 With just a few weeks until the baby comes, Chubbs practiced walking next to the stroller.
Initially he was excited and pulled, but then we switched him to a front clip/anti-pull harness and it made a big difference. I think he's ready for his new brother or sister.  Sully is very impulsive. He jumps on people, chases cats, and pretty much does whatever
comes to mind. So Wait and Stay are very important skills for him to learn. Within a few minutes we had him waiting at the door instead of charging out to chase the cats, and staying while we walked into the kitchen and rattled his treat box. He did great!  Henry already sits very well, so today we taught him Down and Stay. He mastered down in a matter of minutes, but stay was a bit more challenging because little puppies like to follow us around! But with some patience we were able to walk out of his line of sight without him getting up.
 TIP #1: BASIC MEET & GREETS
A good meet and greet consists of the two dogs smoothly making muzzle to muzzle contact followed by some mutual rear investigation. Then either play will break out or the dogs will go their separate ways. A male may urinate on the next available vertical surface. Meet and greets may feature stiffness, posturing and snarky stuff. The latter sometimes indicates some lack of social skill or confidence, or simply routine friction in normal dog interactions. It's a good general policy with unknown quantity dogs to break meet and greets off after several seconds, if the dogs don't do so themselves. If there is some snarking or if they get stuck in some stiff posture, break them off. Happy talk them while walking away if one or both dogs are too stiff. If you want to try again after breaking it off, wait a couple of minutes before re-engaging to let them cool off. Keep the dogs moving during the break and keep up the happy talk even as you disengage. Put the problem dog(s) through some obedience paces at some distance. Then try again. - Excerpted from FIGHT! A Practical Guide to Dog-Dog-Aggression TIP #2: WHAT TO DO ABOUT CRATE SOILING If Spot eliminates in his crate even when not overcrated, your first course of action is to rule out medical problems. Loose stools, a urinary tract infection, or other incontinence problems make it impossible for a dog to hold it for normal periods of time. Assuming all is well, there are several other possible causes of crate soiling:
Solution for crate-soiling Your approach to Spot's crate-soiling behavior depends on the cause. If he has learned to soil his crate, it may help to change his bedding, or remove bedding altogether until he's retrained. Bedding that absorbs fluids, such as a blanket, can make it more comfortable for your dog to be in his soiled crate. His current bedding also may have become his preferred substrate. Try newspaper instead, a square of heavy duty compressed foam rubber (the kind used for flooring), or no bedding. A tether may be a reasonable alternative to nighttime crating. Make sure his crate is the correct size - big enough for him to stand up, turn around, and lie down comfortably. If it's too large he can potty in one end and sleep in the other. Perhaps you're just not making sure Spot eliminates outside before you crate him. In your morning rush to get to work on time, you let him out in the backyard and assume he empties before he comes back in. That may be an incorrect assumption. If it's cold or rainy, he may have huddled on the back porch, waiting to be let back in. Perhaps he was distracted digging for moles under a bush, or barking at the kids walking past the yard on their way to school. Maybe he gets a cookie for coming back into the house, so he's skipping the step where he's supposed to go pee on the grass first. It could be a substrate preference problem - he wants to pee on grass, and all he can find is snow! - Whole Dog Journal  TIP #1: PROPER WALKING ETIQUETTE
Teach your dog the difference between walking and heeling. Whether you're teaching "Heel," or the less formal "Let's walk," the correct position for the part of the leash that stretches from you to the dog is slack, hanging down in a valley. Be sure when your dog is with you that you keep the leash slack. If you keep it tight, he'll think tension in the leash is normal and correct. Here are a couple of things to remember while you're teaching your dog proper walking etiquette:
TIP #2: DON'T LOSE YOUR MIND OVER TRAINING REGRESSIONS People are terribly mystified by any change in their dog's behavior and go on a lot with the "why? WHY" as though there should never be any variability whatsoever in this living organism's behavior. Training regressions are a frequent occurrence and no big deal. It is so important to remember that behavior is always in flux, constantly subjected to whatever contingencies there are in the environment as well as being influenced by unknown internal events. Stay calm and train. - Excerpted from The Culture Clash  Today we taught Kane how to Come When Called. We began by playing recall games but he just wasn't responding as well as I like. We then upgraded our reinforcers to spray liver and
peanut butter and they made such a difference. Even outside we had him running to us.  Cooper steals papers off the desk and likes to chase the cat, so teaching him Leave It is a skill that will come in quite handy. We first taught him with food but then generalized it to these other things. By the end of our session he was mostly leaving the cat alone, which was a big improvement.
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AuthorJeff Dentler, CPDT-KA, IAABC-ADT, FFCP, CTDI Archives
September 2024
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