Hi all,

Just after some advice on an ongoing problem when walking her. Had her from 12 weeks and got her in puppy classes for approx 4 month or so when she was 6 months. However, she is an absolute nightmare on the lead when we come across another dog or for that matter any other animal of that size. She becomes fixated and will pull and shake to get to the animal, she has already snapped her halti which was working well for controlling her. Its getting quite serious now as she is 50kg and my partner is only 9st and is near unable to take her out now for the fear of her dragging her into the road. She was never aggressive to any dogs at the classes the end of last year but 'seems' aggressive when trying to get to animals on the street. We have spent a lot of time training her and cant understand this extreme behaviour. She is also quite good off the lead and recall is quite good with her, she has also been ok with dogs off the lead ?!?

Hope someone can offer some direction for me,

Thanks!

If you had luck with the halti and it is just because she snapped it that you don't use one anymore there are other more stronger head collars out there. I use a dogmatic leather headcollar with both my two but there are others like the gentle leader that other people use and have great luck with. I would highly reccommend the dogmatic though as I have no trouble walking my two newfoundlands together and between them they must weigh over 20 stone. Can I ask does she get to meet other dogs and play with them on a regular basis? If not it may be excitement that is making her like this when she sees them. Can you get together with other owners on a walk so she could play with them and socialise?

She is still very much a puppy at that age and is entering her teenage phase when all your previous training and effort is just ignored because she wants to do her own thing.:) It's a case of persevering with what she has been taught. I always carry a pocketful of treats to distract mine when other dogs walk past but mine are extremely treat orientated which makes it easier and they have each other to play with. I know how hard it is to get other dog owners to let there dogs meet yours when they are big so I ended up getting another.:)

I am sure somebody will be along to give you better training advice than I can and they will point you in the right direction. Don't be too disheartened all owners have teenage dogs that seem to forget all the training they have done and revert back to an extremely big puppy.:)

I would also recommend the leather dogmatic headcollar......my boy is a really strong puller if he sees a cat, squirrel etc, and it controls him well, and there is no chance of snapping it!

Also a dogmatic fan.  They must be kept regularly cleaned with saddle soap to stop the leather cracking and drying out though, otherwise it will snap.  I've also tought him the "leave it" command if he sees something he wants to pull towards.  Works really well.

Sarah.

I have sort of fixed the halti for the moment and still use it but need to change it as soon as poss really. Last night I actually took a small bag of chopped up sausages out with me in the event we passed another dog to see if that would help (didnt pass anyone though). Although, I can sternly say 'LEAVE' sometimes and she is ok, it seems to be smaller dogs and dogs that bark at her first that are the problem. She will back up with all her power to get out of the halti and that normally means backing up into the road!!

She has a play mate which is a 6 month old staffie. They play tug and rough and tumble all over the place. However, I do step in if it gets too rough and they both know whos boss. I've been wondering if this is part of the problem and she thinks she can play rough and tumble with any dog she sees ? Could this be part of the problem ? They walk together perfectly fine on the street.

I wonder if I need another stranger + dog to train with ? Maybe pass them 10 times on the opposite of the street and do this a few times a week ? Then she can get the message that its not acceptable behaviour.

Any help or suggestions welcome!

As you say, at best the Halti has only been a means of managing this behaviour, if it has snapped then it hasn't actually cured the behaviour ?  so your partner is still having to use quite a bit of strength when out with the dog?

As she does understand the 'Leave It!' command (the dog that is, not your partner ;) ) perhaps one way of dealing with this would be to train and strengthen the 'leave it!' command?   you don't need to use dogs at first for this ;)  you can train her to 'Leave' other things (treats on the floor, toys etc) which you can then reward her for with other treats or toys - never the ones she has had to leave ;)  once she is rock solid on this in different situations (house, garden, street, park etc.) then you should find that the command works when you use it around other dogs-  don't forget to praise/treat lavishly when she obeys ;)

Hope this helps
Regards
Dill

Dill - that seems like a good idea :)

My pup is very good on the lead, untill he see's people - he thinks strangers are for kissing & making a fuss of, so he pulls like a steam train to get to them (he's over 56kg). I always give him the 'sit' command - much easier to controll him when his bum is on the floor :)

'Leave' command works fine with anything else, in fact now she wont even touch anything dropped on the floor or even her food without you saying 'Get it'. She will sit and look at you until you give the command. She is a different dog on lead, its so strange, its like being on the lead is causing the problems. If she was off the lead going down the street I would go as far to say she would 'Heal' and not go for the other dog.

I will try to enforce the leave command though and use the treats as my first point of call.

It may seem silly with her size, but she may be afraid,a nd being on lead she can't get away from what is frightening her, and that is other dogs that are behaving excitedly or aggressively, size is irrelevant here, the other dog may be behaving like this because they are afraid them selves.

I would certainly go back to training classes, these really should be kept up until a dog is about two at least, as they are one of the few places where they can be socialised around other dogs in a controlled environment..

Does your dog know a 'watch me' command. Sometimes it's easier to give a dog something proactive that you want it to do rather than trying to stop a behaviour you don't want. I'd start teaching a watch me in the house. When she has that work in the garden to up the distractions. When out, if you can stay very calm and get her to sit with her back to the dog she's barking at and watch you then passing dogs will start being a pleasant and calm experience associated with treats and a happy owner. You can also block her view if she won't turn around. Just another idea.

As a precaution make sure you attach the lead to the collar aswell as the head collar

Hi

As Lori says a - 'watch me' command can work wonders :)

My female Briard had a tendency to behave like this and although not quite as heavy as your breed it was still a challenge to get her to behave and I wasn't happy trying to control her with my strength. I believe that when you start to struggle physically with a dog that is wrong and the time to look at alternatives.

Try to keep the dog busy with the watch me command and it will detract from the behaviour that you don't want.

I started doing it when letting the dog in the garden, when feeding then out in the garden when other things detracted attention, then on short walks as by now she had learnt the command and then finally when we met other dogs, cats, people etc. I also use a Dogmatic for her when on walks (not now) as I have used Halti's in the past and didn't find them satisfactory as they stretched and lost shape.

HTH Joanne

Just to add to some excellent posts, any training you do to eliminate this behaviour ( 'leave it!'  'watch me' etc. ) will need to be done on lead as well as off, as you've found, dogs see being on lead as totally different to being off lead and often don't apply their learning to the different situation ;)   

As Brainless has said, further puppy/training classes might also help to build her confidence if she is unsure of other dogs ;)

Hope this helps

Me too have used the "watch me" successfully...
Very useful command to teach anyway, can be used in so many different situations and used when training other things.

my dog is the same weight as yours and i use a headcollar so that i know i am in control. i also use food and watch me.it works fine so long as aother dogs dont come up for the food too!

> My pup is very good on the lead, untill he see's people - he thinks strangers are for kissing & making a fuss of, so he pulls like a steam train to get to them (he's over 56kg). I always give him the 'sit' command - much easier to controll him when his bum is on the floor :-)

My pup was good on the lead (as I said in the above quote from a post 5 days ago) :( After I posted about him being so good on the lead he has become a nightmare, he has even started flailing around like a mental case trying to get to dogs to play :( I was struggling to hold him, so I bought a harness (the type that goes over the chest & shoulders), I use that and his normal collar (2 leads) and it has transformed him :) We can now walk past anything, he will still try to pull, but a quick 'check' with both leads held together and he will carry on walking 'nicely'. It had got to the point where if we saw poeple/dogs I would have to stand still to brace myself aginst the pulling and have to use both hands with all my stregnth & weight to keep hold of him, now with the harness & collar I can walk and use only 1 hand to keep control of him (I hold both leads together in the same hand). :) I can see it not taking very long to get him in the habbit of walking past peole/dogs without feeling the need to pull, so the £12 harness was a very good investment & I would recomend anybody trying one :)

(I did get a halti aswell, but he freaked out with that on and it will take some time before he is used to it).