Sounds very much like Dexter. And he too will start jumping and leaping when he meets other dogs - out of sheer excitement and desire to play. But it can trigger snappiness in other dogs and also other owners are understandably uneasy when they see my big golden dog fixated on their dog, while he's on the ground before hurtling towards them.....!

Have you tried keeping him on a loose lead, and not letting him off it - I do this with Dex at present while I'm trying, with the help of a trainer, to calm him down around other dogs. Just an idea

Difficult to say without seeing it, sounds like typical predatory behaviour ie not aggression but apprehension shown by one of the 4 Fs ie freezing.

I would not allow my dog to rehearse this behaviour.

Thanks but how would you stop it? He's impossible to distract with toys or treats, he will not do an attention exercise, he is totally fixated. I've taking to physically pulling him up out of the postion but this is not ideal and he's very strong and weighs 45kg! Obviously I can't work on this from a distance as I have no control over the other dogs who come bounding over.

my Tupac does this to his best friends.. he is exited -) (and yes, imo its from the GSD)

Welcome to my world

It's so frustrating. I too used to resort to trying to physically move Dex - it was impossible then and even more so now that he's got bigger...

The mistake I think you are making is using a toy for "distraction".

To be effective a toy should be THE MOST IMPORTANT THING in a dog's life so that a dog is impervious to anything else.

This requires training in isolation from anything else.

If your dog is not "distracted" by a toy or food, it means of course that the presence of another dog is far more reinforcing to it than either of these, or it has a big fear issue which is not being dealt with correctly.

I think in herding breeds it is play, certainly you see it in collies ect a lot.

However there is a diff between the play stalk and the freeze stalk, its noticeable but kinda hard to explain, especially in different breeds.

If you can't redirect him you need a more effective training method!

Adam

Can anyone detail the difference? I would absolutely love to know!

But with Cain the outdoors is just too distracting. He works wonderfully inside but get him outside in the big wide world and he totally loses interest in food or toys. He's hyper stimulated by it all. He is desperate to interact with other dogs which is why they are more reenforcing than any treat or toy. But he also has a lack of confidence and no social knowledge so gets his interactions all wrong and causes more negative experiences for himself. Also for the safety of other dogs I have to be careful with how I expose him to them. I know he's frustrated but he's not safe to just let go. Aside from gentle controlled exposure, as we've been doing for the last year, I don't know what more I can do.

Fully explained replies would be welcome and more helpful than a few short sweeping statements saying "well basically you're doing it all wrong but I'm not going to tell you how to improve."

Fully explained replies would be welcome and more helpful than a few short sweeping statements saying "well basically you're doing it all wrong but I'm not going to tell you how to improve


Unfortunately IME on this forum and others, the response tends to be the same whether you have put in a few observations or written a lengthy post.

IE done it, tried it, etc etc

IME with clients they have not tried it ENOUGH.

So, how obsessed is your dog with food or toys, what training have you done to increase the value of same or identify the hierarchy of reinforcement?


I am finding it a bit difficult to understand how a dog that is allowed very rarely to interact with other dogs can find THIS more reinforcing than other things?

If he is "hyper stimulated" by the outside as you say, perhaps you need to do MORE outside so that the contrast between indoors and outside is reduced?

What do you mean by "hyper stimulated" what behaviours does he exhibit different from those indoors?