I’m actually working towards becoming a professional dog trainer, but it very discouraging when I’m having issues with my own, personal dog. She’s a 6yo hound mix, very driven, very muscular, powerful, extremely smart. I’ve had her since she was two, so four years total, her previous owners used her as a rabbit hunting dog and as a brood, when she didn’t produce well they gave her up. I started her on a prong collar with what I call proximity-training. I’m not sure if it’s an actual thing but I live on a farm and it worked. Basically I taught the dog with corrections and rewards that she could explore and smell stuff, but had to stay close. We also used it hiking (everyday) and camping (over the summer) as well as biking and just playing outside all day. When I got her, I could see the spark, the willingness to learn and boy is she a damn smart dog. Unfortunately we moved to the city less than a year ago and I’ve cycled through tools trying to get her to behave. She’s dog reactive, but it’s not aggression, she simply wants to play with the dogs, and she makes a horrid, high pitched scream you wouldn’t think could come from such a built, stocky dog when she doesn’t get what she wants. I’ve used a flat collar, martingale, full slip, fitted slip, herm sprenger prong (smaller prongs), head collar, pulling harness, and I just got a kong harness today to clip to the front.

We usually go on 8 mile bikerides twice a day, I just started spring conditioning and we had an issue both days I went out, there was an offleash dog that bolted from her owner and came sprinting at her. The second day, we ran into a cat that wouldn’t get out of the sidewalk and June (my dog) nearly pulled us over trying to sniff (she’s non-aggressive, just wants to smell) and then not moments after an offleash dog with no owner in sight tried going after her. I tried going out for a third time a day or two ago and she’s extremely anxious, won’t behave on lead, and I definitely don’t trust her to bike at the moment -problem is, we can’t really exercise her without the bike, a walk just isn’t enough. Year round, now that we’re in the city, she does urban parkour -she’s very stable and can handle just about all surfaces well, jumps a +meter with ease, and can jump nearly 7ft straight up off of a wood floor, so like I mentioned, a walk just isn’t enough.

I’m currently transitioning into full positive, I just bought a front-clipping harness like suggested (a halter makes her issues worse actually). She needs to be vetted again, but in about six weeks I start interning with a trainer (she uses positive methods), and I didn’t think she would take too kindly to me using a prong on my dog, so that was my second push. If I make progress more than I had been with my prong, then there’s a good chance I’ll be using mainly positive methods, yay.

I have an almost 12mo old Dalmatian. He is a super awesome dog. I left a comment on the post about the dog whisperer in regards to a local dog trainer and a prong collar. Right now, my only issue is when we are sitting on the couch, he likes to come up and stand on my lap. He is looking out the windows, but I don’t think he needs to stand on my lap to do that. He’s very handsy and likes to climb up on us and put his “arms” around our necks. He’s super smart, so I can’t figure out why I can’t get him to stop this behavior. I do believe that our puppy class damaged him a little.