Walking.... HELP!

Hi, I have a 15 week old tri coloured boy called Chester who is absolutely adorable. We have had him since he was 9 weeks & he is doing really well settling in, all apart from his walking.

He was doing well & we even had him off his lead over the weekend. Since then he has become a little stubborn with walking & will only walk when both me & my husband take him. If we try on our own, it takes forever to coax him to walk and he keeps sitting down, pulling & even making himself choak. Once we have turned around he is fine walking as he knows he is going home.

Does anyone have any advise on this please?

Hmm.. Kosmo used to do that too when he was little..Puppy classes helped first with walking, then with pulling.. they were SOOO helpful for this kind of stuff.

When he was small I used to go to the end of his leash and then crouch down onto the ground and call him to come to me with a treat (but a GOOD high value treat).. when he came I would say "good boy!!!" and then "lets go" "lets go!" when we were walking. It took a while but he will soon get into the routine of it.

As for choking, have you thought about getting him a harness? It's good especially when they are so small and the muscles in the neck are so fragile. If it's bad enough sometimes the trachea will collapse and that will most certianly bring you problems for the rest of your little one's life. It can even be fatal. I don't mean to scare you, but them pulling on the collar, or being pulled, is not good for them.

Good luck and let us know how you make out!

Gus does this too... especially when we have been with my boyfriend and then try to walk away... he is so sweet, it is like he wants everyone to go. What I have done is put him in a harness so it isn't hurting him if he pulls and he seems to do better if I take different routes, I think he likes the new smells.

Posey was the WORST walker at first - we tried everything (I would practically crawl down the sidewalk alongside her), and we could expect to spend an hour to get around our normal-sized block. We were about ready to resign ourselves to the fact that we had a dog who was 'broken' and simply would never like going for walks!

But our puppy class teacher just stressed patience, and pointed out that it's a big, scary world for a little pup. Indeed, as she gained confidence all around (she'd always been confident around us, so it was tough to understand why she wouldn't trust us once we were out in the neighborhood), her walking got better and better. In the course of a (very exciting!) week, we went from having a pup who'd plant herself down and refuse to budge, to one who was trying to drag us down the block behind her (a whole new training issue!). We've finally settled into wonderful walking behavior—she can even go offleash on the forest trails in a park near our home, and sticks right by us—and she gets quite excited when she sees her harness. I'd say it took about six weeks to go from completely stubborn an A+ walker. Hang in there!

One little piece of advice - try taking the same linear route, and just make it a little longer each time. In other words, go one block, and come back the same way, instead of going in a big circle of new territory. That seemed to help Posey's bravery—she'd recognize the scents on the way back home, and would do much better on the familiar route.

We had a big problem walking Huey at first. We ended up getting a really good "halter" (Puppia) and found that a big help. The trainer at puppy school thinks something about the sound of the collar/leash at his neck made him skiddish.

Patience is the best remedy for sure!

Can you try taking him for a walk with another dog? They will usually try and keep up and will get used to walking. The harness will help too.

With my previous dog, I used to kind of run on the spot really quickly just to make the pitter patter sound as dogs love to run with you and it would get her started. (That sounds wierd doesn't it!)

Kelly said:

Hi, I have a 15 week old tri coloured boy called Chester who is absolutely adorable. We have had him since he was 9 weeks & he is doing really well settling in, all apart from his walking.

He was doing well & we even had him off his lead over the weekend. Since then he has become a little stubborn with walking & will only walk when both me & my husband take him. If we try on our own, it takes forever to coax him to walk and he keeps sitting down, pulling & even making himself choak. Once we have turned around he is fine walking as he knows he is going home.

Does anyone have any advise on this please?

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Chester is very young to be leash walking, and walking on pavement can actually cause damage to his joints. I would let him have short little walks on the lawn, but not very far at all.

Thanks for all your responses.

Both me & my husband took him out this morning but he didnt want to budge from the garden at all. I think something must have scared him at some point & now he is frightened when he gets out the front - he is fine in the back garden.

I have spoken to our Puppy Trainer and she said to just be patient, so I think we will have a couple of days playing in the front garden to build up his confidence again.