Decided after a lot of checking in, staying close training , to put a collar on Bella, and she didn't even seem phased?! Also , she's been fab walking in collar and lead, very rarely pulling?! I did some click treat to reward this behaviour and just stop if the lead goes a bit too far so she then just stops and turns!! I worried before that I left it too late to try her in a collar but at 6.5 months she great, still wearing her harness as when I see a dog I switch it to harness - as much collar pull reduction as poss. So proud of my pup! Recall also good , she said hello to several dogs today but ran after me when I said ' bye now' ;D just wondered ...does the pulling get worse as they grow or is this a good sign???
Re: Collar and lead success!! It's a good sign You may go through a bit of regression, especially when she hits full-on teenagedom, but just keep doing what you're doing and you'll get through it. My two are generally walked with a lead on their harnesses, but every now and again I have to clip them onto their collars and they don't really act any differently. In super-smelly, exciting environments, I have to work on the stop/start with Willow especially, but I know that it works with absolute consistency, so it's no bother.
Re: Collar and lead success!! Loads of positive things there, she sounds to be doing very well. If your dog gets used to pulling in any attachment, and you change it, there is often a reduction in pulling - as you partly break the old associations. However, unless you train very hard to maintain that, it will be lost as easily as it was gained (because the reasons your dog pulls are still there). I'd say dogs pull more when they grow up a bit and find the world more exciting - unless they don't pull, ie have never been allowed to pull, in which case they seem to get through it fine (based on the experiences we hear on the forum, anyway).
Re: Collar and lead success!! [quote author=JulieT link=topic=10735.msg159499#msg159499 date=1430067982] Loads of positive things there, she sounds to be doing very well. If your dog gets used to pulling in any attachment, and you change it, there is often a reduction in pulling - as you partly break the old associations. However, unless you train very hard to maintain that, it will be lost as easily as it was gained (because the reasons your dog pulls are still there). I'd say dogs pull more when they grow up a bit and find the world more exciting - unless they don't pull, ie have never been allowed to pull, in which case they seem to get through it fine (based on the experiences we hear on the forum, anyway). [/quote] Thanks both. I think it's as she's never 'learnt ' to pull on a collar ( so far ) and to be fair never overly pulled on her harness - only if she saw other dogs there would be some pull, just wondered when I should keep her on collar and lead around other dogs, I'm thinking keep going with it minus dogs then 'one day' introduce another dog and so on? Saw a man at puppy class demonstrate a sit by pulling his dogs collar up high , made me flinch, his wife said but ' I see you have both collar and harness' explained my reasoning, next week she came back telling me she had bought a clicker, started reading up and was amazed by her collies response walking next to her ;D
Re: Collar and lead success!! Wow that's amazing CDM. This is coming from someone who invested a year in training my pup not to pull! And even then, pulling toward other dogs or people presented it's final challenge! I think where I went wrong with Gemma was allowing her to pull like a steam train from 12/13 weeks of age as we started walkies and exploring the big wide world. Just out of interest how do others deal with this? I was vaugely aware what was going on, in a bad way, but had no idea to prevent it. - We were still just inside the socialisation window, I wanted her to explore as much of the outside world as possible. - But everything, literally every new stimuli, resulting in excited pulling toward it, whether that was a lamppost sniff, an interesting grass verge, any scent trail etc - I took advantage of any chances for lead+lead doggy introductions, which always resulted in pulling. - I didn't want her to NOT have those experiences, obviously (other than the pulling bit!) - I definitely didn't want to be using lead corrections, or do anything to interfere with such an important set of socialization experiences. Sure, I tried teaching heel from day one. That's what all the books say etc. We had great results with the clicker for marking the heel position, and she learned it fast. Except what the books didn't say was that a 3 month old pup has the mental maturity and attention span of a 2yr old child and that it takes months and months of work to get a reliable heel, with distractions, for any useful duration. Now what do we do about the other 20 minutes? Long term yes, make an early start yes. But quite useless to prevent pulling in those earliest of weeks. I think if I'd had a better plan for those early walks where she learned that pulling is rewarding, we wouldn't have had to spent best part of a year changing things around! Which we have, I'm pleased to say! But with hindsight, I can't help but wonder what we could have done differently to prevent it being "learned" in the first place?
Re: Collar and lead success!! [quote author=CDM link=topic=10735.msg159502#msg159502 date=1430068637] just wondered when I should keep her on collar and lead around other dogs [/quote] There is no magic in a collar, or in a harness - what will stop your dog pulling is to train. If you don't train, her improvement on the collar won't last. So it doesn't matter whether you use a collar or a harness. Personally, I would use a harness. It is a far superior way to attach yourself to a dog, particularly a dog that might pull to other dogs. A collar around sensitive neck parts is an inherently bad idea. [quote author=JohnG link=topic=10735.msg159511#msg159511 date=1430071785] I think if I'd had a better plan for those early walks where she learned that pulling is rewarding, we wouldn't have had to spent best part of a year changing things around! Which we have, I'm pleased to say! But with hindsight, I can't help but wonder what we could have done differently to prevent it being "learned" in the first place? [/quote] I drove my dog to off lead walks until he'd learned to walk on a lead - he met 100s of dogs off lead on Wimbledon Common. He was off lead on his very first walk after his vaccinations. I live in a city, so socialisation was easy. I'd drive to the station, or a school, or supermarket, and sit down on a bench. We met every manner of things, people, etc. I then started walking him on streets and made sure that I did so when I had time to train. He did start pulling, but I was always training, so we were doing ok. So we were far from perfect, but doing really ok. This came to a crashing halt when he was injured at 8 months and went from being active to zero. He was super frustrated, absolutely desperate for doggy company, and his lead walking went downhill rapidly - it wasn't really proofed against much at that point. So we also spent a long, long, time on "no pull". It was painful, and tedious, but worked in the end. It didn't ever great really good though until he was back on full exercise, and his frustrations reduced (he is a very excitable dog, although better with a bit of maturity). Next pup, I'd do the same (hopefully without the injury episode) - only I'd be even stricter about never walking on a lead anywhere that my dog couldn't manage without pulling.
Re: Collar and lead success!! Very interesting Julie thank you. I was aware of the concept in doing some pre-vaccination socialisation by carrying them about, but it never occurred to me that could help bombarding their senses prior to starting walkies
