Loose Leash Walking
Loose Leash Walking can be a simple thing to teach your dog. If you have trouble with Loose Leash Walking, you may have made one or more of the following mistakes:
| 1. You may not have clear criteria. It will be infinitely easier for your dog to do as you wish if you are very clear in your expectations. Where do you want your dog to be? Before you answer, think carefully. What exactly are your criteria for loose leash walking? Before you start training your dog, you must clearly define where your dog should be so that you can reinforce him when he is there. If your criterion is that the dog does not pull on leash, then how much tension will you accept? Some? None? Depends on your mood? 2. Do you adequately reinforce your dog for walking on a loose leash? Is it worth your dog's efforts to remain with you in the face of other fun stuff he may encounter on his walk? Does ignoring distractions pay off for him? 3. You may have reinforced pulling on leash. Every time your dog pulls on leash and you move forward, you are rewarding pulling on leash. Your dog pulls on leash because he wants to get from A to B: if you allow him to move toward B while on a tight leash, you reinforcing that behaviour. That means you are making pulling on leash an even stronger behaviour than it already is. Remember, reinforcement means strengthening. |
In order for your dog to truly understand what you want him to do, it is important to establish very specific criteria for loose leash walking. This will make it easier for your dog to understand and it will make it easier for you to now what to reinforce. A loose leash is a pretty arbitrary concept for dogs to understand. You will have much greater success if you teach loose leash walking as a position relative to you, not the amount of pressure on the lead. Normally, I would begin by reinforcing my dog for being within a two foot circle of me, then when he is fluent (he is there 85% of the time), I would require him to be on one side or the other and NEVER ahead of me.
If you have established your criteria as 'beside me', you then have to reinforce the dog when he is. Start with stationary position as it is easier, then progress to moving postion by following these steps:
1. Have some cookies in your hand and take one step away from your dog. C/T as he moves up closer to you, even if it is just one step at first. As soon as he is reliable, take the cookies out of your hand and start to feed him from your pocket. It is important that you feed your dog at your leg as that is where you want him to be. Ideally, drop the cookie so it is beside your heel. Once he eats the cookie, take a step forward and repeat. Do this in six different places and stay at this step until your dog will quickly pop up beside you, regardless of where you are (80% success rate)
2. Continue as above except now you will toss the cookie three feet behind you. Stay still and wait for your dog to hurry back into position beside you. When he does, click then toss another cookie three feet behind you. Do this in six different places.
3. Again toss the treat behind you, right past your dog's nose. When your dog finishes eating it and turns around to come back to you, turn your back and start walking. (Just take a few steps in the beginning). When you dog catches up to you, but before he gets past your pant leg, click and treat. Repeat in six different places.
4. Goal: your dog will walk on your left side while moving. Your dog is on leash. You turn away from him and start walking. Your dog follows. As the dog catches up to you and is coming up next to you, mark and feed on your left leg. Once he's finished his treat, start again. Feed your dog as soon as he is beside you.
5. Now it's your job to increase the number of steps before delivering the food.
Never feed if your dog has gotten in front of you. Turn around.
Work towards walking more steps before rewarding. You can vary this and reinforce while he is next to you if you wish, or toss the treat way behind you so the dog has to hunt for it and then reinforce him for catching back up to you. As your dog gets better and you can now walk quite a distance without forging and pulling, don't fail to reward intermittently. By reinforcing this behaviour heavily, you are building value for it and your dog will choose more and more to stay with you instead of rushing ahead to greet other people and dogs. You MUST be variable in the number of steps that you take before feeding. Your dog can not be able to guess when his next cookie is coming, otherwise he will start to be like a yo-yo on the leash, forging and returning, forging and returning.
Ideally while teaching this skill, you will never let your dog move ahead of you. If he does, simply turn around and place him behind you again.
If your dog pulls on leash at any time, play the Walk Away Game