Peyton is more head strong and the training methods that I used on my old rottie Duke just aren't working with Peyton. ANy tips from anyone would be very much appreciated.
Kelly
Hi, Kelly,
What methods of training are you using? Traditional training methods, even the gentle kinds (like saying "no" to certain behaviors), don't always work well depending on the dog's personality (as I think you're discovering). Have you tried positive-only training methods? I've been told that it works particularly well for the head-strong dogs that don't respond well to traditional training. It also has the added bonus of strengthening your relationship with your dog
.
We're using it on both our rescue rotties that we got last October. Murphy is 3 y.o. and was never properly socialized (left alone a LOT) and his former "parents" divorced and gave him away. Wonderful is 8 y.o. and came from an ok family with kids. Lots of love from the kids I think, but they bred her for profit and didn't feed her properly so she was malnourished.
Both dogs are responding really well to positive training methods and usually don't get negative attention (I have to keep reminding my husband not to yell at the dogs
... of course the flip side is they mind me better than they do him
). But there's no hitting, shake cans, leash pops, or anything like that. We don't walk them on choke chains, although Murphy has to wear a gentle leader when he's out... he's so reactive.
The other thing is Murphy has a high prey drive. The day after we brought the rotties home, a stray cat adopted us, but after Murphy got the cat in his mouth once (cat was unharmed, but wary of Murphy after that, not surprisingly), we knew we'd have to do a whole lot of training with him or find the cat a new home. At first we opted for training ('cause she is such a wonderfully sweet cat), but as I mentioned, Murphy had little socialization so it will be a long road before he's good around small animals. And it may be that the best we can hope for is that he won't go charging after small animals (and blowing leaves, candy wrappers, etc.) We might never get him to play nicely with them, just leave them alone. In the meantime, it wasn't fair to the cat to be kept by herself so much (to keep her safe and she didn't like being outside unless we were with her) so we found a great home for her. Murphy's prey drive kicked in at dog training classes too with the small breeds, which is why I'm wondering if that's what's going on with Peyton. It's as if, below a certain size, they don't register as fellow dogs to Murphy.
Basically, positive training uses the Nothing In Life Is Free philosophy (NILIF). The dogs don't get anything good (petting, food, treats, play, etc.) unless they offer you the behavior of your choice that either they know how to do already or that you're currently teaching them (sit, down, stay, etc.). If they don't do what you want, they don't get the reward... in fact they get ignored === no negative reaction at all, just ignored.
With Murphy's prey drive, we reward his inattention to the small animal and reward his focusing his attention on us when small animals are present (both are the behaviors we're trying to reinforce). At dog class, he was so intensely focused on the small dogs that we rewarded him anytime he relaxed the tiniest bit or acknowledged that we were even in the room with him
.
From what I understand, the danger in using traditional training methods to teach Peyton how to play nice with small dogs is that he might make the association of bad things (corrections) happening when small dogs are around, which will make him more stressed out and possibly more aggressive around small dogs.
I'm fairly new to positive training myself, but I belong to a great yahoo group where there are a bunch of experienced, professional positive-only dog trainers (inlcuding the list owner, Pat Miller, who's written a couple books on positive dog training; Amazon.com sells her books) and if you ask your question there, you'll get much better idea of what, specifically, you can do with Peyton to make his playtime with small dogs safer for the wee ones. The group is Peaceable Paws at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/peaceablepaws/?yguid=22805128. Most positive dog trainers rely on clickers, too. You can Google "clicker training" and get an idea of what it's all about.
Good luck and BTW, your Peyton is gorgeous! What a sweet face!
Michelle