Quote: Sheila Buckley

.... Put that crate back together and start using it NOW. .... If you choose to tether her give her only enough line to lay down comfortably. GROUNDWORK!! ... Jinn you need to put the two of you on a strict regimen. I would remove the roomates completely from the equation with the exception of taking her outside to relieve herself if you are not home. She is your dog not theirs, thus consider her alone if you are not home.... Make up a schedule you can live with, get up an hour earlier than you do now to avoid rushing in the morning and make sure she has been exercised. I would go for something intense and aerobic for a minimum of 30 minutes (her physical condition being up for it) and if not at least a one hour walk. Ignore her when you first get home, then let her out of the crate and let her burn off some energy outside playing with you and then practice her obedience. Other than these activities I would keep her crated. GROUNDWORK!! ..... You must begin to mark and praise all appropriate behavior and PREVENT all negative behavior. IMO there is no place for punishment in the learning phase. ....

.... And in reading your post I have not seen anything that has indicated she has been taught appropriate household behavior yet she is allowed to get into trouble and then corrected. ...

DITTO!

Do you have this? http://www.leerburg.com/302.htm

If that's the one you have, please watch it again.

I too think this dog is being corrected without being taught.


QUOTE: The only TRUE solution we have is to, well, crate her when we cannot watch her. END

YES!

Just start over. You can do this. (YOU..... not you and the roommates. )

P.S. Free feeding? Why?



Edited by Connie Sutherland (10/08/2007 06:18 PM)
Edit reason: P.S.

Jinn, you're received some good advice.

You can do this. Brush up on marker training....... I see (as others have) that you went too fast over the marker training -- the teaching -- and into corrections, probably often with a bewildered dog.

You can start over. It will be fun, too, because motivational training IS fun.

http://www.leerburg.com/markers.htm

And re-watch the video (302) as a refresher. :>

E collar, laptop and webcam. Leave the house, go next door and remote control the problem away. Ain't technology great?

Howard

Leave the mouse traps uncovered. The dog is big enough to handle the pinch. The noise from under the paper could just excite the dog into a neat, new game. I cured a Dobe with the mouse traps. One time is all it took. The Dobe wouldn't go in the kitchen for a week. The set out big rat traps for anyone that doesn't crate the dog.

 Quote: Old earth dog Bob Scott

Leave the mouse traps uncovered.

Heh...I was going to suggest this but chose to say cover them with paper because I thought (as was said in an earlier post) that people would think I was mean.....

It does work, but going back to basic groundwork should really be done first. Especially if the dog is not understanding what is wanted of her right now.

or you cold just put the trash away....

Hate to repeat all the previous posts but....your apartment needs to be dog proofed. The best way to keep a dog out of things they shouldn't get into is to put it somewhere that they can't get into it. Prevention is the best and only option. Put the trash can in a closet or cabinet and keep anything and everything picked up and put away. When you aren't home crate the dog. Problem solved.

One of mine is a total hethern. He gets on the refriderator to eat the cats food! His favorite place to sleep is up on some shelves that are 5ft. high. I have to really put my thinking cap on to stay ahead of this guy! All of this takes place under my garage. I can't imagine what my house would look like if he stayed inside unattended. Needless to say his free time is pretty restricted. He's almost 3yrs old. I don't see his criminal type behavior getting any better....it's up to me to be the warden!


Good luck,
Debbie

 Quote: Lynn Cheffins

or you cold just put the trash away....

I have to agree.

I'm all for training dogs but for me trash is just a non-issue.

Having trash out anywhere is just asking for trouble. I don't know most dogs that could resist some steak bones in the trash sitting on the floor. My trash is either in a cabinet, or you can buy a large stainless trash can with a lid. Other trash is dangerous because they can get seriously sick on some of the stuff left there.

I just had a big heart to heart with my teenage son- who had left something on his floor that he shouldn't have last night and it was in pieces on the kitchen floor and in the water bowl- elastic, stuffing, etc. Puppy was rushed to the vet last week and put on iv for dehydration and I believe it was something he ate- cost $500.
So put the trash away!

 Quote: trevor morris

Dogs cannot and do not display guilty behavior. What many people mistake for "guilty behavior" is actually a dog cowering. Dogs cower because they know that the presence of certain people mean punishment, displeasure, and fear.

Oh, I know animals don’t feel guilt – hence the quotations around it. ;P I just describe it as “the guilty behavior” because that’s the easiest way to express immediately the look my dog gives when we find her after such behavior is performed –she looks, well, guilty, and everyone knows right away what I’m talking about.

Seems more like a roommate problem than dog problem, hmm.. I’ll have to have a talk with them, they are inconsistent with commands and allowing her to get away with things that I don’t allow. It's not that they TRAIN her, and I can't exactly isolate my dog from them (we all live together, it's impossible) but we'll work something out. You all helped give me some clarity, thank you so much. I’m going back to basics – crate unless I’m around and watching, keeping her at my side, and not allowing my roommates to give her any commands (they often tell her to leave a room right when I give her a sit or down command and confuse her, it’s frustrating). Maybe an e-collar for them is what I should be asking about! And definitely not correcting until I know that she knows the command and not just assuming she understands it. I do have the Basic Obedience DVD, I’ll whip it out and watch it a few good times.

 Quote: Connie Sutherland

P.S. Free feeding? Why?

She was on a schedule when I adopted her, and after 2 months (post-changing her diet from IAMs to Solid Gold Hound-N-Flocken) she was still getting stomach infections, so my vet recommended I free-feed for 2 weeks to see if that helped. The infection cleared up and after a month I put her back on a schedule, but she once again got sick. I'm not sure what it was because I would assume the food made her sick, but she did great on it when she wasn't scheduled, so I eventually just took the food away at night and she is free-fed during the day.

 Quote: Lynn Cheffins

or you cold just put the trash away....

It is – covered trash can (the plastic swing lid) that sits in a small nook under our sink and had two doublebagged tied-up trash bags on the counter, as well as the box was cardboard and securely closed. She was mighty determined -- anything with food and she'll tear off her own tail to get to it. I can't figure out why she has such a high food drive, it's aggravating to me since I don't use food to train (she just focuses on the foodfoodfood and has no concept of anything but FOOD).

Thank you for all the great advice.. I feel better now, my roommates cleaned the entire mess AND cleaned our friend’s CPU for me before I got out of work and his computer works fine. On the phone they made it sound like she had chewed on the hard drive as well as the trash. I’ll re-read the articles on groundwork and start over slowly, sounds like I just confused my poor dog. I still feel awful about it, but at least now I have direction and a lot of great advice to learn from.


Edited by Jinn Schmitz (10/09/2007 12:47 PM)
Edit reason: typoes