Strong On Walks

[Jak-Tay]

I have a 9 month old female rottweiler. She is very strong when walking her, she pulls for about 10 mins when first taking her out but of course she is excited. She is constantly picking things up in her mouth off the floor, she will pick up anything from crisp packets to once a dirty hankerchief! When she wants to get at something she will and with her strength I cant seem to stop her from pulling me. Has anyone got any tips?

[jlaack]

I have a 9 month old female rottweiler. She is very strong when walking her, she pulls for about 10 mins when first taking her out but of course she is excited. She is constantly picking things up in her mouth off the floor, she will pick up anything from crisp packets to once a dirty hankerchief! When she wants to get at something she will and with her strength I cant seem to stop her from pulling me. Has anyone got any tips?

Yes start obedience training and continue for a long time. Having a dog walk nicely on a lead is not a battle of strength but rather teaching them the appropriate way to walk on a lead. I weigh about 110, my dogs were close to 100 (2 of them) and I could easily walk both of them together on lead. It takes a lot of time and patience but it makes going for walks a lot more enjoyable. Further as you are discovering she can out pull you and what if doing so would post danger to you or to her? In a tug of war match you'll likely not win. How I taught my dogs to walk nicely on a leash is simple (but not necessarily easy). When the dog gets a step ahead of me I drop all but the end of the lead, abruptly change direction and move quickly in the opposite direction. I don't say a word to my dogs and if they aren't paying attention and hit the end of the leash so be it. It isn't a correction but rather a direction change. Once the dog catches up and is next to you reward like crazy. Continue to reward so long as the dog is walking next to you. If your dog dives to put something in her mouth use the same technique. This teaches the dog to pay attention to you because she doesn't know what to expect. This isn't a quick fix and when you start out, it'll likely take you a while to walk for a block. So long as you are consistent, eventually she will pick up on where she is supposed to be. My dogs get it enough that if I simply hesitate in moving forward they check to make sure I'm not stopping and that they are where they are supposed to be. Additionally the commands leave it and drop it should become part of her vocabulary. Leave it is the deterant to prevent her from doing something (picking up the dirty handkerchief) and drop it for once she has it in her mouth. You can use the leave it command and couple it with the 'sneakaway' described above.

My only other thought would be to allow her to carry something in her mouth on walks so long as she doesn't have any possession aggression issues and so long as she'll actually carry it for the walk. Our eldest loved to walk with a tennis ball or stick in his mouth and so I used to have him carry one. It gave him a job to do beyond just walking.

[Shelby427]

I concur with everything Jlaack said. I too have a puller (on a flat collar) and we are also working on walking nicely. Shelby my 4 year old is fine, i can actually walk her off leash in a heel (I only do in very safe areas) but Hudson, man!!! he pulls like crazy without a prong collar on, and we're working towards weaning him off the prong to use just the flat, but we're a work in progress.

Shelby always liked to carry things too, so we'd shove a stick in her mouth at the beginning of our walk and she'll carry it the whole way, putting down to rest, then picking it back up and continuing.

[juniata302]

Both my Rotts pulled rather aggressively when their leash was attached to their collar. I bought 2 harness' (about $10-$15 each) and hooked their leash to the harness instead of their collar. What a difference!!!! One still walks with a slight pull which i am working on correcting, the other walked like an absolute angel the very firsat time i hooked up the harness and she has not pulled at all since i started walking her with that.

[themaster]

Training will do it, you are not in control of your dog. You need to learn all the basics, including walking to "heel" and "leave" which should solve the problems you mentioned above, but you need to learn all the other commands too.

Dog training classes to me are less about teaching the dog and more about teaching you how to train your dog so please find a good class and get stuck in, you'll love your dog even more when she's fully trained