![]() Verbal corrections, leash pops, or shock collar corrections do nothing to teach him better coping skills, and they often worsen the underlying anxiety that is causing the problem. Scolding your dog for being afraid is counter-productive, as well as being terribly unfair… he’s acting this way because he’s upset and doesn’t know what else to do. Which brings me to a very important point – as much as you might feel like you should, please don’t ever punish your dog for reacting this way! Remember that what you are seeing (barking and lunging) is his way of communicating that he is frightened and uncomfortable. It stands to reason, then, that we have to address your dog’s fear if we want to make any real progress at changing the behavior. is their attempt to make the scary thing GO AWAY as quickly as possible. ![]() As we discussed last week, most reactive dogs act this way because they are fearful or uncomfortable – the barking, lunging, snarling, etc. (Huge thanks to our doggie volunteer, Louie, and his mom for graciously allowing me to use video from some of their training sessions – you are both fantastic!)įirst, let’s talk theory for just a moment… we’ll get into specifics shortly, but it’s important to understand what we’re trying to do before delving into the process itself. Even if you understand the general idea of what we’re trying to accomplish, it can be quite difficult to translate that into a successful plan for your dog – especially if you don’t have much experience with dog training! By including a case study with videos in today’s post, I’m hoping to give you a really clear picture of how things should look. There’s lots of great basic information on the internet about how to work with reactive dogs (as well as some stuff that’s not so great, unfortunately), but I find that a lot of it isn’t very specific. So, let’s get down to the nitty-gritty of how it’s done. ![]() I’m excited to write this post because this issue is so common, and so incredibly frustrating for owners! As I said last time, leash reactivity is one of my favorite problems to treat because it’s very rewarding – almost all of these dogs get better (MUCH better, in most cases) with a good training plan. Today, I will be breaking down in detail how we approach this problem from a training perspective. We also offer one-to-one training sessions either in person or via Zoom (which can be more helpful for nervous dogs) to address their excitable/reactive behaviour in a supportive way and help thme learn how to stay calm and not react to triggers.Welcome back for today’s follow-up discussion on treating leash reactivity! If you didn’t get a chance to read last week’s post on this topic, you can find it here. We also offer this course as a short intensive course on Zoom which is very successful and effective - Book here. Dogs are taught a variety of calming exercises usually with clicker training, and gradually learn to be in close proximity to their triggers without reacting. Our course helps your excitable or reactive dog learn how to remain calm in the presence of things that trigger a reaction. This course is for those dogs who need more space (we have no more than four dogs per class) and screens to help make them feel safe. ![]() ![]() Our Excitable/Reactive dog training course aims to create a calm environment for dogs who may be more sensitive to certain things in our busy and distracting world. They can either be a little too excitable and want to charge over to these triggers, or they might be nervous, defensive or aggressive with lunging and barking. Some dogs are more sensitive to outdoor triggers such as other dogs, strangers, children etc. Excitable/Reactive dog group training courses ![]()
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