Pulling on leash during walks
 

I'm trying to train JoJo to walk beside me with a slack leash, but I'm failing miserably. He loves to sniff and explore and wants to run up to trees to "mark" them. I've tried the stopping method, where I wait until I have his attention, reward him and continue, but shortly after he's pulling again.

I really want to get this down, as I want our walks to be enjoyable for both of us. I use a harness because of the fear of a collapsed trachea, but I read that harnesses are very ineffective for dogs who pull, and I'm wondering if that's part of the problem. Any advice?

You could probably get one of the front-pull harnesses. I think Chattiesmom offers them && says they are good for training??? I am not sure, but you could ask her?

I have the same problem so I'm watching this thread with interest

From what I understand, they use harnesses on bloodhounds. So yes, they are designed to give the dog maximum leverage to pull humans behind them.

There are some good tips in this thread (some of them from me. ;))

http://www.yorkietalk.com/forums/tra...t-working.html

Leash Pullers
 

I've been reading about the leashes made by Chattiesmom too, and I've decided that I'm going to get one come next month's payday. I've been trying out the theory on that, by hooking up Riley's leash in the front of his harness, where the 3 straps are joined by a ring. It WORKS for Riley!!! Being that the leash hook rests on Riley's body as it is now, it can't be all that comfortable for him, but having the leash hooked up to his harness in the front has made a remarkable,
INSTANT change in the way Riley walks on his leash, and it does keep his attention too. He's much more cooperative.:aimeeyork Now, I just have to decide on the color I want him to have....decisions, decisions!

I'm a relatively new mommy. We've had both extremes. Sitting stubbornly at the end of a leash and or jetting off until the leash runs out and yanks her to a stop, (we used a soft neoprene vest harness that made me feel safe w/that). Somewhere hear I read that Cesar guy said keep the leash short and gently tug in direction you want to head in. And do not use treats as a bribe.

I wonder if you kept your leash short and walking metered? This worked for me. "Good Walk"... Also -- I've been told that Cesar's books help a lot on this topic and delivers a dog by your side. I was also told to never say "Good girl" but to be specific, not to over-talk to Boo and confuse her.

What I have found works: The first few (25 or so) walks i really had to give Boo time to get into it. No such thing as 10 minutes walks. And she was fascinated by every smell, every blade of grass. Took a long time for short distance. All or nothing, 0-10, not much in middle.

When she pulled forcefully, I took up slack, closed the gap and kinda forced her to slow her walk down, again gently but firmly, The more she pulled the more we slowly closed up the gap w/retractable leash. Again - slowly. Once she was walking forward, (still trying to pull but slowed down a bit) we say "Good walk" (even thought it wasn't the best :-)) so she gets that this is the type of walk that makes us happy.

Week Three: Now she trots happily right next to me or a bit in front of me. We give her much more leash and retract when we need to redirect her. She doesn't fight or resist any more and really loves her walks now.

We have 2 commands. When i want her to come back next to me, or off a lawn, the curb etc. we say "Sidewalk" w/tad of command tone, and I shorten the leash and sorta steer. The slight tug sensation (Really Slight but firm - sucking up slack) works, then lotsa of "Good Sidewalk" praise. If she is just a lump on end of the rope, i ask "Pick up"? and extend forearm. If she wants to be picked up she crawls up my arm. Usually that's when she is tired. Then more praise "Good Pick up", instead of just picking her up when i got frustrated, I either ask her or tell her and wait until she digests we are doign a pick up.

Now - if we head out for walk and she's a spaz, I head for space and let her burn it off for a few minutes.

The previous post had some good points
But walking with a dog you have to show who is walking who

If you want your dog to stop pulling ..... stop walking
when he stops and waits for you
then and only then do you walk

Yorkies are very active inquisitive guys
and they will tend to pull to check things out

If you Calmly walk and do not Pull Back ... because this makes the dog think ... hey, this is what walking feels like
they will walk more calmly with you

Well, for starters, I use the Premier Easy Walk harness. It works wonders! http://www.yorkietalk.com/forums/tra...t-working.html You can see a video I posted of Jackson in that thread. It's a harness but it attaches on the FRONT, so it's the same concept as loose leash walking on a collar. When Jackson had the one on his back, it made him pull. I guess it brought out the sled dog in him, lol.

Second, for training, you're going to look ridiculous but to get your dog to follow you practice in your yard or a field where you have the leash on him and you run in circles, and run in different directions, and go every which way so he's like "HUH?!" and has to follow you. It's very tiring to the dog and it lets him know he needs to follow you!

I have had a pulling issue as well. I have 2 yorkies which makes it even more interesting! My yorkies have Tuff Lock harnesses, but I don't particularly love them since they seem to turn quite a bit. I train them separate, but also together, since we go on most of our walks together. I started using the word "Back" instead of "heel" & it actually works for me. I'm still training them so they need some reminders, but here's what I do: Start walking, and if they pull like mad-dogs, I stop and say "No Pull". Once they come back by me, we start going, and if they pull again, I repeat "No Pull" - they have to come back to me on their own or we don't move. After we're walking, if they creep up & start going ahead of me, I say "Back" and stick out my leg across from me (like a sideways kick, but of course, not a kick, just very gently swing out so it bumps them if they don't go back). I'm sure I look like a crazy person, but this has been helping me. I say back, and if they don't listen, out of leg goes (the leash is sinched up at that time as well). I try the turn-around-the-other-way thing, but either I don't have the patience or it just isn't working (I'm guessing it's the first one). And, of course, when there's another dog nearby, their listening skills are non-existent so I'm still working on that too!

Everyone gave wonderful tips and advice. I'm going to start implementing some of these suggestions to hopefully see if they help. The front-pull harness sounds like a great idea. The harness I use has a ring in the front of the chest, so I'll use that for now to see if it's effective, before I invest in a new one. This is my 4th one!

Keeping my fingers crossed! :xfingers:

I got the gentle leader head collar for my pup and saw instant improvement within the first 10 minutes. it's amazing, she walks beside me now! it's not as easy as the harness to put on, but I find she still acts out on walks with the harness. so i definitely recommend it.

does anyone have a link to this so i can see how it looks

Just Google "Premier Easy Walk Harness"

Gentle Leader w/ Plastic Clip Buckle, Petite - Dog Supplies

I started using the Gentle Leader because Sasha pulls like mad and she slips out of every harness I put her in. However, if you get it be prepared for some spastic antics at first. Sasha still occasionally goes ballistic over it usually when we are not moving and she has an opportunity to try and push it off... On the other hand, it works for actual walks.

I have two dogs I adopted from shelters. The first dog was a dream dog! He was leash trained and almost house trained. My new dog, however, is a different story. Very calm spirit and sweet but as soon as the leash goes on is whole body goes down. He seems extremely reluctant when it comes to the leash. Can someone help? :confused:

Stop Pulling
 

I brought my now almost ten months old yorkie girl to piupy classes and she just graduated from advaced class. I brought her to PetSmart for the classes and it tok a while for her to learn to stop pulling. I did use te stopping method and now she rarely pulls (only if shes a person or other dog). It did take a few months to train her though. I guess you just have to be patient:):D and this is my very first post on this site, im very new. Um, how do you make a normal post? like not quoting someone?

oh nvm, i found out how. oh for the stopping method i didnt reward her like that. when she pulld i stopped and when she stopped pulling i waited for about 1 to 2 seconds of no pulling and then walked on. and reapeat and reapeat and reapeat lol

Remy initially was a bit of a puller, and I have taught him to heel.

First, he always is on my left side when we walk. I use a harness on him and short lead (not a retractable).

To train him to heel I carried a bunch of treats in my right pocket. I would hold his lead in my left hand, wound tightly so he was close to me and would hold a treat in my right, above him but so he could see it. I would say "remy heel" over and over as we would walk a little ways, maybe 10 feet. With the lead wound tightly, he was at my heel and his eyes were glued on that treat. His gait was slower because all he focused on was the treat, not "running all over the place"

We would then stop, I would get him to sit and he would get a bit of the treat and I would say "good heel". Then we started over, with "remy heel" and my holding the treat above him. The treat was valuable for training because it kept his attention and he began to learn what "heel" meant.

Now, he is certainly not perfect but when we go out for walks he is generally by my side, sometimes slightly ahead but not pulling. He will still pull once he knows we are "going back inside" because he gets very excited, so we are still working on consistency!!

Good luck to you!

PS - one additional comment - I try to keep his potty location consistent. When we go outside, he potties first and gets to "wander and sniff" in this location until he is done. Once we start to "walk" as opposed to "eliminate" that is when I focus on getting him to heel. Yes, he still gets distracted by a tree here to mark but it is less frequent.

Choke Chain
 

My yorkie is about 3 1/2 months old - and when we first got her (at 8 weeks) we would take her for walks and she loved to go ahead and sniff things - she would go so far that she was at the end of the retractable leash. I let her get away with this for a while b/c i figured she was just little and needed to explore.
Then when i tried to get her to walk beside me, she didn't want to - and would sometimes pull more just b/c I was telling her to come back towards me.
Now we use a choke chain when we go for walks. We asked the vet before using it - and the vet said they are fine for yorkies. Within our first walk she was walking next to me - we attached the choke chain to the retractable leash and locked it as short as it would go, so that she didn't have room to pull.
There are times when we let her have the full leash - and we use the command "heel" and she comes right back to us.

I would suggest getting a choke chain and using that for a while - and then switch back to the regular collar or harness (we use just a collar)

Another tip that has helped us
 

I actually saw this on that Cesar show. So - Now we are paying attention to the dogs body language. He was telling this couple that when the ears are perked up and the body is rigid the dog isn't listening at all anyway.

So..now when Boo is clearly not paying attention, I don't even waste my breath. I stop here completely, say whatever command it is (Sidewalk, Wait..) just ONE time. Then I wait her out watching her ears and stance. As soon as she digests it's all being driven by me, I am the alpha -- I am in control) i can see her body relax and she "concedes". The mintue I see that adjustemtn, even if it is slight, I repeat the command. So far it has had fairly consistent results. AND many times I don't have to repeat. (Meaning maybe she heard & pretended not to?)

Lately Boo has developed this HORIBBLE habit of eating dead (dried up) worms. So -- If i catch her in time, sniffing out a worm, I'll step on the worm, covering it w/shoe and again -- she has to acknowledge I am in control. so when the attempts to dance around my shoe stop -- we keep moving. Each time the waiting her out for the adjusted "acceptance" or resignation gets smaller & smaller.

Good news (per my vet) the worm snack won't kill her -it's just gross. You would think she was eating the best filet mignon the way she chomps these things.

I feel so good when I win :-) which i find very amusing -- such a tiny opponent. hee hee, cause you know they are very willful & creative.

I have also seen a great improvement with Harley when we are walking using the gentle leader he seems to be far more focused and is listening to me much more..:)

I have the same problem with my two. Though after getting annoyed on Monday while we were walking and they just refused to listen I just dropped their leads- we were somewhere safe and turned, walking away at a brisk pace. When caught up and ran ahead I turned and walked away again and again. They quickly began to watch more closely and are much more attentive off lead. I would have only done it somewhere safe with no-other dogs or people around, and didn't walk far. I brought a Halti for Alfie today, managed to get it to fit with some serious adjustment and its like majic. Can anyone tell me how small does the gentle-leader go? Would love to get something for Rosie but she's so small, the size o Halti barely fits Alfie and thats pinning it to its minimum, I know the leader goes to x-tra small but how small is that?

This post is just so wrong on so many levels i don't even know what to say.

This is pretty good advice. I was the OP of the Front Harness not working thread. We've been working with Uni a bit more, and she has improved a bit. I've tried the Cesar method, reading the body language and it has helped. Uni is so quick though, when I make her sit and wait, she will understand sit and wait, but she will do it tense the whole time. She'll sit, wag her tail, ears go down, ears go up, tapping front paws, whining. Clearly she is not relaxed, but she is listening to my commands, but she is telling me that's not what she wants to do. And she can def outwait me, so alas the pulling continues. *sigh* baby steps!!!

I have the extra small halti and it fits perfect Harley is 5lb..:)