I'm Backkk

[haleigh]

It's been a little while since I've been on here last, and since I've been kicked from lessons, I've made some terrific progress with my girl.

 

First, I've been more and more involved with the clicker training. I've opened her potential up a ton by not putting any pressure on her and not using force. Her attention is greatly improved, and her attention span is much longer. Her heeling is so much better- to the point where she only lowers eye contact when we're turning. Her car issues on more quiet streets are almost gone if you pay attention. Before, no matter what you tried, she lunged and snapped at the cars. Now if I see a car is coming and I tell her to back up or leave it, her ears prick up, but she won't lunge.

 

My friend has some agility equipment that she runs her dobie on, so I brought Joy over one day. After a half hour of the zoomies with her dog, I got her attention off of him and could run her through some fairly hard courses. Her distance work is improving, but her weaves were falling apart. They were quickly fixed once I broke out the clicker and some tennis balls. I was actually quite shocked...there was a definite role reversal. Her dobe couldn't concentrate and went chasing after Joy when I ran her, but Joy stayed on course and just snapped at him

 

We're getting closer and closer to solving her reactivity issues, so the sooner we get that squared away, the sooner we get to start lessons again. We will be starting lessons at WAG, which is great news, since they are all clicker training. I got my step bro hooked on agility with his bichon Bear, and I observed a lesson with him. The only thing I could find wrong is how they could have such advanced borders in level 1...

 

I also have 1 problem: We are moved into a new house, in a town where no one has a fence, and doesn't abide the leash laws. I have had Joy in the backyard multiple times (on leash) and the neighbors unidentifiable large breed dogs come running up to her (IN OUR YARD) barking growling and snarking. Joy's on her 50 foot line so I can't really reel her in away from them...it's quite hard to exercise her on a 6' training lead. Dads agreed with them to watch for each others dogs before letting them out. We've been doing our part. They haven't, especially when they tried attacking our little bichon! I am already a very un-calm (haha) person, especially when it comes to the safety of my dogs. I was thinking about doing a little remedial training session with all of them together LOL, now that I'm friends with the girl next door. Any suggestions?

[RaisingRiver]

The best thing would be you to fence your yard. Fencing not only keeps your dog in, but everything else out.

[Ms.DaisyDuke]

Hey, great progress, that is wonderful!

I would also suggest building a fence. Since you just moved in, I am assuming that the dog next door thinks that your back yard is his back yard and I wouldn't be "down" with that! Especially if he's acting out towards your dogs in your backyard, there might be some territory issues. I would feel safer with a fence.

 

j

[esox]

We also have many dogs in the neighborhood. Most are well behaved. We will be fencing in our yard so that "strange" dogs stay out and so our dogs don't have to resist any temptation.

 

Esox

[haleigh]

Yeah, I was hoping we can get it fenced in, but it's a fairly large yard, so it would be quite costly. I'm wondering if a good meeting between the dogs in a more controlled environment would help? The only times the dogs have encountered each other is the neighbors dogs rudely coming up to Joy and getting all in her face. Maybe if all the dogs were under control and on leash it would help.

[mbc1963]

That's tough. I had to fence my yard - it was a traditional cut-through path for all the neighborhood teenagers, and I'm pretty sure there would have been a bite if I didn't put up the fence. Not to mention all the neighbor dogs coming over and ticking Buddy off!

 

Good luck. I'm guessing that if your neighbors have always let the dogs run free, you're going to be fighting an uphill battle until and unless you can get a fence in.

 

Mary

[vanillalove]

Check out your options, some fencing can be cheaper than you expect!

 

While introducing the neighbourhood dogs and supervising them while they are in the backyard is a good idea and will allow for safe playtime, it's always nice to have a backyard of your own where you can train Joy without another dog disturbing you.

 

Congrats on all your progress, I know you had a difficult time with Joy for a while there, and it's great to hear that some things have smoothed over.

[Root Beer]

Sounds like you found an excellent program for Joy! I'm glad to hear that it's going so well and that she is making so much progress.

 

I also second fencing. Even if you can't afford to fence the whole yard, a fenced portion would give you a safe area.

 

We have an acre and it took us two years to get the whole thing fenced. We used poles and wire mesh. We bought them several rolls/sets of poles at a time until we had all we needed.

 

For the meantime, we fenced a small area for the dogs to do their business and be out when I wanted to supervise outdoor hang-out time from inside. It worked out well. We used the big part only when I could be with them. The more fenced it became, the more freedom they could have.

 

In the end we decided to keep the small section and that's very handy.