Hi,

My doberman his turning into a holy handful.I had a doctor appointment and was gone from home for a little over a hour and he broke out of his crate and totally destoyed a whole room. I bought a better crate but he just sits in there trying to get out and barking, crying and howling. I bought a no bark collar but even on the low setting he curls into a ball and won't talk to me for hours, nor will he eat or play after getting shocked by the collar. I've been keeping him on a leash when he not in his crate and now he has eaten thru 3 of those in like two seconds as soon as I turn my back. Do I just leave him in the crate period, till he goes outside?

It is like he is going totally backwards in training. When he is outside training he is very smart and listens. I found a place to let him run so he is getting alot of exercise now.

I know I should buy one of the Leerburg crates but I used my whole savings account rescuing this dog from a puppy mill trainer

Thank you

Hi Justine,
How old is he?

What kind of exercise is he getting?

Do you mean he's chewing through tethers when he is tethered to you, or are you leaving him tethered but unsupervised?

And what kind of training are you doing with him?

He is 7 months old. He chews thru the tethers before I can see it. He is in the kitchen with me and about 3 feet away He is smart enough to not let me know he has chewed thru it, he chews thru it and just sits there like he is still attached to it.

We average 6 hours exercise and training a day now. I have the videos: Your puppy 8 weeks to 8 months and Basice Dog Obedience.
Also have a electric collar and the video that goes with that coming today.

We are working on marker training at this time. He knows sit, down, leave it and we are working on coming to me when I call.

I can say we get enough exercise everyday that I have lost to clothes sizes in a month lol

Hi Justine

If I remember correctly you posted a few weeks ago about your dog being very fearful, nervous and shy.

This is well out of the realm of my level of experience, so I will leave the real advice to others. But If he were my dog I would take him to the vet for advice and possibly medication. It sounds like what you have on your hands might be a genetic temperament issue or a dog that has experienced a serious trauma at a very young age.

You might want to look into getting some in person help from a good trainer, too. Since he has so little confidence you could seek out either the best "purely positive" trainer you can find, or a balanced trainer that uses almost all positive reinforcement. Either way, if you decide to go this route the trainer should probably be someone very experienced in dealing with major behavior and fear problems.

The reaction to the bark collar that you are getting is not at all normal. If I were you I would stop using it. The last thing you want with a dog like this is for him to think corrections come from nowhere.

Lauren

i agree. If you factor in this dogs origins, theres a good chance hes not been solidly bred, and has inherited some temperament issues, including fearfulness, which was not helped by his mill upbringing.
If thats the case, you cannot eliminate that. You CAN however manage it, or make it worse through training and handling, socialization, etc.

i too would leave off the collar for now, if hes fearful, being zapped(out of nowhere!!) can make things worse, he could start to see the world as even more of an unsafe place, heck, now his crate is an unsafe place too, in his mind.

I would start looking at doing confidence building exercises, make the dog think he's the sh*t, and he can handle anything. There are exercises that won't erase his temperament, but will at least allow him to reasonably cope, with you making sure to manage his surroundings as best as you can.

Vet checked him over and says he is a great dog and in excellent health now, the breeder was feeding the worst food. He loved the vet I also have been having people pet him ( if he will allow it). Some people he likes most he has no use for. He won't eat treats out of anyone's hand but my family memember's. I had him out at a friends house for a barbeque and he was polite and quiet. People could talk to him but he would just lie down and watch me. Even if I walked around he just watched me and didn't social with others.

I'm not a fan of electric collars but I'm am out of ideas of how to handle this dog. I do think the breeder used a collar on him and over used it or not in the correct way.



I tried finding a trainer in my area and found nothing with in a 100 mile radius. I used to train horses for 25 years and usually ended up with trouble horses that after I trained them the owners still had trouble with them. I can send Boudreau to Dallas to train but don't see were that will help him here at home. I don't if I'm right in my thinking but I need to fix him in his own enviroment. I do find that outside he is great as well as inside as long as he is by me. I put him in another room and he throws a fit.

He is no longer fearful outside or inside for that matter. He will chase his tug toy and run me in circles with no cowering. He is like a new dog as far as that goes just that is will turn into a demon when away from me. My son says he is only doing it to make noise so I come in and tell him no. Tried the marker for good behavour when he is in the crate or being a good boy when tethered. He doesn't get that if I'm good I get a good boy and if I'm bad I get a no and correction. That doesn't work.

I don't know, I'm just out of ideas.

Yesterday a little dog came running up to him. I was totally freaked out because I had no clue how he was going to react. He was great, all tail wagging and just wanted to play with it. The owner was sitting in the park and wouldn't even come get it. I ended up catching it and telling the owner to come get it or I was calling the police. The dog did snap at Boudreau and his tail never stop wagging. But then I wouldn't be afraid of a dog that is no bigger than my foot either.