H MORRIS

More great advice here. I've been going to supermarket car parks regularly, but maybe a farmers market is even better because of the proximity of people. We've also been taking him to an outside cafe every week for a coffee and cake. He sits for a while, but soon gets restless and usually there's a bit of barking before 15 mins is up. We feed him treats and are hoping to grow this behaviour so we can finally take him out for a lunch and he'll relax by the table. I've now got a soft toy cat on the end of a flirt toy line, like you suggested. He was very aroused at first but after a few days he just sits when I give him the command and doesn't move until I say 'free' even if I move it quickly right under his nose. But that's in the garden. It's progress though. We've also recorded the door bell, cars approaching the house, the door knocking and random noises outside like dogs barking. Not easy because we're fairly quiet out here in the country. We play them everyday whilst he's on his bed and treat him for being quiet. He knows the difference of course and went bananas yesterday when a real delivery man rang the door bell. We're hoping over time it might desensitise him a little. Been doing a lot of recalls recently, at least 10 a day, in various forms with tiny pieces of cheese. Out and about too. The only failure I've had in a week is when he was in the fields behind our house. There's a path some way away that's used by other dogs and he started smelling, which he does an awful lot of. I made sure I was close and started to run away making his usual command, but he completely blanked me. Grrrrr.

Thanks Adrienne. So I need a hierarchical list of distance/contact for each trigger, like your spider list. An anxious dog like Finn has a whole load of triggers, so that's a lot of lists: cats, pigeons, cars, bicycles, noises outside, neighbours coming out of their drives, postman, other dogs, kids running around, doorbell etc Presumably I then do some simple obedience work like sit, down, stay, heel and work up the hierarchy. It's incredibly complex. I can see why if you have a naturally calm dog by temperament that this is a much easier task with just a few triggers. But an anxious dog with a lot of triggers is daunting. And more, setting up some of these scenarios with distance will take some planning. Can I ask a simple question? If I embark on this, and work through lists slowly, is it real that he might eventually be compliant and sit when say a cat runs across the road in front of him, or when a neighbour comes to the fence to chat he'll stay by me and not dash over to greet them wildly?

Thanks Adrienne. So I write a long list of distractions/triggers and put them in categories on a list of 1 to 10 and work through them. That’s what I had in mind. But you mentioned distance and duration which adds layers of complexity. So I have cats on the lane, which I might write down as an 8 on the list of distractions because he definitely won’t listen to me when he’s focussed on them. But if they’re 20 meters as opposed 1 metre away it might lower the distraction level to a 4. So this now confuses my record keeping which I was hoping to do, because the higher distractions can be almost at any level depending on distance away. How do go about recording this? Sorry for not being very bright.

Thanks Adrienne. I think we’ll make a bit of a room for him in our double garage with a mat and a bed. We’ll take him in there from time to time just for a few minutes with a lick mat for a bit of piece and quiet away from us. Then if we have this scenario again he can go in there for a short period ‘before’ we eat and it won’t be unusual for him. If he is put somewhere where he can see us he’ll probably just continue barking and wanting to play. The thing about impulse exercises is that we’ve worked hard on the ones you’ve listed and he’s very good at them . . . when there’s no distractions! We really need to work out a distraction list and repeat them working through the list I guess.

Thanks Adrienne. He’s much improved now. But we had a problem this weekend with a family gathering at our house. We had friends and relatives over and Finn was superb in the garden playing with the little ones. He was there for at least 2 hours running around with five children under 6 playing catch and dropping the ball for them. He joined in with their football and all the adults were so impressed at his gentleness. The youngest was 2 and we were worried he might knock her over running free, but he never jumped up at any of them. They all loved him. Then we all sat down at a big table outside to eat. We put Finn on his bed and gave him a lick mat and a kong, but he couldn’t hold his place and wanted the kids to keep on playing, so he just barked and barked at them, running around while they were eating. He didn’t jump up, but the noise got very wearing after a few minutes. I went over to put a lead on him and take him away, but he just dropped to the floor. I tried to entice him back to his bed with a tug toy and by throwing treats but he wasn’t moving. I gave him another chance but he continued the frantic barking. Eventually, I had to pick him up and take him indoors, because people couldn’t think, let alone talk. I didn’t want to and felt bad. It was such a shame as he was doing so well. When the meal was over I brought him out and he was fine again until people went home and then he barked like crazy again because everybody left. What could I have done different to use it as a training scenario?

Thanks so much for your input Adrienne. I’m certainly learning a lot from you and hopefully helping Finn to cope in a world he finds hard. I’ll get back to you with his progress.

Love the hand kong idea, and I've been using it to do things he doesn't like and it works. He rolled in some fox poo yesterday and it was on his neck. I got a cloth with some shampoo and water to wash it off, but he was in one of his jumping around moods not letting me get at it. So I had some pieces of chicken in the fridge and I put a piece in my kong hand instead of a hot dog. He kept licking it while I washed off the offending smell. Success. Thank you so much. Finn takes treats really well, unless he's over threshold. In fact I can tell how aroused he is by the way he takes treats. I've been throwing them on the floor for when he sees triggers, in line with your suggestion and its less of a problem. We have burrs in the UK but they're not the spikey kind. They get in his fur too, but are not painful. I can remove them by generally scratching him. He's so weird. If he thinks I'm scratching him as part of general petting, he closes his eyes and loves it, I can then work around the area and finally get my nail under the burr and remove it at the same time. But, if he sees me spotting a burr and I just go straight to it to remove it, he'll mouth and warn me. His mind set is bizarre. I'll try the Kong hand next time and see how it goes.

Thanks a lot. More really good advice. Loved the handling video of the Setter. Finn was just like that as pup and is still very particular. We handle him every day, ears, mouth, paws etc and treat him. We can now inspect his ears and look in his mouth but its slow going. Yesterday I was stroking his legs and tummy when he rolled over on his back first thing in the morning and noticed a small sticker stuck to his fur. I stopped to pick it off and he immediately shot his head round and got my fingers in his teeth, to say stop that. He doesn't bite, but there's enough pressure to give me a small warning that he doesn't like it. Picking things out of his fur hasn't been in the training regime. Lol. OK, in line with your advice we had no barking yesterday evening having switched things up. Firstly we gave him a lot more exercise. We had two long walks and several sessions playing frisbee and a long flirt pole session as an experiment. He was pretty tired by the late afternoon. Secondly we bought a few new chews from the pet store including a tough beef strip, a natural root, rice bones and a durable wish bone. After dinner, he came into the TV room where we'd hidden some treats around. He started foraging without our usual command 'find' and we left him to it. Then he walked over to us and I gave him the natural root. He loved it as he'd not had that before and he chewed it for about half an hour before flopping down and sleeping. Success. He might need more exercise, it's very hard to tire him out though! And like you say, it's a balancing act. Get him over tired and he may play up because of it. Anyway so far so good. Wonder how a dog like Finn got on in the old days of aversive dog training, with alpha rolls and choke chains. I guess they ended up shelters.

Thanks, some great suggestions there and we’ll experiment to see which ones can produce a calmer evening. We’ve got to break this cycle somehow. And between management and providing independent activities we’ll change things up in line with your suggestions to see what works. I’d be more than happy if he relaxed by us, and I’d be happy to stroke him for as long as it takes, but he seems unable to do so. He comes over regularly for cuddles and strokes, but can’t actually settle by us. If he goes tired he’ll wander off to another seat or on the floor to crash nearby. And as you say if the stroking goes on for more than a minute or two he gets over stimulated and starts mouthing. I wish there was some way to teach him to relax by us, we’d all benefit from this. What can we do to encourage it and why is he like this I wonder. Most of our friends who have dogs get fed up by their pestering to lay by or on them.

IMG_0369.MOV Here he is barking today. No, he doesn’t get food until mealtimes or during training. In the past we try and ride these tantrums out, or we get up and leave the room, shut the door and come back in after 15 seconds or so. If it goes on too long he goes in a quiet room with toys or chews. Sometimes they’re only brief before he gives up and crashes. Usually it’s when we both sit down together, if one is sitting and the other doing jobs he’s fine. We never throw him a ball because he’s always attention seeking with a ball. He’ll drop it under a chair or sofa and bark because he can’t get it. When we sit down though he’s always had his needs taken care of and gets a chew of some sort. He gets a lot of attention, and a lot of exercise during the day. He can nap anytime he wants, which is usually mornings after his first walk. He’ll also nap in evenings after his tantrum has finished. To answer your questions. He’s very particular about petting. He usually naps away from us. When he wants a cuddle he walks up to us and nuzzles our hands, or jumps up beside us and paws us. First thing in the morning when he comes out of his cage he lies down for a massage and stroke. He’s a lot better at relaxing these days, when he was a puppy he was always restless and couldn’t settle. We took him to the vet for X-rays to check he was OK and had no misalignment problems. He checked out fine, the vet said he was just anxious and needs more rest. So we put him in his cage at 9 pm with a kong and he stays in there until 9am with a short break for a wee at midnight before we go to sleep. He loves his cage and goes straight in. He sleeps most of the time in there or relaxes. Yes, he does tend to follow us around. He likes to be in whatever room we’re in. Even if we’re in the gym working out he’ll wander in with his chew and sit contentedly and watch us. He never runs off if we’re outside, even if the gates open. We have a big garden and if we’re working he’ll just sit and watch us. I think he’s quite insecure. If we’re in the fields playing behind our house and I walk towards the garden gate to go back in, he runs in like a shot before me. He doesn’t like to be left alone, and he’s come to rely on us for entertainment. He’s hopeless at entertaining himself. If he’s in the garden on his own, he’s immediately into mischief, like digging up the lawn. We have neighbours on one side and if we talk over the fence, he’ll dig up the lawn while we’re talking, after he’s had a cuddle from them of course. They love him. He wants attention most of the time unless he knows we’re working on stuff and then he seems content to watch us. We really need to work on his independence. But because we’re at home all day, he’s sort of spoilt compared to most dogs. Here he is napping after. Lol.

Thanks Adrienne we're doing our best for him with your help. As you know he gets a lot of exercise, brain training games, puzzles, and obedience training to help him cope. Another area we're struggling with is his demand barking. This nearly always arises in the early evening, rarely outside this. The two things that set it off are the smell of cooking in the kitchen or us sitting down together to watch some TV. It's like his biological clock makes him most hyper between 5pm and 7pm. He'll stare us in the face and bark. He's saying, "I'm hungry", or "I want to play and you're sitting down". We know this because all his other needs are taken care of. He gets a walk before 5pm for a toilet break, we give him water, a chew (rubber bone, antler, yak chew) and a toy. It gets very persistent and loud at times. I've tried putting him in a quiet place to calm down by leading him into another room with his toys and leaving him to settle, but he's wise to this now and knows. He won't fall for going after treats and drops to floor on his back if you approach him. We put a lead on him but he won't budge unless I pick him up, which I'm trying not to do. We want him to make the right choice himself. He's so clever. We've tried using his mat/bed to settle him, but whilst he's very good at going to his mat at other times of the day when we practise mat work, when he's in a barking mood he'll ignore it. We've tried ignoring him, which is very difficult but he'll jump on to chairs and nose a cushion onto the floor and stare at us, or threaten to bite a rug, while looking at us. He really is quite naughty at times. Our daughter says we're way too soft with him. But he's come a looooong way in 2 years since that feral pup we got that we couldn't even handle, and the ladt thing I want to do is scare him.

Amazing response. OK I’ve already worked out the calories from various websites for the dog of this breed and size. I’ve also worked out all the amounts of the various feeds he gets which is JR dog pate for serious training, cooked chicken, which we boil ourselves, and the two types of kibble, Tribal duck for filling kongs and Eden (small chunks for) general training and walks. I’ve cut the the Eden into even smaller chunks and put them in a training pouch with a slice of chopped JR pate to get the extra taste and oils like you suggested. So far it’s going well and hopefully it’ll keep his weight down. I’m doing as much training as possible around the home with toys. Thanks so much, really helpful.

Thanks Adrienne. I'm pleased the simple 'Get it' + treats on the ground is breaking up his hypervigilant fixation on triggers out on a walk. I'm using it everyday now and I can stop him from blanking me out as he stares at his many triggers. But recognise I need to be able to get his attention on me using the kissy/smaking sound if nothing else because tossing 3 or 4 treats on the ground several times on a walk is driving up the calories. I'm trying to switch his training to toys as much as possible because I don't want his weight to be an issue. But with anxious dogs that have a lot of different priblems I'm finding this to be difficult to manage. Every video you watch says arm yourself with a handful of very tasty treats. Lol.

Great stuff. I’ll throw in some shorter times to mix it up. Thanks for that.

Heck, now you’ve got me! Trying to think. I hold the lead in my right hand as he walks on left. My left hand has three little treats in it, ready. If he reacts to a trigger, I say “Get it” then I toss the treats behind him on the floor. It’s now working every time. I’m working on the kissy noise separately in and around the house to try and build that, as it clearly isn’t strong enough to grab his attention when distractions happen out and about.