Lunging at cars

My friend has a 6 month old collie bitch.
She has always been a 'car chaser', but is getting worse now she's getting bigger.

Can anyone give me any tips I can pass on to my friend?!

Not sure what type of lead is being used, but I use a Ezydog traffic lead when walking around town. If you are not familiar with this it is a very short lead ( google ) and they walk right at your side.

It can be a difficult one with collies.

Often you find that its when they are not being challenged enough physically/mentally the rest of the time, I'm sure they do it to entertain themselves.

My Hoki got really bad both times she was on restricted exercise following her knee ops. But now she's nearly 100% fit again, it isn't so bad (though she does still like to watch them go past).

Of course as a pup, your friend will be limiting the amount of exercise too. If I was her I would:

(1) play with the pup before going out to get rid of some excess energy.

(2) look for a place where she can do a bit of training and possibly even a bit of play (e.g. on lead catch with a ball) where cars are nearby, but not too close. She should concentrate on keeping the pups attention on her with treats/toys. This can be very difficult when they get fixated on cars, hence suggesting starting off a bit further away.
(3) when she is confident that she can keep the pups attention at a distance, move closer to the cars. It may also help if the place is where cars are travelling slower - perhaps the side of a car park.

I'm not suggesting this should all be in one session - it really depends on how well she gets on.

Ideally (and I know this isn't always practical), she should try to avoid walking in areas where cars are close other than on these training sessions - otherwise she will probably have difficulty keeping the pups focus on her and that will just reinforce the pups behaviour.

So in summary 2 things - firstly, find a way of keeping the pups attention on you - with treats/toys, whatever the pup likes best (needs to be very high value) and secondly find an outlet for the dog where it can do what comes naturally - i.e. running, chasing, herding.

If she doesn't feel like she's getting anywhere with these suggestions, I think she should consider getting expert help - but make sure its from a collie experienced trainer/behavourist.

Cassie has always done this from being very small and I blame it on us using an extendable lead as a pup. We've struggled since then to cure her of it and recently she's finally getting better. Patch gave us some invaluable information regarding harnesses and a training lead and this seems to have made a big difference to us. You just have to persevere with the training and perhaps also try getting her to sit as a car is coming and reward if she stays sitting until the car has passed. It's a long and arduous task but we appear to finally be getting somewhere. Tell her not to despair, there is a light at the end of the tunnel

Dale started lunging at cars when he was 12 weeks and Chip is just as bad. However Dale has more or less stopped now.To be honest I'm not sure if he improved because of anything I did or just grew up a bit.

I was told to build up focus on a toy and bring it out to distract him if I saw a car coming. Fine,but we live near a busy road with cars coming all the time so it didn't work well for me. However its been very useful on walks if I see another dog coming or cyclists etc.

I used a harness or a balanced lead when we had to get somewhere or he was having a bad day and worked hard at loose lead walking. Every time he pulled or lunged we walked in tight circles, or figures of eight if I got dizzy, until he settled down. You can't do this if you're in a hurry and I'm sure I got some odd looks. I also rewarded him if he looked at me when a car passed.

I'm doing the same things with Chip and I've started talking him to a playing field right beside a main road. It has a high fence to keep footballs in so its safe. I'm hoping if we play there he'll get used to traffic and it won't be such a big problem.

Collies get so much pleasure from eyeing things and cars move when they stare at them so its no wonder they want to work traffic.

It took Dale until this summer to settle down and he's 2 in November, so if there's a quicker solution I'd love to find it.

I agree with Hali and think often this type of behaviour can often be caused by a lack of mental stimulation elsewhere in their lives. Our collies are all working dogs and not one of them chases cars or has ever shown the inclination to do so.

Collies can get obsessed with things so quickly, that I would tell your friend to get the pup obsessed with a ball or toy. Do all the initial training away from traffic, until the pup is really *into* her toy and then try distracting her closer to traffic.

Good luck!

You can retrain using My Rjj started to try to chase cars, so I went to a local seaside town & sat on the sea wall where cars have to slow down to go round quite a sharp bend. I sat well away from the traffic at first & click & treated when he did not react. I then gradually moved closer & closer to the traffic not reacting it he moved & click & treating if he didn't. I took me three hours, but at the end he ignored the cars & still does.

This doesn't have to be done in one session, but the quicker & earlier it is done the sooner the dog learns to not react to cars

I agree with this. When we first had Skye she used to do it and with bicylces too. By the time she got to 4 months she was obsessed with car lunging.

I got her motivated by giving her jobs around the house and as a reward I would give her, her favourite sqeaky toy........then that toy would be taken out with me as she was about to lunge I'd squeak it and that would bring her attention back to me. With alot of patience she stopped it, now she walks without a lead and doesn't give a monkeys about cars or bikes.thankfully. Good luck to your friend

Thanks everyone!
Must say, the pup gets lots of mental stimulation! My friend is at home all day with her, and they play 'catch' before they go on a walk (catch the ball).
I took her out this morning to see how she was - good as gold for me! Didn't lunge once, and walked right next to me! Typical!

they are good i have them for our two they can be brought at pet city