Normal for a working cocker?

[onemoredayplease]

My working cocker is 18 months old. We've attended weekly group training pretty much since she was old enough to attend. I'm a shift worker so we miss the odd session due to that. We also do a high energy class once a week to burn off some energy. We have also had some 1-1 sessions to tackle specific issues.
In addition she has two good walks a day.

She is however extremely hard work. Her lead walking is still poor. Lots of pulling.

If we are in an unfamiliar area it's much, much worse.

She's obsessed with birds. If I can distract her before she becomes fixated I can walk her past quietly. If however she sees the bird before I do she becomes very fixated and starts barking. This escalates until she is almost hysterical if that makes sense. I can't stop her at all.

I'm at a loss. Our trainer says she's doing well 🙄 and that this is what you should expect with this breed. I've had a working cocker before and this certainly wasn't the way she behaved.

Any suggestions? She's a beautiful loving little dog but I'm struggling with her.

We tried for years to get our working cocker to walk normally on lead but I have a mobility condition and in the end couldn't cope with the pulling so we used a halti, it was brilliant. I'm sure they're frowned upon for some reason now but it was so good. The only downsides we saw were people sometimes thought it was a muzzle so approached tentatively. Ours was generally off lead bar the 1 minute walk to the fields and had good recall as a result of us doing cheese recall training when they were very young.

I have a working spaniel. I have had several. And show cockers. Even in the range of working cockers, there’s huge differences. I have had ones that come from ‘pet working’ lines and actual working lines. Even in both lines you will find a big variation. I also foster spaniels so spend a lot of time with different ones.

I think the main difference is wether they would have made a good working dog. Not all ‘working’ dogs would make a good working dog. The one we have now would have been excellent. While she does want to chase birds her main focus is us and looking to us for instruction. It does mean she needs more than other working cockers, from us. But is an excellent dog.

I think the behaviour you have talked about is with the realms of normal for a working cocker, especially one who would have made a good working dog. Like others, I am not a fan of flyball for working cockers. It doesn’t engage their brain enough and tends to increase the prey drive side of them. It can increase their stress levels. Playing fetch is also one that tends to stress them out. Cockers actually need brain work more than physical activity. Obviously a mix of both is best, but I would always priories mental stimulation over physical. And it needs to be daily.

Gun dog training, scent work, puzzles, training are all great for their brains. We play hide and seek with the dog and the kids on walks. My kids are older so they can go off, then we send the dog to look for them. We also have some sort of poodle mix (potentially a poodle cross bichon) who is a rescue and she had also picked up the game. The mental stimulation makes them far calmer in long run and easier to manage and they listen so much better.

We have a working cocker. Like most he is terrible on a lead (hours of training and gun dog training haven't helped). We barely use one now (he's 5) - like most gun dogs his recall his 100% - he wants to scent/chase but he won't unless told he can go and he will return straight away on command. We concentrated on that and despite living in a forest with plenty of feeler, squirrels, birds, rabbits etc he doesn't chase. We do play a lot of retrieval games when walking - he is always working - we use a ball either for chase or hide and seek - how the trainer taught us.

I would look into Predation Substitution Training. Simone Mueller has just brought out a new version of her book Hunting Together. I've had great success using her methods with dogs with a high prey drive, including ex-hunting dogs.

I've seen that recommended elsewhere too.
OP, another good book is Mission Control by Jane Ardern which is more generally around training high drive dogs. She breeds working cockers and also does pet gundog and other training.

It’s very typical of spaniels. As I’ve had spaniels my whole life I thought it was normal for all dogs but a couple of years ago I got another dog- non spaniel- and it’s been eye-opening how easy it’s been to stop her pulling- she’s so gentle in comparison! We’ve never tried specific gun dog training with our spaniels perhaps that’s why we’ve never managed to get the pulling properly under control. My current sprocker is 8 and still pulls like a steam train given half a chance. I have to keep her on a very short lead otherwise I swear she’d pull my arm out of its socket given half a chance (she’s a strong girl!) The only time she doesn’t pull is after a really good off-lead walk.

Get a figure of 8 lead and the pulling will most likely stop instantly.

The rest of the behaviour sounds typical for a spaniel

Just wanted to say thanks again for all your thoughts and suggestions. I've joined the two Facebook groups recommended. We now have a training dummy which she loves and I am looking for scent work or gun dog workshop's.

Today we are just back from a long walk where she actually walked really well. We walked quietly passed two pigeons and a cat! This is amazing for us. I'm taking the wins when I can. 😁

Have a look at engage disengage training. It is really powerful. It works for whatever triggers a dog - not necessarily in fear. We use it with our working terrier pup and it's been amazing for helping her to engage with us more and dampening down her prey drive.

Chiming in to agree with most of what’s been said. My wcs will walk nicely on lead on pavements in our local area or the park, because those are boring. Take him to the beach/woods/hillside/his favourite walks/new places, and he pulls so hard he is crawling on the ground to get purchase. We got the boring walks cracked with food - hold treat by his nose and walk a couple of steps, feed him. Work up to treats being in your pocket and he has to walk a few steps before you get a treat out, extend the time walking nicely between treats.

Our tactic was to train recall so the dog can be off-lead as much as possible - train a few commands, mine knows ‘come’, ‘this way’, ‘lead time’, ‘heel’. He likes to interpret ‘come’ as ‘come close enough to check in and then fuck off back into the undergrowth’, so we added ‘lead time’ to mean ‘come close and sit until I can put the lead on’. He gets a treat when the lead goes on. The other thing is to learn triggers - I can mostly spot him smelling a deer/other prey now - his nose goes up in the air - and interrupt quickly. Then there’s water, which we have not cracked - he runs full-pelt towards it and can’t even hear us shouting. He comes back if he gets to the riverbank and we’re not behind him, but that would be no use if he’d had to cross a road to get there. So we take care that it’s safe to let him off knowing these triggers and don’t go to walks that aren’t safe for being off-lead.

All normal. My cocker will circle around me and walk to heal but he’s a pain on a lead.

Not had a WCS but just back from walk with my BC who was also hard work to train and is faaaaar from perfect but good enough. We met a couple of lovely cockers who were behaving exactly as people describe, zigzagging round the big (empty) fields, following scents. No bother to other dogs, responsive to their owner clearly well trained but also clearly quite high drive dogs.

Don't worry about what other spaniels do. Just focus on your dog and what you need to achieve. Decent recall in high stimulation environments, calmer round other animals. Maybe the pulling is fixable maybe it isn't because walks are VERY exciting. Different dogs are different so your dog may never be especially calm. But he needs to be safe and not a total bellend to be around.

Our trainer had several collies and I was comforted they were all different and all had quirks. Training is about reaching a good outcome for your dog,not some kind of objective standard.

Scent work
Agility can be good

find a new trainer ;) one that really gets spaniels and how to help them, they should be able to help give you a strategy for birds etc you can practise

Going against everything I ever read on here I have my spaniel on a harness and focussed on being exceptionally consistent with loose lead walking and his walking is so much better, I found on his collar he just kept pulling in a viscous cycle

So interesting reading this thread. We have a working springer spaniel who we love but she is wearing us out. Terrible on lead as she pulls like a train, I’ve more or less given up and just do suitable off lead walks (fortunately we live near a riding club which has great grounds). However it’s worth saying that our adult DD who is a primary teacher and therefore very consistent, has excellent success at lead walking her on a walk round the block. So it can be done.
We did agility for a couple of years ( unfortunately I’m not fit enough ) and also scent work for five years. Scent work is wonderfully rewarding for these dogs and I recommend it. However we have got stuck and not progressing now so sadly this may not work apart from me doing it at home.
Our main issue is that our dog enjoys three walks/runs a day and settles for a bit, but doesn’t settle for as long as we need her to. We are both mid sixties. When she wakes up after an hour snooze after her run, she demands attention, tells us she wants to play, walk, eat, and barks. We are finding this rather difficult as it is every day.
At 5.30 she conks out and sleeps all night.

I will just add she is five and a half, super fit, super intelligent and not interested in playing with other dogs.

Scent work round the garden would easily replace a walk or two.
sounds like your spaniel is anticipating the next activity or walk and routine

absolute dogs have some good tips on ditching the walks and ways to teach a dog to settle

totally agree about consistency for loose lead walking

Yes I think that’s it … anticipating the next walk/meal. She’s trying to get us to hurry up and give her her tea.
Will check out absolute dogs.

So, my dog is delightful on lead for everyone who isn't me, so it may not be anything specific your daughter is doing!

Re agility, if its something your dog really enjoyed, would Hoopers be suitable? It's lower movement for dogs and handlers.

Five years of scentwork is amazing, your dog must be almost a pro! Any tips for those of us at an earlier stage?

@MoreOfADogPerson Hi, well we have kind of got stuck around level 4 ( Covid slowed things up) because my dog is very quick in her reactions and we didn’t establish her indication well enough during the early stages. It didn’t seem to matter because she was very motivated and always found the scent but now the trials are more complex, the fact she doesn’t use a consistent controlled indication is causing us problems. So plenty of work in indication aAll the way through.
Our scent trainer also used to run occasional events where we went to a different location eg a farmyard or a boatyard, a stables, and did searches there for half a day, handlers learned a lot from this.

That sounds fab! Yes, my dog's indication isn't great and I need to do some more work so that its not just him pawing/knocking over where the scent item is hidden.

Apologies for the derail, OP!

I have two. One is amazing on a lead the other is terrible. Both trained the same, so I think it's just the dog.

We drive to off lead walks and just let them out from the boot to run free!

I think you can get some sort of lead to stop them pulling?