Hello, I an raising two hopefulls for the schutzhund field and therefore a little paranoid on doing or not doing something that will forever harm their Possible Schutzhund Careers so please bare with me! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

Both my boys are 15 week old GS. I have socialized them constantly since about 8 weeks when I got them, different kennels and I do everything with them separetly. When we first started going out they wanted to run up to everyone and be petted ect. Which I did not allow unless on my terms at home, friends ect. Other then that I just kept walking talking to the pups in incouraging words, giving treat when they followed me ect. The last couple of walks we had both of the pups (they are only with me separetly) have started to bark at certain people walking by. I was really surprised when they started doing this, especially when both of them started doing this even though they are not together to learn this behaviour from each other.

My question is should I stop this behaviour and how to go about this the correct way as not to interfer with future schutzhund work. With our other dogs I would just correct them with a firm no and that would be that but I'm so nervous of doing something wrong with these two.

Thanks for your patience in advance!! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Hi Petra - my pup (now 14 months old) did the same thing when he was that age. I did not correct for it but just tried socializing him more in the situations like you described. The unwanted barking at certain people went away after a few months and now he usually just ignores people altogether....

Thanks Mike, that's good to know, I've got Ed's DVD raising a working puppy but it doesn't cover those little things that crop up, I'll just continue as before then and hopefully they will correct themselves.

Some clarification may help. There's a couple of reasons he may be barking here... Body language is key.

Is he lunging and giving a high pitched yappy bark? This might be occuring because you've not allowed him to go up to strangers and you've built drive by using that wonderful little tool... frusteration.

Is he moving to the other side of you, barking as deep as he can? Any hackles? Any growling? You may have potentially built up a reason for them to behave this way around strangers. If a stranger walks by, and you pop the leash a little bit saying no. (or whatever your command is) You can convey a lot to your dog doing this. You've almost given them a reason to be aloof. You've showed avoidance behaviour towards the strangers and your pups have picked up on this? Maybe???

When I walk by strangers with my pup, I always offer a friendly hello to the person and when my little guy lunges at them (wagging his tail with his ears pinned) I just hold him short enough he can't mess up the stranger's clothes and give him praise. This usually garner's a funny look from the stranger seeing as I'm praising my dog for percieved bad behaviour but that's what makes it fun for me too! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

A bit more description on your part of the type of barking the pups are doing and hopefully some of the more experienced folks on the board will respond.

Good luck!

Grant

uhhmm, couple of other things.

I should point out that I'm raising my dog to work in French Ring, not Schutzhund.

My little guy has already shown me countless times that he's wayyy too serious when working so I don't mind him being super social to strangers when he's not working.

And one other thing... A nice little "cheat" you can use is to copy and paste a potential post onto an e-mail and then utilize the "Spelling/Grammar Check" feature. Correct spelling and punctuation make posts easier to read. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Have fun!

Grant

Are you a novice training 2 pups simultanious?

Greetings

Johan

Both pups will either stand , ears up, no hackles, tail raised and bark. Sometimes tail is waging but then again sometimes it's not. I say hello to strangers when we pass and when the pup stays by my side I continuously praise while we walk by, if we meet someone I know and stop to chat both pups want to go over and say hi and be petted at which point I kindly ask the people not to pet the pup as he is in training.

During our walk today Chevy barked at a couple approaching us as we were walking up to them, ears up, no hackles and tail wagging. But as we got closer he focused on me and his treat and proceeded to ignore them.

Grant I tryed the copy and paste to E-mail but my E-mail does not have spell/grammer check. Hopefully my grammer and spelling won't offend too many people!

Petra - I think maybe Grant doesn't realize youre not a native English speaker. I don't have any trouble reading your posts, and I realize the *few* mistakes you made were due to spelling phonetically.

I make that mistake with your language all the time. You speak much better English than I speak Czech, thats for sure. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

No Johan, as I mentioned they are being raised separetly, I am a novice to Schutzhund training but we have had 3 purbred German shepherds during our marriage and all were obedience trained, as I stated in my post I'm just very nervous of doing something that will impact their schutzhund work later on!

Thanks Reesie,

English isn't my first language but I've been here long enough that I can't use that for an excuse, but I also realize that it's not unreadable! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> Good luck with your band sounds like fun!