krissy

Jen of Never Say Never Greyhounds discusses this, but I can't find the blog entry I'm thinking of. I did find an abbreviated version which makes the basic point: "We have already talked about greyhounds having trouble with sitting and melting into a down. Be alert for the slightest sign that your greyhound is about to lie down. Step into him to prevent that from happening. I would much prefer my greyhound stand up than to lie down from a sit" I've taught other dogs to down from a sit. It makes sense for them if they're sitting to be lured into a down. If you lure from standing sometimes they just walk along following the treat with their nose to the ground. But they'll stay in a sit because it's comfortable. Greyhounds will always choose a down over a sit.

I personally rarely worry about bloat. Greyhounds are really not all that predisposed. The number of bloat threads that come up on GT though seems to suggest that the general opinion is that bloat is a bigger problem in greyhounds than I seem to think. Not sure why that is. Maybe I'm delusional. Considering we don't actually know what causes bloat I don't find these random correlations all that surprising. Yes, typically we think of feeding large meals and running as being predisposing factors, but we don't actually have hard proof of that. Kind of like how they keep flip flopping on how you should sleep your baby... back? tummy? Just when you think they've figured it out they change their minds and decide the other way is better. I think that's where we're at with bloat right now.

He snarls at YOU? That's no fun. Summit can be reactive to certain dogs, but he always goes after them. Sounds like Duke redirects his aggression since he can't get at the other dog, and you're the closest thing. Is he responsive to you at all during these episodes? I'd probably give him a correction if he's redirecting at you. Just the gentlest correction you can give, like an "ahh ahh" or whatever sound he'll respond to. Depends on how sensitive your dog is though. Generally even a mild correction for Summit results in this look of "Oh no, I did something wrong!" and he immediately stops what he was doing. He requires slightly stronger corrections if he's got a big stimulus like another dog he doesn't like. I'd try to always stay under his threshold while you're working on him. A lot of people have told me I should just avoid all dogs with Summit, but I don't think that's necessary since he's not overtly or dangerously aggressive, and only reacts to certain dogs in certain situations. I attempt to avoid situations I know cause problems, and with dogs I know are problems I still let him see at a distance that is under his threshold. Basically I set him up for success. I also reward polite meetings. I ask for "watch me" even when we see another dog that he knows and is good with, and part of his reward is then being able to go over and say hello. So I don't avoid other dogs, but I try to control the situation and avoid bad situations. My goal is to have him have as many good interactions as possible and as few bad ones, so that good meetings become normal and appropriate.

Are there dogs that he doesn't react to? Like friends dogs or neighbourhood dogs that you run into often? If so I would sit with a click and just click and reward him for several minutes while you chat with the owner, even if the dog isn't looking at him. When the dog does look at him and he doesn't react then he gets a click and treat and lots of praise. This of course only works if there is a dog out there that can look at him without getting a reaction. If he reacts to any dog that looks at him, or you don't have anyone who could stand around with you for a couple minutes several times a week to work on Duke, I would suggest teaching a reliable "watch me" in the house. Then start doing it out in your yard, then when there's a dog at the other end of the block not looking at him, dog across the street, etc. Until it is quite reliable, and then start asking for it with dogs closer and closer to him. Then if you run into dogs while you're out walking, you ask for a watch me, keep his attention as you walk by the other dog, then reward/praise and continue on your walk. He can't react to them if he doesn't look at them.

Had the same problem with Summit. He's food motivated, but if he has to crane his neck too hard or if too much time passes between treats then he loses interest. I tried backing him into corners as well so he had nowhere to back up to, but then he just gave up and tried to walk away. I still ended up using the luring technique. I cut a big brick of cheese and used that as my lure. As long as he was reaching up and back with his head he got to keep nibbling at it and I just kept luring farther and farther. Because he was still getting something out of the deal he didn't give up and as he started to drop his rear end I added praise and encouragement. When his bum hit the floor I let him have a big chunk of the cheese. And then repeat several times immediately after to reinforce that the sit is a big deal. After that, no problem. Agreed. I always leave Summit in a stand until it's time for the down and drop him from there. Most other people ask their dogs to sit while they wait to be asked for the down/stay. I have enough trouble keeping him up in a sit for a sit/stay without having him think *I* think it's acceptable to down from a sit. He does that on his own if I make him sit for too long, and then I have to correct him and ask for the sit all over again.

ha ha, okay, that's a pretty decent sale then. lol Can't really say no to free as a poor student. I love free.

So it was still like $50? lol. Kidding. I've always found them super overpriced, but I'm a starving student so $20 for a hair band (one of those plain fabric ones for sports) seems a little outrageous when I can get 3 at Shopper's for $10. It is pretty cute for a fanny pack though! (Way cuter than the one I had as a kid.)

I take the opposite approach to what most people have suggested in some ways. Summit is generally very good about not changing sides on me, or if he does he's smart enough to try to do it behind me. On the odd occasion that he smells soemthing REALLY good and tries to cross in front of me, I just keep walking right into him, and give him a little "bump" with my leg back to his side (all in stride). To the best of my ability I try not to slow down or deviate. He needs to understand that he stays on his side and that it's his job to stay out of MY way. Like I said, Summit is usually pretty good. When we first got foster dog Sunny though he was atrocious. He would lean into you while walking, he'd try to cross in front of you, etc. I did the same thing. I just kept walking on my original trajectory. If he was in the way (which he inevitably would be if he kept trying to cross) then he got bumped. He learned pretty quickly to stay on his side. I also keep things simple for Summit. He always walks on my left. Always. And he knows this. Sometimes when I'm carrying things and end up with the leash in my right hand, he will still walk on my left even though that means the leash is around my back and super short on his side, he doesn't change to the right where he'd have more slack.

That's so weird that you had vet visit and clipping nails stuff in an obedience class. I guess it's good for newbies, but personally I would have wanted to know from my trainer if she was going to do that and I'd skip... but then I'm in vet school so that REALLY would have been a review! In terms of head halters, we just had a seminar with Dr. Susanne Simmons about a month ago and she was discussing all the different kinds of equipment and tools you can use for training. The Gentle Leader is a lot tighter. It has to be tight to work properly, but a lot of people are unwilling to tighten them as much as they need to. The Halti is meant to fit a lot looser, such that a dog can actually open his mouth almost as wide as he wants. Technically with the Gentle Leader they can get a tennis ball in their mouth, but only just. The thing with head halters is that for the most part they're a quick fix. You're not really addressing the heart of the behavioural issue, you just find a way to deal with it. Which is fine if that's what you want, or if a dog is so out of control on walks that you even need it to begin working on correcting the problem. If Ryder pulls on walks it may be beneficial to walk him individually so you can focus on him. Or you take one dog and hubby takes the other. It's a slow, frustrating process at first, so I can see why people want to just get a head halter and have the quick fix. Personally I like the circling method. Any time the dog pulls, you force him to walk in a tight circle before continuing. If you really have a puller this will make you dizzy, so sometimes I use the alternate method of turning quickly into the dog and walking in the opposite direction. You can also just come to a complete stop and refuse to continue walking unless the dog gives you slack. Most frustrating experience I had with this was a foster puppy I had. It would literally take us a half an hour to walk the last block home. But he was going to be huge (and he is huge, I just saw him at Christmas) so I wasn't going to have him learning bad habits at 8 weeks old.

Large meals are thought to be one of the predisposing causes for bloat and GDV. I feed twice. I'd prefer to feed 3 times, but my schedule doesn't allow me to be very consistent with that. I reduce his meal sizes by providing kibble in his Kong and Tricky Treat Ball that he gets while I'm out. Keeps him occupied and lets me make his meals a little smaller most days.

I didn't read through all the replies, so excuse me if I repeat a technique someone else has already been through. Wait was the first thing Summit learned. I didn't even use food rewards for this one. Whenever we come in or out the front door he has to wait and let me go first. He also had to wait for his meals. To start I would get ready to go for a walk, and had his leash fairly short, but relaxed. I opened the door and when he tried to walk out, I blocked him gently with my body. When he was back where he was supposed to be I stepped aside and if he tried to go out on his own I again gently blocked him. I also added a "non-reward marker" as I'll call it, which was just a gentle "Ah ah" or something similar. If he stayed where he was for a couple of seconds with the door wide open then I praised him and said "okay" (release word) and let him walk out the door. I didn't use food rewards because in this situation going out for a walk was the reward. After he started to get it, I added the command. Same with dinner. This is a similar technique to what people described with the treats in hand. I told him to wait and put his bowl down. If he went for it I blocked him. If he waited for a few seconds I released him to eat with "okay". In both situations you make the amount of time you require for the wait longer and longer. Summit is not good at sit stays... we haven't worked on them much because outside of the obedience ring I see no need to make him do a sit stay if he's more comfortable to do a down or stand stay. That said, he will hold his sit stay for quite a while if I ask him to sit stay before his dinner. And he has no aversions to short sits. A vibration collar may not be painful, but I don't think it's really necessary. I taught Summit to "watch me" to get his attention, and once I have his attention there's no reason for him to not recall or do whatever else I ask. So now he's got a very reliable recall. It didn't happen in 15 minutes, but I'm weary of things that give "quick fixes". I prefer the old fashioned way.

I like this. I think I'm going to teach Summit this one as a party trick since I'm out of useful things to teach him for the time being. Also, if a hound can move around, a variation on the game can be to hide treats around a room and then invite the dog in to hunt for them... starting easy and making it harder and harder. Does she need stimulation ideas for the dog while people are home or while they are out? Because I agree that training tricks is good stimulation, but if they're at work and the dog is bored that obviously doesn't work.

Nooooo! Summit's first agility class has been pushed back by a week. Trainer has a conflict with a conference she's supposed to go to. I was so excited! ha ha. Also, I've got Summit fetching a tennis ball now which is awesome because his other toys aren't very conducive to being thrown more than a couple metres.

Not sure what a tornado toy is but I have a Tricky Treat Ball for Summit. It's a ball with a hole in it and he has to role it to get the food out. It's not too physically demanding as long as a hound can walk around with it's nose to the ground. I've also seen feeders that are designed to be mentally stimulating. They have different compartments. The dog eats the food out of one and then has to slide the lid to get to the food in the other half of the compartment. Then move on to the next compartment, and so on. I've also been looking for "Tug a Jug" with no success. It's basically a bottle (the "jug") with a rope attached. The dog has to pick it up and throw it around to get kibble out of it. Not sure if these are stimulating enough.

I'm sure he'll figure it out eventually. If you were closer I'd offer to bring Summit and a tunnel to show the boys how it's done. If Kasey will go through the makeshift tunnel I'm sure Ryder would be hot on his heels! After the tunnel in agility comes the chute, so I'm sure that'll be even more awesome. I'm waiting to see what Summit thinks of that in a couple of weeks when we start agility!

Re: Tunnel. We didn't get Summit through the first week. He was having none of it. That was the only thing he wasn't best in class at. ha ha. The second week though we really made the tunnel as short as it would go and I used a long treat (you can use a block of cheese if you want) so that he could take little nibbles as I lured him. We got him to put his two front legs and his head in, but he still wouldn't go. Finally we sent his GSD buddy Dax through the tunnel, and I saw Summit think "Well, gosh, I certainly am not going to let that barking, not listening, pushy little bugger outdo ME at anything" and followed him right through. Then we encouraged him through with food a couple more times before I took him off to do something else. The next week he moved up right to the full tunnel. All I had to do was throw a treat into the tunnel and once he was in I quickly ran to the other end and called him through the rest of the way. Now he goes in on command and sometimes goes in all by himself and looks very proud of himself. If Ryder likes any of the other dogs in the class, try having him watch them do it and see if he won't just follow them through, or at least be more willing to try. And seriously, a block of cheese is awesome because as long as they're trying you just keep letting them take nibbles out of it. So as long as his head and feet continue in the right direction he gets rewarded.

Sometimes I'll throw Summit a treat when he lays down on his bed in the living room, and it always hits him in the face. He doesn't even seem to see it coming. He has learned how to catch his toy in midair though, so I'm sure he can eventually learn to catch a treat. If I take too long to throw his toy he'll back up and square off to me, and then I'll give him a soft underhand lob so he can track it and he almost always catches it. If your dog likes toys maybe start with a toy because they're big and soft.

That's awesome that the puppy's owner understood that dogs teach other dogs. My friend has a GSD puppy (actually, he just turned 1 year old this month, so he's not much of a puppy anymore... in fact he's bigger than Summit now). He's just a friendly guy, but Summit doesn't have a lot of patience. Too bad Dax doesn't understand corrections. Summit will growl and air snap at Dax, who will come right back and put his face in Summit's face not even 2 seconds later. We have a good laugh at Dax's expense for it. Driving to obedience class every week with the two of them in the backseat of my sedan is interesting.

I can't say I've had the same experience as the OP, but we specifically indicated that we wanted a male. We did a lot of research and thought a grey would really suit our lifestyle (I'm a vet student, so I spend a lot of time either at school or studying... don't have the time or energy to take a border collie for a 5 mile run every day). That said though, I had a list of "wants and needs" that I gave to the adoption agency to allow them to help us choose the right dog. We had been told that the females were more aloof and "cat-like", and since I don't really like cats due to their personality and wanted a DOG I specifically said I wanted a male. My other "needs" were that he be small animal safe, quiet (no barkers... our landlord lives upstairs!), and "high energy" in that I wanted a dog that would love going for walks and outings. And that's exactly what I got in Summit. He is very quiet, no separation anxiety, he is afraid of my 3 rabbits, and he jumps to his feet any time he so much as THINKS we might be going for a walk. I think it's very important for people to sit down and really think about exactly what they need in their dog, and to find the dog that matches that. That said a relationship takes time and effort. We have had Summit for 5 months and he has a much stronger bond with me than my boyfriend because I am his sole caretaker. As far as Summit is concerned my BF just lives here. I feed, walk, and train him. The BF is a petting dispenser. But I think the two biggest factors in his bonding with me were time and training. I started teaching him basic obedience at home, and then we took a Level 2 Obedience, and we're starting Level 1 Agility in 2 weeks. While a lot of the things our dogs do are based on their personality, a lot of things can also be taught. Summit wouldn't even LOOK at a toy when we got him (and he'd been in a home before us), but with a bit of creativity I taught him how to play fetch which he now LOVES! He also knows how to sit, down, settle, drop, stay, roll onto his side, target, watch me, and a bunch of obedience commands (like heeling, front, around finish, etc.). Remember, you think she's boring, but maybe she's *bored*. Maybe she thinks you're boring. What do you do with her? Where do you take her? I try to take Summit to new places for walks whenever I can. I take him to school with me sometimes if I can get away with it. I take him to my friends' houses, to pet stores, to regular stores (as long as they don't sell food you can actually take a dog into a lot of shops), to different parks, walks on trails near our house, to his weekly greyhound run, for playdates with friends' dogs, etc. I try to keep him stimulated with new adventures so when we walk out the door... yeah maybe we're just walking around our neighbourhood like we usually do twice a day... but maybe we're going somewhere cool! Just give her some time. A month is nothing for a dog just off the track. She'll come around.

Sounds like Ryder is doing well! I have to say I feel very fortunate that Summit is a social butterfly. That said he doesn't necessarily perform for everyone, but in some ways I am fine with that. He almost never shuts down on me, and he will listen to my BF as well to a point. He would probably do "come" for anyone, but certainly not sit or down. He will do those for me almost anywhere at this point though.

I've heard that it's popular in Britain - but my family is Armenian so I don't know what their excuse was!!! (Of course, my grandfather used to have a jar of pigsfeet on his counter, too!!! ) Man, you guys are nuts! I LOVE white tripe. Of course, I'm half British and half Chinese, so I've got the genetics for it on both sides. Mind you, I've never COOKED it myself. But I get it at Chinese restaurants whenever I go. Delicious! EDIT: Pork hocks are delicious too if cooked properly, as are pork ears. I don't see why an ear or a foot is gross but boiling turkey organs to make gravy isn't. White people are nuts.

6 cups is a lot of food. My boy gets 3 cups per day, plus about 1/4 cup in his Kong, and he gets a tonne of treats because he's in obedience and agility. That said though, if he's going in EVERY 2 WEEKS to donate blood, his body needs a little extra to make new cells. That's insane to me... every 2 weeks, especially at his age. I'm a vet student so my grey is a blood donor for the school's clinic. All the dogs go in once every 2 months (occassionally students and staff get their dogs calling in earlier if they're really desperate for blood, but not if they donated less than a month ago), and they have to be between 1 and 5 years of age. Summit will be turning 6 in May, so the only reason they are using him is because I'm a student and he's a greyhound (convenient because I can bring him in at a moment's notice and of course he's the Universal blood type and very well behaved for the collection). Dogs are retired after 2 years (i.e. about 12 collections). We used to keep dogs at the school as blood donors (lots of greyhounds, but also other breeds) but they were all adopted out a couple years ago and they now use privately owned community dogs (the cost of keeping the dogs was the reason for scrapping the original program). But even when the dogs were kept at the school they were retired and adopted out after 2 years. We still keep cats as blood donors and they too are retired and adopted after a 2 year stay. Honestly, I think he's donating too often. I don't know of too many clinics that require that much blood except emergency vets and referral vets (like University clinics). If they require that much blood they should look into adding more dogs to their donor program. ETA: Just re-read the original post and noted that it is a University clinic. However, it still stands that if they need to be bleeding their dogs once every 2 weeks then they have too few dogs in their program and they need to expand.

That was an interesting video. I've always thought of counter conditioning as asking the dog for something incompatible with the behaviour he is trying to display. The example that the behaviourist at school likes to use most is asking a dog who jumps up to sit. He can't jump up while he is sitting, so we teach a reliable sit and then when he goes to try to jump up, we ask for the sit and reward that. So, in many ways what people have suggested about doing "watch me" exercises, basically IS counter conditioning. This is what I've done with Summit. He cannot stare at the other dog and growl or become reactive if he is looking at me. So I have trained a "watch me" command, and ask for it when another dog appears. This video was very neat though. Good find.

She almost sounds like a puppy going through fear phases. I had a foster puppy a few summers back. I'd never had a dog or puppy before. For the first couple of days he followed me EVERYWHERE. Even if he didn't really want to leave our driveway, if I dropped the leash and kept walking he would run after me because he was more afraid of not being with me than he was of the outside world. A couple days later he started refusing to leave the driveway completely, and wouldn't follow me if I kept walking. I was so distraught thinking I'd made walking so awful that he didn't want to go anymore. Turned out it was normal. Puppies go through fear phases at certain weeks of their life and they want to stay close to home which is safe, so they start refusing to leave the house, and really wanting to return (i.e. pulling/running once you turn around to head home). How old is your girl? Technically these fear phases are all in the early weeks, but because our GHs are raised on farms and don't get the same exposure to the outside world, they essentially are at the same point as puppies, especially the younger ones. I wonder if she isn't just going through a sort of fear phase.

If you are a runner, try taking her for jogs with you. Dogs need a job, and when they are running they tend to just put their heads down and run. Summit will try to sniff all the time on walks, and he notices people and dogs and wants to meet them (he does have some dog issues as well that we have been working on, but it is only certain individuals he doesn't like), but when we go jogging he doesn't try to sniff things and he doesn't notice people or dogs across the street. He is in a zone. You could try taking her for short jogs and see if she is able to ignore stimuli at a distance. If you don't jog, you could try a backpack. Having a backpack on similarly gives a dog a job to do and puts them into a similar, calmer mental state. And try to walk briskly. Not as if you are running away from something, but as if you're going somewhere with a purpose. I do this with Summit sometimes and once again with the added speed he makes fewer attempts to stop to sniff and is less reactive to the environment.