advice needed asap.

minimad1970

We got our dog as a companion for my son. Unfortunately my son suffers with anxiety and with Truffle being a bit difficult it doesn't help the situation. My son is pretty indifferent to the dog, but we've started clicker training and doing some agility. Both my son and Truffle are really enjoying it and I'm sure it's helping them both to be more confident and to become closer. Perhaps you could try something similar to get your son more involved. I now call my son to give Truffle his dinner. It's trying to do things that focus on the positive things about the dog rather than his problems

Fosterdog

How much of the lack of bond with your son is because you've never given them the chance to bond?

I agree with catkins that you need to set a deadline of a month or six weeks and make the final decision then. If today is the first time you've helped your son to bond with Scampers than see how well bonded they are at the end of the deadline.

Wellyboots6

The people who have said it takes a long time for a rescue to settle are right. It also takes YOU a long time to adapt to the dog.

You can train the dog to a certain extent to fit in with your lifestyle, but you also have to be prepared to be flexible in your lifestyle to fit in with the dog. If that means extra babygates around the house, and dog is kept on a house line for a bit (like a lead that you leave trailing so you can grab if necessary, but with no loop on the end to catch on things) then so be it if it means you have a happy relationship with your dog.

I am on rescue number three now (excluding family dogs, all rescues) and I can honestly say with all 3 that by 5 months I was still having episodes of crying wondering what on earth I had taken on! It does get better though, and you look back and realise how much the dog has changed and bonded with you.

As someone else has mentioned, something like fun agility classes with your son would help them bond. I would also say not to push their relationship though. If they don't want to be best buddies then so be it.

How is Scampers with dogs when he is off his lead? Both of mine were fine off-lead but evil when they were on their leads. Their recall started off awful, so I used to use a long line and let it trail on the floor. That way they feel like they are off-lead, but you can jump on the end of the lead if needed. They then got to interact with dogs but I still had control. I am now gradually increasing the amount of contact dog feels with the long line whilst he is interacting with dogs, with the hope eventually he gets de-sensitized to the feeling of being on a lead.

I have found parks to be no-go areas if you need dog free places. Woods are quite good if you keep dog on-lead as there are plenty of sniffs to keep him entertained, and you tend to hear people coming and they tend to be less busy than parks. I also find footpaths across fields quieter than parks, and again you tend to be able to spot people a distance away. I avoid road walks like the plague unless it is unsociable hours as it is too tiring keep crossing the road every 5 minutes to avoid someone.

Also, get a few stock phrases practiced to shout out. I tend to shout 'just wait there a minute whilst we cross over please' or something like that. Something where you are giving the other person an instruction telling them what is going to happen. That limits the opportunities for the 'but mine is friendly' response as you haven't left it open for discussion. I can't remember who it was, but someone on here also advised me that shouting about your dog being contagious is a good one if the other person is really insistent. I have tried it and it really does work!!

neveranymoney

The escape attempts were at the start btw, our house and walks now are top security, Fort Knox events.

James lost interest when it became clear scampers is not particularly into toys, I will persevere with getting my son to feed him the best treats and see how things go.

krlyr

You can build up a dog's "drive" for toys, so don't feel that's a no-hoper

http://www.clickerdogs.com/createamotivatingtoy.htm
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMy74EwNXgE

Also, if he's foody, you can use food in place of a toy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcQA7sz_13Y

neveranymoney

I LOVE the contagious bit. I am very mild mannered but I would have just walked past the man shouting, grab your bloody dog please! But the contagious one is a winner. People will be crossing the street, muttering under their breaths about the muzzled, diseased Dingle family!

joansgirl

I LOVE the contagious bit. I am very mild mannered but I would have just
walked past the man shouting, grab your bloody dog please! But the contagious
one is a winner. People will be crossing the street, muttering under their
breaths about the muzzled, diseased Dingle family!

:rotfl:
I can't stop laughing! At least you've kept your sense of humour.

YORKSHIRELASS

I think you are being really sensible about it. Just another couple of thoughts:

I think trainers feel like they have a responsibility to be brutally honest. I can remember feeling gutted when mine said that I should never forget that my dog has bitten a child and also when he said that some of Bertie's problems may never be resolved.

Someone said about baby-gates. Having a safe place where you can shut your dog, either behind a baby gate or in a crate is really useful, no matter what dog you have. If you can train the dog to feel safe and happy there then you know you can always put them in there if they need a bit of time out. If you ever have lots of visitors or whatever and feel like Scamper is getting a bit overwhelmed its best to be prepared.

Oh and recall, its hard to train in terriers but not impossible. Bertie never goes off lead and has a perfectly happy life. We have a long line which we use in familiar, open areas and a big enough garden where he can have a proper run after the ball. Of course all dogs should have recall training but until you can 100% trust him with other dogs I wouldnt worry about it.

We clicker trained Bertie to play with a ball. It took ages but he now absolutely loves Kong tennis balls with a squeaker in. We started just rolling the ball past him and clicked and treated if he looked at it, then we worked up to him touching it and eventually got him to pick it up in his mouth.

As for other people, I dont give a stuff any more what they think. I just shout "keep away please, he's not friendly", even though thats not really true.

catkins

Person_one wrote: »

Sorry if this sounds critical, but you really need to make more effort to avoid other dogs on your walks. Drive miles to isolated spots if you need to, go after dark, turn round instantly when you see another dog so that Scampers doesn't see it.

katy721 wrote: »

I have found parks to be no-go areas if you need dog free places. Woods are quite good if you keep dog on-lead as there are plenty of sniffs to keep him entertained, and you tend to hear people coming and they tend to be less busy than parks. I also find footpaths across fields quieter than parks, and again you tend to be able to spot people a distance away. I avoid road walks like the plague unless it is unsociable hours as it is too tiring keep crossing the road every 5 minutes to avoid someone. !

What you both say makes sense but may not be practical for the OP.

We don't know where she lives or if she drives. I don't drive and I do the dog walking Monday to Friday so have no choice but to street walk. There is a smallish park near by but it is still a 10 minute walk away.

I can't think of anywhere even remotely close to me that I would call isolated. When we had our dog reactive dog me and my husband would sometimes drive miles but we never found anywhere where there were no dogs. There just seems to be tons of dogs where I live.

krlyr

catkins wrote: »

What you both say makes sense but may not be practical for the OP.

We don't know where she lives or if she drives. I don't drive and I do the dog walking Monday to Friday so have no choice but to street walk. There is a smallish park near by but it is still a 10 minute walk away.

I can't think of anywhere even remotely close to me that I would call isolated. When we had our dog reactive dog me and my husband would sometimes drive miles but we never found anywhere where there were no dogs. There just seems to be tons of dogs where I live.

OP mentions going out in the car twice on this thread (perhaps with hubby driving rather than herself though) so we do know that a car has potentially been available.

I live in a more built-up area with more dogs now, which does make it a bit more difficult with reactive dogs. I certainly would have struggled with Casper in his worst stage - we lived more rurally then and he could react to a dog 1/4 of a mile up ahead! I was fortunate enough to live next to a farm that had very few walkers come through it, which was lovely - but equally you do need to have some exposure to other dogs or you're just avoiding the issue.

Impractical or not, it is a very important to try to achieve it, because the dog really does need some downtime after reactive episodes. Also, the more a dog practices a behaviour, the more ingrained a reaction it becomes - so the more OP is bumping into other dogs, the more Scampers is learning to bark and lunge at other dogs, and the harder she will have to work to recondition his behaviour.