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6 Posts
Hi all,
This is my 1st post so be gentle
I own a (nearly) 2 year old male Mastiff that we show regularly at championship level. He's a pet first and foremost but we enjoy the days out that showing provides and being able to mix with other like minded people.
Last year we attended the Blackpool Champ show and (if you never heard about it) winds were up to 80mph and in the end the show was abandoned. Our boy was very spooked as he was just a puppy at the time and now whenever we go to a show he is very afraid at specific times.
1. He is afraid whenever we have to navigate about the show and he pulls me in any direction to try and get 'away' from whatever it is he is scared of. When he is like this he is not interested in any kind of food as I have tried gesture feeding in order to give him more confidence. He will sit or lie down if I ask him but as soon as we set off again he reverts back to the pulling and shaking. I'm convinced this is because of what happened at Blackpool and am pretty stuck on how we can help him see that there's nothing to be scared of.
2. Secondly (as we saw at a recent show) he is scared whenever it is very windy. We showed under a marquee yesterday and the wind coming through made it very noisey. As such he was shivering and trying to sit down whenever he could which obviously isn't the right behaviour when you are being examined by a judge. Whenever we had to move round the ring he was pulling to get away. Again, at these times he isn't interested in food at all as he is so focused on flight from the situation.
3. Thirdly he is afraid of big articulated lorries. We live right near a freight depot so this makes being out on our walks difficult. This fear hear isn't as intense as the shows and I have been able to start gesture feeding here as a distraction
All of the above seem to be centred around crowded/noisey places. The weird thing is that if it isn't too windy, once we are around the show ring he is absolutely fine. In the ring he behaves perfectly too. Another weird thing is that I am a drummer and he will happily lie next to me whilst I am playing drums and will actually go to sleep which is the ultimate calm behaviour!!
I have tried various approaches:
1. Gesture feeding - he is too scared for this to work
2. Comforting him - this doesn't seem to help and have read this may re-inforce his fear
3. Ignoring him - this doesn't seem to work particularly when he is pulling me about on the lead when trying to walk between the car and the show ring.
I have had various advice. Some bad - such as shouting "no" whenever he pulls or yanking on his lead. To me this will only intensify his fear.
Whilst at the last show Jan Fennell was there so I asked one of her advisers who suggested a specific technique for walking him. I have just read her first book and have been putting into practice the 4 techniques to achieve alpha status. They said to compliment this when out walking I should continually change direction so that the dog is always following me. It might take hours to get to where we are going but he said that it really does work.
This makes sense to me but with dog shows I can't really walk round for 3 hours when we usually have a 3 hour drive beforehand and are judged at 9am! So, I need to think of how I can recreate the situation. However, we go to crowded places such as parks etc on regular walks and he behaves perfectly. He will walk to heel quite happily off the lead and away from the 3 specific instances above he seems to be bomb-proof!!
So - now I'm hoping that people on here can provide some advice/real life examples of how they have helped their dog to overcome fear.
We could easily stop doing the shows but for me that is avoiding the issue and if our boy is scared of something I don't like to think that he can't be cured so I'm willing to spend as much time as possible on this in order to help him out.
Thanks for reading,
Paul.
This is my 1st post so be gentle
I own a (nearly) 2 year old male Mastiff that we show regularly at championship level. He's a pet first and foremost but we enjoy the days out that showing provides and being able to mix with other like minded people.
Last year we attended the Blackpool Champ show and (if you never heard about it) winds were up to 80mph and in the end the show was abandoned. Our boy was very spooked as he was just a puppy at the time and now whenever we go to a show he is very afraid at specific times.
1. He is afraid whenever we have to navigate about the show and he pulls me in any direction to try and get 'away' from whatever it is he is scared of. When he is like this he is not interested in any kind of food as I have tried gesture feeding in order to give him more confidence. He will sit or lie down if I ask him but as soon as we set off again he reverts back to the pulling and shaking. I'm convinced this is because of what happened at Blackpool and am pretty stuck on how we can help him see that there's nothing to be scared of.
2. Secondly (as we saw at a recent show) he is scared whenever it is very windy. We showed under a marquee yesterday and the wind coming through made it very noisey. As such he was shivering and trying to sit down whenever he could which obviously isn't the right behaviour when you are being examined by a judge. Whenever we had to move round the ring he was pulling to get away. Again, at these times he isn't interested in food at all as he is so focused on flight from the situation.
3. Thirdly he is afraid of big articulated lorries. We live right near a freight depot so this makes being out on our walks difficult. This fear hear isn't as intense as the shows and I have been able to start gesture feeding here as a distraction
All of the above seem to be centred around crowded/noisey places. The weird thing is that if it isn't too windy, once we are around the show ring he is absolutely fine. In the ring he behaves perfectly too. Another weird thing is that I am a drummer and he will happily lie next to me whilst I am playing drums and will actually go to sleep which is the ultimate calm behaviour!!
I have tried various approaches:
1. Gesture feeding - he is too scared for this to work
2. Comforting him - this doesn't seem to help and have read this may re-inforce his fear
3. Ignoring him - this doesn't seem to work particularly when he is pulling me about on the lead when trying to walk between the car and the show ring.
I have had various advice. Some bad - such as shouting "no" whenever he pulls or yanking on his lead. To me this will only intensify his fear.
Whilst at the last show Jan Fennell was there so I asked one of her advisers who suggested a specific technique for walking him. I have just read her first book and have been putting into practice the 4 techniques to achieve alpha status. They said to compliment this when out walking I should continually change direction so that the dog is always following me. It might take hours to get to where we are going but he said that it really does work.
This makes sense to me but with dog shows I can't really walk round for 3 hours when we usually have a 3 hour drive beforehand and are judged at 9am! So, I need to think of how I can recreate the situation. However, we go to crowded places such as parks etc on regular walks and he behaves perfectly. He will walk to heel quite happily off the lead and away from the 3 specific instances above he seems to be bomb-proof!!
So - now I'm hoping that people on here can provide some advice/real life examples of how they have helped their dog to overcome fear.
We could easily stop doing the shows but for me that is avoiding the issue and if our boy is scared of something I don't like to think that he can't be cured so I'm willing to spend as much time as possible on this in order to help him out.
Thanks for reading,
Paul.