Where to start?

[neona]

So, I was looking through the videos on http://www.youtube.com/user/tab289/videos?flow=grid&view=1 and there are a bunch I want to work on. BUT, we just brought home 18 month old Dante about a week ago. I know I need to go slow and he's new and needs to learn to trust and that we are his new family. At the same time, I cannot really wait as there are things that need to be addressed.

In the week + that we've had him I've seen him get better about sitting until allowed in/out of the door or to eat. He responds to sit probably 75% of the time by the 2nd/3rd time I say it (except when distracted, then all bets are off). He objects much less to going in the crate (we separate them when feeding or when letting them in the back yard to potty). Things we need to train: no romping in the house with Ruby - this needs to be outside only, pee/poop in designated outside area, he has peed inside twice so I'd really like a more obvious notice that he needs to go outside (like putting a bell on the door to be rung), stop barking when we say it's ok, stop pulling on walks, listen to me when we are on walks & approach another dog - we are in a very dog friendly area and there are A LOT. There might be more.

Any advice on where to start? They all feel equally important to me LOL Also, any other good training resources would be appreciated as well.

 

[ruthcatrin]

Well, quite a bit of that you can (and SHOULD) work on all the time before any further bad habits occur:

romping in the house-put a stop to it and/or move them outside if possible.

Potty in the designated area-ALWAYS walk him to the area for potty.

Put up a door bell for him NOW and start working on it NOW every time you take him out.

Stop barking when you ask.

All of those can and should be worked on EVERY SINGLE TIME it occurs. Or you'll just solidify the bad habits and it'll be harder later.

Pulling and paying attention on walks I also highly recommend working on asap, as he's only going to get bigger and harder to cope with.

I know it seems like alot all at once, but if you think about it, its all done at different times, with different things. So its not really an overload for him. Basically you want to enforce NOW, the behavior you want. The hard part will be for YOU to keep track of what you're doing in response to what behavior!

 

[neona]

Well, quite a bit of that you can (and SHOULD) work on all the time before any further bad habits occur:

romping in the house-put a stop to it and/or move them outside if possible.
Doing Biggest problem here is that they either get moved to the outside back yard which is just dirt, bleh, or they get crated.

Potty in the designated area-ALWAYS walk him to the area for potty.
Sigh. OK. LOL

Put up a door bell for him NOW and start working on it NOW every time you take him out.
Haven't seen how to actually do this. Do I just ring it myself everytime?

Stop barking when you ask.
Mostly a problem when he's excited (I just typed that then said to myself, "well yeah obviously" LOL). But HOW do I get him to stop?

All of those can and should be worked on EVERY SINGLE TIME it occurs. Or you'll just solidify the bad habits and it'll be harder later.

Pulling and paying attention on walks I also highly recommend working on asap, as he's only going to get bigger and harder to cope with.

I know it seems like alot all at once, but if you think about it, its all done at different times, with different things. So its not really an overload for him. Basically you want to enforce NOW, the behavior you want. The hard part will be for YOU to keep track of what you're doing in response to what behavior!

Some replies in red/purple above. So, yeah, maybe it's just overload for me But I see what you mean. I was looking at it as "having training sessions" but that's not really what most of it is. Maybe just the walking part really. I'll start that one on the next walk. I've seen a lot of good videos for that. As always, thank you

 

[ruthcatrin]

Yup, when you want to take him out, take him to the door, and put his nose as close to the bells as possible and ring them while saying "outside" or some variation there of (as works for you basically), and then take him out. We got bells to teach Arty to tell us when he had to go....and although Apollo wasn't included in the training he now rings the bells to go out!

For the barking: Some dogs respond best to a "look at me" type command. Apollo gets so locked in I have to actually go over and touch him (typical TM), I'll scratch his side, and tell him thanks (for guarding, which is his job), which gets his attention, and then I'll get him to sit. Apollo is apparently unable to multi-task and so if his butt is on the ground he's not barking. Which doesn't occasionally keep him from popping back up and returning to barking, but we're getting there.

I also often recommend that rather than teaching a "quiet" command you first teach "speak!" and THEN quiet, and some dogs will work well for this for the stopping excessive barking.

There's no reason you can't do SOME of this as training sessions, but some of it has to be done each incident too or you'll regret it.

 

[neona]

OK, I just put my googling skills to use and found plenty about how to do the doorbell thing!

---------- Post added at 03:42 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:39 PM ----------

Apollo is apparently unable to multi-task and so if his butt is on the ground he's not barking.

LOL he's such a cutie!
I should've refreshed before posting again! Thanks again for the advice!

 

[neona]

Apollo is apparently unable to multi-task and so if his butt is on the ground he's not barking.

LOL he's such a cutie!
I should've refreshed before posting again! Thanks again for the advice!

---------- Post added at 03:43 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:42 PM ----------

Wow. Posting gets a little crazy sometimes huh? I'm almost afraid to post this now... How many will I get?

 

[neona]

Wow. Posting gets a little crazy sometimes huh? I'm almost afraid to post this now... How many will I get?

 

[Rugers-Kris]

The way that finally worked for me was as soon as he started barking I would go to him touch his collar and say "Good Boy,Thank you...It's ok". That worked pretty quickly so the next step was to get him to do it without my touching him. So I started just going to him and saying the same thing without touching, once we had that I got further away until now as long as he can hear my voice,he will stop immediately upon my words regardless of where I am. For us, it didn't take long at all. Every dog is different but Ruger is very motivated by praise so when I say Good Boy, he stops and struts around all proud of himself and he will come to wherever I am to get his love. LOL He is a booger!!

 

[ruthcatrin]

Wow. Posting gets a little crazy sometimes huh? I'm almost afraid to post this now... How many will I get?

lol!! Alot!

 

[Marrowshard]

I'm sure it's not a novel idea for you, but when adapting a new dog to the family a lot of the bonding can come while training instead of "in place of". Our Oscar was adopted as an adult and while it does sometimes take a lot of time for a dog to bond with and trust a new family, there's nothing that says it all has to be cuddles and easy-going playtime. Oscar's strongest bond with me came when we were training him to be polite around other dogs. It's a work in progress but the hardcore training and constant reinforcement helped give him a sense of purpose, as in "I have to EARN my keep here, I have a job to do".

It's never too early for leash manners, especially if you're around a lot of other dogs. Trust me, it is way harder to break the bad leash habits when they're fully grown.

Same goes for romping in the house. Oscar only tried it once, got scolded, and hasn't done it since. Then again, we make a point of getting him out the door first thing in the morning for his usual #1/#2 and some playtime, especially if we see the "zoomies" right away outside. That means he's got serious energy to burn and we'll spend lots of time throwing his Wubba or kicking around the Jolly Ball, playing hide-and-seek, etc. Between that morning exercise and a good training walk he's generally too knackered to try jumping around the house.

Tired mastiff = happy mastiff.

~Marrow

 

[Robtouw]

On the indoor romping, put them on leash while indoors and give that leash a good tug, separate them and have them sit when they are caught romping. Put them in opposite corners and have them both lay down and give them something to quietly chew. You have to over react to the romping and really make it a big deal. Give loads of praise when they are behaving. Its a royal pain in the tush, but it does work. My last Rotti and German Shepherd were guilty of indoor romping and it drove me nuts. For about 2 weeks I was constantly grabbing that leash and fussing, slowly they got it and would play but not crash into everything, when they got a little loud they would look at me to see if they were in trouble.


We taught Cruiser "no talking" by placing our hand over his mouth when barking and giving that shushing sound with our finger over our lips, and "speak" which is both good and bad. He now looks at you before he does any major barking for approval but also speaks when he wants more of something, and does a lot of that low mumbling back that my hubby finds annoying!

 

[Mooshi's Mummy]

I see a lot of this is already covered, which is great as it saves my fingers. lol. I would like to chime in with the walking to heal bit though if it helps at all. i taught bear to walk to heal by leash training him in the house first. i put the lead on and walked around the house, the second he pulled forward i quickly turned around and walked the other way. once he was good with that then we took it out to the garden, bigger area with more room for distraction. dont forget to praise and reward. once the garden was 100% we took it to the street, up and down, pull, turn, pull turn etc. luckly by the time Mooshi came Bear was walking to heal and she learned from him, we didnt need to teach her. it takes time but you will get there. btw - we tried the stop and sit method but that didnt work for me. the pull and turn was the only one that did.

 

[neona]

He knows where to pee! I still need to go out in back with him of course, but it's progress! And the walk this morning was a lot better, but I think that's because I only walked him and not both dogs. I'm going to start doing that turn in the other direction thing. Thanks for the other tips as well. Now I just need to remember to do all these things He really is a great dog and already doing really good with waiting to be told to come in/out and to go ahead and start eating.

 

[Marrowshard]

Rescues are fun, yeah? Once they come out of their shells, it's all worth it ... just up until that point that will terminally try your patience LOL. Keep at it and remember you're doing good work

~Marrow