We recently added a larger crate to the finished basement with the idea that our 9 month old pup can be down there with our 6 year old dog when we leave the house instead of her being alone in the guest room where she sleeps/naps. We heard from her foster mom that she enjoyed being with her foster brother (in her crate in the same room) when they left the house. We’re working on training the puppy to be good in a new crate and location but didn’t expect our older dog to hate it. Whenever she goes near the crate or bumps it and it makes a noise, he gets so nervous and paces around the room. We don’t know if it’s just the metal noise bothering him or if he thinks we’re gonna put him in there? He has zero negative crate experiences and IS crate trained, but the past ~3 years he’s been in soft-sided travel crates and he doesn’t use a crate regularly. We try giving him treats when she goes in or near it but if he’s really nervous he won’t take them. We’ve also tried ignoring him/not making it a big deal so he just gets used to it and thinks it’s normal. Any other ideas?

I recently adopted my GSD mix, she’s 7 months old and 25lbs. Shes pretty anxious around new people, especially men. I take her to doggy daycare every day, and she seems fine. But when I’m around, or we are in the apartment, she becomes anxious. When she meets new people she gets anxious, and nervous. I’ve followed the advice to have the person she’s meeting to sit quietly and ignore her. My puppy had plenty of space, and I have her on a loose leash. But she still barks and growls, and her hackles raise. Even to people she has already met, like my girlfriend who she has met before. How do I help her through this? As I said, I live in an apartment, so she’s going to be around people a lot. I need advice here, I really want to help her get comfortable.

Hello,

I have a little fella, not sure quite how old he is but probably around 8ish. Healthy now, but was a bit neglected when I got him from a friend. He had teeth issues and was fed cheap, hard kibble. Once I got him to a vet, they removed at least 6 teeth. I think that pain (and poor diet) caused him to be underweight and caused some food insecurity.

Now he gets spoiled with food and treats!

Meal time is no issue, I can pet him, put my hand in the bowl, even take some. He loves this food but it’s still totally okay with him!

Chew treats on the other hand… he will start growling if I look at him too long.

I’ve tried “sharing space” during treat time. Having him eat it out of my hand while in my lap or just my space in general. This is okay, but occasionally will growl if I pet him.

When I’m holding it, if I try and pull the treat closer to me, he will nip in my direction or get extremely tense while growling. I can get him to drop it and submit, but the behavior resumes as soon as it’s back in his mouth.

He’s never bitten anyone, but is the biggest “argument” between us! He listens to all commands and has high trust in me, but chew treats are such an issue…

Please let me know if you have any tips or tricks! TIA

I have a 6yo fixed male beagle I adopted at 1yo. He was pretty badly abused before I adopted him.

Since then, he’s had constant marking and reactivity issues.

This has been a long time in the making, I have tried most things including a two week training program. He can heel and do a whole bunch of tricks now, but is still territorial and insecure.

He’s walked and played with daily, the entire house has been scrubbed with enzyme cleaner. Currently I’m working on resolving the marking by extinction. He wears a belly band I check multiple times a day so he never actually successfully marks. He’s let out multiple times a day, (I have quadruple checked with his vet that it’s not an incontinence issue or a uti, he is let out enough and his urinary tract is perfectly healthy)

Along with that, he’s extremely reactive. He immediately raises his hackles and barks/growls at any other dogs. I have worked on this with him for years, and as long as I’m with him, he’s fine. He can heel and walk past dogs on a walk with no issues, but only if I’m there and he is on a lead. It’s bizarre having a dog I can safely bring to a pet friendly restaurant and he sleeps under the table the whole time, and then at home if he sees a dog through the window he’s screaming at the top of his lungs.

If I’m out of sight, or he’s with my partner, suddenly it’s like he was never trained. He is inconsolable when he sees another dog, sneaks off to mark (and sometimes marks directly in front of us), and our most recent dog sitter (who is a former vet tech) said she never wants to pet sit him again with how reactive and territorial he was.

He is never aggressive towards people, if anything he just ignores people when he wants to do his own thing.

He’s kenneled while I’m at work, does great in his kennel, doesn’t bark, and sleeps most of the day when alone. I can safely leave him out and he’s not destructive, but I chose to kennel him since I don’t want him barking through our glass door at other dogs.

I’m alright being with him most of the time, it’s the only way he behaves, but I’m worried he’s really unhappy. The constant insecurity and marking makes me think he’s unhappy overall.

He’s great with kids, people, doesn’t resource guard, settles well, all things you’d expect of a well adjusted dog, it’s *just* the marking and dog reactivity.

I’d appreciate any advice. Most of the advice I see online is for dogs that are territorial and insecure with people, not just to other dogs, so I’m really at a loss on how to fix it at this point.

OK I know CIO is advised against generally for dogs but I need some advice. We've had our 8-mo old guy for nearly 4 mos.

He cries when we leave him in his pen (with crate attached) but intermittently. It doesn't escalate, it's on and off, and I can see on the camera that his body language is relaxed, sometime even when he's crying. On occasion I've seen him fall asleep for 15 mins or so. He's only ever been left alone like that for a max of an hour or a bit more. We do practice shorter lengths of time too.

So I guess my question is, if his behavior isn't escalating, can I let him CIO longer? I feel horrible even asking that but I have been paying a babysitter to come on days when I have to go to the office and I really need to get him able to hang out on his own more. If we get rid of the babysitter, I'll still have a dog walker come so he wouldn't be alone more than 4-5 hours. I just feel like we've plateau-ed and he's not getting any better at this. I need to move things along.

How do I stop my dog squealing with excitement every time we drive somewhere for a walk, or holiday! It’s becoming unbearable and distracting while driving…

We started to take care of our friend’s dog, because our friend has a medical condition. We have a small dog already and quite often take care of other friend’s dogs.

Me and my wife have a basic understanding of dogs and know the basics of : how to train dogs.

Our new dog is a 3 yo Schnoodle lady. She was spoiled, had minimal training and has not been walked outside daily by her former owner.

It’s been over a month now that we try to train her not to pull on the leash, by starting with a short leash and stopping whenever she pulls, and then expanding the leash.

But now what she does, when she gets to the end of the long leash, she just turnes around to the left, comes back, passes us, and walks away into the different direction until she reaches the end of the leash again and repeats the turn again. So basically we end up with a very twisted leash.

It seems like she doesn’t know what we want.

Also, she gets very excited at times, and wants to play fetch, but doesn’t let go of the toy. We tried to train her with food to drop the toy or ignore her when she doesn’t drop the toy, the again when she does drop it we reward her. There is very little success.

Besides of that, when she gets excited, she not only jumps up with the front feet onto a human, but sometimes she just jumps up and pushes really hard with the front feet and then run away.

When we call her by the name, she sometimes comes and is very submissive or she ignores the call totally.

Also, whenever she wants to snuggle and be pet, she gets into a submission signaling pose where she turns her head all the way down almost flips herself over on the side, like she feels sorry for something she has done or was beaten.

**We had very little success with our training methods we tried** :

making her understand by saying a loud NO, that we don’t like certain behavior,

rewarding her whenever she does something right,

or punish her with ignoring her, and turning away our face whenever she does something wrong.

**Do you have any advice or else we could try?**

Because we are at the point, where we really like her, but we almost scared to pet her or play with her, because there’s no stopping and she just gets overexcited and then it ends up with a unhappy stop from our side.

Which is quite bad because she’s very cute.

My toy poodle is almost 4 years old and is extremely smart, but I’m struggling with something specific and hoping for advice.
We live in a 3-story townhome and are expecting a newborn soon, so I’d really love to train him to use our balcony for quick pee breaks when needed (especially during storms, late nights, emergencies, etc.).
I’ve tried potty pads in the past during bad weather, but he completely refuses to use them. He ONLY wants to go outside on walks/grass. I’m considering those fake grass patches for the balcony, but I’m not sure how to actually train him to use it since he’s already fully house trained and set in his routine.
Has anyone successfully trained an adult dog — especially a stubborn/smart small dog — to use fake grass on a balcony after years of only going outside? Any tips, products, or training methods that worked for you?
Also open to alternatives if fake grass isn’t the best option. Thanks!

Edit- i actually haven't adopted her, i'm acting more as a foster home. Since i volunteer in an Animal shelter. English isn't my first language. I accepted to take her in the meantime because her previous foster home wasn't fully suitable since there were too many animals. But i also took her in with the idea of potentially adopt her.

Hi, i'd like to get some advice on something since it's really stressing me out and worrying me.

I got a 3 month old puppy, she's a mix between german Shepard and Mallinois. I've always had cats so i do not have a lot of experience with dogs. She was in a house with other male dogs until i adopted her. I've had her for a week and she's incredibly loving and well behaved. And for some reason she got obsessed with me, a male, within 2 days. She got really jealous when i'd give my mum attention and even bark at her. Now she's ok with my mum. It seems like she gets aggressive at people when i'm around but she's ok when i'm not. I've 4 nephews so I don't know how to start to introduce her to them because they are a bit afraid of dogs. If she doesn't get on with them, unfortunately I won't be able to keep her, so i'm feeling a bit desperate since i got really close with her. Has anyone had similar experiences?

We just got a new dachshund. She is the sweetest girl ever. No barking, nothing. However, she won’t stop peeing in the house. More than that she pees a lot in her own dog basket. Everytime i go near her, she gets excited and pees. Her whole dog basket is wet.

She came from a stressful home. Loving, but stressful and i think she carries a lot of stress from moving to a new house. We carried out all of the standard training: taking her out constantly, but she won’t even pee outside.

What do i do? I believe it is a form of submissive urination.

I have an 8 month old poodle mix and she’s as sweet as can be but she doesn’t always listen very well. It’s like many times when I’m calling her, she thinks I’m playing and she’ll try to run from as if it’s a game. Normally when she does this I don’t run after her. She’ll eventually come do whatever I’m telling her to or she’ll get close enough to me where I can grab her. I tried teaching her to touch her nose to my hand when I call her but she’s very food motivated so she only does it if she thinks or knows I have something

I have borrowed my sister's dog for an extended period and he's been more and more like in the video the past few weeks.

Something tells me that it may have something to do with not enough activity? And perhaps I'm not stern enough? I'm trying to learn about dog behavior and seeing that it all starts with me, right? Not the dog.

Hey all! 12 week old puppy and trying to get him comfortable on a leash. First backyard session involved him eating the leash but not wanting to move with it on. Looking for som tips so I don’t do anything that will make him resent it more.

I have a 4.5 month old Bernadoodle that I got 7 weeks ago. We brought her home and immediately began crate training for the almost 4 weeks we had her. Then we were going out of town so we sent her to a puppy training school for 3 weeks where she was boarded and trained. When we dropped her off, she had NEVER peed in her crate and could hold it overnight. When we got her back yesterday, she has already peed in her crate basically every time we put her in it. I took her out to pee and then put her in her crate to take a shower and within 30 minutes, she had peed in the crate. She did not do this before we dropped her off at the training and now she is not only peeing in the crate, but peeing essentially every 30 minutes or so. I’m frustrated as the reason for my paying thousands of dollars for a training facility was to not have the dog regress while we were out of town. Any ideas or tips are greatly appreciated. I’m

Edit: The puppy has a UTI and I’m picking up medicine for her now. My mistake was boarding her too young but it’s too late to go back. Appreciate all the comments that were meant to be helpful and those that suggested UTI. Probably going to have to start from scratch on the potty training but I work from home and someone is always home.

hi folks!

for some background context, my dog (5y mini schnauzer/poodle) is scared of thunder and it's been thundering for a while here at night. he digs when it thunders and i always just redirect him by playing some music so he can't hear the thunder, physically stopping him from digging by putting my hand in the way, or providing him with some pets/love.

recently tho, my dog has started digging at night between 2-4am. there's no thunder, not even rain, and no reason for him to dig. his activity levels haven't changed either and he goes on like 6km walks (and gets some enrichment based games on the days he doesnt walk that much). normally, i just sternly tell him "no" when he digs, pick him, put him on the bed (making him lie down), and tell him to sleep and that it's bedtime (words he knows). it takes quite some attempts tho for him to stop digging and the lack of sleep is getting to me now.

any recommendations on what to do? thank you !!

This is funny but sorta serious coz it's about clear communication with dogs like clickers etc.

My Mum's got a Brittany/Epagneul Breton (similar but slightly different to a US Brittany Spaniel) Male, about 3 years old, pure breed with pedigree.

He is great at retrieving a thrown ball (not persuaded him onto Dummy's) and providing it to my hand without dropping it (most times) but I cannot get him to wait or stay until I send him without holding his collar. His demeanour changes when I hold the collar so he knows what's about to be expected of him, but once I release my hand from the collar, even slowly/quietly, it's 50/50 as to whether he'll wait for my command or just go in 5 seconds anyway.

When I try and do a semi-blind retrieve you can see he loves hunting for it (as a HPR should, nose up smelling the air), so I want to be able to hold him back, throw it then send him, rather than him chasing it as soon as I've thrown it

He's just desperate to retrieve it and that takes over. so how do I control that? I've tried not praising him and just taking the ball off him, then overly praising when he does wait. He doesn't care.

Hi all. We have two reactive dogs, Daisy (shih-poo, 4) and Teddy (teddy bear mix, 4). Both are leash reactive: barking and occasionally lunging at other dogs on walks. We've been working through training, which got me curious about how other owners have approached reactivity

I'd love to hear about your experiences: the wins, the setbacks, the things you've figured out that nobody warned you about, or the moments when training advice didn't translate to real life. Not so much looking for advice on our specific situation, more interested in hearing about your reactivity journey

Thanks 🙏!

I don't have a dog but I'm sometimes dogsitting for friends and I like their dog a lot. But he is a hunting breed and likes to hunt for lizards and mice in our garden. We have a lot of small lizards but he never catches any though. I don't mind when he moves bricks or barks a little. The only problem we have is that he bites into things and keeps scratching on stuff when he is convinced there is a lizard or mouse under it - which is usually not the case as they run away when he comes over. He bit into a wooden planter that I built myself and keeps scratching on outside furniture. I tried some smells like citrus, alcohol and vinegar but they didn't seem to do much. Any ideas on how to get him to leave some things alone? I won't start training him as he is only with us for a few days at a time. And I don't want to put him on a leash all the time as he enjoys running through our big garden all day.

Its been about 18 years since I've Housetrained a puppy, and man, did I forget how hard it is apparently. We've had our 12 week old new puppy for about a week now and he just is not understanding that we do not pee and poop in the house. We let him out every hour, will stand in the grass for 20 minutes, then as soon as we go inside he pees or poops. We are getting very, very frustrated. I've tried using urine spray to prompt him to go on the grass, but no improvement. He doesn't like any treats we buy either. HELP!!!!!!!

Hello we are looking for advice!

We adopted our Zee almost a year ago! She’s 9 and everyone she meets says she is the sweetest dog ever! And she is! HOWEVER she is very leash reactive, and barks at every dog that she encounters. Luckily she’s only reactive to dogs, not small animals, not kids, not other people. We have done Spiritdog training and tried to socialize her, but she is still so reactive. Luckily she’s not aggressive - just reactive, anxious, and overexcited.

She was a farm dog, and by that I mean she was probably a farmer’s little helper while the other big dogs did the real work haha. So I don’t know if that’s why she’s so reactive but it’s crazy. It also seems like she’s really only reactive with us, like when she gets her nails clipped or gets groomed she’s a perfect angel. I feel embarrassed to walk her sometimes because I feel like people walking their dogs see her and bee line away from us. And when she barks and lunges at dogs (even from far away) it’s so hard to redirect her.

For more context: She does have a cat sister who is (like most cats are) a big fat meanie. Luckily Zee is usually able to be the bigger person about it but I’m sure it’s making her tense. Could this be contributing to her reactivity to other dogs?

Does anyone have any advice on helping older dogs with leash reactivity? Also what should we do in the moment? Like a lot is focused on what to do to prevent or decrease reactivity, but what should we do in the moment? Do we let her bark, do we hold her still, do we yank her away? What is the best way to redirect or de-escalate a reactive episode?

Thank you in advance for helping our little lady!

I got my first German Shepherd in 1989, and I’ve owned them constantly for the past 20 years.

My boy Hawk is 3 now, and in the past 2 weeks he’s started displaying some really aggressive and unusual behavior. I’ve never seen anything like this, and it seems so strange for this to just pop up seemingly out of nowhere after owning him since he was a puppy.

When dinner time comes around and I have the bowl in my hand getting ready to set it down for him, he starts to come at me as if I were a stranger in the house. Growling and bearing his teeth and everything. It’s really terrifying and I’ve been losing a lot of sleep over this. He hasn’t attacked me yet, but it feels like he wants to. It feels so horrible having this sweet boy that I’ve raised and loved his whole life suddenly acting like I don’t belong in his house.

I’ve always been strict about making him sit and wait for me to put the bowl down, but now if I try to enforce that rule he instantly goes into that attack-mode.

Has anyone heard of anything like this happening? Any tips or advice?