My 10 month old lab is brilliant around the house, he listens, recall is great, does tricks and is just generally a lovely dog. But as soon as he leaves the house he doesn't listen. Me & my partner took him to puppy classes when he was 4 months old and he did well and learned a lot ( us too). I take him for a walk as soon as I wake up, in the morning he is super excited so I tell him to calm down before I open the back gate for us to leave. If he bursts through the door, we come back in until he calms down and we try again. This seems to be working but the issue is when we get to the park. I walk him on lead for 10-15 minutes to practice his lead walking, I then let him off lead and throw a ball or frisbee for him to burn some energy. If he spots a stick he grabs it and starts chewing it, I tell him to leave it and he does not listen. He will lie down in front of me and chew it looking at me as I'm telling him to leave it. If I try and get near to take it off him he runs off with it. We've used treats to get him to stop doing it but he seems to think sticks are amazing and his treats don't measure up. The big problem we have is how excited he gets to see other dogs, if he sees another dog in the distance he's gone, it will easily take me 10-15 minutes to get him back on lead. I've tried using his recall that works perfectly in the house, he doesn't listen. I've tried running in the other direction to get him to follow me, throwing treats in the direction I want him to go. Any info would be great, Am I better keeping him on lead all the time? Or is he just a lunatic that doesn't listen or will he calm down around other dogs eventually?
It sounds like you (to put it bluntly!) need to train your dog... This means making a list of the things you want to train him to do, and breaking those tasks down. You also need to understand that prevention is an incredibly important part of dog training. If he is able to keep chewing a stick and then to run off with it if you approach him, then he will continue to do that. If he is able to ignore you and run off to another dog or person, then he will continue to do that. Until you implement prevention properly, you will have not much success. You need a 10m long-line (in the US, check-cord) which you clip to his harness and ensure you are always able to grab it or stand within reach of it, whenever you are out of the house. He simply can't be off that until he is reliable with his Drop cue and his recall cue. Then you need to be working on the Drop cue and the recall cue, beginning at home and then progressing away from the house. I like this video for the Drop cue: For the recall (and the drop, actually), you need to be using incredibly tasty treats. For the recall, this might include sardines, pate, smoked mackerel, gourmet wet dog food - all delivered using a plastic toddler spoon. You need to choose your phrase or whistle cue and then you need to practise it over and over at home, 20-30x a day - always for something amazingly tasty until it is deeply programmed into your dog's brain...
