Walking Roscoe

I'm sure I must have touched on this subject in the past but I think it is very important in making your relationship with your four-legged friend the best relationship it can be. As Cesar Milan tells his clients and writes in his books over and over "mastering the walk" is the single most important activity you can do with your K-9 friend.

When we first adopted Roscoe we used a regular collar. It wasn't that big of a deal while he was 10lbs but soon his weight doubled and then tripled. Now that he weighs over 30lbs walking him on a regular buckle collar is an unpleasant pulling match. My dad tells me often that he likes the added challenge of his Irish Setter constantly pulling out in front of him and deciding without warning to pull this way and that. It is very true as he says that they both do much more physical work in a shorter amount of time but his dog, Copper, is also learning that if she pulls hard enough in one direction she'll get to go where she wants even if he doesn't want her to go there. A walk like this also cements the relationship as one which puts Copper's wants above my dad's, making Copper the master and not my dad.

Now that you know the bad results of letting your dog drag you all over creation I will share some of the benefits to having a dog that can walk next to you on a loose leash and how to achieve this. First of all you far more likely to want to walk your dog if you don't have to play tug-o-war the whole time. This will make you want to go get some exercise as well as exercise your dog. Second, if your dog walks next to you on a loose leash this means that even though you aren't in your house your dog still is looking to you as its master. My third point is a combination of the first two, since you are more eager to walk farther and longer you are able to maximize the time the two of you spend cementing a wonderful dog/master relationship. The more respect your dog gives you while walking the easier it is to transfer that respect into the rest of your relationship in public places and at home.

Now that you know the benefits of having your dog walk on a loose leash next to you and not in front of you I will give you a few tips that you can use to make this happen with your dog. First the type of equipment you use and making sure you use that equipment correctly can have a huge impact. There are three major types of equipment designed to give you more control over your dog. These three options are head-collars, slip collars, and no-pull harnesses. A head collar works in a way very similar to a bridle on a horse. Rather than attaching the leash to the base of the neck where the animal has a lot more strength you attach the leash under the muzzle where the animal has less strength. If you capitalize on the dog's weak spot you increase the effectiveness of your own strength. Now that you have the leash attached in a way that gives you the advantage I will explain how this benefits you.

As the dog starts to pull to the fullest extent of the leash its head is forced to turn back toward you, the master. This redirects the dog's attention off of whatever it was pursuing and back on you. Also as your dog starts to walk with a loose leash corrections are much easier to accomplish when the dog "forgets" what it is supposed to do. A simple flick of your wrist will accomplish far more that trying to pull a dog with a buckle collar.

Second I will explain how a slip-collar works. Slip-collars are often known as choke chain, but this name is misleading because if properly used you will not choke your dog. With a slip-collar you are able to adjust the position of the collar from the base of the dog's neck by the shoulders to the top of the neck where it meets the base of the dogs head. The idea is similar to the head-collar. The slip-collar attaches the leash to a weaker part of the dog's neck so you don't work as hard and you have better control with better results. As the dog starts to pull give it a quick pull and release immediately, making sure the collar is positioned so that when you release tension the collar slips and becomes loose again.

Third, is the no-pull harness. This is a harness that has the leash attachment at the dog's chest rather than its back. Like the head-collar, the dog is forced to turn back to you when it tries to pursue something and it allows for quick and easy corrections for the same reason as the head-collar. The advantage of the n0-pull harness is that a dog that constantly fights the head-collar which is around its muzzle will still most-likely accept a no-pull harness which has no parts near the dog's face.

Of these three I prefer the head-collar. I don't like how harnesses look and I don't like the stigma of choke chains. This is purely an opinion. All three work very well as long as they are used properly.

Update...

I am no longer a volunteer at the Brown County Humane Society. I now live and work as a live-in caregiver with my wife and two dogs. We acquired our first dog, Baron, from a breeder that had originally kept him to show but didn't want him any more because he developed some flaws as he reached maturity. Our second dog, Roscoe, we adopted from the local humane society where his mother gave birth to him and his litter-mates.

While I no longer volunteer with large numbers of dogs I still am working with my two dogs, both of which came to my home with their own unique problems. Baron came to me with a fair amount of training but most of this training was geared toward making him a great show dog. He hadn't learned how to sit, roll over, eat nicely and calmly or even how play fetch.

Roscoe came to us at 8 weeks old. He hadn't acquired any training at all. He wasn't house-trained and had no manners for interacting with people and still had a lot of work to do on his manners for interacting with other dogs as well.

With both dogs we are very happy with the progress they have made. They have both learned a number of skills or tricks including learning how to walk like "gentlemen" on their leashes. They both know how to sit and stay as well as lie down. Baron has also learned how to roll over, circle, shake, high five, and sit pretty. As you see from this post both dogs have made huge improvements in their abilities and will continue to do so as I and my wife continue to put our time and effort into training them and making them better canine citizens.

Shelter Problems

Having been volunteering at the Brown County Humane Society since January one thing has become blatantly obvious. This one thing is that the longer a dog is in the shelter the greater the potential for unwanted behavior.

It is unhealthy for a dog to be penned and left alone, separate from people and other dogs. It is accepted fact that dogs are pack animals and live and work in a group. This means that when we kennel dogs separately and leave them alone for long periods of time they are experiencing something unfamiliar and unnatural. These strange situations bring with them added stress and excitement.

It is usually a pretty easy thing to deal with when you own your own dog that gets to run around, play, and go on walks whenever you are home from work, a dog that spends the vast majority of its day out and in contact with people and possibly other dogs. Shelter dogs that are kenneled for the vast majority of the day turn to unwanted behavior to deal with the stress and excitement of this situation. This will start to make them less desirable and in turn almost always guarantee that the dog will be in the shelter that much longer. It all revolves around in a circle. First the dog is in the shelter, then stress and excitement lead to unwanted behavior, then the dog stays in the shelter, and then more unwanted behavior results from the added stress and excitement.

How do we fix this problem? For some shelters it is a possibility to hire some full-time staff. This coupled with a lower number of dogs will decrease the amount of time that a dog is separated and forced to be alone. This will give the dog interaction with humans and hopefully supervised play time with other dogs as well.

But what about a shelter that is entirely volunteer operated? How can a shelter like this cope with these problems? I am seriously asking for some suggestions because I don't know what to do in this situation. Thank you.

Backpacks for Dogs

A while ago we had gotten two backpacks to put on our dogs while we walk them. Our initial reason for using them was to provide a more intense workout for the dogs in a shorter amount of time. It works very well, but I have recently discovered a second, but more important benefit to putting backpacks on our dogs while we walk them.

I have discovered that putting a backpack on a dog is an excellent way to establish myself as the leader. I approach the dog in its own kennel and take ownership of that kennel. Calmly I put the choke chain and leash on the dog and then also the backpack. By doing this calmly I present myself as a calm-assertive leader and the dog is very willing to follow me. The fact that I have put the backpack on the dog does not mean that all pulling will be gone for the walk but is usually minimized.

I have walked five of our current dogs with backpacks and of these five dogs all of them adopt a follower's attitude which makes the walk easier and more enjoyable for both of us.

Pit Bull Progress

Our three pit bulls are working hard. Unfortunately we really do not have the resources to rehabilitate the two with the greatest problems. There is a slight possibility that our pit bulls will be able to go to a specialized pit bull rescue where they will have more time and be able to maximize resources better than we can at Brown County Humane Society. In the mean time we still do what we can to work with these dogs and take baby steps in the right direction.

Chelsey is by far the one with the least difficulties. The problem with Chelsey is that when she feels like there is no one else to take control of a situation she must, and she takes control by baring teeth and biting. Once there is a clear authority however she will refrain from snapping and allow the person in charge to take control of the situation.

Boomer is a very dominant aggressive dog. Whenever he sees something moving he feels a great need to control it. If it is a person, a car, a dog, or another animal he feels this great need to control, or sometimes even to kill. We have started using a dog backpack on him when we walk him so that he needs to focus more of his mental energy on the job he has been given. This does a lot for burning off energy. I can only speak for myself here but Boomer is doing much better on walks than he used to. Now he willingly takes on a follower's role walking next to or even behind me. The downside is that he still tries to go after people, cars, and animals.

Much of Hershey's aggression is fear driven, but some results from excessive excitement. She needs to learn how to control her emotions in a way that will benefit her.

Yesterday Izzy, the black lab mix puppy was adopted and today Penny, the beagle was adopted.

Interested?

If anyone is interested in how any of these dogs are doing leave a comment and I'll let you know.

Rewards from Rescue Dogs

Today was a very rewarding day at the Brown County Humane Society in New Ulm, MN. Two things of great importance happened. The first thing is that we have 3 pairs of dogs that walk well, and the second is that Boomer looks like a different dog when he wears the backpack. I don't know if it would be fair to say that either of these two discoveries is more important than the other but they both hold great importance in different areas.
First off I mentioned that we have 3 pairs of dogs that do very well. This means that we have 3 different cores into which we should be able to start introducing other dogs. Before we introduce other dogs into these pairs I it will be a good idea to mix and match the pairs we have so that each dog will become comfortable with a number of dogs. This will be good for their own individual psychology as well as for making them more appealing to those looking to adopt. If we can successfully mix and match our 3 pairs we will have one very strong core of six dogs into which we will be able to introduce the other dogs that may not do so well. The goal here will be to use the structure of the original core to rehabilitate the new dogs which we choose to introduce.
Now for the second great discovery of the day, Boomer and his backpack. As you may recall from previous posts Boomer is a very dominant dog which can easily turn him into an aggressive dog. While on walks it was very normal for him to pull on the leash, to lung after cars, birds, people, and other dogs. We had made some progress in the past. The last two times I walked him by the end of the walk he was choosing to walk behind me and give me full authority over him. But this didn't happen until the last half, or even quarter, of the walk. Today was completely different, in a much better way.
Since I was able to fix the dog backpack yesterday I couldn't wait to use it today and see how it worked. Boomer was my test subject. At first he didn't really like the idea of me putting it on him as he tried to run away from me but as soon as it was on him it was obvious that he was focusing all his energy on his new job which was to carry that backpack with two cans of dog food in it until I made it clear that he had finished his job. And as soon as I opened his kennel it became even more clear that he had already accepted the role of follower when he took on the backpack. The walk with Boomer today was the most enjoyable walk I have even had with him and I am convinced that this was the case for a couple of reasons.

1) I established myself as his calm-assertive leader the moment I picked up the backpack (before I even entered his kennel).
2) I did not give in to him when he showed me that he didn't want the backpack. Instead I insisted on putting it on him, but once it was on him I did allow him a couple minutes to get used to it.
3) The new object connected to him and swinging on his body gave him a new, more intense job to do rather than just walk.
4) We still followed the normal procedure set out for walks (He doesn't go through the door until I let him and he is always next to, or behind me among other things).

From the moment we walked out the door Boomer assumed a follower's position. As a reward I allowed him the full length of the leash to roam around next to or behind me. Through the entire course of the walk he did not lung at a single car, person, bird, or dog, and he never pulled.
A simple tool like a backpack can do wonders for releasing pent up energy in your dog as is clearly visible in the account of Boomer I have just given. Other accounts of this type of success can be seen in various episodes of Cesar Millan's show The Dog Whisperer among other sources.

Dog Backpack

The Brown County Humane Society now has two dog backpacks. One of the dogs had chewed up one of the backpacks but I was able to fix it this morning. The backpack will become a regular part of the dogs' lives and the volunteers are thankful that we have them now.
The best part about the backpacks is that we now have a way to increase the intensity of the exercise of the dogs without increasing the length of the time doing it. At this point I do not know the time ratio for walking a dog with a backpack to walking one without it but Cesar Millan and other dog professionals advocate the use of backpacks to increase the amount of energy burned during a walk or just while the dog is going about around the house.
After I fixed the backpack that had been chewed through I wanted to see how some of the dogs reacted to having it on their backs. I picked Boomer and Chelsey. They reacted in completely different ways. When I put it on Boomer it was so foreign to him that he froze for about 2 minutes. The added weight of the backpack and the two cans of dog food that were in it were so strange that Boomer didn't know how to react. It was so strange that even though all four legs were not under him when I put the backpack on him he wouldn't move to a more comfortable position. Luckily though he did eventually become more comfortable and he did start to move around in his kennel with it on. Once he became comfortable with it I took it off so the next time I put it on him he will remember the relaxation he felt at the end of his trial run.
After I took it off of Boomer I went to put in on Chelsey. Like I said earlier Chelsey reacted in a completely different way than Boomer did. Chelsey welcomed the backpack and acted like it wasn't even on her back. As you may know from earlier posts Chelsey is usually very obedient and an excellent walker. In her kennel however she can get quite excited and loves to jump up to be close to you. The backpack didn't keep her from jumping, not even a little bit. For all I know she didn't even know it was there. It will be interesting to see how she does with the backpack when she goes for a walk.
I hope to have an update on this tomorrow.

A Rewarding Experience

Yesterday I had one of the most rewarding experiences I've had since I started volunteering at the Brown County Humane Society. I was walking Boomer with a choke chain like I usually do. I was keeping his leash real short to prevent him from being able to assert control over me. I don't want to give him the slightest clue that he is the one who needs to be in charge and not me.
For the first half of the walk he struggled against me. I exhibited the behaviors that I have come to expect from him, lunging after cars and animals, and struggling to take charge and lead. As usual I gave him corrections whenever he behaved in an unwanted manner. Finally at about the halfway point in the walk he settled down for about two minutes and I wanted to reward him for it to reinforce his good behavior. I didn't have any treats left because I had used them all up in the first half of the walk as I tried to reinforce the sit command so instead of giving him food I gave him the rest of the leash. What happened next was amazing.
Boomer took the freedom of the longer leash and reinforced the fact that I was his leader. He didn't take the opportunity to walk in front of me and sniff around but he went directly behind me. This was the first time that I knew Boomer was putting me in the position of his leader and he wanted me to be in that position.
I am not always the best at recognizing my own attitude, or energy as Cesar Millan would say. Sometimes I am very good at ignoring the dog but I think most of the time I focus on the dog. I like to see what the dog is doing so that I can correct bad behavior immediately before it gets out of control. These are the times I have the most problems with the dogs. When I focus on the dog I tend to worry about what the dog will do, but if I focus on the goal I am more calm and assertive. When I focus on the goal I know that I will accomplish it on my terms which gives me more confidence in my abilities.
Looking back at yesterday's walk with Boomer I can pinpoint the transition between Boomer pulling and following to the moment when I decided in my head that I was working toward the goal of a completed, well mannered walk. At this point I started not to worry about what Boomer was doing and I led with confidence rather than with worry.

Update/things to come

I arrived back in New Ulm about an hour ago (9:30 PM). This means that tomorrow I will once again be volunteering at the Brown County Humane Society. As it looks on petfinder.com we have some new dogs as well as some old ones. It looks like Chelsey is still there as well as Boomer with the addition of a couple others and still some more that I just haven't been able to mention yet.
As I said in my last post I hope to start doing some clicker work with one or more of the dogs. I am very excited to see how it goes since I haven't done clicker training before. I hope you are excited to see the results as well.
Another new feature that I hope to include in my posts are videos. I bought a flip video over my break so I now will be able to shoot short video clips of the dogs and and work I do with them.
Check it out in the next few days and see whats new and let me know how you like it. Your feedback is how I know what you want and what you don't. Thanks and enjoy.

Clicker Training

When I get back to New Ulm and volunteering again I will start to use clicker training on some of the dogs. Of course this will be after the time when the old ones get to know me again. Anyway the basic idea behind clicker training is that when the dog does what I want it to do I click my clicker and then proceed to give the dog a treat. The clicker is used as a bridge between the action and the reward. It cements the cause and effect relationship between the dog doing what I want it to do, whether it be sit, lay, or something else, and the reward. When the clicker sound is connected to the treat reward the dog will begin to react to the clicker just like it does to the treat.
One of the main benefits of the clicker is that it becomes much easier to pinpoint the behavior that is wanted and reward that specific behavior rather than cause confusion as to what is actually being rewarded.
Clicker training can be used to teach a variety of animals a variety of different behaviors. You can train anything from a dog, to a mouse, to a horse, to a bird, and a multitude of other animals. The behaviors you can teach are only limited by the limits of your imagination.
Next week when I begin to use clicker training with the humane society dogs I will also be able to shoot some short videos and then update you on what progress is being made.

Possession Guarding

Possession guarding in dogs is a serious issue. This is even more serious when the dog that practices it is exposed to strangers on a regular basis or to children. In both of these cases the dog exhibiting the behavior is most likely approached by people who do not know of this issue or how to behave around a dog with this issue.
Solving this problem takes time. You are not going to be able to make your dog give you any object you want whenever you want it in a single day or even two. Depending on the degree of the possessiveness it may take weeks or months to fix this problem. Don't give up. It can still be done. Before you reach the point when you can take anything from your dog you want it is a good idea to remove toys and other objects your dog guards from its access. Put toys away so that you have to give them to your dog for your dog to play with them. Then when you do decide to give your dog a toy keep treats at your disposal to toss to your dog in order to make him give up the toy, even if it is only long enough to pick up the treat and swallow it. This is the way it has to start. This begins the connection for you dog between you and all good things. The idea is that from this point you will be able to progress ever so slowly to the point when your dog will take the treat out of your hand and then to the point when you can trade a treat for the toy and then to the point when you will be able to tell your dog to drop the toy and he will allow you to take it.
Again, this is not something that is fixed over night, it takes time and patience. Other important factors can include other areas of your life with your dog and how your dog perceives your interactions with each other. In some instances this can be the result of allowing your dog, or making your dog take the position of leader. If this is the case you will need to establish yourself first as your dog's leader and then proceed to work on other issues after that. If your dog does not look at you in a leadership position he will not respect your wishes or your commands. If you have not already established yourself as your dog's leader a structured walk is the best way to do this in my opinion which Cesar Millan supports. This includes boundaries like where your dog must walk in relation to you, and making your dog become calm before you take him out and making him follow you out the door and possibly for the entire walk (I like to keep dogs with their heads parallel to my thigh with everything from their shoulders back behind me).

Vacation

Last night Abby went back home to my brother and his wife. This means that I no longer have a dog to work with for the next week until I go back to New Ulm, MN on the 15th. There are still a few things for me to write about before I go back to New Ulm so I encourage you to visit a few times before the 15th. At least one of those posts coming up will be about possession guarding/aggression. This is one of the issues Abby has which I started to work on with her and I am hoping my brother continues to work on it with her. Right now the basic idea is that whenever she is given a rawhide bone she will be given very small treats to encourage her to give up the rawhide bone. It starts with only getting her to drop the rawhide in order to pick up the treat and then go back to the rawhide but with time and patience the result should be that she will allow anyone to take anything away from her without any negative responses.

Dog Walking, Abby 2

Today I spent a full hour and a half working with Abby on walking. She already does well in a heal position as I stated in my last post but needs work on not pulling when she is allowed more freedom.
When I walk dogs I like to keep them in a heal position for most of the walk but I use the freedom of a longer leash to give rewards along the way by giving them more space and the opportunity to roam a little and sniff about more. Obviously if this is my general practice when walking dogs it is going to be the same when I walk Abby. Since I know that she does not always do so well with the limits of the reward time I started out by requiring her to stay in a heal position for a greater period of time. After establishing the rules of the heal position to a greater extent it was much easier to carry over the limits of the leash to the reward times. All I needed to do in the reward periods was give a small flick of my hand on my end of the leash and Abby would relax and release the tension on the leash. Another important part of this is that while I allow her the freedom of a longer leash the boundaries or clearly defined. As soon as the leash became taunt I flicked my hand because that was too far. I want a loose leash and that was as far away from me as Abby was allowed.
In addition to this the length of the reward period is important. As suggested by Cesar Millan, I only give five minutes of reward time roughly every fifteen minutes. This limits the chance that Abby will start to view the reward time as time when she is in charge and not me.
When I got done working with Abby today I gave her a rawhide bone as a reward for doing such a good job. This is when I discovered a problem in her behavior. Abby is very possessive of her rawhide bones. Since the bone I gave her was a large bone I took it away when she had eaten half of it. To my dismay she clenched it in her teeth, growled, and raised her hackles. I was able to take it when she settled down to start chewing on it again and set it down for a second but this is an issue that needs to be addressed differently from now on or it will most likely become worse.

Once again thank you too my readers and feel free to comment.

Dog Walking, Abby

Abby is my brother's dog. Since he is on vacation I get to take care of her for the week. This means that I become her leader. She has already become a model walker for me...when I keep the leash short and want her at my side. She takes corrections at my side very well and learns to walk with a loose leash in a heal position very well but as soon as I want to reward her by giving her the full length of the leash she is pulling once again. I am confident that this problem can be fixed by investing more time in the walk with Abby.
In addition to being a good walker in a heal position she does well while walking with more than one person at a time. She does not get confused as to who her leader is but I think part of this is due to the fact that my fiancee and I took turns holding the leash and making the corrections to make it clear to Abby that we both were her leaders.
After today it is clear to me that she needs work in two areas for sure. The first area is that of walking on a long leash. The second is running on a leash, or it might just be running with a person. I'm not sure at this point but tomorrow I should be able to determine the second area more specifically.

At this point I would like to thank all of my readers and invite you to leave comments whether they be positive or negative. That way I will be able to reach my readers more effectively. Thank you.

Dog walking, Chance

I have been told a number of times that Chance is the worst dog we have when it comes to walking on a leash. I disagree. Today was my first opportunity to walk Chance. He started out a little head strong and stiff necked but I was firm, consistent, and calm as his leader. First things first, I wait until every dog is calm before a let them go through the door, after I do. This means that I am the leader and I require a calm-submissive attitude before I let them do anything. Since there are three different doors that I need to take a dog through before we get outside the repetition does amazing things. Some dogs, like Chance, will still want to pull when I first get them outside but after about two blocks of timely and consistent corrections they tend to settle down and assume a follower role, even Chance.
Obviously one walk in which Chance was able to eventually assume a follower position is not enough to deem him a good walker. This does however give us a very good starting point from which we can improve.
My tool of choice is becoming more and more a chain. Most dogs are already used to having a collar around their necks so they usually accept a chain very easily. I find this the best for me to use with most dogs, although with dogs who put their heads down to sniff constantly I prefer a halti or gentle leader. With these dogs a chain will slide to the base of their necks and make it useless. The halti or gentle leader maintains control over the heads and necks of these dogs.

It is becoming more and more obvious to me that Cesar Millan is right when he says that 99.some% of all dogs are able to become balanced dogs. Every day I work with these dogs they become one step closer to better balanced and better behaved dogs.

Boomer is getting better

Boomer does great in a place without distractions. I was able to work with Boomer for about an hour and a half again today with a good chunk of that time doing some work at the park. On the way to the park Boomer was the most aggressive. At the park and after the park Boomer become much more calm and submissive but not completely.
An empty park is a nice place to work on a particular problem without distractions like cars, people, and other dogs. I used a long line of about 20 feet. We ran and did some basic obedience work.
The run is what set up the bond that made it possible to do obedience work. Even though I gave him the full 20 feet of line I made it clear that I was his leader. I didn't hit him or punish him. I led and corrected him. I started by giving him about 5 feet of line and had him run next to me. Almost immediately he moved behind me and I rewarded his submissive behavior by giving him more line and inviting him to come next to me and even in front of me. After running for about 20 minutes I had him stop and sit. I had him sit until I had stretched the rope out and then would call and have him come to me. Every time I bent down to reward him with petting. After the basic obedience work we ran a short time again and then we went back to the humane society.
The walk back to the humane society started a little rough as Boomer wanted to take control once we moved to a new setting. By being a calm-assertive leader I was able to get him to calm down and he was totally ignoring both cars and people but still had a little trouble with other dogs by the time we got back.
If we are able to get Boomer out for workouts like this he will be well on his way to becoming more adoptable. We will still need to work on introducing him to other dogs and how he interacts with them but I think it is a very good possibility that this can happen.

Walking, regular collar with a leash

The most obvious option for walking a dog is probably the regular collar/leash combination. This is a collar adjusted to fit around the neck and not slip off over the head. This is one of the last steps before you are able to walk your dog off leash. A collar like this does not increase control beyond the point that the dog cannot actually run away from you. If your dog is one who leads you it will most likely be pulling you down the sidewalk rather than being calm and submissive next to or behind you.
With a dog that recognizes you as leader 100% of the time you will have no problem walking your dog with a regular collar/leash combination.
I would not recommend only this set of tools for teaching any dog how to walk properly on a leash or in your pack.