I cant get my dog to walk on a leash without pulling! help?

I've asked myself many times why I wasn't chosen as one of those dog owners whose dogs walked or ran so peacefully on the leash. I guess I was just always blessed with the lovely "rip your arm off" types. For this reason, I've been forced to try many different techniques and combinations.In short, it all depends on what works for the dog and the owner.

While gentle leads can work great for one bread or dog, they are not always the answer. My Beagle/Lab mix, for instance, hates the gentle lead and will fight it the entire 20 minute walk. This makes for a miserable walk for both of us.

Also, it is important to note that due to the way the gentle leads fit, it is imperative that you do not pull harshly or yank on the leash, as this could lead to spinal/neck injuries in dogs. After trial and error, and a lot of sore muscles, I finally found that for both my lab mixes, a pinch collar works beautifully. Unfortunately, pinch collars are avoided due to their ugly, inhumane looks.

But rest assured, this collar is safe, humane, and works like a charm on dogs who like to walk their owners rather than the other way around. The collar adds a pinch of pressure around the neck to discourage your dog from pulling harder, thus ripping your shoulder out of its socket. The Dog Owner's Guide can provide you with ways to safely use your pinch (or pronged) collar, as it varies with different temperaments and size: canismajor.com/dog/walking.html Once you've found a collar that works with your dog, you can begin the training ritual all over again.

Only this time, your training will be more effective. Of course it is best to begin training your dog as a puppy. I love it when websites point out the obvious, as if I wasn't already frustrated enough.

In reality, that is not always possible. With canine adoptions being so popular, we often end up with lovable adult dogs with little to no training.So we deal with what we have. Training school would still be the best option, but if you choose to do it yourself, then patience and repetitiveness is key.

dog-obedience-training-review.com/traini... has a very helpful video clip showing you how to successfully train your dog on a loose leash. Loose leash being the complete opposite of the tight, strained, about to snap leash you are currently used to. Bottom line, get help and real techniques from professionals, as there are tips out there that can not only hinder your training progress, but also cause possible damage to your furry family member.

Best of luck and hopefully you will be enjoying those leisure strolls with your pup soon enough!

One of the easiest fixes is the Gentle Leader head collar (buygentleleader.com/View.aspx?page=dogs/...). In short, when you dog pulls, the head collar makes the dogs head move down and stare at the ground and the dog stops since it can't see where it's going. I have 2 70-80 lb dogs and these head collars are life savers.

They used to try to drag me down the street and would be coughing and choking. Once you've solved the problem of the dog trying to choke itself, then teaching the dog to walk on a loose leash is usually the next step. There's a step-by-step guide for how to do that here (dog-obedience-training-review.com/leash-...).

The most important points are that when the dog pulls on the leash, you absolutely must stop and NOT go in the direction the dog is pulling. You must remove the reward he gets for pulling on the leash (i.e. , getting to something).

So when he pulls, you just stop and use whatever your No word is (in my house, "Ah ah" means you just lost your reward or you're not going anywhere mister - I don't really like other people telling my dogs what is and isn't okay and since they really have no clue what "no" means, other people correcting them doesn't really do anything). You wait until the dog slackens the leash and / comes back to you, praise him like mad and give him his favorite treat. For Snoopy (my lab) I use clicker training and click when he's not pulling at random intervals and he gets some kind of reward, a treat, lots of petting, a toy to chew.

My dog trainer rewards her Bullmastiff by letting him pee on a bush... Snoopy is further progressed and really only pulls due to high distraction (another dog, a child). For my other dog, the word "good" means you get a reward. I'd start this exercise in the least distracting areas and move to progressively more distracting areas.

For example, start it inside the house where the only thing the dog is likely to pull towards is the door and start as far from the door as possible. Then move to just outside the house (I use my fenced back yard). Then progress to the actual outside world.

I'm still working on this with my Lab, which is my younger dog (my older dog is the dog I hand to someone else if I'm going for a walk with a friend or family-member since he rarely pulls now). Make sure you have adequate time or that at least you're comfortable with not really going anywhere, since the first several times, you'll be lucky to make it around the block in 45 min. I generally alot about 20-30 min per session.

It's also extremely important to be consistent and to never ever let him get to what he wants when he pulls. If sometimes when he pulls he gets to get what he wants and sometimes he doesn't, the pulling will get much worse, not better. Intermittent rewards are more reinforcing than anything else.

You might want to check out the simpleLEASH. My boss trained her lab to stop pulling on his leash with it and it worked really well. There's a sensor that measures the pull force and when it reaches a certain level the leash beeps.

Then if the dog continues to pull, a small stimulus is given. Here's there website for more info: simpleleash.com Hope this helps!

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