Too excited

[EMILY GORE]

I have an 8month of Australian shepherd. He’s calm when my husband and I come home. But anyone else he gets so excited and jumps all over them. 
we are trying to learn door manners and having him sit and stay until we can say it’s okay to go outside. But he gets so excited for the neighbors dogs he doesn’t listen. 
 

when it’s a calm environment he’s very good at listening. 
once he gets excited - new people - doorbell/knock- neighbor dogs - he just can’t stay focused and listen. 
even inside fetch - fantastic. As soon as we go outside to do it - it gets excited and distracted and can’t bring it back to me. 
 

how can I keep his attention so he can listen even when he’s excited? 

[JMFS]

Hi Emily, and welcome!  Adrienne is unplugged until the 14th, I believe it was.

We have the same situation.  Management, look at me, look at that, emergency u-turn, and the airplane game come to mind for getting you started until Adrienne can give you a proper response.

Management is managing the environment.  If I see a neighbor's dog out front, I'll take Esther out back.  You're managing the situation, basically.  Another example, if I'm leaving the room and I have food on the table I can kiss it good-bye, but not if I put it out of reach of the dogs.  Gertie was a yarn addict and destroyed several of my crochet hooks, two projects, and made a rat's nest out of numerous skeins of yarn.  So, I learned that I had to put all that away if I was leaving her alone in that area.

Look at that / me is a game to teach your dog to focus on you.  I'll come back and post some links to these things so you can read the articles.  🙂  I make them look at me before they get released to eat, before they cross the threshold, before I'll even open the door, again when we're outside before I release them to go to the yard.  This one takes a load of repetition.  Some days we'll be at the door for 10 tries before I get their undivided attention.  They're constantly scanning the yard, looking for something to chase down and I'm having to override that after a good deal of time of letting them get away with only a sit. 

Emergency u-turn is one of my favorite tools.  We used it at least 10 times yesterday at the pet store.  Esther was so over-the-top excitable with other dogs and slightly less with humans that we sent her off to a Boot Camp.  The trainers use the same force free methods as Adrienne so it was a good fit.  They were going to keep her 3 weeks, but ended up needing an extra 2 with her.  Now we're doing a 6-week training class with them at the pet store and they put us right next to the window so Esther can see everyone, and everything, walking into the building.  It's Exhausting, lol, but it's part of the work she needs to do so we can take her places.  Anyway . . . Emergency u-turn is where you see something you know is going to set your pup into a tizzy and you say, "let's go," (or whatever phrase you wish) and you pivot either you around them or them around you - it depends on which direction you need to go.  We practice this in the yard daily and I'm fairly certain there's an article I'll be able to post for you.

The airplane game goes with look at that / me.  It's a game that teaches your dog to look at you, even with weird distractions (like you putting your arms straight out) going on. 

Fetch - limit his space.  We get great games of fetch in the house, too, but outside it's not so great.  We have bushes lining our sidewalk and I'll play fetch with them there.  They would have to bound through the bushes to run off with the ball so it is effective in helping me keep their attention.  Eventually I'll expand the territory until I get a reliable retrieve, rinse and repeat until we're using the full yard.

Doorbell is easy!  I recorded our doorbell sound because I couldn't find another one like it.  I then played it, and before she could bark or react (like as soon as I pushed play, lol) I gave Gertie a treat.  But, I threw it so she would have to reset (go get the treat, come back to me and sit).  We did that until she got to where she would look at me when I played the sound. 

People coming through the door is harder, but still easy - it just takes persistence.  We started working on her going to her mat when she heard the doorbell sound.  I have a mat near the door and we started with me knocking on the wall the mat is next to.  When I knocked I'd tell her, "mat," and she was required to touch it with her foot before I tossed the treat (I needed her to reset so I toss the treats away from our working area).  Then I increased the criteria to her standing fully on the mat.  Then sitting, then lying down in sphinx (where they're able to spring up), then lying down with a rolled hip (relaxed).  This took several days, mind you, and Gertie is a calm dog so it could take longer with yours - or it could go quicker because Gertie had to relearn how to greet people at the door so she was working through a learned behavior to acquire a new one.  I moved closer and closer to the door, further away from her mat, and each new step threw her off so be prepared to rinse and repeat a Lot. Then I started opening the door and that was a whole new thing!  Eventually we got to where I had help with someone else doing the knocking, and I had to shut the door in their face several times so if you end up with an assistant do prepare them for that.  When Gertie stopped reacting to her just walking through the door she started leaving through different doors and walking around the house to come through the front door again.  We'll up the ante to having a Doorbell Party where we have as many people as we can walking through that door while Gertie remains on the mat.

Those are some things to keep you busy for the next few days.  🙂  I'll go hunt up those links.  If you have questions, ask away, and I'll do my best to help.

[JMFS]

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/brain-training/preschool/look-into-my-eyes/

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/brain-training/university/look-at-that/

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/archive/conditioned-emotional-response-cer/

The conditioned emotional response (CER) link is to explain why you're going through all these steps.  Nutshell:  In an alpha type of training we force our dogs do things via intimidation and dominance, which gets us a negative CER.  When we teach them to do something on a reward-based system they develop a positive CER and they'll be more likely to do what we want because They want to.

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/archive/impulse-control-frustration-tolerance/

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/video-archive/train-dog-go-to-mat/

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/archive/approaching-people/

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/archive/threshold-levels/

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/archive/counterconditioning/

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/archive/ignoring-commands/

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/members/archive/emergency-u-turn/

https://www.braintraining4dogs.com/the-airplane-game/

That's enough links for now!  If you find you need more, enter the search term at the top of any of those articles and you'll get several results.  She doesn't have a "fetch" specific article, but I know there are several threads in this forum about it and there's a search function here as well.

[FrederykBlot]

Hi

I have not much to add as advice, but just know that everything is normal here :D :D

The working during high stimulation is the most difficult. Our Loki would be like the best at home, or when we're alone, but as soon he sees another dog, he goes berserk (for playing not fighting), starting to pull on the leash, not listening to cues anymore...

It gets better with age, and with consistency. The results won't happen fast, but one day, you will have one "look at me" when he's excited, and that would be cause for celebration :D

[Adrienne Farricelli]

Hi Emily,

How are things going? I must have missed your post as I was away from my computer for a few days last month. Feel free to post an update or any challenges you are encountering and we can do some troubleshooting. 

Best,

Adrienne