you are a brave woman! I know my NI are so strong esp Kody who is a real powerhouse, when I walk both on lead at the same time I have both mine of a head collar of some sort and then collar and lead in my hand - I just know if they were attached to my belt they would pull me over

Good on you for training your husky to walk safely off lead
All five of our huskies go for off leads walks daily, all five also live with cats In my experience the breed with the highest prey drive are probably Patterdales, However I've met Patterdales that live with cats and know a Patterdale that lives with a house rabbit.
I strongly believe all dogs are individuals and it's more down to training and socialisation than what breed they are

sorry i couldnt reply sooner

kai is 2 1/2 and has grown up with guinea pigs and cats that we used to foster so small furries dont interest her in the slightest

the reason i wanted to try and find more info is there seem to be a lot of people who claim to know about all breeds and yet the info they give seems confused

as an example we used to take kai to puppy training and the class was working towards their good citizen award. now even though kai had a great recall and was one of the best behaved dogs in the class the trainer wouldnt put her in for the test because she said huskys were dangerous dogs and couldnt be trusted off lead.

in that class was a boxer puppy that was so wappy it would almost bowl the owner over by running into them and could not do a single command, and yet it was put forward for the test and passed!!!!

needless to say we have never been back there but it has made me more determined to find out more about dogs in general not just my particular breed

you might find this interesting regarding different drives.

http://www.volhard.com/training/cpp.htm

Gaz I would change to a different training school, for a trainer to say husky's are a dangerous dog is a very sweeping statement. I have 4 mals that have all been through training school, all did their GCA even if it was only level 1, and the trainer treated them all equally to the rest of the class. having said that two of my mals totally ignor our cat, but the younger two would give chase if the cat moved very quickly, maybe they would only smooch all over the cat, but I wont take the risk of leaving my cat with the dogs if I am not around to supervise.

Mo

I know of people who walk their Huskies off lead and as I said we walk our mal off lead. We have no small furries at home and now we couldn't get any as he could not be trusted in the slightest.

I know of people who have a couple of mals and keep rabbits ducks etc. As has been said its all about socialisation, the individual dogs personality and other such factors.

I used to have a pet rat, a jack russel and a ferret and they could all play happily together (not unsupervised obviously) yet my jack russel would happily hunt other rats when we were out and I am sure my ferret would have given a chance.

Max used to be like this....

I'd let him off lead to do recall in the class and he would go over to every other owner/dog. I could be waving a whole roast chicken at him and he would ignore me.

Luckily, he is much better now and we passed our KC Bronze Award.

Max's prey drive is huge. He will chase anything - cats, rabbits, birds, other dogs. Luckily he's not stealthy enough to actually catch anything. He just gallumphs over to them at 100mph and they run away...

Hi There

I have a Northern Inuit and when we let him off he always comes back (probably because we always take some tasty liver trests with us), but i have read the same thing. The only problem i have with Shobi is he is aggressive with other male dogs. Not quite sure how we are going to tackle it? We have not had him long. Let me know how you get on. I hopefully attached a picture? Still new to this!

I think its fair to say with any breed there is a picture built of the breeds overall characteristics over many generations, different lines have different traits and may exhibit different tendancies within the breeds range.

Many of the breed characteristics that are mentioned in books etc are there to give people an understanding of what a dog of this breed could be like. It cannot predict what each individual dog is like. I applaud you for training your husky to this level and hope it continues (if she is two and a half then it should).

It doesn't change the fact a large number of Huskies are unpredicatble (for recall) off lead and prone to throw a deaf moment when it suits. The very same independant mindedness that allowed them and other northern breeds to survive for thousands of years in such inhospitable parts of the world can be a real trial in a pet dog. The warnings are so new potential owners appreciate what they are possibly getting themselves into.

We have found our boy to be a very easy dog to train, he is incredibly intelligent and very willing to learn. However we were warned how difficult Mals could be, its a case of prepare for the worst and anything else is a bonus I guess. Though I hasten to add he is only 13.5 months so will not have passed through pubity yet.

Browser - if he is aggressive at that tender age (you said he was 9 months?) then I would get back to basics - training classes, socialisation walks etc, seek proffessional help cos depending on what mix he is he may not finish growing till 2-3 years and will be a very powerful dog and if unchecked his aggression could become much worse.

Hi

Thanks for helping me. We are currently on a waiting list to see a professional trainer who helped me with my deaf lurcher. We have only had him a few weeks and he has just turned a year old. We are, as you said, trying with the basics at the mo. Firstly we wanted to get him used to us and settled as he has had 3 homes (including ours), that is a lot for a young dog. As beautiful as he is and the thought of a puppy would be wonderful, but i think as soon as he is mature enough we are going to get him to have the op (aah poor thing!) Hopefully this will help his aggression. He is fantastic with our children, the youngest being 9 years old, but i would still not leave him alone with the youngest as he his very playfull and boistrous (hope i spelt that right!?).