Canreef Aquatics Bulletin Board

Quote:

Originally Posted by busypencil (Post 482112)

You must realize that the decends from a pack mentality. You and your wife-girlfriend are the pack to the dog. No in a pack someone has to be boss. To be boss they have to be respected. Sometimes people get their emotions involved when they have a tendancy to think of the dog as a little person in their house hold and he is not. There are a few simple things you can do to get the idea across as to who is boss.
Food is usually the easiest. Do not leave his food on the floor for him to self feed. Then in his mind the floor is the provider and who are you that I have to respect.
When feeding the dog put food in a dish call the dog. At this time you have to have an idea in your mind of what type of behaviour you want as an end result. If the dog jumps up on you at feeding time this is disrespect, and the best way to treat this is to pivit to your right no talk no touch no eye contact. After all you are boss and he is nothing but a lower pack member. The dog will do what works and if jumping up gives him what he wants in his mind he will continue to do it. IF you responce to jumping is different such as turning away he will enitially try harder. Keep you responce constant. When he realizes it is not working he will stop. If he is hungry he will finally sit and stare at you. Bingo. Now he is willing to take direction from you. If he is trained to sit with one command ask no tell him to sit with conviction in your voice it does not have to be loud but not a plea. Once and once only. If he is not trained to sit mearly use the food to shape the behaviour first before introducing commands. By placing the food just over his head in such a way that he does not jump but is incline to sit to reach the food 2 inches out of reach. It is important at this time to praise as this is the indication reward is comming from this marked behaviour. Then lower his dish and allow the dog to eat. If he will not respond in the desired manner such as continue to jump or walks away he is not hungry enough so put food away for the day and try again next schedual. He will not starve so do not treat him. A time will come when he will understand you are leader and supply the food of life at which time you time your feeding after a sit when the dog is watching your eyes. Praise and reward (feed) You are now much more important in the pack and on your way for respect in other areas. I.E. Do not him lead you on the walk the dog in front is the leader. That is your place. reverse directions you may not go far in the first few walks but he will get the idea. You are first. Even through doorways he waits while you go through even if you have to go through backwards to ensure you go through first. Be consistant. I am sure the paper or kennels in your area can put you in touch with clicker training or other positive methods of training in your area.

Thanks.

Yeah he actually has to work for his food. He does not eat out of a dish when he eats dry food. He has to listen to commands and his reward is small portions of his food from my hand each time. So feeding takes about 20 minutes or so but its worth it I think. He gets wet food a few times a week as well but I do put that in a dish :lol: For wet food though, he has to sit about 3 feet away, wait for me to put it in the dish and then sit still until the timer on the stove goes off. I set it to about 1 minute right now. Took a long time for him to learn this but now when I feed him wet food, he will just sit a few feet from the full dish until the timer goes off.

I can teach him new commands in a matter of hours. He is very smart and obedient now. Very easy to train and knows for sure that we are boss. He is very respectful of our space and I couldn't be happier with him at home when its just the two of us.

Now its a whole different story when other people come over :sad: or on walks. All this goes out the window. Hes very slowly getting better on walks but still can't handle seeing other dogs.

I am still kind of lost on how to fix this. He obviously needs more socialization but so far the one daycare near us doesn't seem to want him there because when I went in to inquire he was pretty hyper and I could tell they weren't too impressed. They told me right away that they don't like to take small, energetic dogs. I had called a week ago to ask and they had room but then suddenly when I went in that day, they were booked "for a long time". Yeah right.

We don't really have all that many people over and honestly less now because of him. It's just not fair to the people that come over. I know people need to so he gets used to it but its a lot to ask people to put up with. I lease him in the house when people come over but then its all howling, whining and barking...ugh!