Me again! ;D Sorry if these seem like silly questions. Dexter is 10 weeks old today and Karl and I have bought his lead to walk him around the garden before he goes out into the open world (still a few weeks to go!) A few questions... 1. What age would you think is best to start getting him used to being on a lead? 2. What type of lead would be best? Any articles that people can point me towards would be great! As always, grateful for all responses!
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden Paige,I'm rushing to go out so cant write in detail but please be advised by me that you need to tread carefully,I totally cocked up collar and lead walking with Dexter and we had to go right back to the basics...There was a long thread there's recently in either Labrador puppies or chat titled zig zagging on the lead .....lots of wailing from me but Pippa commented in there too and she has written articles on this in the main site which will really help.If you start right it will help enormously ......I was so inexperienced I messed it up x
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden Hi Paige , I started Sam off on a very lightweight material type collar and lead as soon as he came home at nine weeks, used to put the lead on indoors and let him just trail it around the house and then in the garden too, sometimes holding the end . By the time he was allowed to go for proper walks , the lead wasnt such a big deal, he accepted it as a necessary evil
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden Echo Angela - spend lots of time looking it up before trying! The threads are: "Collars" on 1st July in labrador chat And "zig zagging on the lead" on 10th July in labrador chat And "which lead" on 5th April in labrador puppies I boiled down the advice (for me, for my pup) to this: Teach puppy to walk alongside you without a lead first - clicker train this, see Pippa's article on how to do it. Drive to off lead exercises areas at first, don't try to walk a long distance along a street with distracions before the puppy knows how. Use a harness to keep the puppy safe when not training how to walk on a lead and/or before reliably not jumping and lunging towards other dogs and people. Clicker train walking alongside you on a harness and lead - same article as above. Use a collar and lead once puppy has learnt to walk properly to heel without a lead and on a harness. So the collar is never associated with pulling. But I'm sure everyone has different methods, the above worked for me. Good luck!
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden Iv just been to my first puppy socialisation/training class and had murphy on his harness and lead because he pulls and lunges at other dogs so I knew he would there too, but the trainer made me out his lead to his collar and said he would just learn not to pull because it will hurt his neck. It was horrible because then he was making horrible noises and kept coughing and choking! Iv decided as other people have written to get Murphy walking to heel off lead first and if we do take him out for socialising etc he will have his harness on. But at the puppy classes he will be on his collar and lead. The trainer said he should have a lead and collar for training and a lead and harness for fun walks. There are so many different ways to do everything depending on where you look it's really hard to know the best thing, I am just playing it by ear and seeing what works best for me and murphy.
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden Wow! I'm so glad I asked now. We'll be sure to take all of this on board. Thanks very much for all of your detailed answers I'll look for the topics named tonight or tomorrow
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden [quote author=Fwhitt246 link=topic=2244.msg20756#msg20756 date=1376337859] the trainer made me out his lead to his collar and said he would just learn not to pull because it will hurt his neck. It was horrible because then he was making horrible noises and kept coughing and choking! [/quote] Same thing happened to me - after the first class, I said I wouldn't return to have my dog damage his neck like this, and the trainer agreed it was best he stayed on a harness. So we stayed in class. Otherwise, I would have left. He was worse in puppy class at first than outside, because he was so keen to get to the other puppies - very tempting for a young friendly labrador!
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden My turn to ditto Julie.My obedience class trainer actually suggested a front fastening harness for Dexter.the pulling in class was even worse than on our walks fueled by the fact that his diet was so restricted at the time.Not only did he want to go and meet and play with everyone,he wanted all their tastier treats so the pulling of his neck and the noises were making me weep!Dexter is our first dog and I have taken the responsibility for his training,boy I make mistakes as I go along...but one thing (amongst many ???)that I have learned is have confidence in standing up for what you want for your dog....if its something that's making you uncomfortable please don't accept it for your dog x
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden I would have thought any trainer would be happy with what you choose for your dog/puppy to make training easier. When I took Hattie to training classes as a puppy Ray accepted all kinds of harnesses, slip leads, canny collars, haltis, the works and they were happy dogs and puppies. This was also the same when she progressed to Obedience Class. Angela is right, speak up and do what you think is right for your dog. Helen xx
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden I agree. You will get as many opinions as people you ask. My trainer advocates a figure 8 slip lead. Lots of negative comments on the forum about using these. I have to say it has been fine for us - not saying though that it is the best for everyone (/anyone?). I think that there is probably no substitute for encouraging walking to heel off lead before even getting near to lead walking. This is said with hindsight : Its easier to do it right from the beginning than try to fix things once gone wrong. Loads of advice from Pippa on the main site about this. jac
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden I agree Jac about walking to heel off lead before attempting on lead, and with our next puppy I will definitely do that as I didn't know all this when we got Hattie our first dog : Helen x
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden Ditto ditto ditto Jac and Helen!Im gutted I mucked it up......get the off lead heel before the lead and collar.... If only I knew then what I know now too! But hey oh! So when are you getting your next puppy helen? ;D x
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden Yea I am going to work hard on walking to heel off lead and then I am definitely going to keep him on the harness when he's in situations where he's going to pull a lot so I'm just going to say to the trainer that thats that. I didn't actually agree with some of the other stuff she said as well as it was different and against stuff iv read on here but as already said, everyone has different opinions. Something that annoyed me a bit was that she huffed when I said that I mainly use his kibble when training (unless doing recall and if i happen to havechicken or sausage leftovers) and she said that it was like me working for Brussel sprouts! He likes it and learns on it so I don't see the problem. She said that she uses cheap treats from b and m homestores and they last her ages and have no rubbish in them but i beg to differ, especially as her dog she was using to demonstrate was clearly overweight! Oh well, I'm not able to go for the next two weeks so going to work hard on what she "taught" us (I'd already been doing it all from learning and reading on here and main site!) so that when we go back he will be top of the class
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden Its almost tempting to get another one just to try to do it right next time ;D [oops! oops! Sophie - ignore what I just said....I've been drinking...I didn't mean it!] Jac ;D
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden NOT YET Angela that is way, way in the future when I am doggless and I don't ever want to think about that :'( Helen x Sophie don't listen to mum she WANTS a puppy ;D ;D Helen x
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden On this topic can I just add that one of the challenges I faced NOW I LOOK back was that I was training Dexter with kibble Fwhitt246.I had too because we were going through a process of getting an upset tummy balanced.Due to this the only thing that we got out of our training was socialisatation.Dexter was too desperate to get to the other dogs chicken,sausage and cheese to focus on me and his sad old kibble.On this I believe your trainer is correct.I have actually signed up to do puppy obedience again with Dexter next month ( at the veteran age of 11 months) now that we can manage steamed chicken for training treats.he has a good level of obedience in most things until we get to distraction of other dogs so its a resource I am using to help us to practice around other dogs......strangers in the park only have so much patience! Is there a reason you are using kibble?it has its place as a low value reward for sure but Having been through the experience I think success depends on higher value treats...at least initially
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden We were told sausage or ham etc. when we did puppy classes. Helen x
Re: Lead and Walking Around the Garden I did kibble in the very early days of training - and it worked. But only for about 2 weeks (so between 8 and 10 weeks). Once Charlie got a bit more confident, and stopped crying into my shirt for half of puppy class, kibble didn't cut it. I moved rapidly on to chicken...then tinned sardine...then pressed cod...then hot roasted chicken for recall on the beach (I actually thought that was nuts when I read it in total recall... now I'm wondering whether warm fois gras on toast would help!).
