freaking out about shadows and reflections

[Toffee's Mom]

OMG! HELP! My pup (9 months) loves to chase shadows and reflections. She stands at perfect attention until a shadow moves...She chases it and then waits again. This was cute at the beginning but now I am thinking it is becoming an obsession! She would not go out this morning because she was watching my shadow and waiting for it to move. How in the world do I break her of this!

my GOD Shelties are the greatest, the weird obsessions they come up with

if you ever played with her and the shadows, she is right that needs to stop right away if you want to break that one... clicker training!! Behaviour modification is the most humane, easy way to break even the weirdest obsessions...
SO load up your clicker if you haven't yet, as it is never too late and you kinda can't really mess up too badly Loading the clicker simply means in the very beginning you click and treat (with REAL yummy treats.. TOffee's is cheese) right away about 60 times at the most, before the dog knows every time a click happens great things follow.. (you can also use the word, yes, or something as a marker, if no clicker handy) theis will help you with any training you want... don't click tho if she is doing something silly which you don't want her to learn, lol

Set up scenario like today where she sees her shadow, and if she wavers even for a second or looks away, RIGHT THEN click and then treat when she moves forward or away from the shadow, or looks at you... Give it a command like 'leave it' after a few times, if you don't have her trained already for it...
It'll work

 

[emmygirl]

I did watch that! It was great. But at that time we did not have a problem so I deleted it!!! Silly me! Who would have thought!

Victoria Stillwell did an episode on this - a Gordan setter that salivated and was mesmerised by reflections and shadows. I will watch it again tonight to see how she dealt with it. If I remember rightly she got the owner to get up and leave the room every time the dog looked at the reflections. Can't remember if she made a sound first though.

We have a cattle dog at flyball who chases shadows - which can be a problem if any of the handlers cast a shadow at the start line. But she is getting much better now she is learning to be obsessed with balls instead!

 

[ruckusluvr]

Lynn is shadow chasing as i type this!

she used to do it way too much! now she does it just a couple of times a day, about 1 or 2 minutes each time. She used to do it 10+ times a day up to 20 minutes at a time if I let her. she mainly out grew it! but trying to distract her did help too!

 

[emmygirl]

How do you break it?

How did you break her of it?

Lynn is shadow chasing as i type this!

she used to do it way too much! now she does it just a couple of times a day, about 1 or 2 minutes each time. She used to do it 10+ times a day up to 20 minutes at a time if I let her. she mainly out grew it! but trying to distract her did help too!

 

[ruckusluvr]

for the most part, Lynn just grew out of it.

When I caught her doing it, I would TRY to distract her.but it rarely worked. I would squeak a toy, and call her name.