Hello, My situation is as follows. We have a 2 year old female GSD. We have been training her with great success since we got her at 10 weeks old. Our problem is no matter what we try we can't get her to calm down when we leave her with someone else holding her leash. EXAMPLE: She did great on 1-9 of her AKC Canine Good Citizens Test, until we got to the 10th item, a stranger holding her leash while we walk out of sight for 2 minutes. She then began whining and yelping thus failing her test and 20 bucks down the drain. Also when we leave her and go anywhere she barks and whines for about 5-10 minutes. I wouldn't describe it as separation anxiety for say as she dosen't destroy anything, or carry on for a long time. Another example is if we are walking with a group of dogs and my wife has the leash if I attempt to walk in front of her she starts a loud whine like someone stepped on her tail. She also does it if I try to walk someone else's dog. We would like to know the best approach to solving this, we have viewed the Leerburg E Collar DVD but as of yet have not trained with a E Collar. Before we do so I would like to know the best methods for solving this.

Which is the most pressing thing? They don't all sound necessarily related ... is it the issue of not being able to hand off the leash?

Each of these sounds quite remediable, and none sounds anything like an e-collar situation to me. JMO.

This one: "if we are walking with a group of dogs and my wife has the leash if I attempt to walk in front of her she starts a loud whine" ... do you mean you are walking ahead of them on the walk, or you cross in front of their path? The dog is whining because you are walking another dog and your wife is walking your dog?

And the whining when you leave ... do you mean when you go out and she is alone? (How did you find out it lasted only 5-10 minutes?)



eta
"She did great on 1-9 of her AKC Canine Good Citizens Test, until we got to the 10th item" .... kudos! That's still pretty darned good!

Edited by Connie Sutherland (03/01/2011 03:08 PM)
Edit reason: eta

 Quote: Connie Sutherland

Each of these sounds quite remediable, and none sounds anything like an e-collar situation to me. JMO.

Me too! Welcome to the forum Jason.

Jason hi, n congrats on considering other options before going straight for the e-collar. hope you thouroughly investigate all your options n strategies before you go down that path for a young dog. posting here is a good start.

Question 1. yes, if I try to walk ahead of my wife she starts whining and pulling trying to get to me. Also if we are in public and I try to walk in a store and have my wife hold her outside she starts with the whining and it sounds like someone is hurting her, same thing if I hold her and my wife goes in the store.

Question 2:When we leave to go somewhere she starts barking and whining, we went around the corner from the house and listened several times and after about 5 -10 minutes she stops.

As for training we have tried when she was younger to have someone hold her leash and we would walk out of sight for just 30 seconds or so and she would go nuts. Once she would stop we would return and give her a treat. We were careful to never reward her while she was whining so as to not reward the bad behavior. After repeated times of this type of training we never got any where. We want to do obedience comps with her because she is really good at most other commands. However if I have my wife stay away while trying to do the comp walk through with her she can't focus because she is too busy looking for her mom and vise versa.

 Quote: jasontrail

As for training we have tried when she was younger to have someone hold her leash and we would walk out of sight for just 30 seconds or so and she would go nuts. Once she would stop we would return and give her a treat. We were careful to never reward her while she was whining so as to not reward the bad behavior. After repeated times of this type of training we never got any where. We want to do obedience comps with her because she is really good at most other commands. However if I have my wife stay away while trying to do the comp walk through with her she can't focus because she is too busy looking for her mom and vise versa.

I would try working on this again at home with the two of you. One holds the leash, the other steps around the corner for one second, two at the tops. Thirty seconds is a long time to begin training this with both mom and dad disapearing. Assuming she doesn't whine after one or two, you pop back in mark and reward. Gradually increase the time, but go slowly. If she whines, just a gentle "nope" and try again. Only after you get her comfy with one of you gone for 30 seconds would I then add someone else holding the leash and you both leaving... for one second, etc...

I hope this helps!

Barbara, I have had this problem and I wonder if breaking it down even smaller might work. Like walking away just to the limit of where she might become concerned, turning back and rewarding for being concerned at all. Kind of like desensitizing for dog reactive dogs.

The only reason I'm suggesting this is because I have tried what you are saying, but IME it didn't work because it still allowed her to get into an anxious state of mind in the first place.

As a disclaimer, I have not tried what I'm describing myself, mostly because I don't have someone to hold the leash for me everyday while I work on it. I'm just thinking out loud on this one.

I wonder what Connie thinks.

Edited by Lauren Jeffery (03/01/2011 08:16 PM)
Edit reason: clarification

I will definetly give this a try, and keep the forum updated. Thanks to everyone for your replys, it's much appreciated.

Lauren, it might take some experimenting to see what will work, but definitely breaking it down smaller/shorter can never be wrong. (That is why I suggested trying to leave the dog's sight for one or two seconds vs thirty.) Trying to walk away while still in sight might work too - it is certainly worth a try.

I'm not sure what you meant by "IME it didn't work" and "I have not tried this myself"... do you mean you tried the walking away and coming back but not having someone the dog knows holding the leash while you popped around the corner for one second?

Connie's advice is always worth waiting for!

I mean I tried leaving and coming back, just outside the door at home.

The walking away thing is where I would need a helper to work on it daily. Before the dog reactivity started up, Tasha was all set for the CGC, just like this pup. This was one area that would have been a big fail.