Just interested at what age you started lead training with your pups and at 16.5 weeks should I start practicing with the collar and lead with Bella in the house or no need to yet? Bella is doing great walking in her harness ( now I can put it on with ease !) so I'm not in any rush at all but should she be experiencing it in doors /garden now? Also, what age do people generally replace the harness with the collar and lead for formal lead walking and do some people never bother? Thanks ;D
Re: When did you start lead walking? I am a newbie when it comes to lab puppy training (obvious from my previous posts ) but Louis is now 13 weeks and we have been "lead walking since 9 weeks"...sort of because lead walking was and is something along these lines: -- at 9 weeks: Ran around the house with colar and leash hanging after him -- at 10 weeks: Inside walking around, stopped when he pulled or bit -- at 12 weeks: Outside, stopped when he bulled or bit (a lot of stopping jejeje) Hoping to avoid bad habits
Re: When did you start lead walking? Gypsy has never had a harness and this has been her regime so far - 10 weeks - put collar on for meals and playtimes only 11 weeks - put collar and lead on when carrying puppy around the area for socialisation 12 weeks - short walks on lead in low dog areas - 5 mins 16 weeks - normal lead walks (10 minutes) 5 months - learning to 'sit' 'wait' etc on lead (15 mins) 8 months - 40 min lead walks on non free-run days, shorter on free run days
Re: When did you start lead walking? We did lead walking from day 1. We'd take Holly into the garden on her collar and lead for short periods every day. As soon as her jabs were complete we started short walks outside (5-10 minutes).
Re: When did you start lead walking? My dogs were on lead, well a long line, from the day I brought them home. We live on a farm and while I can let my dogs out into a large enclosed garden from the patio window it wouldn't be safe to have let them out into the back yard. The yard isn't enclosed and although they probably wouldn't have done they could've easily got into the farm yard, barns etc with big tractors moving around. My nerves couldn't take it. :. They have always walked very well on lead as did my old lab and I do think it could be because I started them young
Re: When did you start lead walking? Interesting thanks, she's happy in her harness for now , but think ill start some little bits of collar and lead training too and least she'll have experienced it young. She didn't seem to like her fabric collar much when she first came home , she kept scratching , but it was new for her. ;D
Re: When did you start lead walking? I started mine off from day 1 with collar and lead training. I switched to harnesses when Shadow slipped his collar, and I'm in no rush to go back to a collar. I suppose I would be quite interested to see if they walked as nicely on a collar as they do on their harnesses now. Willow HATED her collar to start off with, but got used to it pretty quickly. Shadow never had an issue (but he's a pushover)
Re: When did you start lead walking? Hi Meg had a collar on from 8 weeks. I have a thing about having their ID on. Lead walking from 12 ish weeks straight after jabs kicked in. We had no problems with either. She now at 1 wears a harness sometimes and is not bothered by that either. Good luck, Emma.
Re: When did you start lead walking? We got Woody at 10 weeks and he has been in collar and lead since day 1. I think his breeder did a bit of training with him too as he wasnt bothered by it at all and has great loose lead walking at the moment ( I'm still waiting for the difficult teenage phase where they ignore everything you say lol). First few days I just let him drag the lead around the house, but by 11 weeks he was walking outside on collar and lead!
Re: When did you start lead walking? Bonnie had her collar on from day one. In fact, the breeder gave her a collar the day I met her and agreed she was "the one" 8) 10 weeks - started lead training in the house but it didn't translate when at.... 12 weeks - tried lead training outside with no real impact! 14 weeks - still not much improvement in the lead training, will walk for a while on command of "walk nicely" but starts pulling again as soon as treat is administered! 16 weeks - getting better but treats are administered very frequently! 18 weeks - much better but constantly looking at me for the treat, head always turned towards me! No pulling though! 20 weeks - have just started administering treats only when she looks ahead and not at me. Massive improvement, very few treats needed. Fingers crossed, I think we're nearly there! 21 weeks onwards..... we shall have to see !!
Re: When did you start lead walking? [quote author=Bonnie link=topic=9853.msg145014#msg145014 date=1424542857] Bonnie had her collar on from day one. In fact, the breeder gave her a collar the day I met her and agreed she was "the one" 8) 10 weeks - started lead training in the house but it didn't translate when at.... 12 weeks - tried lead training outside with no real impact! 14 weeks - still not much improvement in the lead training, will walk for a while on command of "walk nicely" but starts pulling again as soon as treat is administered! 16 weeks - getting better but treats are administered very frequently! 18 weeks - much better but constantly looking at me for the treat, head always turned towards me! No pulling though! 20 weeks - have just started administering treats only when she looks ahead and not at me. Massive improvement, very few treats needed. Fingers crossed, I think we're nearly there! 21 weeks onwards..... we shall have to see !! [/quote] I'm having trouble with this one… see I've trained a bit of a "walk by me and look at me" thing, because I want her checking in when she sees a distraction, etc, and to train that return to me instinct. She doesn't spend her whole walk like that, but also doesn't really pull much (exceptions are - the park! the beach! the VET!) so I'm happy-ish but yes I do feel like I treat too much… but I don't want to discourage her looking at me… so I'm not sure what the happy medium is. I do try to sneak in treats for walking nicely without staring up at me, but that cues her to stare up at me for awhile, seeing if anything else will come…
Re: When did you start lead walking? From day one for Cooper (now almost 12 months old.....how time flies!). Had collar and lead on in the house.....yes, he scratched the collar area for a few days but that is understandable....I would also scratch if I had something new around my neck. Started walking him outdoors with the regular collar but have now changed over to a harness that buckles on his chest. It was like night and day....he stopped pulling....dont know the dynamics of it, but what a huge change. Went from crazy walking to pretty calm walking (unless he sees a squirrel or another dog or a neighbor he knows).
Re: When did you start lead walking? You don't need to ever switch to walking on a collar if you don't want to You can just continue to use the harness for walking and the collar just for holding ID info.
Re: When did you start lead walking? [quote author=Oberon link=topic=9853.msg145038#msg145038 date=1424550244] You don't need to ever switch to walking on a collar if you don't want to You can just continue to use the harness for walking and the collar just for holding ID info. [/quote] That's what I thought, Bella has an id tag attached to her harness
Re: When did you start lead walking? The other thing I've discovered, more by accident than design, is that Bonnie's much better after her off-lead run about. So, I tend to take her to the woods at the bottom of the lane first, have a good run about and then do lead training on the way back. You might want to try getting some of Maisie's puppy energy out of the way first. We're lucky the woods are so close but maybe you could try a few games of fetch in the garden first. I'm sure all lab pups are the same, they don't listen to a darn thing when they're full of energy! ;D Today Bonnie walked fairly well all the way without many treats. The reason we went "cold turkey" is that last night one of my friends (very kindly) pointed out I should watch her weight. ??? I suddenly became really conscious of how many treats I've been using so I decided I had to be brave and risk administering less. It seemed okay. I think she knows what she has to do now and I just have to be patient and keep reinforcing it. Don't get me wrong, we're not model owner-pup walkers by any means but the improvement since we first started going out is huge.
Re: When did you start lead walking? We don't have a yard/garden or any off leash areas really nearby - there is a dog park which we go to very sparingly when it isn't busy, and mostly to get to the dog beach, where I do let her run around off-lead.. but we have to brave a 10 minute on lead walk first! There's also a park where she can run around on a long line. We just live in a very residential area so it's mostly streets, no woodlands, etc, nearby, and no car. She's really a very decent on-lead walker though, and I find she's actually WORSE at her on-lead walking when she's tired from her off -leash beach runs! Her morning walk is always super calm even though you would think she has major energy. My only real issue is that she likes to stare at me for treats, but it's alright. To avoid making her too stodgy from treats on walks, what I've been doing is giving her half her food allowance in kongs, etc, for her crate times, and then half of it gets soaked overnight. Once it's soaked, you can either chop it into 4 pieces or just throw it in a bag and break off pieces as you walk. Her other treats are also quite minuscule in size, so I'm not super worried about the amount right now since I'm managing it that way.. it would just be nice for her to get the idea that "we walk forwards, and occasionally we get a treat, but not every 2 feet". Right now I'm just trying to extend the amount of time in between nice walking and treats… so instead of treating for every 10 steps nice walking, every 20-30… then build it up. I'm sure it'll come in time!
Re: When did you start lead walking? [quote author=Bonnie link=topic=9853.msg145137#msg145137 date=1424614260] The other thing I've discovered, more by accident than design, is that Bonnie's much better after her off-lead run about. So, I tend to take her to the woods at the bottom of the lane first, have a good run about and then do lead training on the way back. You might want to try getting some of Maisie's puppy energy out of the way first. We're lucky the woods are so close but maybe you could try a few games of fetch in the garden first. I'm sure all lab pups are the same, they don't listen to a darn thing when they're full of energy! ;D [/quote] I think this is true and I do the largest part of my slower training (heel walking, steadiness etc) after they've had a good run about, but I do still think it's important to do some amount when they're buzzing with energy, so they start to learn to control themselves. I just ask for a lot less duration than I would do after they've had a hooley.
Re: When did you start lead walking? [quote author=maisiesmomma link=topic=9853.msg145148#msg145148 date=1424622514] To avoid making her too stodgy from treats on walks, what I've been doing is giving her half her food allowance in kongs, etc, for her crate times, and then half of it gets soaked overnight. Once it's soaked, you can either chop it into 4 pieces or just throw it in a bag and break off pieces as you walk. [/quote] That's a good idea. Think I will do that too. [quote author=maisiesmomma link=topic=9853.msg145148#msg145148 date=1424622514] Her other treats are also quite minuscule in size, so I'm not super worried about the amount right now since I'm managing it that way.. it would just be nice for her to get the idea that "we walk forwards, and occasionally we get a treat, but not every 2 feet". Right now I'm just trying to extend the amount of time in between nice walking and treats… so instead of treating for every 10 steps nice walking, every 20-30… then build it up. I'm sure it'll come in time! [/quote] Yeah, I'm sure it will - she sounds absolutely adorable. You'll get there! 8)
Re: When did you start lead walking? [quote author=snowbunny link=topic=9853.msg145160#msg145160 date=1424626273] I think this is true and I do the largest part of my slower training (heel walking, steadiness etc) after they've had a good run about, but I do still think it's important to do some amount when they're buzzing with energy, so they start to learn to control themselves. I just ask for a lot less duration than I would do after they've had a hooley. [/quote] That's also very true! 8)
