Teaching Your Dog To Watch You

One of the problems people often ask me about is how to prevent their dog from chasing off after other dogs when it's running free.

Often this needn't be a particular problem if your dog just wants to go over and say a quick 'hello' before coming back to you. Granted, you might find the habit annoying, but in the overall scheme of things it's fairly minor in my opinion.

But where it really _is_ an issue is if your dog tends to be aggressive with other dogs. Chances are if your dog's like this you don't often let it run free for fear of it causing trouble if you meet anybody else out with a dog.

But I wouldn't mind betting that if that does describe you and your dog, you still have problems when your dog's on a leash and it sees another dog coming towards it.

There's a relatively simple technique you can use which will help. You need to teach the dog to look at you.

Start with a pocket full of treats that your dog adores, whatever that might be. And practice the early stages of this exercise away from all distractions. Around the home is the perfect place to begin with.

Get a treat and gently waft it past the dog's nose so he knows what's in your hand, then bring your hand up to the bridge of your nose holding the treat in such a way that it's clearly visible to the dog.

As soon as he looks at the treat say "Fido, watch me" and immediately praise the dog and give him the treat (obviously you substitute the dog's name for 'Fido').

Do it once more.

Now do it without wafting the treat past his nose. Just hold it straight up at your face. You should be able to give the 'watch me' command and he'll look straight up. As before, immediately praise the dog and give it the treat.

The next stage is to be holding the treat in your hand, but just have your hand by your side or behind your back. Call the dog's name and give the 'watch me' command. If he looks straight at your face immediately make a big fuss of him and give him the treat.

If the dog _didn't_ look straight at you, you need to go back a stage to what you were doing successfully before. After a couple more successful goes at the previous level, try again with your hand by your side or behind your back.

He'll soon get the hang of it.

Once the dog is successfully looking at you on the 'watch me' command, you need to gradually extend the length of time before you give the treat.

At first you gave it immediately. Then make the dog wait one second.

Then two.

Then three. Then five. Then ten.

And so on and so on. If you take it in nice easy stages there's no reason at all why you shouldn't teach the dog to hold a fixed stare on you for thirty seconds or a minute or even longer.

The idea is that when you're out for a walk and you see a potential 'flashpoint' like another dog coming towards you, you can make the dog fix its attention on you until the danger has passed.

The only way this will work is if the dog knows that looking at you is a more pleasurable and rewarding experience than hassling other dogs because you're always going to give it a yummy treat if it does as you ask.

So you need to make sure you always have a pocketful of treats with you when you go on your walks.

Just make sure you don't expect the dog to perform 'for real' before it's well and truly ready.

What I mean by that is that until the dog is 100% reliable on this exercise around the home where there are no distractions, don't expect it to behave impeccably outside if another dog's coming or some other temptation is looming.

Once the dog's completely reliable on this around the home you can try it outside. But first of all try it where there are still no obvious distractions.

Then gradually put the dog in more and more demanding situations and give the command. If you take this stage nice and easy you should find that within a few weeks you can use this technique in a 'real live' situation.

Recommended reading "Dog Training Blueprint To Success".

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