We adopted our dog, Tino, from Bide-a-Wee to join our household consisting of me, my husband and our 12-year old beagle, Darling. We were told Tino was about 3 or 4 years old. At first, Tino was very friendly with strange dogs and unfamiliar people. After Tino ran away overnight while we were in the country, once back in the city he began a pattern of barking and lunging at other dogs. Eventually walking him became a stress-filled experience for me and probably for him as well.
A neighbor recommended Who's Walking Who after she had seen good results in a dog with similar issues. We had never done much training with our past dogs, which was immediately apparent to Stacy when she visited us in our apartment.
Before we addressed Tino's behavior on the street we had to change our own behavior, and we began by re-establishing the pecking order in our house. Among other things, we trained Tino to sit, stay, down. We no longer gave him any food or treats without his having „worked¾ for it first. None of this was done punitively ‚ it was all performed in a fair, patient and kind way.
After we had improved Tino's responsiveness to us, Stacy began working with us on the street and by the dog run. In a step by step process we began to reduce the anxiety and stress that had become associated with other dogs. I began to really enjoy learning the training methods and seeing the progress he made.
This is not to say that there were no setbacks or that Tino's behavior is perfect even now. Especially in the beginning, I became discouraged and doubted whether his behavior could ever be changed. But as I looked for improvement rather than perfection in his behavior, and as I became clearer about what we humans needed to do, I became more encouraged that we could succeed at this.
After about five private lessons with Stacy and consistent practice and behavior on our part, he was able to join a group class. His barking is more sporadic now than consistent and usually holds much less conviction that it used to. In addition to the improvements in his behavior outside, he's much more alert to our commands generally, and actually will look to us for direction whereas before he would just act out in a negative manner.
Training Tino and ourselves continues to be an ongoing commitment and a work in progress, but the small steps we started with have really added up to big improvements and a more rewarding relationship with our dog. I think we're all very proud of the progress we've made.
-- Debra Vogel
July 21, 2003
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