What to do when you can't avoid triggers on walks?

M

MeoMeu

Forums Regular
I've been working with my reactive dog to try and make him calmer on walks, our main issue is vehicles. When I see a car approaching, I have him sit near me and then give him a treat once the car passes. It gets a little tiring doing this for each and every car that passes but it does seem to have paid off- he doesn't lunge and bark at normal cars that pass by and rather sits and waits for the treat instead.

The problem now remains in the form of especially loud/fast cars, big trucks, motorcycles (a true nightmare), skateboarders, etc. Even the most high value treats don't do it for him, he lunges and barks like crazy and I can't get his attention until the offending object is out of sight. The only thing that slightly works is picking him up, when I do that sometimes he doesn't bark at all and just watches it go past, or if it's something he really hates, i.e. a motorcycle, he'll wiggle in my arms and bark a few times, which is still a lot better than his reaction if he were on the ground.

I don't imagine that is the best thing for me to do- the last thing I want is to be rewarding the behaviour in some way, but I don't know what else to do. I can't really distance him from the trigger cause we're on the sidewalk with nowhere to go. Where I lived previously, there was a big park and trails right behind my house which was perfect, but here there isn't a park within walking distance and I don't drive yet so there isn't an escape from all the traffic. The looks I get from neighbours and strangers probably wondering “why can’t she control her dog?” are pretty embarassing which is why I've taken to just lifting him up when I see something approaching us that I know there's no way he'll be able to calmly handle....but that in itself is kind of embarassing as well LOL.
 
Firstly when we train / help our fur babies we really need to remain indifferent to what other people think (it can be very difficult)

Not less trafficked roads you can use for training, where there is also opportunity for "good dog smell"??

Have been back in your posts and can not see how old your boy is, but can see he's had a bit of problems.

If he is some years - I would not care about whether I should take him up or not -when there is the most daunting motor vehicles and so only interest me for the less noisy, and would reward while we move with a "look at me"

Sure you will get many good solutions from the other members - whose English is not so hopelessly as mine. :wink2:
 
Oh I feel your pain.. my boy got hit by a car at 8 months because of his car reactivity :(. We have worked A LOT on it since then so I can give you some tips, but I do suggest going to a professional for help, as it's hard to give advice when we can't actually see what's going on.

The Look at That game: find somewhere that you can stand back 15-20 feet and watch cars go by. When the dog watches calmly, click (if clicker trained) or mark with a "yes" and reward. They pick up on it quickly! When you can stand 15-20 feet back with no reaction, move a little closer. If stimuli is too much, then move back again. When you can stand 6 feet from the cars, add movement. Start in a parking lot or quiet neighbourhood so you don't overwhelm the dog with stimuli. The game is the same except you're walking instead of standing still.

This game helped us so much with the neighbourhood cars, but we still struggle with highway speeds. When we train around faster moving cars, he wears a head halter but I wouldn't start using one of those unless you ask a trainer how to use it properly!

Good luck and let us know how it goes!
 
Phoebe can pretty much ignore traffic unless something really noisy goes by. I talk to her and tell her what a good girl she is for not reacting to the cars, and if she blows it she has to sit until she calms down. no treat. All I can recommend is that you walk her with a halter rather than a collar. You never know what they are going to do and a harness gives you better control.
 
Well having a dog that's reactive like that as well, I can say, Awesome job! Because I know how hard it is to get them to the point where they will ignore some cars. Honey is at the same point yours is, and it's a constant struggle, some days she's better than others. I too pick her up when a car is going so fast she will be lunging, and I think you're doing all the right steps, a trainer as suggested above is probably going to have some good tips, but it sounds like you're doing really well. If your neighbors are giving you dirty looks ignore them and just keep working on it!
 
With my dogs I gave up with the treats long ago. Treats can become a rod for your own back, and they should be phased out before the expectation of a treat encourages bad behaviours.

My dogs are generally fine when they are walked alone, but together they can get silly and all bets are off. Frankly, they get a growled "leave it" before they get a chance to bark for fun, and it does actually work. I can tell if they are in a silly mood so are likely to bark at noisy vehicles, and the dogs have a 'tell' when I can see they want to bark at something.

A couple of other things that help me are keeping a short leash, and walk faster so they don't try to fill in the time with barking.
 
I think I'd just get a good, strong collar that won't break or come off, then take him to a location where lots of cars go by (preferably residential where speeds aren't too high) and just drag him along when he overreacts. Once he's inured to the stimulus he'll stop reacting.
 
Mignarda said:
I think I'd just get a good, strong collar that won't break or come off, then take him to a location where lots of cars go by (preferably residential where speeds aren't too high) and just drag him along when he overreacts. Once he's inured to the stimulus he'll stop reacting.
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Hate to say it but I can tell you anecdotally that isn't correct. I can walk Bentley in a busy area and he reacts every single time he sees or hears another dog. Walking him more often or in busier areas hasn't made a difference. 8 years later he's still just as reactive.
 
If only it was that easy..... we tried the whole desensitizing thing after Cruz got hit and it just made it worse. Ideally you want to remove the dog from any of the stimulus he/she reacts to for months then slowly reintroduce it. Unfortunately that's not realistic with cars, so start out training around slow moving ones (parking lot, neighbourhood).
 
I agree with Ashley. Flooding a reactive dog with whatever sets them off could very likely make things worse. My dog use to lunge at cars. What worked for her was standing on the sidewalk and shoving her mouth with treats when a car passed. I started off with a not so busy street, one where a car passed every minute or so. Eventually, I was able to reduce the number of treats and increase the walks to busier blocks. My dog also quickly picked up that "Car = Treat" and reached a point where she would look at a car, not react and instead look at me for a treat. Sometimes she still lunges, so I can never let my guard down, but she is a zillion times better. Motorcycles and loud cars still sometimes set her off, she'll look at me for treats and I still reward her. She doesn't even look at most normal sounding cars.

The key is to start out slow, less busy streets. If your dog is being too reactive, go home and try again in a few days. Don't push your dog. Good luck!
 
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