The Dog Walk

As soon as it is safe for your puppy to go out, take it on walks – lots of them. There is no better overall socialisation exercise and no better overall training exercise.

As an added benefit, dog walks are good for the health, good for the heart, and good for the soul. Walk that dog!

Housetraining on walks

If you do not have a private yard or garden, make sure your dog urinates or defecates before you begin your walk. Thus, the walk becomes the reward for doing the right thing in the right place at the right time. Otherwise, when you terminate an enjoyable walk after your dog has done its duty, you’ll end up unintenionally punishing it for eliminating. Your dog might then start delaying elimination to prolong its walks.

Put your puppy on a leash, leave the house, and then stand still and let the pup circle and sniff. Give it four or five minutes. If it doesn’t perform, go back indoors and try again later. If your puppy does go within the allotted time, praise it profusely, reward it with a simple treat, say ‘Walkies’, and off you go. You’ll find a simple ‘no-faeces-no-walk’ policy quickly produces a speedy defecator.

There are additional benefits to teaching your dog to eliminate prior to a walk. Clearing up the mess and depositing it in your own trash is much more convenient than a mid-walk clean up.

Socialising on walks

Take a few time-outs on each walk. Do not rush your young dog through the environment. Give your dog ample opportunity to relax and watch the world go by. A stuffed Kong will help it settle down quickly and calmly each time you stop.

Never take your dog’s even temperament for granted. The great outdoors can be a scary place, and there will be the occasional surprise to spook your pooch. The best approach is to prevent these problems. Hand-feeding your dog its dinner on walks helps it form positive associations towards people, other dogs and traffic.

Offer your dog a piece of kibble every time a big truck or noisy motorcycle goes by. Offer your dog a couple of pieces of kibble every time another dog or person passes. Praise your dog and offer a treat whenever it greets another dog or person in a friendly fashion. Praise your dog and offer three tasty treats whenever a child approaches.

Should someone wish to meet your dog, first show them how to use kibble to lure/reward it to come and sit. Ask the stranger to offer the kibble only after your dog sits to say hello. From the outset, teach your dog to always sit when meeting and greeting people.

Training on walks

Dogs pull on the leash for many reasons. It appears to be intrinsically enjoyable for dogs, and we let them do it. Each second the leash is tight, each pulling moment is hugely reinforced by each step the dog takes, forging ahead to investigate the ever-exciting, ever-changing olfactory environment.

For the best results, train your puppy to wear a head collar from the start. Your dog can’t pull effectively when on a head collar and the collar allows you to easily deflect the head if your dog is looking at another dog or a person. With a head collar, there are no more tugs of war!

Here are a few do’s and don’ts on teaching your dog to walk calmly on-leash:

• DO practice leash walking around your house and yard from the very beginning and take your puppy for walks in public places as soon as it is old enough.
• DON’T wait until your dog reaches adolescence before trying to teach it to walk on leash in public, unless you wish to provide amusement for onlookers.
• DO alternate short periods (15-30 seconds) when your dog walks by your side, with longer periods (a minute or so) when your dog is allowed to range and sniff at the end of the leash. This motivates your dog to walk by your side, as walking side-by-side is regularly reinforced by permission to range and sniff.
• DON’T expect your adolescent (or adult) dog to endlessly heel. It will learn that heeling is mutually exclusive to ranging and sniffing. It won’t want to heel and will grow to resent training and the trainer (you) for spoiling its fun.
• DO consider training your dog to pull on-leash. Thus, instead of being a problem, pulling on-leash can be the solution – an effective reward to reinforce calmly walking by your side. Alternating slack-leash walking and pulling on-leash is enthusiastically endorsed by my Malamutes. Also, on-command leash-pulling is wonderful for ascending steep hills, pulling sleds, and skateboards.
• DON’T allow your dog to decide when to pull on the leash. Employ red-light-green-light training. When your dog tightens the leash, immediately stop, stand still and wait. Once it slackens the leash, or better yet, once it sits, proceed with the walk.

Red-Light-Green-Light

Many dogs go quite crazy at the prospect of a walk, and, of course, the walk only reinforces its craziness. Luckily, there’s a better way. The walk can reinforce your dog’s mannerly behaviour.

Before going on a walk, practice leaving the house in a mannerly fashion. Say ‘Walky, Walky, Walkies!’ and waggle the dog leash in front of its nose. Most dogs will go ballistic. Stand still and wait for your dog to calm down and sit. Your dog may frantically bark, beg, jump up, lie down, rollover, paw you and circle you. Ignore everything your dog does until it sits. It doesn’t matter how long it takes; your dog will eventually sit.

When it does, say ‘Good dog’ and snap on its leash. When you snap on its leash, your dog will likely reactivate. So stand still and wait for it to sit once more. Head towards the door one step at a time and wait for your dog to sit after each step. Have your dog sit before you open the door and have it sit immediately after going through the door. Them come back inside, take off the dog’s leash, sit down, and repeat the above procedure.

You’ll find that the time it takes for your dog to sit progressively decreases as the exercise proceeds. Also, you’ll notice your dog becomes calmer each time you leave the house. By the third or fourth time you leave, your dog will walk calmly and sit promptly.

Don’t prompt your dog to sit. Let your dog work it out for itself. The longer you wait for your dog to sit, the better it learns which behaviours are unwanted. When your dog sits and receives praise and a reward, it is learning what you want it to do. Very quickly your dog learns which green-light behaviours (e.g. sitting) get you to proceed and which red-light behaviours (everything else) cause you to stand still.

When your dog can leave the house in a mannerly fashion, it is time to go for a real walk. Put your dog’s dinner kibble in a bag. Hold a piece of kibble in your hand, stand still and wait for your dog to sit. When it does, say ‘Good dog’ and offer the kibble. Then take a giant step forwards, stand still, and wait for your dog to sit again. As soon as you step forwrad, it is likely your dog will explode with energy. Stand still and wait. Eventually your dog will sit again. Say, ‘Good dog’, offer the kibble, and take another giant step forward.

As you repeat this procedure over and over, you’ll notice your dog sits progressively quicker each time you stand still. Now take two giant steps before you stop. Then try three steps and stop, then five, eight, ten, twenty, and so on. By now you will have discovered that your dogs walks calmly and attentively by your side and sits immediately and automatically each time you stop. You will have taught it all this in just one session, and the only words you said were, ‘Good Dog’.

Sit and settle down

Have numerous short training interludes during the walk. Each time you stop, say ‘Sit’ and as soon as your dog sits, say ‘Let’s go’, and start walking again. Thus, every time you stop, resuming the walk effectively rewards your dog for sitting.

Keep most training interludes shorter than five seconds, so as to reinforce quick sits and/or downs or short sequences of body-position changes, such as sit-down-sit-stand-down-stand. You may periodically reward your dog with kibble if you like, but this is hardly necessary as resuming the walk is a much better treat for your dog.

Occasionally insert longer training interludes to practice having your dog walk by your side for 15-30 seconds at a time or to reinforce two or three-minute settle downs. Offer a stuffed Kong for your dog’s amusement and read a newspaper for yours.

The above techniques will mold your dog’s behaviour and mend its manners in a single session. By averaging fifty or so training sessions per kilometre, a single walk will troubleshoot virtually any training problem. For example, you may experience some difficulty getting your excited dog to pay attention and settle down the first few times you stop, but by the fourth or fifth time it will be easy. After an enjoyable 5km walk with 200 or so training interludes, your dog will be nothing less than brilliant!

Training in the car

Don’t forget to practice in the car. It’s the same technique as on the walk. For a couple of days, read the newspaper in the car, having instructed your dog to settle down with a stuffed Kong. Have a short training interlude every minute or so to practice some body-position changes (e.g. sit, down, stand etc.). It is much easier to train your dog in the car when you are not driving and the car is stationary.

Once your dog promptly responds to each request, repeat the exercises with a friend driving. You’ll soon find your dog happily responds to your requests when you are driving.