he has already learned to walk nicely IN the class - now it's time to work on walking nicely TO the class!

I don't think you need to change your method of training unless you want to, I don't think you need to beat yourself up for not being interesting enough - I think you just need to show, in a way that Indy can understand, what the required behaviour is and make it so that he won't get where he wants to be by acting like a loony.

Aw, bless 'im.

Hi China Blue

I think the fact that you can't distract the dog even with fillet steak means that his main motivation is to get into wherever it is.  And he wants that so much the fillet steak is not even registering. 

So, you know what he wants.  Now use that motivation. 

WHen he scrabbles like this, just stand still.  Tell the trainer you might be a while coming in and she should start the class and ignore you.  Wait outside your friend's house and explain you'll come in, in a while.  Wait outside your car while he does this. 

As soon as you see he stops scrabbling, walk forwards towards the door.  If he starts again, walk back to where you were and wait for him to stop.  Keep doing this.  Only move forwards when he stops, and go back when he starts again.  At first it might seem like he's not 'getting' it, but persevere and I think you'll see it stop!

Thank you so much guys
Kizzy - nice to know it's not just him, it's a really odd quirk, have you ever tried to stop her doing it? If so what?
Lillith - thank you, and I know you are right, I think I didn't want to face up to the fact that I will be in the car park all night rather than the training class :D and yes bless him, he is a sweetie
One-two-three thank you too, yes I can see the logic here too. He's so manic that I think I'm being negative and thinking it just won't work, but deep down I know that it should, and I need to try it and persevere.
Finally - Mike. I don't agree with you about training with lure's. I have seen their success too often to think it wouldn't work. I also think that you didn't really read my post. It is ONLY in this context when he's not interested in me. Otherwise he is attentive, will recall in the middle of games with other dogs (that he adores) is very well behaved and we have a good relationship. I dont train with fillet steak normally :D, just happened to have some from a dinner at a restaurant earlier in the week, and decided to see whether that would influence his behaviour in the stated context. Under other circumstances he waits when asked, even when he's desperate to get in and out of the car, and is getting better at that all the time. In actual fact he is relatively 'submissive' not self important at all, and he doesn't leap all over visitors that come or push himself forward, he says hello nicely! So I think that sort of blows out that theory, but thank you for responding anyway.
Thanks all again, and any other training ideas and suggestions are gratefully received, but I am going to be spending a lot of time in that car park next week :D
Kat

ChinaBlue,

It will work :D just remember that the time in the car park is time spent TRAINING so it counts as much as actually being in the class (just very boring for you ;) )  Just be prepared for him to try harder at first, after all, pulling has worked so far so he'll be thinking that even more pulling and scrabbling is the way to go :rolleyes: And remember, the least little bit of pulling and its back out the door   once he realises he's wasting his time it'll start working ;) ;)

GO KAT :D

Hope the weather stays fine for you! :-D

When I'm in that car park in the rain I'll be thinking GO KAT - GO KAT - Go home you idiot! :D

OOHH!  Been there done that!  I have a dog who REFUSES to pee/poo in the rain   as a pup I spent hours in the pouring rain trying to get him to 'go', in the end the only thing that worked was to push him out the door and watch from a window (none really overlook the garden so had to hang out the bathroom window ) until he performed, then click and let him in.  No treat, he was grateful enough just to get indoors :D