There are so many poorly trained dogs!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just curious - of all of you complaining about "poorly trained" dogs, do any of you have rescues, or do you all have bred dogs?

Yes, I rescued a 1 year old German Shepherd/Husky mix, and he was hard as hell to train. I spent thousands and used three trainers, but now I don't have to worry about him being troublesome with humans or other dogs. It was worth it.

Some people don’t have those resources, especially to spend on a problem like barking at other dogs. I know your response is that “you shouldn’t have the dog then,” but really, that’s not how life works in practice. You like the dog, the kids like the dog, and he’s otherwise not dangerous and well behaved.

Fine, don't train the dog, but then please drag it away when it starts barking like crazy at other dogs. No one, dog or human, wants to listen to that. And if your dog sits in the window and barks at passing dogs, don't let it sit in that window--move it to the back of the house. Finally, I'll just say that a barking dog is not a happy dog. S/he might need anxiety meds.

I have never seen someone with a barking dog that just stands there and lets it go crazy on the sidewalk. Also, a dog that barks at dogs or people approaching the home is pretty much… just being a dog??? And you want to medicate it??!?

Barking chronically is not just "being a dog." Most dogs don't bark at people approaching the home. It's extremely off-putting, and yes, barking is a sign of stress. The dog sees the person/animal as a threat. Why would you put your dog in a place where s/he feels threatened most of the day? That's why I suggested putting the dog in a room that overlooks the backyard. They can still see out, but aren't constantly on alert. If all you've had is a dog that barks, I can see why you'd think it's normal, but it's really not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just curious - of all of you complaining about "poorly trained" dogs, do any of you have rescues, or do you all have bred dogs?

Yes, I rescued a 1 year old German Shepherd/Husky mix, and he was hard as hell to train. I spent thousands and used three trainers, but now I don't have to worry about him being troublesome with humans or other dogs. It was worth it.

Some people don’t have those resources, especially to spend on a problem like barking at other dogs. I know your response is that “you shouldn’t have the dog then,” but really, that’s not how life works in practice. You like the dog, the kids like the dog, and he’s otherwise not dangerous and well behaved.

Fine, don't train the dog, but then please drag it away when it starts barking like crazy at other dogs. No one, dog or human, wants to listen to that. And if your dog sits in the window and barks at passing dogs, don't let it sit in that window--move it to the back of the house. Finally, I'll just say that a barking dog is not a happy dog. S/he might need anxiety meds.

I have never seen someone with a barking dog that just stands there and lets it go crazy on the sidewalk. Also, a dog that barks at dogs or people approaching the home is pretty much… just being a dog??? And you want to medicate it??!?

Barking chronically is not just "being a dog." Most dogs don't bark at people approaching the home. It's extremely off-putting, and yes, barking is a sign of stress. The dog sees the person/animal as a threat. Why would you put your dog in a place where s/he feels threatened most of the day? That's why I suggested putting the dog in a room that overlooks the backyard. They can still see out, but aren't constantly on alert. If all you've had is a dog that barks, I can see why you'd think it's normal, but it's really not.

Some breeds bark a lot. Some don't. It's normal for some, it's not normal for others. That's it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a reactive German shepherd and no inclination to apologize. He’s a rescue and overall an excellent dog. If I had raised him maybe he wouldn’t have been like that but I don’t know. Getting him over his anxiety of other dogs has been a long process. Deal with it!

A reactive GSD is not an excellent dog. It’s dangerous.

Says you, he is only dog reactive and very gentle with people. All he does is bark at other dogs, which is not a crime the last time I checked. Would you prefer he be put down?.

If you can’t control and train him, you shouldn’t have him. Period.

A dog-reactive GSD is a nuisance at best.

So, your preference is that he be put down. Got it. Who else is going to adopt an older dog reactive German Shepherd in the dmv? No one.

Sure. That is one option. I don't think euthanasia is a dirty word. If you can't take care of the dog responsibly, you can't take care of the dog responsibly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just curious - of all of you complaining about "poorly trained" dogs, do any of you have rescues, or do you all have bred dogs?

Yes, I rescued a 1 year old German Shepherd/Husky mix, and he was hard as hell to train. I spent thousands and used three trainers, but now I don't have to worry about him being troublesome with humans or other dogs. It was worth it.

Some people don’t have those resources, especially to spend on a problem like barking at other dogs. I know your response is that “you shouldn’t have the dog then,” but really, that’s not how life works in practice. You like the dog, the kids like the dog, and he’s otherwise not dangerous and well behaved.

Fine, don't train the dog, but then please drag it away when it starts barking like crazy at other dogs. No one, dog or human, wants to listen to that. And if your dog sits in the window and barks at passing dogs, don't let it sit in that window--move it to the back of the house. Finally, I'll just say that a barking dog is not a happy dog. S/he might need anxiety meds.

I have never seen someone with a barking dog that just stands there and lets it go crazy on the sidewalk. Also, a dog that barks at dogs or people approaching the home is pretty much… just being a dog??? And you want to medicate it??!?

Barking chronically is not just "being a dog." Most dogs don't bark at people approaching the home. It's extremely off-putting, and yes, barking is a sign of stress. The dog sees the person/animal as a threat. Why would you put your dog in a place where s/he feels threatened most of the day? That's why I suggested putting the dog in a room that overlooks the backyard. They can still see out, but aren't constantly on alert. If all you've had is a dog that barks, I can see why you'd think it's normal, but it's really not.

That's literally exactly what dogs do.
"Recent research shows that the domesticating of dogs began between 20,000-40,000 years ago. In that period of time, dogs have learned how to understand large vocabularies, compound sentences, and upwards of 1,000 words if trained properly.

Like us, dogs use verbal and nonverbal cues to communicate. For dogs, barking is a completely normal behavior—it’s one of the most effective ways dogs know how to communicate with their owners.

They use barking to communicate a variety of feelings, so in order to fully understand what a dog is communicating, pet parents need to contextualize a dog’s verbal cues within their nonverbal cues (dog body language).

.....
Fear, Anxiety, or Territorial Barking
Defensive barking is often heard when there is a clear stimulus—such as a strange person approaching the home, another dog being nearby, or being trapped in a position with no clear escape route.

These barks will usually be deeper and may have a growl associated with them. They will also be fairly continuous and incessant. This is your dog’s way of saying, “hey, what’s this? We need to be at the ready for a problem.”

For anxious/fearful dogs, their body language will usually include a tail between the legs, hackles raised, and low head posture.

If it’s just territorial barking, then the body posture may include having the ears and head at attention and the tail straight. This is the dog’s way of indicating that they are larger and may bite.

In both scenarios, the dog’s body will be tense.

https://www.petmd.com/dog/behavior/why-do-dogs-bark

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just curious - of all of you complaining about "poorly trained" dogs, do any of you have rescues, or do you all have bred dogs?

Yes, I rescued a 1 year old German Shepherd/Husky mix, and he was hard as hell to train. I spent thousands and used three trainers, but now I don't have to worry about him being troublesome with humans or other dogs. It was worth it.

Some people don’t have those resources, especially to spend on a problem like barking at other dogs. I know your response is that “you shouldn’t have the dog then,” but really, that’s not how life works in practice. You like the dog, the kids like the dog, and he’s otherwise not dangerous and well behaved.

Fine, don't train the dog, but then please drag it away when it starts barking like crazy at other dogs. No one, dog or human, wants to listen to that. And if your dog sits in the window and barks at passing dogs, don't let it sit in that window--move it to the back of the house. Finally, I'll just say that a barking dog is not a happy dog. S/he might need anxiety meds.

I have never seen someone with a barking dog that just stands there and lets it go crazy on the sidewalk. Also, a dog that barks at dogs or people approaching the home is pretty much… just being a dog??? And you want to medicate it??!?

Barking chronically is not just "being a dog." Most dogs don't bark at people approaching the home. It's extremely off-putting, and yes, barking is a sign of stress. The dog sees the person/animal as a threat. Why would you put your dog in a place where s/he feels threatened most of the day? That's why I suggested putting the dog in a room that overlooks the backyard. They can still see out, but aren't constantly on alert. If all you've had is a dog that barks, I can see why you'd think it's normal, but it's really not.

I agree. Constant barking is an expression of stress. It's not good for the dog. The most vocal hound should not be barking all day. I used a bark collar on my teen dog who developed anxiety separation and would start to bark AFTER I left the house, and I tested the shock on myself FIRST, to make sure it wasn't painful. It took a couple of barks, and he got the message, and busied himself with all the toys and treats I left for him. So a combination of stick and carrot - when you can't "positive train" your way out of a deleterious behavior, stick and carrot is the gold standard. He and many others dogs, can't use the toys and treats if they're stuck in bark mode, so the aversive signal distracts them away from barking and towards the positive items at their disposal. My dog still barks when he's excited, but that's a normal, healthy way to express himself, which is totally fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes, I have a semi-reactive dog who only barks when he meets some, but not all all, larger, also reactive dogs. After many years, I've narrowed down the list of possible dogs he might be triggered by: usually labradors/goldens/GSD type dogs who are also reactive. He can walk by a calm Great Dane or Great Pyrenees without a hitch. He usually ignores howly hounds. He's great friends with small dogs.

My dog is always on leash and we walk by quickly if he starts to jump about, lunge and bark. That's all I can do, OP. "Training" can't do more than that.

My dog is exactly the same - he is scared of and therefor leash reactive to goldens and labs - he got over it, then during covid got bad again because we weren't letting him near other dogs, and then we retrained him, got over it, and then when we got another dog, he has relapsed and we think it is to defend the puppy. We are retraining again but anyone who knows dogs understands this and isn't offended when we are trying to pull him out of the way, get him in a sit and be calm. 90% of the time it works still working on the other 10%. I don't think we should have to get rid of him because he is occasionally leash reactive. He would never hurt the other dog it is fear driven and we are doing our best to retrain again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just curious - of all of you complaining about "poorly trained" dogs, do any of you have rescues, or do you all have bred dogs?

Yes, I rescued a 1 year old German Shepherd/Husky mix, and he was hard as hell to train. I spent thousands and used three trainers, but now I don't have to worry about him being troublesome with humans or other dogs. It was worth it.

Some people don’t have those resources, especially to spend on a problem like barking at other dogs. I know your response is that “you shouldn’t have the dog then,” but really, that’s not how life works in practice. You like the dog, the kids like the dog, and he’s otherwise not dangerous and well behaved.

Fine, don't train the dog, but then please drag it away when it starts barking like crazy at other dogs. No one, dog or human, wants to listen to that. And if your dog sits in the window and barks at passing dogs, don't let it sit in that window--move it to the back of the house. Finally, I'll just say that a barking dog is not a happy dog. S/he might need anxiety meds.

I have never seen someone with a barking dog that just stands there and lets it go crazy on the sidewalk. Also, a dog that barks at dogs or people approaching the home is pretty much… just being a dog??? And you want to medicate it??!?

Barking chronically is not just "being a dog." Most dogs don't bark at people approaching the home. It's extremely off-putting, and yes, barking is a sign of stress. The dog sees the person/animal as a threat. Why would you put your dog in a place where s/he feels threatened most of the day? That's why I suggested putting the dog in a room that overlooks the backyard. They can still see out, but aren't constantly on alert. If all you've had is a dog that barks, I can see why you'd think it's normal, but it's really not.

I agree. Constant barking is an expression of stress. It's not good for the dog. The most vocal hound should not be barking all day. I used a bark collar on my teen dog who developed anxiety separation and would start to bark AFTER I left the house, and I tested the shock on myself FIRST, to make sure it wasn't painful. It took a couple of barks, and he got the message, and busied himself with all the toys and treats I left for him. So a combination of stick and carrot - when you can't "positive train" your way out of a deleterious behavior, stick and carrot is the gold standard. He and many others dogs, can't use the toys and treats if they're stuck in bark mode, so the aversive signal distracts them away from barking and towards the positive items at their disposal. My dog still barks when he's excited, but that's a normal, healthy way to express himself, which is totally fine.

A lot of times they've actually inadvertently trained these behaviors into the dog. The dog barks at strangers, dog gets attention. I've seen it play out with friends. They're reinforcing the behaviors.

If you can't afford training for your dog or can't be bothered to at least do some reading or watch some videos on dog training, you really shouldn't have a dog.

[Anonymous]

Haha, OP definitely has a Pitt bull mix and made this thread in response to the other one.

Anyway - the misbehaved dogs are everyone's pandemic puppies that they never bothered to train. The shelters are FULL of dogs that need to be re-homed now that the single 20&30-somethings are back at work and don't want to hire dog sitters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I just walked my giant breed dog. Thankfully, she’s calm and submissive because so many other dogs are reactive and poorly trained. I think her size sets off other dogs, but it’s so common that it’s annoying.

We passed a GSD who was lunging and barking at her, and then we passed a football-sized mutt with a small-man complex. He was barking and lunging at us, too.

My big girl was chill the whole time; she is a lover not a fighter, thankfully.

Please socialize and train your dogs, people. It’s kind of scary out there.

Today I learned what bigotry toward dogs looks like in writing. How dare that little mutt occupy the same space as your beautiful purebred giant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just walked my giant breed dog. Thankfully, she’s calm and submissive because so many other dogs are reactive and poorly trained. I think her size sets off other dogs, but it’s so common that it’s annoying.

We passed a GSD who was lunging and barking at her, and then we passed a football-sized mutt with a small-man complex. He was barking and lunging at us, too.

My big girl was chill the whole time; she is a lover not a fighter, thankfully.

Please socialize and train your dogs, people. It’s kind of scary out there.

Today I learned what bigotry toward dogs looks like in writing. How dare that little mutt occupy the same space as your beautiful purebred giant.

Is "mutt" bigoted? Or do you take offense to "football-sized"?

While my pup is quite beautiful, I like all dogs. I just take issue with the poorly trained ones.

[OP]

[Anonymous]

I have two terribly trained dogs! Which is why I keep them the heck away from pedestrians, other dogs on the street, schools, the dog park, whatever.


They are toy breed and flat faced so can't even bite if they want to (pugs). They have terrible manners and are basically untrainable. If I saw OP on the sidewalk and my pugs started acting up, I'd move away because that's MY responsibility >>> I know they are poor canine citizens

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Haha, OP definitely has a Pitt bull mix and made this thread in response to the other one.

Anyway - the misbehaved dogs are everyone's pandemic puppies that they never bothered to train. The shelters are FULL of dogs that need to be re-homed now that the single 20&30-somethings are back at work and don't want to hire dog sitters.

I wouldn’t think so. Pit bulls are notoriously poorly trained and highly reactive dogs (with owners incompetent to adequately control their dogs).

[Anonymous]

OP, the dogs likely wanted to play. We have a small dog. He's always on a leash. He isn't going to hurt anyone. I'm not going to be "training" him to act differently. He's got some attitude, some personality, which I view as a plus.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just curious - of all of you complaining about "poorly trained" dogs, do any of you have rescues, or do you all have bred dogs?

I have a breeder Mastiff. I’m not sure why you ask, but rescues should not be held to a lesser standard of behavior. They’re just as dangerous when reactive.

[OP]

I think you know why I ask. There are people who rescue dogs, and there are people who buy dogs. People who buy dogs want a warm-blooded stuffed animal and think that "all dogs" should be similarly docile. That's just not reality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just curious - of all of you complaining about "poorly trained" dogs, do any of you have rescues, or do you all have bred dogs?

Yes, I rescued a 1 year old German Shepherd/Husky mix, and he was hard as hell to train. I spent thousands and used three trainers, but now I don't have to worry about him being troublesome with humans or other dogs. It was worth it.

Some people don’t have those resources, especially to spend on a problem like barking at other dogs. I know your response is that “you shouldn’t have the dog then,” but really, that’s not how life works in practice. You like the dog, the kids like the dog, and he’s otherwise not dangerous and well behaved.

Fine, don't train the dog, but then please drag it away when it starts barking like crazy at other dogs. No one, dog or human, wants to listen to that. And if your dog sits in the window and barks at passing dogs, don't let it sit in that window--move it to the back of the house. Finally, I'll just say that a barking dog is not a happy dog. S/he might need anxiety meds.

I have never seen someone with a barking dog that just stands there and lets it go crazy on the sidewalk. Also, a dog that barks at dogs or people approaching the home is pretty much… just being a dog??? And you want to medicate it??!?

Barking chronically is not just "being a dog." Most dogs don't bark at people approaching the home. It's extremely off-putting, and yes, barking is a sign of stress. The dog sees the person/animal as a threat. Why would you put your dog in a place where s/he feels threatened most of the day? That's why I suggested putting the dog in a room that overlooks the backyard. They can still see out, but aren't constantly on alert. If all you've had is a dog that barks, I can see why you'd think it's normal, but it's really not.

That's literally exactly what dogs do.
"Recent research shows that the domesticating of dogs began between 20,000-40,000 years ago. In that period of time, dogs have learned how to understand large vocabularies, compound sentences, and upwards of 1,000 words if trained properly.

Like us, dogs use verbal and nonverbal cues to communicate. For dogs, barking is a completely normal behavior—it’s one of the most effective ways dogs know how to communicate with their owners.

They use barking to communicate a variety of feelings, so in order to fully understand what a dog is communicating, pet parents need to contextualize a dog’s verbal cues within their nonverbal cues (dog body language).

.....
Fear, Anxiety, or Territorial Barking
Defensive barking is often heard when there is a clear stimulus—such as a strange person approaching the home, another dog being nearby, or being trapped in a position with no clear escape route.

These barks will usually be deeper and may have a growl associated with them. They will also be fairly continuous and incessant. This is your dog’s way of saying, “hey, what’s this? We need to be at the ready for a problem.”

For anxious/fearful dogs, their body language will usually include a tail between the legs, hackles raised, and low head posture.

If it’s just territorial barking, then the body posture may include having the ears and head at attention and the tail straight. This is the dog’s way of indicating that they are larger and may bite.

In both scenarios, the dog’s body will be tense.

https://www.petmd.com/dog/behavior/why-do-dogs-bark

This- my dog is not even particularly sensitive or inclined to stand at the window, but sometimes he barks at passersby. And he is big, so his bark is “scary.” He is a dog, for crying out loud!