jaybeece

My folks had a dog around the same age that was wonderful with all dogs until he hit around 8-ish and he started to become less tolerant with younger dogs in particular. We picked up a young adult female dog from the pound not long after and he cheered up almost overnight. I swear she added years to his life. I don't know if that's typical of all only dogs as they get older, but it does seem that they (only's in particular) get more intolerant of rude behaviour and more picky about what dogs they'll accept. If that's the case though it doesn't mean she should be allowed to keep it up, everything Erny's said is right on (as usual ) and you want to make sure the new pup is accepted without too many dramas.

more gremlins

gremlins

Mine turned 3 last week and I'm still waiting patiently for the brain fairy to turn up Slack cow. That said he's much better than he used to be. He had a particularly stupid day yesterday (couldn't focus, heel, sit, stay, or anything else) which really highlighted how far we've come from when he was a silly puppy, thankfully he was back to normal after a walk wore him out.

right (shake right paw), left (shake left paw), crawl, up-up, off, over, on-the-bed (he'll go drop on anything that resembles a bed, even a towel) and sniff (instead of eating something in front of him he sniffs it).

Yup, I have and they said I'm in What's your direct email addy?

Sadly finances are only going to (just) cover Sunday + a private consult (if we get in), but I appreciate the offer anyway!

K9: when it comes to bringing a dog, some who have attended more tha one have felt that sometimes they prefer to learn without the dog there, less distracting, others like to have the dog there, not many places you can actually take your dog these days & we also may work that dog.. We may not work every dog there, there are many variables such as how many dogs, how many questions etc etc, but we will try & give a good coverage.. You could bring your dog & if i is crate trained bring the crate. Not sure what you mean by basket case, but the crate can help an anxious dog through the day... Ahh sorry, by basket case I mean he can just get a bit worked up and anxious if he's trying really hard not to get upset by other dogs. He can hold it in for a while, but the anxiety just ends up building until he can't handle it any longer. I avoid these situations any time I can, but there are times when it's hard (ie. vet waiting room). He is very well behaved in general and would make a good example dog though, I guess it really depends on how many dogs are there and how close they'll be. He's not crate trained at the moment, but I've always intended to do it as soon as we get a crate so this will be a good motivator to get off my arse and do it That could definitely help ease any anxiety brought on by other dogs.

Actually I'd like to know if bringing one with issues would be a problem I'm considering bringing mine, but if he's just going to be a basket case all day because there's other dogs there it won't be very productive. But since I want to attend the Sunday seminar he could most definitely be used to demonstrate stuff.

My dog went through a period of being very warey of strangers, to the point where I was beginning to worry it'd develop into fear. He'd cringe when new people came through the front door and would nervously almost nip at them if they paid too much attention to him. So I stopped visitors from paying any attention to him. He is to be ignored as much as possible until he's had a minute or so to sniff them and after that they're his best friend. He gradually showed signs of improvement using that alone as people weren't the challenge they once were at the front door and sometimes even had food for him. He's improved out of sight after a lot more socialising at dog school and in public as well, but the fact is that he's still warey of strangers and I don't expect him to change. The reaction is no longer verging on fearful though, just warey and I don't think that trying to push him any further would be productive or good for him.

My boy went up a class in obedience today He went up to class 3, which he was in at our old club, but it's still exciting as I've been dying to get back to where we were. He also happened to have a very good day with other dogs, part of the test was to go free and be social and he passed it beautifully, despite having a couple of big dogs only a metre or 2 away

I've had 2 strange dogs come in recently and my boy is not generally very good with strange dogs. The first (female greyhound) was introduced in the house. He pushed her around a bit and didn't handle any crowding at all well. There was also some resource aggression when the other dog found a cat toy (I could have sworn I picked up all the bloody toys!). After a bit he calmed down, but he really wasn't interested in the dog and didn't know what to do with her even after a couple of hours. I learned from the first, so the next dog (female border collie) was introduced in the street out the front of the house, then they went for a walk together for half an hour or so. When they came back to the house we had no problems at all, although he took over an hour to become interested in playing with her. I didn't test toys with them, but I get the feeling he would have happily shared a tennis ball with her. In the future all new doggy intros will be done the same as the second dog.

Oh please me, please please, me! Any time, day or night. I sent an email to your bookings folk, but they said they can't book anything in quite yet.

Mine's always done the same thing :D The bugger generally doesn't pull out front, but he will yank me towards trees that he wants to sniff and/or pee on. I've switched to a leather lead (used to have one similar to yours) and I watch for when he's just started to pull, then correct him and have him sit back next to me. He then gets to go free and sniff on the condition that he doesn't pull to get there. It's slow progress, but he has improved That's so awesome Sounds like all that hard work is paying off for you! Congratulations and I hope she keeps getting better.

Or tell her there's broken glass on the front nature strip! You could also grow the grass longer as a deterrant

What on earth? Surely the council won't take that kind of complaint seriously? It's normal for dogs to bark at people walking past the house, especially when they come by that close!

I'd really like updates on how you go, so if this one is abandoned it'd be great if you could start a new one :D

My 2 big ones are: Stressing out when you need to be calm and Using leash as a steering wheel It's so hard to get out of the habit of both, especially the stressing one. Using the lead for steering kind of ties into stressing I guess as I want to make sure I have complete control at all times. The rest I think I'm pretty good with

I've been following this thread for a little while and just wanted to say good luck RottyLover01 I really admire your dedication and persistance with this dog and I hope a session with K9 will help straighten things out. I also understand how you feel. I had a behaviouralist come see my boy once who was lovely and extremely knowledgeable, but unfortunately her suggestions didn't have the impact I was hoping for. I also joined a dog school that had been recommended to help him, that bombed out. For me money has been a pretty big issue and I can't afford to just throw it away in the hope that someone can eventually help us, so now I just go an obedience club every week to slowly chip away at the problem by getting in some positive experiences and improving his obdience. He's not getting any worse and sometimes shows improvements and for now that's all I'm after. I'm really just biding my time until K9 and Erny put on their show in Victoria And hoping that K9 just maybe has room for a private consult....

:cool: Well....mine peed on a weed the other day :D I just wish I'd trained him to do that

Totally agree :D As far as my dog is concerned I'm going to hell for being a big meanie Sad looks get him nowhere and he knows it. I guess it's a good preparation for kids some day...

Mine is trained to throw up on tiles/lino/floorboards He started making hucking noises tonight and took off racing down the hallway. I tried to haul him into the bathroom, but then realised he was headed for either the back door or the kitchen. I'm so proud of him, even though thanks to my attempts at getting him into the bathroom he didn't quite make it in time and most of it went on the carpet His best tricks are left (left handshake), right (right handshake), crawl (just downright cute) and he can sit from a drop. Ok, nothing that exciting, but he knows them very well. EDIT: OOOH and he gets into the bathtub all on his own now! He's a sooky lala about water, but the towel rub down at the end is obviously enough incentive to climb on in

Another boring one from me... I took le mutt to the beach last night so he could go for a paddle on his long lead in a quiet spot. This is a little way down from the Brighton offlead area so we walked past a lot of onlead dogs on the way there and back. Normally he loses his mind when larger dogs approach head on, but he walked beautifully past around 6-8 dogs without showing any sign of getting worked up. In fact the couple of occasions when he did get excited to the point of pulling on the lead were very justified- I ran into a friend with her 2 tiny dogs and he desperately wanted to say HI! HI! HI! HI! to her but couldn't because her dogs are terrified of him. Even when he was out on the end of his lead and a larger dog was let off nearby (illegally) he didn't fixate on it and I managed to call him back pretty easily. I'm so proud of him The extra socialising at dog school has really paid off well.

Ah yes, I've used this before to distract mine from approaching dogs when he'd normally be out front barking and choking himself to get at them. It's helped quite a lot to keep him focused and seems to keep him calm as I'm almost between him and the other dog.

I like that he's a big believer in treating dogs like dogs, having strong leadership and providing ample exercise. The regular appearance of pit bulls as the stable control dogs is really awesome too I read one of his books and was really inspired by it. I don't however like the one size fits all solutions he gives and the idea that everything is centred around dominance and submission. The alpha rolling he does could be downright dangerous in the wrong hands, and I've also never seen him try it on a bigger dog So no idea how he'd handle aggression in a dog that was too big to manhandle. All in all he's better than most televised dog trainers, but I can understand if some people don't think much of him.