Doing Obedience Club With Two Dogs

[huski]

Hey guys

I have been taking Daisy to obedience club for a few months now, we are progressing nicely (everything is a challenge with a beagle though, lol).

Micha my husky has had a private lesson with a behaviourist, as he started lunging at some strange dogs that walked past us on our evening walk, after having a dog try and attack us on our walk one day. He is also very dominant with younger dogs. He's never been in a serious fight or injured another dog before but then again I wouldn't give him the opportunity!

So far I am quite happy with Micha's progress, he used to go to the dog park everyday for several years but obviously we have stopped doing that when his behaviour worsened, he doesn't want to allow any strange dog approach me. I have a couple of times put him with new dogs, he will ignore them and recall well but if I allowed him to focus on them and get face to face with them he'd snap at them (not all the time, but it is irregular as to which dog he won't like). He loves dogs that he knows, and will play with them happily.

I took him to get a hydrobath on Sunday, there were quite a few dogs there he doesn't know, he was fine, he wasn't interested in them at all. He happily stood with me in line in rather close proximity to other dogs. However, if we saw a strange dog on our walk he would probably been different.

I am wanting to take him to club with me every now and then, his obedience is great and I am very happy with it, but I would like to get him used to be near strange dogs and I feel he is at a stage where he might be ok with the amount that are at obedience school (numbers are quite small at the moment as it is winter).

Does anyone else have experience in taking a dog dominant/aggressive dog to obedience? Did it work for you and your dog, did they improve at all? I don't care if he never wants to play with another new dog again, but I just want him to be able to be near another dog without wanting to protect me or lunge. He has improved greatly from our training program and I feel it may be time to "step it up".

Also, if you train two different dogs, how do you do club? Do you alternate which dog you take each week (they would be in different classes but on at the same time)? At the moment I would only take Mish every now and then, maybe once or twice a month. Would this be enough to make a difference?

Thanks in advance everyone

Edited July 19, 2007 by husky87

[poodlefan]

What does your behaviourist recommend?

One thing you need to be mindful of with an aggressive dog... dog obedience clubs have a substantial number of members who are oblivious to the 'personal space' issues of other dogs. At our club, despite the constant barrage of information about giving all dogs space, they allow their dogs to approach dogs tied up and don't watch their dogs around others.

You could see a lot of hard work go down the toilet.. I'd not be doing it unless your behaviourist agreed with it and gave you some strategies on how to manage it.

Edited June 5, 2007 by poodlefan

[huski]

What does your behaviourist recommend?

One thing you need to be mindful of with an aggressive dog... dog obedience clubs have a substantial number of members who are oblivious to the 'personal space' issues of other dogs. At our club, despite the constant barrage of information about giving all dogs space, they allow their dogs to approach dogs tied up and don't watch their dogs around others.

You could see a lot of hard work go down the toilet.. I'd not be doing it unless your behaviouralist agreed with it and gave you some strategies on how to manage it.

At our club they have the yellow ribbon rule - any dog with a yellow ribbon must be given a wide berth. I thought the same thing as you PF but it works quite well, the trainers remind everyone of it at the start of the night and point it out to everyone in the class. We had a dog with a yellow ribbon in our class a couple of nights ago and it was successfully given lots of space.

I am emailing the behaviorist right now, I just wanted to know if anyone had any personal experience with this sort of situation.

Edited June 5, 2007 by husky87

[jaybeece]

Does anyone else have experience in taking a dog dominant/aggressive dog to obedience? Did it work for you and your dog, did they improve at all? I don't care if he never wants to play with another new dog again, but I just want him to be able to be near another dog without wanting to protect me or lunge. He has improved greatly from our training program and I feel it may be time to "step it up".

Yep, I used to take my boy along every week and it most definitely helped him to ignore other dogs around him. Now we haven't been for a while I see the difference in that he's more easily distracted by other dogs than he was before.

The biggest issue I had was being able to keep him from reacting week in, week out. It could be stressful for both of us and we did have slip ups when I didn't catch him early enough (usually due to being a little hungover), which would be a backwards step every time. Keeping him at a bit of a distance from the rest of the class was the best way to go as he wasn't quite so wound up, but we did participate in weaving around other dogs as long as none of them had any aggression problems. The other problem is that the class we're in involves a bit of offlead work which I'm not comfortable participating in for the time being so we do have to sit out on a few exercises.

I keep meaning to go back at least once a month since his training is going extremely well, but the 8am starts on a Sunday are hard to get back into

[huski]

Yep, I used to take my boy along every week and it most definitely helped him to ignore other dogs around him. Now we haven't been for a while I see the difference in that he's more easily distracted by other dogs than he was before.

The biggest issue I had was being able to keep him from reacting week in, week out. It could be stressful for both of us and we did have slip ups when I didn't catch him early enough (usually due to being a little hungover), which would be a backwards step every time. Keeping him at a bit of a distance from the rest of the class was the best way to go as he wasn't quite so wound up, but we did participate in weaving around other dogs as long as none of them had any aggression problems. The other problem is that the class we're in involves a bit of offlead work which I'm not comfortable participating in for the time being so we do have to sit out on a few exercises.

I keep meaning to go back at least once a month since his training is going extremely well, but the 8am starts on a Sunday are hard to get back into

Thanks for your reply Jaybeece.

Micha would definately not be doing offlead work! You have to be in advance class to do that anyway

The behaviourist we use showed me a few good techniques to use when training Micha around other dogs, but I agree, giving him distance would be the best thing to do.

I have been doing work with Micha on a smaller scale, such as when we pass dogs on our daily walk or like I said in the OP at the local hydrobath etc. I also walk past the dog park right along the fence line and get him to do sit/stays etc near the other dogs. He has been doing well at this which is why I feel it may be time to step it up.

Glad to hear it helped your boy

[skip]

Hi Husky87

I take two dogs to obedience and agility. Obedience I take one dog in the first session and the next in the second session. We obviously have two sessions and we start at 9.30 am. It would be a very quiet day at training with a 8 am start!!!! The dog not working is in a pen but mine are small. And I swap which dog goes first as they are both so desperate to work. Although in the second session I am at a disadvantage. I am in the higher group so the dogs do basic heeling pattterns,warm up etc in the first and then in the second it's straight to harder exercises. So I have to be accepting of the fact that the second dog is not as settled.

And I'm sorry, I am not that experienced with dogs but I thought taking a agressive dog to training would only be good.

There was a man who came with a agressive unsocialised dog. But the man himself was loud, rough and given to threatening the dog with his fist! Nobody knew how to deal with this. But it was even more strange that this man had even come to training. One trainer in particular saw the fact that he was there as meaning something. Over time he has learnt to tone down his behaviour. He is learning to treat his dog with respect and affection. At the end of the year he and his dog received a special award for encouragement. The dog itself was agressive to dogs and I don't think many people would go near it either. But now the dog has improved out of sight. Sorry this is a long tale but some part of our small country obedience club is about socialising dogs. Many dogs these days are rescued and already have bad habits. We also get too many hunting types as pig hunting is popular.( disgusting in my opinion but thats another topic )

Glad you have a behaviourist to advise. Good luck with it.

[Mooper]

I found that it helped Jack immensely, in combination with social walks with ARFers and get-togethers with dogs he knew.

When he came home from the pound at age 4, nearly three years ago (where does the time go? ) he was so protective of me on walks that we couldn't pass a driveway with a dog behind the gate without Jack barking.

Through consistent training, establishing and enforcing the pack structure and non-threatening experiences, he improved greatly. Adding a clicker to our training regime was the next step to improvement.

He still hates every husky and mal he sees on-sight, though. I have no idea why And he wasn't too keen on a white shepherd we saw at the Million Paws Walk, either.

Our club didn't have the yellow-ribbon rule, but it was small enough that the instructors knew that Jack didn't like dogs in his face. Controlled greetings were fine.

As you say, the smaller numbers in winter could work in your favour. But I'd be guided by the behaviourist first and foremost. Can they perhaps attend the first night with you, to assess the options? You want to set Micha up for success :D

[huski]

Just a quick update to let those who are interested know I got around to taking Micha to training this week. A wonderful DOLer who works as a trainer at the club offered to put micha in her class so I coud do some desensitisation training with him. She has knows the behaviourist I've used and has done workshops with Steve from K9 Force and was very helpful!

Before going I talked to our behaviourist and she agreed that as long as I could train micha at the right pace and distance for him that it would be beneficial taking him to class. I was so surprised at how well behaved micha was throughout the class. As it was a level one class there were a lot of young dogs and puppies which Micha always wants to dominate. However, I was able to get him as close as a couple of metres or so away from the other dogs without any lunging, or his focus being poor! He was very good during the sit/stays as he was next to a rotti which I thought he might feel intimidated by, however he was very focused on me the whole time. He didn't lunge or even raise his hackles once.

This is enormous progess for him to be this comfortable around other dogs. His focus was much better than I expected especially considering that it was a new environment for him. I tried really hard to make it a very positive experience, he got lots of roast chicken treats I never expected him to be able to get so close to other dogs with no problems. Obviously, I didn't want to rush him in getting him closer to other dogs but his focus surprised me and improved greatly as the class went on. He even heeled quite nicely (for a sibe anyway )

I am glad that I've found a good place to take him for socialisation, where I can trust that the other dogs will be leashed etc and that he is comfortable there. I am thinking I'll take him once a month or so, and take daisy the rest of the time as she is the one that needs the most work :D I am just so proud of my boy right now!! :p

efs

Edited July 19, 2007 by husky87