Regarding teaching informal heeling: after watching a training video that mentioned grass might be a distraction, I realized that Greta is way more distracted by the smells along the sidewalk than walking on the street at the curb. We moved out to the street, as a step up from our driveway, and now I'm noticing that every time we add a little new ground/distance, she is still pretty distracted.

We walk a little ways until I lose her attention, cross the street and start heading back towards the house, at which point she pays attention and walks really nicely. We do this over and over until it's not new any more and she's engaged with me both directions. We've made it about a block and a half over the last two months... I'm not terribly worried about distance yet, just the rate of progress I guess.

I think she is just excited about going new places... she's still only 10 months. We also only work on this 2-3 times / week. Does this sound normal? Am I just not trying hard enough to get her attention when we add new ground and she is distracted, or is this just how the process goes and I need to be patient?

For reference, she has graduated to a prong (keeper) and I am using "yes"/treats when she does well, "finger-tip" pops when she starts to pull and if that doesn't work we change direction and try again.

Thanks-

What method are you using? Is the dog pulling when distracted?

Pops should be given at a level that your dog respects. Rewards should be something your dog really wants. One of those is out of whack for you to still be having problems with LLW after 8 weeks.

It's not unreasonable to expect a dog to walk beside you without pulling and to ignore distractions at 10 months.

Have you done leash pressure work? I'd really focus on meaningful guidance for a few days defining exactly where you want the dog and then up the correction level.

I agree with Cathy on leash pressure work and I would start from scratch, in particular on your own property where the distractions/stress will be lower.

It's not uncommon for a stressed dog to do a lot of sniffing the ground.

Work on engagement.

Ed has an excellent video on leash pressure and it also covers a bit of engagement.

All of the Michael Ellis tapes are based on marker training so that is critical to doing thing that avoid stressing the dog.

Without your dog's attention it will be hard to do most any training.

Marker training starts with engagement!!

Cathy- could you be more specific on what you mean by what method? Are you talking training in general or LLW specifically? Entirely possible I need to up the reward level. Possibly the correction level as well.

We have been using the ME videos, including "Leash Skills," and did work on leash pressure when I first introduced the collar (slip lead at the time). Maybe we didn't work on this long enough? The explanation in the video seemed to be more about introducing leash pressure over a few sessions and then a variety of (possible) future applications rather than continued teaching of the skill specifically, if that makes sense.

Bob, which video of Ed's are you referring to? Entirely possible I have it and need to revisit...

She could be stressed, but I think a lot of it is also excitement. For example she is distracted by litter (especially food wrappers/cups), balloons, cat feces, surveyor flags, etc. She reacts by wanting to dash over and check all of these things out, preferably by trying to pick them up, lol.

Definitely more engagement is needed- any other posts or tips that you can throw my way there?

I'm re-watching the engagement section on the puppy video- engagement with an older pup / teenage dog is the same game, right? look, yes, treat, etc.?

We're probably not doing enough of this-

the leash pressure is the one I was talking about but the engagement video covers a lot of important things.

Non of the videos are a teach and forget thing.

No different then in correction training everything needs to be kept up with.

To many training in both methods drop the "training" aspect because the dog 'already knows it".

Dropping correction OR reward will soon loose the dogs skills.

My dog Trooper is 10 1/2 but through random reward he knows there will ALWAYS be another reward with the "next" behavior, or the one after that or the tenth one from the first, etc!

As per Michael Ellis the "random" reward will actually BUILD drive for the reward when done correctly.

I agree with that 100%.

I too PIA!