Tugging technique

corbinam

corbinam

Moderator
This may not be the best place for this question, but I will ask it here anyways. For agility, we do a lot of tugging. Since we do so much of it, I think it's important to encourage the right technique. Tugging the wrong way can hurt your dog's neck and back. Tugging the right way can improve their rear strength.

That being said, I've never had a dog before that had a naturally enh tugging style haha. Enzo tugs by moving the toy side to side with his neck, and then he wants to fall over and tug on his back. It's adorable to watch, but not good for him in the long run. He almost never pulls straight back. I try to encourage him when he does, and also push him back a little bit. He also knows how to back up for cookies.

On our list is teaching LOTS of rear end awareness but curious if anyone else had any ideas.
 
The way I encouraged Missy to pull straight back was walking backwards myself. Of course, this might have been the wrong way because Missy has no rear end awareness. But she does tug correctly.
 
I'd love to be able to get Dickens to tug at all. For some reason he doesn't want to grip anything with his front teeth; he takes things in his mouth so gingerly that often they fall right out.

With former dogs I've found that playing tug with an old cotton sock helps clean their teeth, and I wish I could get Dickens to do it!
 
Hmmm I actually have the same issue with Bailey. She rarely tugs backwards. I try to encourage it by pulling the toy towards myself to get her to pull it back. She'll do it for a second, but then drops the toy. She prefers I hold the toy while she tugs it side to side.
 
haha, Spruce never used to tug backwards either, I found less wiggling and more constant backwards pressure on my part increased it exponentially as it triggered the oppositional reflex.
Of course I am still working on tugging in public a tad more consistently that I care less how he tugs lollll

please video of the roll over and tug on yer back from Enzo!!!! :fl
 
Submissive dogs rarely challenge the owner to tug with them.

A challeging dog will try to remove the tug from the owner by using force and whatever it takes.

My sheltie likes to tug if I walk with her, but she never enters in competition with me no matter what I try. My cocker spaniel is a completely different story. She measures dominance with me hence why I never let her win the tug war game not even as a reward. IF she thinks she is stronger than me I am really in a bad situation.

For Mei-Li I drop the tug as a reward. I can say....MeiLi melts my heart!:hugs
 
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