The Official Uncertified Dog Training Thread

iman29

Well-Known Member
OK Doggo people - If you have ever visited the Post Your Doggo thread you may know that I dabble a bit in dog training for the last xx years even though I have no formal certifications, training etc... of record. Then again the whole dog training industry is pretty much unregulated so you can call yourself whatever you want with a PDF certificate you make at home. I do have aspirations to one day make this into some kind of business but thats more a bluesky dream right after I win the mega millions lottery.

That being said, I do have some very happy "clients" on this forum, as well as other friends, family and neighbors where I have made suggestions, recommendations and even offered to come visit. This thread is not about being the expert (me) which I am not, just to talk and share what's up with your pup and how the collective knowledge here can help you with anything related to obedience, behaviors etc...

tagging a few people to get started, bring along anyone else that may like to chime in:

@Mare45
@serviceguy
@jklett
@kdebello
@extremedave
 
Last edited:

extremedave

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Sweet.
I'll kinda kick this off. (ok now I'm 2nd!)
Paul, our current Bahamas foster has a guarding issue. He was maybe 4-6 months old when he arrived, fyi. He's pretty shy and fearful overall, he will come to you for affection but has quirks. At first it was when he was in the crate, he would growl at anyone walking by and if you got close he'd lunge. He'd also growl at Luna even though they'd been playing and wrestling for a hour. Then he started hanging out on the dog beds by the tv and began the same behavior. He's never bit anyone but....close. However he doesn't persist with it and will back off. Often Luna will step in if she's nearby and engage him which also stops it.

Paul doesn't guard anything else; be it food, toys, bones, treats. Initially he gravitated to the girls and was afraid of me (Paul would skitter out of the room if I came close) but the more I walk him the more he looks towards me. He is still nervous in certain rooms, is sometimes afraid to cross thresholds, a lot of stuff that makes sense for a dog that was never indoors. Odd though that he's so young with some of it.

A trainer attached to our rescue said it's a form of resource guarding and to (in a nutshell) reward the good behavior and stop the negative. Seems to be a work in progress as it's unpredictable and a bit spooky to trigger on purpose.

Side note, Teddy our little 10 pound jerkoff would aggressively try and get between Luna and Paul when they were playing. He would go after
Paul with intent and finally Paul nailed him pretty good. We keep them separate and the guarding happened before and after.

Oh, almost forgot, Paul would go after me if I moved towards my wife but seems to have stopped that. Like I said, it's unpredictable.
Cheers.
 

iman29

Well-Known Member
Sweet.
I'll kinda kick this off. (ok now I'm 2nd!)
Paul, our current Bahamas foster has a guarding issue. He was maybe 4-6 months old when he arrived, fyi. He's pretty shy and fearful overall, he will come to you for affection but has quirks. At first it was when he was in the crate, he would growl at anyone walking by and if you got close he'd lunge. He'd also growl at Luna even though they'd been playing and wrestling for a hour. Then he started hanging out on the dog beds by the tv and began the same behavior. He's never bit anyone but....close. However he doesn't persist with it and will back off. Often Luna will step in if she's nearby and engage him which also stops it.

Paul doesn't guard anything else; be it food, toys, bones, treats. Initially he gravitated to the girls and was afraid of me (Paul would skitter out of the room if I came close) but the more I walk him the more he looks towards me. He is still nervous in certain rooms, is sometimes afraid to cross thresholds, a lot of stuff that makes sense for a dog that was never indoors. Odd though that he's so young with some of it.

A trainer attached to our rescue said it's a form of resource guarding and to (in a nutshell) reward the good behavior and stop the negative. Seems to be a work in progress as it's unpredictable and a bit spooky to trigger on purpose.

Side note, Teddy our little 10 pound jerkoff would aggressively try and get between Luna and Paul when they were playing. He would go after
Paul with intent and finally Paul nailed him pretty good. We keep them separate and the guarding happened before and after.

Oh, almost forgot, Paul would go after me if I moved towards my wife but seems to have stopped that. Like I said, it's unpredictable.
Cheers.
Extra kudos to you and your household for fostering. I cant do it I would want to keep them all.

resource guarding is a really hard one. its not always fear based but in this case it sounds like it is based also on the personality especially if hes not guarding things.

Its hard to work on this one because you basically have to trigger it to correct it, but seems like you have something in the works. Way too much to type or explain here too.

Shelby never had guarding issues the first 9 weeks we had her, then we (mistakenly) sent her to the Petsitter we had not used in a few years and turns out the lady was losing her marbles (seriously). In 4 days she had her she did everything we asked her not to (keep her near other dogs, didnt follow ANY of the training i was using) and ruined everything I worked on. We showed up to pick her up and the first thing she told us is how nasty Shelby was with her food and that she nipped her. :mad: . Mind you the dog had NONE of this behavior before we left her there.

It's too long of a story but it probably took me 4-6 weeks to undo all that (plus jumping, nipping, chewing my stuff) the one thing that still lingers is i have to always reinforce the food guarding of her bowl. I had to sit and hand feed her every meal for a month just to get her to stop growling. Now at each meal she has to sit and wait to be served and told "OK" to go eat Then I randomly interrupt her and stick my hand in the bowl and make sure she backs away and sits down. I have come to the realization I will probably have to do this with her forever but its fine since the most she has done is a small growl and she has never nipped me. If she protests the slightest bit, that just means she has to wait a few minutes extra to go eat.

It's all good and it's manageable, but it can easily turn into something bad if not kept under control.
 

iman29

Well-Known Member
We adopted Sammy from a shelter/shop hybrid (which apparently is quite shady in their practices so I won't mention them).

View attachment 178321

We immediately lost him to the hills of Summit...seriously first night he slipped his leash. Eventually recovered him a week later thanks to some super hard working dog catchers that helped us from Monmouth county. Then the fun began. The sweet shy boy we adopted was actually an incredibly fear aggressive anxious dog. Shocking that a chihuahua dachshund mix would have those traits. We got him to an okay baseline. Potty trained, less defensive of his mother (my partner) but still barked like mad at any visitor and had basically only sit in his bag of tricks.

We hired a trainer for about a year and we made some good progress. He can go on little walks around our small neighborhood without freaking out but aside from us and his grandparents he really does not care for people much. Once he calms down he eventually is okay with them. Moral of the story is we were super in over our head with this dog and if it was even a possibility, we should have given him back but with my partner that was a non starter. He'll live his sheltered life with a nice little yard for him to do his business. He also now eats half kibble, half green beans which is fun.

At least the next dog will probably be a breeze compared to Sammy. I love him, but he definitely has taught us quite a bit about dog training.
wow I am glad to see that did not turn into a frown story and something bad happened when he got away.

My experience is too many people group all type of aggression together and label the dog "bad". Good on you for sticking with it and getting a trainer and not giving up on him. I've seen too many times people not realize they are in over their heads and just make all the bad behaviors worse without trying to understand why its happening in the first place.

If you ever wanted to try for more socialization there are some ways to help him conquer the fears outside his little bubble but it certainly takes a lot of time and patience.
 

Mare

Well-Known Member
I vote we have a puppy walk one day with all our dysfunctional pups. Granted, we'll walk far apart and just try to be in the same state, but it's great "socialization" for them. Seriously...it's a great chance for us to work through some issues if other people understand and know what we are trying to do, and we can get some in person feedback and help.

I have been taking Marlee to stores that allow dogs cause there are a lot of distractions and oddly she is better in the stores than anywhere else! I do have to constantly tell people she is in training and step between her and people who come running up to pet without asking, but that's ok with me...it's a learning experience for me too to read her and set boundaries for her. Plus it allows me to find some great bargains at the same time!

Anyway, just saying hi really and participating in our newly established dog training forum that is going to launch @iman29's lucrative business! I don't know as much as iman, but I have learned a lot and am happy to share my knowledge (or dump unsolicited knowledge on you).
 

serviceguy

Well-Known Member
I have to say that reading the few posts in this tread so far made me feel a lot better about the status of our relationship with Bailey L.

  • 11-12 months old
  • your-guess-is-as-good-as-mine pure breed
  • sweet as pie (loves her daddy, the jury is still out on mommy)
  • she's into chewing stuff when bored (mtb shoes, furniture, pillows and stairs steps so far)
  • she's fairly obedient, waits for OK before grabbing her treats, going through the door in and out, going in and out of her cage
  • responds fairly well to sits, stay and ok/let's go
  • except for 2-3 minor accidents she'd been on point with being housetrained (and it wasn't her fault, the first time we waited too long to take her out and then we didn't use the proper cleaner so she went again on the same spot, since then we used enzyme cleaner and bought a pet specific carpet cleaner which seem to have done the trick)
  • friendly with adults and kids, seems not to be particularly attracted to males (other than me)
  • she launches at cars, apparently only when walking around the neighborhood and on the driveway if in proximity of the road. Parking lots seem fine
  • she pulls hard on the leash when walking outside the property, not always. When she gets into she will not respond to food or praise, you can only make her stop and sit, but the behavior will resume as soon as you start walking again.
  • she jumps at me and my wife but not in an aggressive manner (even though jaws snapping is involved) but she responds to No and pop of the leash and stops it
  • first and only time we let her out voluntarily she was doing fine until a pickup truck zipped by and she took off, had to retrieve her in the neighbor backyard where she was peacefully chomping on a cranberry scone...
We're in 3 out of 5 private lessons package with a trainer, I've seen improvement especially because she's pointed out what to do and how. tools and other stuff. AS said many times before it takes patience and consistency.

I start thinking that we have unrealistic expectations in terms of how fast this was going to work out, Bailey L. has been with us for less than 2 months, and atthe beginning some of the behavior that we now consider 'offending' seemed cute and we probably encouraged it as well...

My wife is the one taking it harder because she strongly lobbied me into getting a dog (don't get me wrong, I wanted a dog since I was 5 but was never in the position to get one) so now finds particularly frustrating that she did not turn out to be the doll she expected her to be. To be fair my better half has some health problems (which was what made me think that getting a dog would not be a good idea) but both her and her doctor thought it would be actually a good thing to get some distraction and it would motivation for some exercise...so I find myself having to work on both Bailey L...and my wife!

Unfortunately since we got Bailey L I have not been able to ride much, I took her with me while riding and the first 2 times it was great (always on the leash). but the 3rd time it was impossible to manage and had to head back home after a few hundred yards of pulling to the side, dropping on the ground etc...
 

Fat Trout

Well-Known Member
Now at each meal she has to sit and wait to be served and told "OK" to go eat Then I randomly interrupt her and stick my hand in the bowl
tactics my wife uses. Hand in bowl is usually only for a "newbie" until they get with the program. We have 5. when they are waiting to be told "go get it" to eat.....4 of them keep looking at each other to see if anyone is going to cheat. the other one is little terrier/jack russell mix, she just stares at the food with laser eyes that could burn a hole in the floor.
 

Mare

Well-Known Member
@serviceguy, right before I got Marlee, I was approved to foster dogs through some rescue org. They sent me tons of paperwork to read and one had to do with decompressing. It takes much longer than I'd expect for a dog to decompress and settle. And honestly, I never even thought about decompressing before. My last dogs were thrown into my life and we just did things. One was very scared and had issues, but I never felt like I had to revolve my life around him. My point is, you are right - 2 months is not a long time and your dog is still adjusting and learning. You made some good points about what was once cute and encouraged is what you are now trying to fix.

I don't know what your wife's health issues are, so I hope I don't offend, but dogs can give a person a purpose and a focus that distracts from illnesses. I have had quite a few and still deal with some stuff, and Marlee is both a blessing and a curse. She takes my mind off of myself and stuff I am dealing with, and gives me a purpose, but she is also impossible for me to manage when I am struggling. I hope you and your wife can find balance with all of this.

It sounds like you are doing great with the trainer and are really trying with B.L. :)
 

Fat Trout

Well-Known Member
My point is, you are right - 2 months is not a long time and your dog is still adjusting and learning.
I agree with this for sure. My wife and I have had 4-5 dogs for a while now. I'll call it a rolling average as we have had dogs pass and new ones come in. My wife works in a vet office so we are ground zero for hardship cases and we are confirmed foster failures. Foster = keep. Things take time, but its amazing to see the progress and change. Our dogs are by no means perfect and we definitely let marginal behavior slide because its "cute" but as a whole we keep the peace and in some ways the madness of 5 does bring some assistance as well because we didn't start at any one time with 3,4 or 5 new dogs. When a new dog comes in they tend to gravitate to the others and fall in line-ish. Crazy personality differences though. We require certain things but bend to personality a bit. One of our dogs is very shy. Her home is our bedroom closet (when allowed). We call it the condo and put a bed in there for her after we realized she was sleeping on shoes. One side is left open and the other side cracked so she can peer out. Sure we lost some closet space, but it keeps the peace.
 

Fat Trout

Well-Known Member
Side note. We have a cat. While typing the above I heard an "unusual" noise upstairs. I go upstairs and one of the dogs is chewing on a cat dish. Hmmm where did you get that. Oh look, the baby gate to the room the cat calls home is open. I just got home at 6, my wife left for work at noon. Dogs stay in a downstairs room all set up for them and we plan departures and arrivals (her and I) accordingly to make sure they go out.

Sent a text to my wife. "It seems you left the baby gate open. Dogs tell me the litter box is clean" haha
 

iman29

Well-Known Member
Side note. We have a cat. While typing the above I heard an "unusual" noise upstairs. I go upstairs and one of the dogs is chewing on a cat dish. Hmmm where did you get that. Oh look, the baby gate to the room the cat calls home is open. I just got home at 6, my wife left for work at noon. Dogs stay in a downstairs room all set up for them and we plan departures and arrivals (her and I) accordingly to make sure they go out.

Sent a text to my wife. "It seems you left the baby gate open. Dogs tell me the litter box is clean" haha
Haha Reminds me of my previous dog she had a horrible habit of retrieving “Rocky road” samples from the litter box for us. 🤢
 

Fat Trout

Well-Known Member
Haha Reminds me of my previous dog she had a horrible habit of retrieving “Rocky road” samples from the litter box for us. 🤢
I have come a long way and that is perhaps good info for others. I was a "zero" pets person who met a "tons" of pets girl. Lets just say I've learned to loosen up a bit and go with the flow. Stuff happens lol
 

iman29

Well-Known Member
I have to say that reading the few posts in this tread so far made me feel a lot better about the status of our relationship with Bailey L.

  • 11-12 months old
  • your-guess-is-as-good-as-mine pure breed
  • sweet as pie (loves her daddy, the jury is still out on mommy)
  • she's into chewing stuff when bored (mtb shoes, furniture, pillows and stairs steps so far)
  • she's fairly obedient, waits for OK before grabbing her treats, going through the door in and out, going in and out of her cage
  • responds fairly well to sits, stay and ok/let's go
  • except for 2-3 minor accidents she'd been on point with being housetrained (and it wasn't her fault, the first time we waited too long to take her out and then we didn't use the proper cleaner so she went again on the same spot, since then we used enzyme cleaner and bought a pet specific carpet cleaner which seem to have done the trick)
  • friendly with adults and kids, seems not to be particularly attracted to males (other than me)
  • she launches at cars, apparently only when walking around the neighborhood and on the driveway if in proximity of the road. Parking lots seem fine
  • she pulls hard on the leash when walking outside the property, not always. When she gets into she will not respond to food or praise, you can only make her stop and sit, but the behavior will resume as soon as you start walking again.
  • she jumps at me and my wife but not in an aggressive manner (even though jaws snapping is involved) but she responds to No and pop of the leash and stops it
  • first and only time we let her out voluntarily she was doing fine until a pickup truck zipped by and she took off, had to retrieve her in the neighbor backyard where she was peacefully chomping on a cranberry scone...
We're in 3 out of 5 private lessons package with a trainer, I've seen improvement especially because she's pointed out what to do and how. tools and other stuff. AS said many times before it takes patience and consistency.

I start thinking that we have unrealistic expectations in terms of how fast this was going to work out, Bailey L. has been with us for less than 2 months, and atthe beginning some of the behavior that we now consider 'offending' seemed cute and we probably encouraged it as well...

My wife is the one taking it harder because she strongly lobbied me into getting a dog (don't get me wrong, I wanted a dog since I was 5 but was never in the position to get one) so now finds particularly frustrating that she did not turn out to be the doll she expected her to be. To be fair my better half has some health problems (which was what made me think that getting a dog would not be a good idea) but both her and her doctor thought it would be actually a good thing to get some distraction and it would motivation for some exercise...so I find myself having to work on both Bailey L...and my wife!

Unfortunately since we got Bailey L I have not been able to ride much, I took her with me while riding and the first 2 times it was great (always on the leash). but the 3rd time it was impossible to manage and had to head back home after a few hundred yards of pulling to the side, dropping on the ground etc...

Leo first sorry To hear your wife is having health issues in the middle of all this. Whatever it is I hope it works out and she’s better soon (no need to share any private details of course).

I can sense the frustration and disappointment that it’s not all going according to your plan with the dog. Reading back the list It certainly seems impossible but I can tell you it’s not as long as you manage your expectations like you said.

Maybe I can suggest as part of your next trainer session to ask if you can get a schedule of "mini sessions" you can do on your own with Bailey especially once the 5 sessions are over. That’s when the hard work starts really. I think it was mentioned in the other thread if you can find a way to plan 10–15 minutes a few times day to work with her on a specific skill or behavior it will go a long way. There are also unplanned random opportunities for correction that you will come across, you just have to be prepared on how to manage it. You just have to make sure YOU know the proper technique for what you are trying to show her and what messages you may be sending her not just in your words, but also in how you feel. It sounds crazy but I would swear on the statement that dogs know how you feel and it travels down the leash to them. So if you are all anxious and stressed, they feel it too. If you get angry or frustrated they also know it and it gets reflected in their mood.

And as much as maybe it sounds like I am bragging about Shelby sometimes, I should be more transparent to say that when she hit 6-8 months old I was feeling the exact same thing. Especially after she came back from that Petsitter my wife was in tears cause the dog was being so “bad”. I definitely had my moments of like OMG I can’t do this. But my mindset was basically this wasn't her fault she got shown the wrong thing to do and it was my mission to bring he back around to a well mannered happy pup.

Not sure if any of that helps but hopefully you can see its not an automatic thing. It's only been ~2 months and shes still adjusting to integrating into your family.

#TeamBaileyL ;-)
 

serviceguy

Well-Known Member
Leo first sorry To hear your wife is having health issues in the middle of all this. Whatever it is I hope it works out and she’s better soon (no need to share any private details of course).

I can sense the frustration and disappointment that it’s not all going according to your plan with the dog. Reading back the list It certainly seems impossible but I can tell you it’s not as long as you manage your expectations like you said.

Maybe I can suggest as part of your next trainer session to ask if you can get a schedule of "mini sessions" you can do on your own with Bailey especially once the 5 sessions are over. That’s when the hard work starts really. I think it was mentioned in the other thread if you can find a way to plan 10–15 minutes a few times day to work with her on a specific skill or behavior it will go a long way. There are also unplanned random opportunities for correction that you will come across, you just have to be prepared on how to manage it. You just have to make sure YOU know the proper technique for what you are trying to show her and what messages you may be sending her not just in your words, but also in how you feel. It sounds crazy but I would swear on the statement that dogs know how you feel and it travels down the leash to them. So if you are all anxious and stressed, they feel it too. If you get angry or frustrated they also know it and it gets reflected in their mood.

And as much as maybe it sounds like I am bragging about Shelby sometimes, I should be more transparent to say that when she hit 6-8 months old I was feeling the exact same thing. Especially after she came back from that Petsitter my wife was in tears cause the dog was being so “bad”. I definitely had my moments of like OMG I can’t do this. But my mindset was basically this wasn't her fault she got shown the wrong thing to do and it was my mission to bring he back around to a well mannered happy pup.

Not sure if any of that helps but hopefully you can see its not an automatic thing. It's only been ~2 months and shes still adjusting to integrating into your family.

#TeamBaileyL ;-)
Thanks, I have to say that both you and @Mare45 already helped changing the my perspective in a more positive way, kind of already knew the bits and pieces but I needed somebody to line them up for me. And you nailed exactly what my biggest worry is, growing frustrated and pass it on Bailey L.

I'm not much around the house anymore but I take any chance to do these mini-sessions while I take her out for her bathroom call and walk her around and around an try to manage the distractions, taking all little wins in good spirit...this morning she did not bark at the neighbor while he getting in his car and we actually managed to have a little chat without me having to keep telling her that 'it's OK, it's OK...', so +1 #TeamBaileyL!
 
Last edited:

shrpshtr325

Infinite Source of Sarcasm
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Alright, ill jump in here, we have 2 rescue dogs

1) Newton, great Pyrenees, 6 years old this past Nov (5-6 months when we got him)
2) Kepler, great Pyrenees/Newfoundland mix 3 years old next month (march) (3 months when we got him)

Both adopted sight unseen from rescues in the midwest and transported to NJ for midnight pickup.

In both cases house breaking was a relative simplicity, and they can both manage 12+ hours inside with now accidents. Anyone who knows the breed will tell you the great pyrs are not all that interested in doing tricks and 'food motivated' is a rarity, but they are well behaved and walk well on the leash without a ton of pulling EXCEPT when we get barked at by other dogs, especially little ones while walking around our neighborhood. The reaction seems to be limited to our normal walking area since at the vet they lay there and let everyone alone :/. That said 2, 100lb dogs jumping and barking is certainly a sight to be seen and we tend to avoid encounters with other dogs in our neighborhood since noone else seems to care about training their dogs around here (and they use those stupid self retracting leashes that are like 500000feet long).

That said if an encounter is unavoidable the best moves we have found vary, for kepler we can have him sit and he will sit, but wimper until the other dog is out of sight. Newton goes into full on guardian mode (especially if my wife is walking him) barking and growling and jumping, we have found that holding him by the collar calms him down, but doesnt stop the barking.

side note, we walk with front clip harnesses since they know how to slip out of their collars and they have so much fluff that getting the collars tight enough to avoid it is very difficult.
 

extremedave

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Agreed! How long have you had him? Sorry if you posted and I missed the answer.
Our advice on fostering is get the first one out, no matter what. We had our first foster 6-7 months, she was brat but also funny as heck and huge pals with our dog. That one was tough.
If you're unsure, ask the rescue for a crappy one. You'll be thrilled when they get adopted! :p

@Mare45 We've had Paul for... 3-4 months? Not positive. He was definitely puppy stage when he came up.

@iman29 yesterday he got off the dog bed and happily came to me for pets. That's something I just thought of; it's like a reflex reaction then he stops. Wonder if even as a pup there wasn't enough to go around and his first instinct is to guard. Hmm. It's even tough to reward good behavior as there's such a fine line between the two.

I've had a lot of adopters over the years insist the behavior of the dog is due to some type of abuse...I think dogs are just weird sometimes so I don't put huge stock in past experience.
 
Top Bottom