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Our pit bull, O’Shea, has been a wonderful addition to our family. Immediately after getting him, we enrolled him in basic training courses, going through the motions of sit/stay, down/stay, off, stand/stay, and I have even taught him how to shake.
However, his loose leash walking never caught on. Because he does so well with everything else, I know he’d be a good candidate to get CGC certified, but what’s holding him back right now is his loose leash walking. Does anyone have any tips on how to overcome this? I would appreciate any/all comments. THANK YOU 🙂
Are you trying to get him to heel when you walk? I’ve tried holding treats at my side to keep him there as we walk. Another tip I was given was to use a long mixing spoon w/ peanut butter or cream cheese on it to keep the dog on your side.
Yes, we’re trying to use “heel” for “come to my left side.” Mostly used if he gets ahead of us and pulls a bit too much. And we use “come” for if he lags behind.
We have tried the holding treats to keep him there; it’s a good thing he’s treat oriented. But it hasn’t quite sunk in yet. I guess we could try the mixing spoon thing, too. Thanks for your comments. 🙂
Good luck. All just takes time, patience, time, and more time. = ) sounds like you are really active w/ your pup so I bet he gets it sooner then later.
Rebecca,
I have put Kira through CGC and loose leash is important but a really big thing is meet and greets. I was lucky Kira was natural AT FIRST. She started to get stubborn so I had to use a very stern voice when giving her commands. My reccomendations are to use a choke chain(not prong color or halter those are not aloud for testing) and walk him the minute he begins to lead give a quick tug on the leash and say Heel. Keep repeating that so he knows that when he walks in front of you he is not behaving well. As he keeps walking beside you sound excited and say good boy heel good boy. Then slowly loosen the leash. Make sure you yourself are relaxed. You are also wanna walk in variable speeds. That is on the test too. Walk slow then medium then really fast.Thank you! We’re hoping we can devote a lot of time in the evenings/weekends to the loose leash walking. And perhaps the choke chain would be best for him. I think a lot of times he just finds all the smells and people around him interesting, so he tugs a bit to get to those things. As far as meet ‘n’ greets go…on the CGC test will the dog meet another dog? O’Shea just gets real excited around other dogs–he wants to meet and play with them (hasn’t ever gotten to do this)…but when he does meet people, we always have him sit, maybe lay down if it’s a really small child, and he seems to do extraordinarily well with this. If you have any other tidbits that would be helpful in prepping for a CGC thing, let me know!! 🙂
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