Hi all,

I'm now about 15/16 weeks and according to my owner (I hear him on the phone) I/m doing quite well. I sit on command, have great recall off the lead and am 99% housetrained.

However, on the lead I constantly pull. They try to 'pull me in' and hold me on a short lead at the ankle whilst saying "Heal". However, I sort of 'float' on my back legs (front paws in the air!) and just keep pulling. I don't like it as I start to choke myself and worry my owner.

Whats the bext method my owner can adopt to get me to walk nicely on the lead without pulling!?!?

Love Chance

XX

__________________
twitter me...

www.fun4fido.co.uk

"Properly trained, a man can be a dog's best friend."
Corey Ford

Hi Chance,

I am 11 weeks and mum has started practicing with a lead around the garden. I pull like crazy on the lead and mum was worried I'd injure myself as I am a small dog. Today a parcel arrived for me in the post. It was my easywalk harness that dogpositivetraining recommended. I am about to try it out today so I'll let you know how it goes but it looks good.

Love Oscar x

P.S. this was a good idea! Mum is always on the laptop, now is my turn.

I had a similar issue with my lab pulling like a loon. Sometimes shed pull so hard that shed begin to weez and get a bit feint. Tried tugging backwards and saying heel when she reached my feet but she just looked at me as if to say "yes thats very good you can pull me back, can we get on with the pulling now ?"

I was advised to get a harness and tried several, none worked to any real end but i think this is because by this time she was 14months old and had quite alot of strength behind her. A harness just meant that pulling was a little more comfortable for her and instead of pulling like she used to, shed hang back and run to get some speed up...really get a shoulder joint out of place. This may and probably will be a differnt story with you dog as its smaller and cannot apply quite so much force so will learn not to pull well before it gets the strength to yank you about.

Anyway, BEST method i ever used to stop her pulling was as soon as her butt left the line of my foot (i.e - she was officially infront of me) id say "heel", 2-steps later if no effort was made to slow down id just stop dead in my tracks. To begin with you will likely need to show him/her what you want him/her to do when you stop, i attracted Daisy to my knee and as soon as her head lined up with it "good girl" *stroke stroke* and then move on.

If you are walking and he/she is pulling then i imagine the message you are sending to the dog is "if you pull, we move forward" stopping dead as soon as that lead tightens frustrates the dog to a certain extent i imagine as it cannot get to whatever it is trying to get to by pulling. Soon Daisy learnt that if she wanted to get to something quickly, waiting near me would get her there faster.

If its a problem dog then the first day is going to be VERY frustrating as you will not get further than 3 steps without having to stop again but this, in turn is just as frustrating if not more for the dog so all should even out quickly in a matter of days i imagine. Daisy got it in about 20mins but i wouldnt like to say thats a definate as she is my first dog.

Hope it helps

Thanks all - interesting reading.

When you pull just say tell your owner to say heel and change direction keep your owner doing this everytime you pull eventually you will realise that if you pull you turn around and walk the other way and never get the fullness of your walks, if you are a good puppy and behave on the lead the walks are a lot more enjoyable

__________________

I'm still struggling with Archie, he's now 9 months old. Have tried harnesses, etc - but didnt work. I still do the "stop when he goes forward" and most of the time he'll do the circle walk as call it (how we were taught at training) and come to heal, sit if I tell him, a cheerful lets go then 2 paces on he's off again!! What am I doing wrong???

I just bought an easy walk harness - not tried it yet, but have noticed it says not to use on puppies, is Archie too young?

We tried quite a few harnesses with our lab, all seemed to make his pulling worse.
We then tried a halti, so much better than the harnesses, hes now walking to heel no probs, cant recommend them enough.
Keep at it, with a bit of perceverence youl get there in the end

I am not for harnesses, haltis, special collars and what else is outthere.
The keyword is "contact" and without that, teaching your dog will be very difficult.

Is there not any training class in your area where you can some help? It really doesnt take long to teach a dog to walk nicely on lead

I actually agree. I have 3 different harnesses but I was told at puppy school that they like the dogs to wear collars to train. So, for a few days, I tried with the collar. He actually prefered it. When on the harness, Oscar refused to budge! He went for his first walk today on a collar and didn't pull too much.