On Leash

I have a lot of students who struggle with leash manners with their dogs.  They expect to be able to walk along and never connect with their dogs in any kind of meaningful way.  They seem to think that marching around a city block at what amounts to a slow shuffle will fulfill their dog’s needs for exercise and mental stimulation.  Most dogs don’t agree that this is a desirable activity.  It beats sitting in the house, but it doesn’t meet the dog’s needs either for mental stimulation or for exercise. 

Let’s start out by looking at an on leash dog walk from the dog’s perspective.  To begin with, the two leggers go far too slow and far too consistently.  They go one methodical step at a time, piece by piece around the neighbourhood.  They never break out into a joyous bound, or stop suddenly to sniff the important stuff.  I imagine that if the dog were to operate the walk, you would leave your front door like a freight train running free down a mountain and then you would come to a crashing halt about two driveways down.  After a brief pause to check the pee mail, the dog would choose to zig and zag through the obstacles of the local yards, vaulting over obstacles and changing directions on a whim.  Imagine for a moment the most whimsical tour of your neighbourhood, where you are permitted the joy of looking into your neighbour’s trash bins, of hurdling the decorative fences and of stopping suddenly when the need arises.  You would pee at least four times, and you might defecate too.  Probably on the least weedy lawn along your route.  In short, a dog walk would be a dog “bounce, change direction, explore, go to the toilet, bounce again, run around, see things major event”.

I think most dogs start out every walk in the hope that we, the dog walking people, will someday “get it”.  Instead, every day, the people try and fit this free joyous spirit into a slow march of straight lines, scheduled stops and complete lack of interaction with the environment.  Walking the dog becomes a chore that we have to convince ourselves to do, for several reasons.  Firstly, few dogs naturally match our pace and few people are any good at matching their dog’s pace.  Secondly, people rarely do a good job of teaching the dog what we expect.  We are still delighted when the dog learns to sit at corners, but forget that corners and street crossing only makes up a very small part of the walk.  When the rest of the walk is made up of a constant tug of war between you and the dog, fighting over the pace and direction, this is not a pleasant recreational activity and it is no wonder that few people enjoy walking their dogs even though most folks feel they must for some reason do so.

In order to meet your dog’s needs for exercise and mental stimulation there is nothing that will beat an off leash walk in a country setting.  I well recognize that my friends in downtown Toronto and New York City do not have this luxury, but if I were to develop the optimal situation for my canine friends, it would be to give each and every one of them a half an hour to an hour off leash, walking with me, in a safe rural setting.  This does not mean that the dog will go out and run sheep or chase horses either; this means that you and your dog will travel for an hour or so, on foot, together or in the company of other people and dogs, and the dogs are permitted to bolt ahead and fall back, to sniff and to leap and return and check in with you.  To do this means that you must start early-preferably before sixteen weeks when the dog begins to be more independent and it means that you must teach the dog to check in regularly with you.  There are rare exceptions, but the majority of dogs can learn to do this and it is very mentally good for them to do so.

Dogs do need to learn to walk nicely on leash, and I teach that there are three rules for leash walking. 

1.     Putting the leash on is a commitment from the human to pay attention to what they are doing.  This includes paying attention to the dog, to the environment, to the world around you, to the dogs in your environment and being present at all times.  This does not happen if you walk and talk on your cell.  Or if you stop and engage with the neighbours. 

2.     A tight leash is a brake.  If the leash goes tight, then you must stop.  The difference between good brakes and bad brakes is how much tension you must feel before you stop.  In general, if the leash is not hanging directly below your hand, then it is too tight.

3.     Walk with direction and purpose.  There is nothing more annoying than accompanying someone who is wandering around and the dog knows this.  If you are walking purposefully, and you have a direction to go and a reason for going there, the dog will go with you quite happily.  On the other hand if you wander along, with no particular reason for going where you are going, the dog is going to go somewhere meaningful for him.  For most dogs, this means that going around the block is annoying.  You start out, you turn right, you turn right, you turn right, you turn right and you are back home again.  What fun is that?  There is no point for most dogs!  If on the other hand, you go out to the potty place, allow your dog to toilet, and then walk purposefully to the corner, stop, check in with your dog and then cross the street to the park where he can go off leash, then your dog is likely going to be willing to do that politely and in a controlled connected manner.

Yes, he is a service dog, but the rules still apply; the leash is loose so we can move forward!

Opps!  The leash got tight so we will need to stop!

When you walk your dog on leash, you have to have some sort of system to come to an agreement about what that walk will look like.  If you follow the rules above, and provide some appropriate off leash walking opportunities, then you can have pleasant outings together.  There ARE other systems, but the bottom line remains the same; you must commit to something if you are going to walk on a loose leash with your dog.

If you have been battling a pulling or lunging dog, you should know that it will take time to teach him to walk nicely on leash, and obliterating 100% of errors is unrealistic.  Saying that your dog will never ever pull on leash or lunge is like saying that you will never take a wrong turn in traffic or make a spelling mistake.  We are not perfect, but if we can be present with our dogs when we walk with them, then we can achieve great things together.

CONSIDERING AN INVISIBLE FENCE? CONSIDER THIS!

Invisible fences are becoming more and more popular and in a few cases they are a very successful method for keeping your dog on your property.  In most cases though, this can go badly wrong.

Consider for starters that you are depending upon a boundary that the dog cannot see.  Invisible fences work best when they are the back up to a visible boundary.  This is why you start out with flags.  Most people take the flags away far too soon, and the dog is not exactly clear on where that boundary is or is not, meaning that they will get shocked more often than is strictly necessary for success.  When I recommend an invisible fence, I would put it along natural boundaries that are visible to the dog, such as a flower garden, along a driveway or lane, or along a row of trees.  I would not use a sidewalk or the street as a boundary for reasons I will outline below.

Consider that you often cannot control the degree of shock that the collar delivers.  If you really want to know what your dog is experiencing, put the collar on your upper arm with the electrodes against your skin on the inside of your arm.  Walk towards the fence.  Repeat that five or six times so that you are certain about the outcome.  There is a caveat.  This will hurt and it will hurt a lot.  Electric shock is one of the most intense sorts of pain we are able to deliver, and most collars are factory set to deliver a very intense pain.  

Consider what happens when your dog sees the kids coming home from school.  If he darts out meets the kids right at the boundary line, he may learn that the kids cause pain.  I have seen four cases where this happened and in one case the dog became so aggressive towards people that we could not safely live with him.  When looking for the cause of the shocks, the dog is not going to naturally gravitate towards his behaviour as the underlying cause of the pain.  He will look for clues about when he gets shocked.  He may decide for instance that cars, kids, other dogs, the mail delivery person, or the contractor who comes to install the air conditioner is the source of his pain.  Dogs in pain are much more likely to bite than dogs who are not, and if the dog decides that the contractor is the source of his pain, then the contractor is who he will bite.

Consider that you are depending on a piece of equipment that may not remain charged and may not work all the time.  If your batteries die and you don’t notice, your dog may approach your boundary and not hear the tone he would normally associate with approaching the edge of his yard.  Not hearing the tone, he will eventually test that boundary and then discover that the fence does not currently shock him.  This leads to a gambler’s effect.  When the fence is sometimes live and sometimes not, any time your dog approaches the boundary and he doesn’t receive a shock, he in effect receives a reward.  This means that he will start to gamble to try and figure out when he can win and when he cannot.  This means that in reality you are increasing your dog’s likelihood that he will try and test the fence, even if that means that some of the time he gets shocked.  The rule for using punishment is that it must occur every time that the dog behaves in the targeted manner, and when you use shock as a punisher, this is especially important.

Consider that your dog may learn that the equipment is what causes the pain.  If you do not condition the collar properly, your dog will learn that having equipment put on is going to create pain and they may become difficult to catch and also difficult to put other collars and harnesses on, or even to bandage if they are injured or ill.

Consider that other animals can get into your yard without penalty, and if those animals (foxes, skunks, raccoons, other dogs, children, adults, cats, coyotes, bears, wolves, deer, sheep, goats and pretty much anything else with feet in your neighbourhood) are aggressive or dangerous to your dog, he cannot escape.  This means that if a person comes into your yard with the intent to harm your dog he cannot leave unless he is willing to be shocked.

Consider that most pet dogs are breeds that were intended to stay close to us, and they don’t actually like being outside alone.  They want to do stuff with their people, even if that stuff is just laying close to you while you type on the computer.  Invisible fencing makes it easy to leave the dog out of doors unattended and able to learn nuisance behaviours such as barking at the fence line and ripping the siding off the house.

Mostly...dogs just want to be with their people!

Consider that if your dog sees a squirrel, another dog or a friend across the street and he breaks through the invisible fence, he may learn that the cost of roaming where he wants is a moment of intense unpleasantness.  If he is running towards something fun, he may consider the pain worth the gain.  Coming home is another story though.  Coming home means facing angry and upset people AND experiencing shock.  Thousands of dogs every year die because they broke through an invisible fence.

Considering the eight points above, you may wonder if there is ever a place where I would recommend an invisible fence, and how I would suggest using it.  For rural properties of five acres or more where you want to contain the dog in a specific component of the property, and where there are good visual landmarks, I would consider an invisible fence.  Why five acres?  Because I want the fence to be far, far from a road.  Because I want to be able to see when people are approaching so that I can bring the dog indoors when someone comes to the house.  I want permanent visual boundaries that can be seen even after it snows (tree lines, garden beds, decorative fences, laneways or livestock fences are all possible visual barriers).  I don’t recommend only putting the collar on the dog when he goes outside; I recommend keeping it on all the time.  I suggest that your dog should be accompanying you most of the time and should be in the house when you leave the boundary area.  If you need to remove the dog from the boundary area, take the collar off and either go through a physical gate or take your dog in your vehicle to get him out.  Even then, I have to say that I am not a huge fan. 

If you live in a covenant community that does not allow fenced yards, consider treating your dog as though you lived in an apartment.  Take him out on leash to toilet.  Teach a rock solid recall and a rock solid down stay.  Keep him with you more often than not.  When I compare the number of behaviour problems I see in dogs who live with invisible fences to those who live in apartment buildings, I have to say that I see far fewer dogs who live in apartments.  That says something profound about the life style of dogs who live in apartments.  They just don’t have the opportunity to experience the problems and pain that those who live with invisible fences do.

YOU, ME AND US

Riding Kayak has brought me a number of important lessons about being a novice working with a species I am not intimately familiar with.  I am not saying that I am not familiar with horses; I am!  I am just not as familiar with horses as I am with dogs.  Lately I have been thinking about my role as trainer, and my horse’s role as learner, combined with our joint role of being partner’s to one another. 

Some of the time, when I ride it is all about Kayak.  It is all about what she needs and when she needs it, and the skills I am trying to develop in her.  It is about meeting strange things successfully and facing fears and overcoming them.  Our most recent challenge has been puddles.  As far as Kayak is concerned, putting a hoof in a puddle is really, really dangerous and she might be sucked deep into a vortex from which horses never return.  When we walk up to standing water, she snorts and huffs and puffs and if I am too insistent, she may side step and crow hop.  As someone with a strong back ground in behaviour, I know how to get through this using classical conditioning, and approach and retreat and clicking for moves towards that puddle.  It took me about ten minutes yesterday to convince Kayak to put both of her front feet in a puddle, which is a big step towards success and the culmination of several lessons of approaching, clicking and retreating.  So there she is, both front feet in the puddle.  This challenge has been all about Kayak and her needs. 

Sometimes, it is all about me.  I am competent rider, but not a confident rider.  This means that some of the time, I need to work on MY skills and confidence.  I am an intermediate level rider, and progressing well along the journey towards solid horsemanship, but I am not yet there.  This is a journey of a lifetime, and I will never stop learning about riding.  I work on things like posture and position, of clear communication, of good position through both upwards and downwards transitions (going from the walk to the trot and back again for instance).  I work on staying calm in the saddle in the face of things that might be difficult for my horse.  On those rides, it is all about me.

I see this split between the trainer and the learner with my students all the time.  Some of the time, the learner is the dog and some of the time the learner is the person.  Sometimes the dog needs to have their learning needs met, right now, without regard for what the human learner needs.  When the information is not clear to the dog, he cannot be successful, and the more I train, the more convinced I am that repeated success if the single most important part of the training process.  If the dog isn’t clear about the work he is doing, he is not going to be successful and he is not going to be able to make this work.  The more often that your dog is successful, the faster and more effectively he will learn, and some of the time, it is all about what the dog needs when training.

Periodically though, coaching my students to meet the needs of their dogs doesn’t meet the needs of the student.  This happens when the student isn’t clear and cannot convey clear information to the dog.  When this happens, I need to address the needs of the student, and that may mean in the moment, not addressing the needs of the dog at all.  In order to make things clear to the human end of the partnership, I may choose to have them work with their dog on an already trained behaviour, or I may choose to have them work with a different dog who knows more, or I may do a walk through where the human and I take the roles of the trainer and the dog and switch around until the human understands what they need to know about the exercise.

It is important to note though that the goal is not developing the dog or developing the trainer.  It is about developing the team to work as one.  When I ride Kayak, I am strongly reminded of something one of my early mentors said about dogs; “If we had to get up on their backs and depend on their soundness and understanding of the work, we would breed and train differently”.  I wish I could remember the name of this man who seemed to be at every dog show I went to (he was on  crutches all one year, but that is probably too little information!), because he is absolutely right.  If I set things up the wrong way with Kayak, she could kill me.  If I asked her for instance to canter down the hill on my farm towards our farm pond, I don’t doubt I could get her to do it, but it would not be safe.  She would be frightened and I would be frightened and most likely something would go badly wrong, especially at this icy time of year.  At best, I would fall off and she would stand there looking down at me, asking me what sort of a fool I was to ask her to do that sort of a stunt.  At worst, she would break a leg and roll on me and hurt me so badly I could die.  So even on the days when I am working more on me than on her, there is an imperative that I only ask her to do things we are both ready to do.  If I ask her for things we have not prepared for, I could die.

In dog training the imperative is still there, but the consequences aren’t.  Rarely would a dog cause you serious harm in your day to day training.  Yes, there are dogs who would bite me and who might cause me great harm, but for the most part, that won’t happen.  The worst case scenario if the trainer asks the dog for things the dog is not prepared for, is that the dog fails.  The problem here is that the dog’s failure is not something that deeply impacts the trainer in the moment.  Yes, the trainer may be frustrated, but that is nowhere near as important to the trainer as being rolled on by their horse.  The dog’s failure just doesn’t impact the trainer nearly as much as it might impact the dog.  This means that as an instructor, and as a trainer, there is a higher level of responsibility to set training sessions up so that the learner is successful.  The consequences are not there, so awareness must be greater. 

When the trainer sets things up so that the learner is successful, then something incredible happens.  When Kayak and I are on the same page, and I have set up the training session so that she can be successful more often than not, I don’t have to ask her to do things-I think them and we do them together.  It is a special kind of teamwork that just happens.  It isn’t that I don’t move my leg or use my hands on her reins, I do, but those movements are whispers not screams.  When I work with Eco and D’fer, my adult dogs, this happens in every training session because we have a deep and well developed connection; I think it and it happens, smoothly and gently.  I ask quietly with my voice and the way my body moves, and they respond.  They move in specific ways and I respond to their motions.  It is a dance of the animal giving me feedback and me responding and returning and changing as the dance continues.  When that connection develops, we are tied together in a special way, and that special goal is what I would like my students to experience.