How did you stop pulling and how long did it take?

[Circletime27]

Pup is now 7 months and pulls like a train. He’s quite good for DH as he naturally walks faster and does mostly on lead walks whereas I take him for his longer, sniffy, off lead walks so I think he associates me with running around unrestricted.

Anyway, we’ve got to try and get it sorted because the off lead walks are getting less and I get zero pleasure out of being pulled around the streets.

Any advice? He’s currently wearing a harness (sorry I can’t remember the name!). An old fella advised me to get him on the collar the other day, said it’s stopped all his dogs pulling as it stops them putting any real power being them. Would this hurt his neck/throat though?

I don’t know wether we should try a different harness or do the stop/start training thing.

Def set aside a week where you can stop dead at every single tug, that worked on all bar no1 dog who was also being walked by adoring teenagers who undid all my good work.
Maybe try a halti contraption- lead connects to the nose, so when they pull it turns them around. Worked well on no1 dog, who settled into her harness like it was designed to make towing us more comfortable. Not for every dog - No 2 dog refused to walk at all with it on - lay down on the pavement and rubbed his face against it until he’d nearly skinned his poor nose!

Brilliant thanks so much for all the replies, I’m going to work my way through all the suggestions. I think I’ll start tomorrow in the field, to get a feel for what I’m actually doing without feeling like the whole streets watching me!

You’ll never use a collar again after your dog has backed out of his collar and run into a busy main road. Mine hates his harness but he’ll never ever go out on collar and lead again.
He stopped most pulling at age two.

I'm another person recommending a Halti or similar. I've used them for several rescue dogs and they make a tremendous difference even on the first walk.

Mine is two and we mostly trained him out of it using bribery 😂

Squeeze tube of primula by your side and give some to pup at regular intervals. That keeps him by your side to get cheese. Then we just spaced out the intervals he got the treats until he was doing it for the whole walk.

He still pulls if he gets a scent but he's a hound so it's in his nature!

My dog is generally pretty bright, but the stopping when he pulls thing just doesn't work with him. He just seems to think you want to constantly stop and start, so that's what he does - stops when I stop, then pulls, then stops when I stop etc ad infinitum. Also he's not remotely interested in even the tastiest treats when he's out on a walk - far more interested in getting to where he's going! I've also tried halti, figure of 8, dogmatic, harness, normal collar.

We also use bribery! To begin with it was a lot of bribery . Now he is almost 2 and mostly walks great on the lead but we do still use the stop/start method when need be. If he gets too excited (because he has seen/smelt something) I don't think he can 'hear' me. His brain is too flooded with Adrenalin? So I stop and refused to move until the lead is loose. We started in the garden and I still do 'close' training with him where I walk at different paces. It's still a work in progress. Oh and we use a collar but I'm very careful not to yank or pull him as don't want to hurt his neck.

I have tried every single technique quoted on this thread, my dog walker who is a professional dog trainer has even accepted that my dog is simply a knobhead and if he wants to pull, he will.

www.channel5.com/show/dogs-behaving-very-badly

If you don’t like link clicking google the show name above. He has lots of handy tips and walking has come up several times.

Reading this has inspired me to tackle my dog's pulling. She wears a Perfect Fit harness and isn't the type that pulls like a train all the time, but the sniffing is awful.
She's a hound and a very greedy one so she sniffs scents and every scrap of food on the ground.Living near a school and a college there's usually plenty of that. (It's better at the moment of course).

I've had a lot to work on with her but reading this thread made me realise I can improve her walking by slowing right down. I tried it just now when we were out for our walk and it definitely helped. That and lots of rewards which she loves. So that will be our focus now that she can see other dogs, cats, gulls and crows without lunging and barking.

Day 1, I thought I’d start small and just get him out of the door without pulling. We went out through the back garden instead so that foxed him a bit and he didn’t pull at all.

Then I thought we’d do the 5 mins on lead to the field. It took for ever to get out of the street. He just kept lurching to the end of the lead then I’d stop and just wait for him to relax but it took him so long, it just wasn’t clicking.

After a few stop starts he started to twig that I had a pocket full of chicken and his attention was then completely focused on me. He was trotting alongside looking up at me and I gave him a piece of chicken every 3 or 4 steps. I was buzzing that he wasn’t pulling so we went a bit further on lead like that and then doubled back to the field. We did the same from the field back to the house.

My question is, does something switch in their brains where they can walk forward without pulling and without their focus being on the chicken? He wasn’t even looking where he was going because he just wanted to chicken!

Gradually you space out the chicken to longer intervals for the good behaviour. I added saying ‘heel’ when mine was doing it nicely so that I can tell him to heel if he starts pulling or stops too long to sniff.

Brilliant, I’ll had the word in. I can see this isn’t going to be a quick fix but we’re lucky to have this time when we’re not in any rush to get him exercised. Even though it was only for a few minutes it felt so lovely to have him trotting alongside. When he’s dragging me at full pull it’s really unpleasant.

I wish I could even get mine to focus on a pocket full of treats! Obviously he likes treats, but is not interested in them when a walk is in progress!

You have all inspired me to work on this during lockdown so I am doing lead walking for 10 mins each day round the garden. With my 10 month cockapoo. I tried to work on it a few months ago but gave up. On the basis that my fitness regime and any kind of self control around food and booze is out the window at the moment, if I can master lead walking on lockdown, to me, it's a win. Lots of kibble and taking things really slow seems to be really helping. Plus afterwards he is really tired which is a bonus. Thank you all!

steppemum has it summed up perfectly, stop dead, every time, it is boring but necessary.

We have trained gun dogs for over 40 years using this method.

There are some good books out there. This to me is the oscar of them all PRA Moxon. Having said that there are many out there.

You can have so much fun training a dog. During this time of lock up you can train a dog to seek within the house.

We’re a few days in and I’d like to say we’ve made progress but it’s not clicking with him yet, he stays close when he’s focused on the treat but if something takes his eye he will pull to the end of the lead. I stay still, he then looks at me puzzled and eventually sits down with the lead still taught 😆

I’m not giving up though!

What has surprised me is how quickly I stopped feeling self conscious about it, I must look ridiculous but I genuinely don’t give a shit.

justasking111 did it work with all of them? I tried this for ages early on with my pointer, but he just stopped when I did, then carried on pulling as soon as we moved again. Repeat ad infinitum. It was as if he thought "Oh ok, she seems to want me to stop, then go, then stop etc. Weird woman, but ok if that's what she wants!" At no point did the stopping dead convey to him that what I wanted was for him to walk on a loose lead.

What has surprised me is how quickly I stopped feeling self conscious about it, I must look ridiculous but I genuinely don’t give a shit.
Training a dog is a surefire route to public embarrassment. You will look, sound and feel a twerp. I have given up caring.

IME it does take a long time and constant reinforcement. We've been using treats and stop/start since he was a pup, he is now coming up for 2 and we still have to keep implementing this training. It definitely does get better though. I've always found the start of walks the worse. When he is full of energy or in a new environment it's honestly like his brain just doesn't hear me. I have to keep stoping and getting him to focus. After a run if I put him back on the lead he is much better.
Almost 2 years on we use much less treats (was literally a treat every couple of steps in the beginning) and he walks well about 70% of the time. I'm not sure if we will ever reach the 100% mark, well not until he is a lot older at least.

Girlintheframe thankyou it’s good to have realistic expectations, the training videos that I watch (and that’s not just for pulling) make it look so quick and easy and then you have a go and it’s a disaster! The temptation is to just give up but I do need to persevere with this or I’m going to end up with shoulder problems.

The start of the walk is definitely worse and as approach the field as well. He’s much better coming home.

DH says he doesn’t pull at all on his evening walk which is good and shows he is capable of it.

so, when I trained ours, we got to a certain point, not bad, but not there really and me stopped makng progress.
I think it is because the stop start method works, but with a sniffy dog like a spaniel, there is a natural stop start in them, so, they tend to walk like this
not pull, quick tug ot lampost, no pulling, dart across to grass, no pulling, tug forward to nice smell.

He also did what a pp said, which is to stop as soon as I stopped, but keep the tension on the lead, which means you can stand there for ever waiting for him to relax the lead.

So to get that last bit in, I took the stop start one step further.
I stopped. If he didn't immediately loosen the lead, I took a slow step backwards. It never took more than 2 steps.

I also followed something I saw on-line which has worked really really well.

We have pulling hot spots, eg past a particular house/tree/lampost.
When he pulled there and stop start didn't work, I turned round and walked bakc down the road. When we were a fare enough away from the hot spot, I stopped, made him sit, rewarded him for sitting and then started again. Eveyr time he yanked towards the house, I truned round and wnet back to a [;ace before he yanked. Made him focus on me, sit etc rewarded him for sitting nicely and starte doff again.
It works. I have done it again recently when we changed our route and found a new 'hot spot' = a house with a dog in the garden. now he walks past it liek an angel.

One last thing, never ever allow him to go through a door/gate ahead of you, even in the house. if you walk through a door with him, tell hime to wait, you go first. Do the same when out.

blimey that is full of typos, sorry!