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Guide: Help for Your Barking and Lunging Dog

TOC Reactivity Guide cover with red background and brown dog on the right

Living with a reactive dog can be really challenging. It can also be really beautiful. Reactive dogs are some of the best teachers I know. While reactivity can be isolating at times, it’s important to know that you are not alone. You are not a bad dog guardian. And your dog is not a bad dog. If you find yourself looking for some support with your reactive dog, the good news is that there are so many wonderful, skilled, trainers (who are committed to humane training practices) out there creating great resources for you and your reactive dog. 

While this guide is not designed to lay out exactly what to do with your your reactive dog, our hope with this page is to: 1) give you a useful overview of reactivity to help you make informed decisions on your reactivity journey; 2) connect you to great reactivity resources across a range of formats (books, courses, webpages, podcasts, etc.); and 3) recommend trusted products that might help you on your journey - keep scrolling for our list with links. There is no one perfect resource or product, so ultimately, you’ll still want to do a little investigating to find what works for you, but we hope this guide gives you a great jumping off point. 

We want this to be a community resource, and we are thrilled to receive suggestions of things we should look into adding to the guide. You can make a suggestion here.

While we may use the term “reactive dog” in this guide for ease of reference (referring to a dog who shows reactive behaviors under some conditions), in reality, reactivity describes behaviors your dog does in certain conditions (for example, when another dog comes within 20 yards of them on a walk) rather than who your dog is. Your dog is wonderful. “React” is what your dog does in certain situations.

The photos in this guide are all from awesome, “reactive dogs” from our TOC community with captions that share a bit about that dog’s journey. Let’s dive in!

close up photo of Tatum who is three years old and is a black dog standing and looking at a camera while on the grass and in front of a road with trees and grass behind it

Tatum is three years old and has a ton of interest in other dogs. He barks/lunges/growls when he can’t say hi to them. Even seeing a dog across the street (with natural barriers like trees and cars in between) was too much for him at the worst. He’s made a lot of progress, and while he can’t pass dogs on the same side of the street, he can disengage from dogs nearby much easier. (Photo & story credit: Hannah)

What Is Reactivity in Dogs?

This is a really important first question to ask. Reactivity is often described as an “overreaction” to a stimulus (something in the environment). I think this type of general description may be useful in providing an overall “sense” of what reactivity is, but ultimately, “reactivity” and “overreaction” are both labels. If we want to really understand a behavior (and at some point, change it), we need to operationally define it: What behavior can I actually observe? 

Here are some common behaviors that are often associated with reactivity: barking, lunging, freezing, excessive pulling on leash, hyper fixation, whining, and jumping. 

Talking about observable behavior is important, but we also need to talk about the conditions under which the behavior occurs. Behavior doesn’t happen in a vacuum, and many of the behaviors listed above would get labeled as reactivity in some contexts but not others. For example, if my dog was stuck in the basement and barked at the door, I wouldn’t call that reactivity. If my dog was lunging and barking anytime another dog got within 20 yards of us on a walk, I’d probably label that reactivity. Ultimately, we need to talk about behavior in context to understand it.

And while it may go without saying, I want to mention that reactive behaviors (like any behavior) involve the whole body. This means that there are lots of physiological processes at work – the nervous system, the circulatory system, and respiratory system, etc. are all involved when a dog is “reacting.” This also means that the dog is experiencing emotions as they are behaving and interacting with the world around them – this should matter to all of us. 

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What Causes Reactivity in Dogs? 

Gotham wears a yellow muzzle and lies in the grass with his black leash and orange biothane handle over him

Gotham is a three year old Doberman who has "stranger danger" and reacts to dogs in certain contexts. Things that have helped his reactivity include: Playing around his triggers, carrying his ball, describing his triggers to him, blocking triggers with a small umbrella, wearing a muzzle, and pattern games such as up & down game and 1-2-3. (Photo & story credit: Steff)

Behavior in general comes from three things: genetics, learning history, and current conditions. You can’t do much about the genetic piece of your reactive dog’s puzzle or the experiences that they’ve already had (though knowing this information can be useful), but you can build new learning histories and adjust current conditions. 

One of the most important aspects of the current conditions to consider is whether your dog is experiencing any pain or discomfort, which are often present when we see reactive behaviors – especially if there is a sudden shift in behavior. Unfortunately, it can be difficult to tell if your dog is in pain or discomfort (especially if we haven’t been trained how to spot it), so we’ve included some resources in our resource list below to help you. Getting your dog checked by a vet and any other relevant professional is an important first step on your reactivity journey (we generally don’t want to start any behavior modification until pain is addressed if pain is involved). A trainer should be able to help you through this process too (they won’t diagnose though). Okay, so what else could be causing the reactivity if pain isn’t involved? 

In order to understand why your dog is reacting, the key is to look at their observable behavior and the conditions under which it occurs. While your dog’s behavior may look like an “overreaction” to you, it’s functional behavior for them (i.e. it produces some valued outcome) – otherwise they wouldn’t be repeating it. This is just the way behavior works on this planet. 

If you want to understand what is causing your dog’s reactivity, here are some questions to investigate (noting that ruling out and/or addressing pain/discomfort is the place to start): 

  • What are the behaviors you are seeing (describe them in observable terms like barking or lunging)?

  • What happens in the environment immediately after your dog performs the behavior? This likely tells you WHY your dog is performing that behavior. For example, did the mail person walk away from the house? Did the passing dog look away?

  • What happens in the environment immediately before your dog performs the behavior? This tells you WHEN your dog performs the behavior. This could be something like another dog appearing within 15 yards of them.

  • What other things might set the stage for the behavior but not directly cue it? This might be things like whether or not your dog has had a trail walk that day, how many dogs they’ve seen on a walk, how long it’s been since their last acupuncture appointment, etc.

These questions can help you pay attention to the behavior and the conditions under which it occurs (or doesn’t). If you are feeling up to it, you can even collect data (an important part of changing behavior)! Check out this post we created to get an idea of an easy way to collect data.

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When It Comes to Reactivity, How Do My Dog’s Emotions Factor Into the Equation?

You may have noticed that emotions were conspicuously absent from the “what causes reactivity” section above. Using a behavior science lens (or even a neuroscience lens), emotions do not cause behavior. 

Does that mean I don’t care about a dog’s emotions? HECK NO! I care deeply about dogs’ emotions. And I think there are likely some very big feelings involved for our reactive dogs and see great value in thinking about emotions anytime we try to change behavior.

The difference is really in how we talk about those emotions in relation to the behavior: Instead of saying “the dog barked and lunged because they were afraid,” we can say “the dog barked and lunged AND was afraid because an unknown dog came within 15 feet of them.” The environment causes both the behavior and the emotions. 

Ready to add another layer to it? 

Scenario 1: Imagine you are on vacation and swimming in the ocean. Suddenly a shark appears. You feel afraid and immediately swim to shore. The contingency (“When X event happens, if Y behavior is performed, then Z result will happen”) in play is basically this: When the shark appears, if I swim to the shore, I will avoid being bitten. The emotions that track an escape/avoidance contingency like that tend to be “unpleasant”/”uncomfortable” (not in all cases though – for example, I move away when a dance partner moves into me, and my emotions aren’t uncomfortable). 

Scenario 2: Now imagine you’re a marine photographer swimming in the ocean with your camera. A shark appears. You feel excited and start snapping photos. The contingency in play here is likely: When the shark appears, if I snap photos, the camera will click (which is a conditioned reinforcer … down the line results in photos of sharks). In contingencies where individuals are behaving to get/access something valued, emotions tend to be “pleasant” or “comfortable.” 

In both scenarios, the same thing showed up in the environment: a shark. But in the first scenario, you felt fear; in the second, excitement. What you felt was determined by the type of contingency that was in play. 

While saying that emotions don’t cause behavior may sound callous at first and then like a picky semantic thing, I actually think it matters when it comes time to help our dogs. If the cause of the barking and lunging is fear, it’s harder to figure out where to start if you want to change the behavior. How do you just make a fear go away? Perhaps you see how it starts to get circular very quickly. However, when we think about the cause of both the behavior and the emotion as being the unknown dog coming within 15 feet, you now have a pretty tangible starting point if you want to change the emotion and the behavior (we can change conditions to change behavior AND emotions). If we can get the unknown dog approaching to signal a different contingency, different emotions and behaviors are likely to follow. 

Note: We happened to talk a lot about fear here as an example (it’s a common one), but it’s not the only emotion dogs may experience in situations where they display reactive behaviors. For example, plenty of dogs experience excitement and frustration in situations where their reactive behaviors show up. 

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What Is a ‘Trigger’ in Dog Training?

Nova sits in front of tombstones and is wearing a patriotic bow tie while on a leash

"Nova started exhibiting reactive behaviors, including on-leash reactivity toward other dogs and other big feelings in general, when he was four months old. With three years of consistent R+ based training working with fantastic trainers and behavior professionals as well as vet behaviorists and Fear Free vets, I'm happy to share that Nova's once debilitatingly big feelings - especially on walks - have dramatically been reduced. Some of our go-to training and management techniques in the face of triggers include u-turns (Nova's personal favorite), arch-bys (if we're feeling comfortable and confident), and "front" (face me for treats as triggers pass). My favorite piece of equipment is the double-ended leash because it helps distribute the force more evenly if he lunges." (Photo & story credit: Jessica Arnold)

With reactivity, it’s common to call the stimuli that “set off” dogs’ reactive behaviors “triggers,” which has a way of making you think that your dog’s behavior is being involuntarily “triggered” when this thing shows up. So many reactive behaviors are big and explosive and give the impression that they’re happening automatically. In reality, most of the observable behaviors that we think of as the reactive behaviors (e.g. barking and lunging) are voluntary and have been learned based on the past results (consequences) of doing them. 

There are certainly also respondent behaviors (“reflexes”) that are triggered (aka involuntarily pop) in the presence of whatever your dog’s “trigger” is – those behaviors are primarily physiological responses like muscle tension, heart rate increase, etc. These involuntary behaviors happen basically at the same time as (or maybe fraction before) those voluntary ones like lunging. Some of those physiological responses may even make certain voluntary behaviors more or less likely. 

I don’t bring this up trying to zero in on the difference between respondent and operant behavior (ultimately, a less and less useful distinction), but rather to emphasize that the language that gets used with reactivity isn’t always as accurate or helpful as it could be. Most of the behavior you think of when you picture your dog reacting (barking, lunging, jumping, etc.) is not automatic; it has been learned based on the past results of doing that behavior in similar situations. 

Here’s the good news about all this: Learning is always happening! Our dogs can learn new behaviors! We can really humanely and effectively change conditions to change behavior and emotions – yay!

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How to Change Your Dog’s Reactive Behavior

We can’t give an individualized plan in this article, but we can highlight some key aspects of a lot of good reactivity training. Before doing any training, it helps to start with determining exactly WHAT the reactive behavior is (what does your dog do), WHY your dog behaves that way (to produce what outcome?), and WHEN your dog behaves that way (under what conditions … presumably they aren’t barking and lunging 24/7). Below this general overview, we’ll connect you to resources we really like to help you on your journey.

  1. Health check – Make sure your dog has a clean bill of health. If you suspect pain or discomfort, keep going until you find the right person to help assess your dog. 

    1. For example, when my dog suddenly seemed quicker to bark on walks, I had a gait analysis done to see if a professional noticed anything and suspected pain. 

  2. Add enrichment – A key part of most behavior plans is meeting your dog’s needs. We want dogs with big skill repertoires and environments that have a big variety of reinforcers that they can behave to access! Behavioral health is health! Some of the resources we’ve shared below provide great enrichment info. 

    1. For example, this might mean finding low-traffic trails and taking your dog on walks using a long line and letting them sniff and move freely. This could also mean hiding a food item in your yard and letting your dog sniff and scavenge for it (I am a BIG fan of sniffy enrichment). I’ve also found it hugely helpful to teach “reactive dogs” tricks – dogs gain lots of new behaviors and ways to impact and control their environment to access a range of reinforcers related to working with you. There are SO many ways to add enrichment – the key is to watch how it impacts your dog’s behavior. 

  3. Prevent rehearsal of reactive behaviors (as much as possible) – This is done by avoiding certain environments, changing conditions, and/or implementing trained management strategies.****

    1. For example, if your dog is reactive to other dogs coming within 20 yards of them on a walk, this might mean avoiding areas where other dogs walk altogether. It might also mean teaching your dog a pattern game (like Leslie McDevitt’s 1-2-3 pattern) at home and then gradually moving it into more distracting settings until your dog is able to play the pattern game with you to move past another dog. 

    2. Pssst … sometimes this is enough to make daily life navigable for you and your dog. Other times, you may continue teaching new skills. Either way, preventing the rehearsal of reactive behaviors (as much as possible) is an important step.

  4. Teach desired behaviors out of context – It’s often easier to teach your dog skills in contexts where they’re likely to occur as a starting point. Why swim against the current?

    1. For example, if you want your dog to orient to you when they see another dog, you would first train offered attention at home and then gradually add neutral distractions and move to new locations before finally working on the behavior around other dogs (at a distance to start). Or if you were looking for your dog to sniff when they see other dogs, you may start training by playing a nose work game and then slowly fade in distractions (starting with neutral) as the dog sniffs.   

  5. Slowly bring those behaviors into the target contexts / teach your dog to do desired behaviors around their triggers – This is a slow process. You won’t move straight from your living room to working outside a dog park. 

    1. This is true for even “simple” things like eating a treat from your hand. A behavior that shows up in one context may not in another. It’s our job to gradually add distractions and change environments in a way that keeps the behavior stable. This may mean playing the up-down pattern game at home, then at home with some toys out, then at home with a friend walking around you, then in a low-distraction new location, etc. 

**** Sometimes we can’t change conditions enough to make space for new behaviors, so we may need to partner with a vet behaviorist or vet to add some pharmaceutical support if needed. This can be a very important part of a reactivity journey. If medication may help your dog thrive, it’s absolutely worth exploring.  

Ultimately, if we want to change behavior, we change conditions. There are so many things we can play with to help support our dogs: distant antecedents (things like the amount of enrichment they’ve had that week, their learning history related to desired behaviors, etc.); antecedents (things like walking in places less likely to have triggers or introducing other stimuli that can cue more desired behaviors); and consequences (things like reinforcing more subtle distance increasing behaviors like stiff body or upping the value of treat available for orienting to you). 

Hana Solo lies on a red and gold turkish rug and looks at the camera

Hana Solo is a two year old Keeshond who reacts to dogs, cats, squirrels, (and anything that could be a dog/cat/squirrel), and people when they're alone or in small groups. Hana's human expressed that it can feel demoralizing when reactivity training feels like "two steps forward, two steps back," and also explained that they have to be quite selective about when they go outside with her to avoid huge reactions. (Photo & story credit: Hana Solo)

As a little plug here, I can’t speak highly enough about the importance of adding enrichment to you and your dog’s life. Working on reactivity can be hard (on you both) – be sure to also do things that you both love doing! I could go on a whole tangent story here, but my dog used to bark and lunge at anything new in the environment. I mostly addressed this by doing LOTS of fun shaping games that didn’t seem super related to the “problem.” I still had to work on reinforcing some new behaviors in the contexts where the barking and lunging historically showed up, but our “unrelated” training gave my dog a whole new set of skills and learning history that changed how he approached some of those situations. Plus, fun matters. 

At any rate, there are SO many ways to work on changing reactive behavior. One key element in most (all?!) of them will be honoring the function of your dog’s original behavior (when possible). If your dog was barking and lunging to create distance, they still need to be able to use their behavior to create distance (especially initially) – you might just teach them other behaviors that can also access that same distance increasing result. In plenty of cases, we don’t even have to teach them anything new. We just need to help them create space (e.g. walk them away or ask someone to stop approaching) when they show more subtle behaviors (like muscle tension) than barking and lunging (i.e. we just have to be really good observers and “listeners”). If they can effectively use those more subtle behaviors to control distance from a trigger, the need to bark and lunge may decrease. 

While retaining your dog’s ability to avoid or escape a trigger, you can also teach them that “good things” are available in the presence of a trigger. Sometimes being able to effectively say no opens the door for them to say yes to other things. 

And in time with new skills and experiences, that trigger showing up may no longer represent an escape contingency at all - cool!!! It may come to represent the opportunity to gain valued things (this takes some intentional work on your part)! As a quick reality check, this doesn’t necessarily mean your dog-reactive dog is suddenly going to seek out social interaction with other dogs (though it certainly could). It might look more like a reactive dog who sees another dog and either looks to you for a treat or puts their head down to keep sniffing and walking. Behavior is flexible, and that is a good thing. 

I feel excited knowing that there are so many ways to tailor training to support specific dogs and teams. There are lots of levers you can pull that can influence behavior and so many different procedures. 

Reactivity is really about a problem situation, and we can adjust situations (at least to some degree). 

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Charlie sits in a living room on a blue rug with a lighter pattern

This is Charlie -  a seven year Great Pyrenees/Pitbull/Boxer mix. He’s the biggest, cuddliest sweetheart and is also selectively reactive to other dogs when in the house (looking out the windows) and on leashed walks. He has a few dogs in the neighborhood he strongly reacts to, even from a good distance. His humans do a lot of avoidance and try to reinforce a range of alternative behaviors to reacting around dogs. Without any dogs present he walks like a dream: loose leash, casual sniffing and taking in the world. Charlie can slip out of a harness or collar on its own, so his humans use a collar/harness combo and clip them together at his chest, which helps them keep Charlie secure in case they can't avoid a reaction. (Photo & story credit: Emily)

Resources to Help You and Your Reactive Dog

Reactivity can be a tough journey with a lot of ups and downs. It can feel isolating and frustrating and can get expensive quickly. There are so many reasons to be hopeful though! There are wonderful people creating great resources to support you and your dogs. Our hope is to connect you with some of them. With that being said, here are some resources for you to explore. We’ve included some recommended products below the resources section in case it’s of interest. (You and your dog are doing a good job!!!!)

As a note, we recommend resources and products from companies that follow a suggested hierarchy of behavior change procedures according to the least intrusive, effective intervention principle (LIMA). 

If you see any missing resources or products you think should be in our guide, you can make a suggestion here.

Books:

Reactivity Courses, Webinars, etc.: 

Free E-Books, Guides, and Webinars: 

Articles: 

  • Thanks for Barking 2.0 by Kiki Yablon – If you have a dog who barks a ton at noises they hear in the apartment hallways or things they see out your window or through your fence, this is likely going to be a very helpful blog for you. The “thank you protocol” (as it’s often called) is pretty straightforward and accessible and can help you build an alternative behavior to barking at stuff out of windows and fences (or at a minimum, have a reliable way to stop the barking).

Body Language YouTube Videos: 

Podcasts:

Relevant Research or Scientific Papers and Articles:

Other: 

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Products We Like for You and Your Reactive Dog

We are big fans of buying quality products so you don’t have to buy as much stuff. With that in mind, we’ve collected recommendations from our community and shared them below for you. 

Signage 

There are lots of ways that you can try to signal to people to give your dog space – you can use leashes with words on them, attach leash sleeves to your leash or the belt of your treat pouch (attaching to your belt can be helpful!), wear a vest yourself (can buy these on Etsy or DIY them), and much more. Here are some recommendations from our community: 

Leashes & Leash Add-Ons

A good leash setup will go a long way with any dog, but it can be especially important for a reactive dog. In general, people tend to like slightly longer leashes with a traffic handle add-on (so you can quickly grab a shortened leash if needed), a safety strap, and a harness and collar. Here are some recommendations from our community: 

Harnesses

A well-fitted, non-restrictive harness is critical. We have an entire TOC Harness Guide to help you determine the right fit. The guide also has a lot of harness product recommendations. 

Muzzles

Good dogs wear muzzles! I am a strong supporter of muzzle training dogs – even if they don’t need to wear them. You just never know when they might, and future you (and your future dog) will thank you if wearing the muzzle isn’t stressful. Muzzle training can be so empowering for you and your dog and open up their world. Here are some preferred places to get muzzles from our community: 

Go-To Enrichment Items

Enrichment before a walk may set your dog up for a bit more success, and enrichment after a walk may help them decompress. Here are some favorite enrichment activities and products from our community. 

Treat Packs

Other Fav Products: 

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Rosie sits on leash on a bed of fall leaves

Rosie used to be very reactive and fearful of other dogs and animals, barking at them loudly and only focusing on whatever she was reacting to - even from long distances - and of sounds and objects she didn't recognize. Three years later and she's traveled with her humans through eight countries on a road trip and can settle in cafes and restaurants and even the vet. What’s helped the most is simply building her confidence. For instance, her human, Johanna, would sit in parks with her just watching what's around and delivering treats, play with her in various places, do cooperative care training, and even agility and tricks in parks using the environment as their props. Recently, Rosie was even able to do scent training in a class with other dogs. (Photo & story credit: Johanna)

TOC Reactivity Instagram Posts

In case it’s helpful, we’ve compiled links to all of the posts we’ve done related to reactivity.

“Feed your dog when they notice a trigger to create a positive association.” A deeper look at this common advice.

If you use treats to train your dog, will all future training requite treats? Will you have to use them forever?

Why your management may not be working with your reactive dog.

Why are thresholds important in training?

Working through your dog’s toughest distractions.

Change conditions to change behavior.

Hypothetical stories to explain your dog’s weird behavior.

Reminder that you’re a wonderful human for your dog.

12 ways to change your dog’s behavior without formal training sessions.

Management: Tips to prevent unwanted behavior and teach new ones.

It’s okay to run away.

The most useful behavior my dog knows.

Info/advice about reactive dogs that you wish you’d been given sooner.

Affirmations for when life with your dog feels hard.

Tips to prevent your dog from reacting to triggers.

This simple trick for walking reactive dogs is not cheating.

Long line handling skills.

Calming dog down after getting worked up.

Why I sometimes show my dog treats to help get behavior.

Up-down pattern game & how I modify it to suit different situations.

Handling a reactive dog when visitors come over.

Can your dog take a breath?

Helping a noise sensitive dog with a fear of trucks.

Simple enrichment game to help build your dog’s confidence.

“My dog knows it but chooses not to respond” → What to say instead.

Can you make progress if you're avoiding the scary things with your dog?

Questions reactive dog guardians can ask themselves to help navigate the environment.

One way I use sniffing to change a fearful dog’s behavior.

Dog training tips for passing other dogs on walks.

Some things we can do to make life easier on reactive dog teams.

One way to help dogs who struggle with noises.

IRL example of handling triggers with a dog-reactive dog.

Should you toss treats towards something your dog is afraid of?

But what if I can’t get ahead of my dog’s problem behavior?

One way I set up training with an anxious dog.

What does good training look like? Training around horses.

Reactive dog success stories: they involve management.

Reactive dog training doesn’t always look flashy.

Reactive dog management: Teach “harness” cue.

Why decision making with your dog can and should look different.

Try this simple scent game to help your reactive dog.

Is my anxiety causing my dog to be anxious?

Navigating hot zones in apartment buildings with a reactive dog.

Watch me navigate a trigger with my dog IRL.

How I reduced my dog’s barking at noises outside the door.

Let your dog do their own desensitization. 

Watch this tiny reactive dog learn to pass other dogs.

Thank You

It’s important for us to thank the people who have contributed to this guide - including the many members of our community who’ve made recommendations. We’d also like to thank trainers Lyz Knight, IAABC-ADT, FFCP, Juliana DeWillems, CDBC, KPA CTP, and Ran Courant-Morgan, M.S., Behavior Analysis for sharing their favorite resources and really helping us get this guide off the ground. Grateful to be a part of such a generous community who really cares about helping people and their dogs. 

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Packing List: The Best Travel Gear and Tips For You and Your Dog

Recently on Instagram we asked you about the travel products YOU love that make trips easier and more enjoyable with your dogs. Once again we were blown away by your responses, and decided to turn them into an easy to reference guide. We will keep adding to this list as we get more great recommendations from YOU, the amazing pet parents and pro-trainers in our TOC Family! PS: One of the easiest ways to be sustainable is to buy less. With that in mind, we compile these lists to try to help you find quality products so you don't have to keep buying things. Just because it is on this list doesn't necessarily mean you need it to travel with your dog. Please feel free to also check around for used versions of these products! [Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning TOC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through our links, at no cost to you.]

What To Prep Before Your Trip

  1. Make a Packing List

 

From @gingers_naps:“Ginger has her own packing list so I don’t forget anything 😅. Before we go, I look for dog-friendly locations near where we’re staying, walking trails, restaurants and cafes with outdoor seating, etc.”

 

2. Plan Your Potty Break/Enrichment Stops Ahead of Time

 

From @elphapupper: “ … we always try to stop every few hours and get in a leg stretch - which means we often go off the highway rather than a highway rest stop. We’ve found some really pretty parks and hikes by going slightly off track.”

 

3. Plan the amount of food and medication you neeD + Pack Extras

 

From @soelsoprano :”…I now always travel with an extra day supply of kibble because I have lost luggage and all his kibble for the trip was in my checked bag and it was just stressful to have to immediately find a pet store.”

 

4. Research vets nearby

 

From @keeping.up.with.flynn: “ … aware of where your nearest vet might be - dependent on where you are it’s multiple hours away.”

 

What to Pack

  1. Collapsible dishes

 

From @zeldaandaaron: “When staying at b&bs or hotels I always make sure to bring … their foldable bowls (always with me) … ” Note: TOC found this collapsible bowl on GSI Outdoors.

 

2. first aid kit

 

From @keeping.up.with.flynn: ”Dog first aid kit ... ” Note: TOC found this first aid kit on Amazon.

 

3. travel water bottle

 

From @owenthelobo: ”We only do road trips with Owen, so luckily we get to pack more for him than if we were to have to fly. For sure packs: … doggy water bottle.” Note: TOC found this water bottle on Amazon.

 

4. extra leash

 
red rolled up biothane long line with gold hardware

From @dachshund_nola: “ … Extra leash … - you never know 😅😂” Note: TOC found this long line on High Tail Hikes and you can use code TAILSOFCONNECTION for 10% off on all products!

 

5. toys

 
two orange tug toys stacked

From @rseuler: “ … toys ... it's like having a toddler! 😂…” Note: TOC found these toys on Amazon.

 

6. LED Collars

 
a neon greon glow collar in the nitehowl packaging.jpg

From @steelandflorawellness: “I don’t leave home without the LED collars or harnesses, because we often arrive after dark.” Note: TOC found this LED collar on Amazon.

 


7. enrichment toy

 
orange rubber snoop

From @boba.the.sustainable.mutt: ”An enrichment toy or two that work easily with kibble. I like bringing two different sized toppls because they can work together as a food dispenser, or separately. Alternatively, we bring our snoop.”

 

8. old plastic peanut butter jar for treats

 
a plastic open jar of peanut butter on a bead of peanuts in the their

From @boba.the.sustainable.mutt: “I also tend to bring an old plastic PB jar filled with extra [treats] so I can refill as needed, and have easy access to a treat jar wherever we’re staying.” Note: Make sure you use a peanut butter jar that doesn’t contain xylitol that is toxic to dogs.

 

9. dog bed

 
Two standard sheepadoodles - one looking up and lying down and one lying down with its head on their leg lie on grey dog beds in the back of a trunk

From @frankie.p.pittie:“We only car travel. Her normal favorite bed is a must.” Note: TOC found this bed on the Houndry site. Before you put your dog on their bed in the car, we encourage you to research what is safe for you and your dog in your particular vehicle. This post has some good advice.

 

10. blanket

 
a golden retriever puppy sleeping on a grey blanket on a blue couch

From @elphapupper:“We have done a few weeks long car travel trips and there are some things that I just *always* keep in the car so I don’t have to worry about packing … blankets …” Note: TOC found this blanket on Amazon.

 

11. towels

 
A brown and white dog sits on a grey rolled up towel with a paw print embroidered on it in the black. The towel is grey

From @captmorgan_10:”We also bring the quick-dry towels that roll up small.” Note: TOC found this towel on Amazon.

 

12. paw wipes

 

From @captmorgan_10: “We also bring the quick-dry towels that roll up small, his paw wipes …” Note: TOC found these wipes on Amazon.

 

13. shampoo

 
a yellow burts bees dog shampoo bottle

From @stanleysthoughts: “We always bring shampoo with us in case Stanley needs a random butt bath or paw bath before reentering the place where we’re staying or even getting back in the car.” Note: TOC found this shampoo on Amazon.

 

14. lickimat

 
a grey and blue lickimat with the packaging on it

From @jessyergin : “We always bring a lickimat with us and it’s come in handing during quick paw baths."

 

15. snuffle mat

 

From @owenthelobo: “We only do road trips with Owen, so luckily we get to pack more for him than if we were to have to fly. For sure packs: … a snuffle mat …“ Note: TOC found this snuffle mat on Etsy.

 

16. Lint brush

 

From @steelandflorawellness: “I travel a lot with the dogs! … I keep a … lint brush … in the car. Note: TOC found this lint brush on Amazon.

 

17. extra high value treats

 
a blue and white bag of pure bites treats

From @dachshund_nola: “ … Extra high value treats …” Note: TOC found these treats on Amazon.

 

18. toothpaste and toothbrush

 
a brown box of bamboo tooth brushes next to 4 bamboo tooth brushes standing together to the right

From @owenthelobo: “ … toothpaste and toothbrush … ” Note: TOC found this toothbrush on Amazon.

 

19. DIY scratchboard

 
a brown dog with its paw on a diy scratchboard that a person wearing a light grey beanie and a grey sweater is sitting and holding in a room with wood floors and a grey and white rug by a glass door

From @owenthelobo: “… I also bring a homemade scratch board for easy training and nail maintenance, plus grooming scissors in case I need to cut some hair out for whatever reason …” Note: TOC published the article below on how to make a DIY scratchboard.

 

20. Ruffwear food caddy Bag

 
the navy and neon green ruffwear food caddy bag standing up

From @steelandflorawellness: “… Oh and the Ruffwear food caddy bag, it seems dumb to spend money on but it keeps the food stink off the rest of my stuff better even than double ziplock.”

 

21. Muzzle

 
a black plastic baskerville muzzle in profile pointing to the right

From @keeping.up.with.flynn: “… muzzle incase of emergency’s - increased bite risk if they are in pain …” Note: TOC found this muzzle on Amazon.

 

22. cardboard

 

From @frankie.p.pittie: “ … cardboard for chewing” Note: TOC found these plain cardboard moving boxes on Amazon, but if you buy one of the other products on our list from Amazon (or if you already have cardboard at home), you can just use that free packaging etc. for for enrichment.

 

23. Fanny Pack

 
A black canada pooch fanny pack with white speckles on it

From @boba.the.sustainable.mutt“ … We always carry a fanny pack with treats (as well as extra poop bags & a collapsible water bowl) … ” Note: TOC found this fanny pack on Amazon.

 

24. Extra Collar

 
a stack of brown orange black and purple biothane collars on a brown bench in front of branches

From @dachshund_nola: “- Extra … collar - you never know 😅😂.” Note: TOC found these biothane collars on Mossy Pawz’s site. They are featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Pet POC Diretory here.

 

For the Car

  1. CAR Hammock

 
a black quilted backseat car hammock in a car with tan interior and an open sun roof

From @blissdogs831:Walking groups of dogs, I feel like I’ve tried every kind of seat cover and destroyed them all. 😂this is by FAR the best one, on Amazon: “Plush Paws Products Premium Rear Car Seat Protector w/Hammock.”

 

2. Seatbelt harness

 
white and brown dog in profile looking up and right in a red harness. Dog is sitting

From @blissdogs831: “I have a small senior dog so in addition to the many great ideas above, we always bring & use his Kurgo seatbelt attachment and a back-clip harness … ”

 

3. Ramp

 
white and brown dog standing in open trunk at top of metal ramp

From @theotheramyprice: “If you have a Great Pyr or similar breed, consider a ramp for the car. I think we could have avoided issues if we had one when we traveled. Also, be aware that a lot of rental places have very slippery floors (easier to clean, I guess?) That can be a challenge for some pups. :)” Note: TOC found this ramp on Amazon.

 

4. car crate

 
beige kennel with black front door

From @luna.in_the.city: “Love this! We have been traveling with Luna since she was 6 months. We do MA-FL car travel twice a year and she's a champ. We do set her up for success by: bringing her crate along with us …” Note: TOC found this crash tested crate on Gunner’s website.

 

5. Roadside Emergency kit

 
bright blue case with emergency roadside graphic on cover and tire pump in front

From @elphapupper:” … car emergency kit (which has things like jumper cables, flares, etc. in case we are stalled or stopped on the side of the road).” Note: TOC found this kit on Amazon.

 

6. snooza travel bed

 
cocker spaniel in black bed

From @pretendyelling: “So we have tried a couple of car seats with bolsters for her to steady herself against, the best being the Snooza travel bed. We chose the medium size so that she can lie properly on her side rather than being curled up, which must be uncomfortable on long trips. It's designed so you can bring either the whole bed or just the cushion insert out of the car and use as a bed at the destination which is handy …” Note: TOC found this bed on the Snooza site. Before you put your dog on their bed in the car, we encourage you to research what is safe for you and your dog in your particular vehicle.

 

7. back seat extender platform

 
german shepherd lying down with head up and looking out on black back seat extender hammock in car with tan interior

From @steelandflorawellness: “I have a back seat extender platform from Amazon …” Note: TOC found this back seat extender on the Amazon site. Before you put your dog on an extender in the car, we encourage you to research what is safe for you and your dog in your particular vehicle.

 

8.Sleepy Pod Harness

 
black red orange and blue sleepy pod harnesses on top of each other in a row pointing right

From @myhelpfulcloud: “ … For car trips, I always have our sleepy pod harness.”

 

9. trash bag for motion sickness

 
white plastic bag with a red tie

From @the_marvelous_ms_mavi: “I also make sure we have … a trash bag in case of motion sickness.” Note: TOC found these trash bags on Amazon.

 

10. enzymatic cleaner

 
white plastic bottle with blue label of stain and odor eliminator

From @the_marvelous_ms_mavi: “I also make sure we have enzymatic cleaner …” Note: TOC found this cleaner on Amazon.

 

11. cooler with frozen kongs or chews

 
red kong

From @kitstagram_awoo: “ … We bring a cooler with frozen kongs and chews (as well as her crate from the car) to help her get through it!”

 

For the Plane/Airport

  1. Carrier

 
black open carrier with fleece liner

From @soelsoprano:“I fly often with my little one (in the cabin with me), and we do training with his carrier about a month before any flight. Small sessions, I basically start as if it’s the first time (though he seems to know the drill now). It helps so much for him to be comfortable going in and out while we are at the airport.” Note: TOC found this carrier on Amazon.

 

2. Potty clean up kit for the airport

 
tiny bottle of urine free with green label

From @soelsoprano: “My dog also refuses to use dog relief stations at airports, so I have a little potty clean up “kit” (lots of paper towels, dog friendly disinfectant wipes, and keeping him on non carpeted areas if I think he might pee).” Note: TOC found this travel urine stain and odor remover on Walmart’s website.

 

3. Extra Food

 
two white paws on a wood floor by a bowl of kibble

From @myhelpfulcloud: ”I’ve had trips where my dog gets his own suitcase and trips where he gets a ziploc baggie full of kibble and that’s it 😂. It really depends on where we’re going but I HATE to overpack … ”

 

4. Toy to play with

 

From @soelsoprano: “I always bring a toy he can chase (a ball, chew toy, rope toy) because we have to get to the airport so early, I like to give him some play time.” Note: TOC found this toy on Amazon.

 

5. Treats and chews that are tummy-safe

 
bag of pet botanics training reward treats

From @myhelpfulcloud: “For any type of travel, do NOT give your dog new treats. Make sure any treats or chews your dog has are already demonstrated to be tummy-safe. The plane, car, train etc. is the worst place to find out your dog doesn’t tolerate something. And I like to keep the no new treats rule for the entire trip, just for safety.” Note: TOC found these treats on Amazon.

 

6. Stasher Bag for Food

 
a clear stasher bag with nothing in it

From @otis_unleashed: “Stasher bags for the plane. They are great silicone bags that you could stash your extra food in.”

 

For Your Home Away From Home

1.Grooming kit

 
a red slicker brush at a diagonal with the bristles on the lower left

From @myhelpfulcloud:” … a small grooming kit so I can keep him looking nice on the trip.” Note: TOC found this brush on Amazon but you can assemble your own small grooming kit with products that you might already have at home!

 

2. X-pen or baby gate

 
two white babies sitting in a nursery behind a light wood baby gate

From @owenthelobo: “I have a Regalo wooden baby gate from target that is really easy to pack. It’s not the most sturdy so I’d only recommend for dogs that’s are visually deterred when they see a barrier rather than an escape artist 😂 the X-pen is the you & me brand from Petco and it is much less easy to pack since it’s so heavy, so I’d only bring it if I’m really unsure what the layout of the house is and if I want to block large spaces rather than just one room.”

 

3. Travel Crate

 
blue open travel crate above the beige black grey purple and camo crates

From @c_healy21: “I always travel with a travel crate … It’s the EliteField 3 door soft folding crate on Amazon. I have the 42” and the 36”. They are so light and easy to carry!”

 

4. Rain jacket

 
a profile view of a frenchie wearing a pink canada pooch raincoat

From @blissdogs831: “I have a small senior dog so in addition to the many great ideas above, we always bring & use his … sweater & rain jacket.” Note: TOC found this rain jacket on Amazon.

 

5. ULLERSLEV from Ikea as a bed

 
a cream furry fleece rug

From @pretendyelling: “ … though she just sleeps on a rug on our bed when we travel) ... it's ULLERSLEV from Ikea 😁”

 

6. White noise machine

 
a white sound machine with grey buttons

From @luna.in_the.city: ”Love this! We have been traveling with Luna since she was 6 months. We do MA-FL car travel twice a year and she's a champ. We do set her up for success by: bringing … her white noise machine, and a few toys.”

 

7. Human headlamP

 
a grey and black head lamp

From @boba.the.sustainable.mutt: “ … I wear a @petzl_official Tikka headlamp (once this one kicks the bucket I’ll probably invest in one of their rechargeable options).”

 
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Training Christie Catan Training Christie Catan

Back To Basics: How To Train Your Dog to Recall

Have you ever felt like you're talking to a wall when you call your dog to come to you? I realized a while ago that my little dog, Sully’s, recall had gotten worse. After some thought, I decided to start completely over with recall training, and I’m inviting you along for the ride. 

What Is Recall?

Recall is the term used to describe a dog coming to us when we call them. In reality, the “recall behavior” is actually multiple behaviors performed sequentially. Those behaviors may vary a bit depending on what the dog was doing, what you cued, and when/how you marked and reinforced. 

Generally speaking, when you call your dog to come, your dog will: Stop moving (if they are moving away from you), turn towards you/orient to you, run to you, stop when they get to you, and station in front of you (aka sit or stand in front of you). I often simplify this to: 1) Orient to you; 2) Move towards you; 3) Station by you. 

Panel one - mint bubble w/ text Orient to you above grey & white dog turning towards camera @ distance in forest. Panel 2: Move towards you above image same dog closer to cam. Panel 3: Station by you above close up shot of dog.

By thinking about individual behaviors that make up a dog’s recall, we can really hone in on strengthening those component parts, which can help us build a stronger overall recall.

Understanding the individual behaviors that make up the broader sequence of behaviors we label “recall” is incredibly helpful in training. We will loop back to this in the future! 

How Do You Get Your Dog To Come When You Call Them?

For now, let’s start with the basics. 

When you call your dog to come, are they coming just because you asked them to? Sorta ... But not exactly. 

Have you heard people say that “reinforcement drives behavior”? Whether or not your dog comes when you call them is determined by what happened under similar conditions in the PAST after they came to you. 

Lili Chin's graphic of "The A-B-C of Operant Conditioning" An example: Boogie Recall & Four Quadrants

The most basic unit when talking about operant behavior, which is voluntary behavior that is increased or decreased as a function of its consequences, is the Antecedent - Behavior - Consequence (A-B-C) unit. You want to start by defining the behavior you are looking at. The antecedent and consequence are stimuli or events that happen in the behaver’s environment. The antecedent comes before the behavior, and the consequence comes after the behavior.

“Come” is an example of a cue (in this case, a verbal one). When you call your dog, it signals the opportunity for them to access reinforcers (like treats) if they come to you. In other words, your recall cue (e.g. “come”) tells your dog what behavior-consequence contingencies are in play. 

Here’s a human example of how cues work: When your phone rings (cue), if you answer it (behavior), someone on the other end will talk to you (consequence). Your phone ringing signals to you that the behavior-consequence contingency of “if you answer the phone, someone on the other end will talk to you” is now in play. If you answer the phone when it’s not ringing, there won’t be anyone on the other end who will talk to you. 

So … your dog isn’t recalling simply because you told them to or because “they know what the word come means.” How they respond to your recall cue in the present moment is determined by what outcomes their behavior produced in the past under similar conditions. 

This gets more complicated. For example, there are a lot of factors that may change how motivating a particular consequence is. I talked about this using the same human example as above (phone calls) in a recent Instagram post if you want to check it out.

We’ll leave it here for now. 

Is It Harder To Teach Some Dogs Recall?

It might help to know a little bit about Sully. She is my great humbler, and I probably don’t thank her enough for all that she has taught me. She is not an “easy dog” in many ways, but I can rest easy knowing that the same behavior principles that apply to every other living animal apply to her. 

Someone once described her as a “bloodhound in a terrier-like agile body,” and I thought that was fairly accurate (though I don’t think it fully captures her “prey drive” behaviors … in quotes because there is far more to it than “drive,” but I am not going to get into it here). Long story short: she finds the environment SUPER reinforcing. 

A blonde dog sits close to the camera covered in mud from head to toe in the woods with bright green trees in the background behind her

When I say I say Sully loves the outdoors, I mean she is literally one with nature. I am competing with the dirt we walk on. I’d like to tell you that it’s rare that she gets herself this dirty, but that would be a lie.

On top of how much sniffy-hunty behavior she does, I struggled at first to even find reinforcers I could reliably use. When I first adopted her, she wouldn’t eat treats outside (she would occasionally, but not consistently enough to do anything meaningful with them). Someone might have labeled her “not food motivated,” but it was more so that the relative value of food went down when outdoors and she didn’t have a big reinforcement history for eating outside. I had to spend a fair bit of time just working on eating outdoors in a range of environments before I could even consider using food as a reinforcer for other behaviors like recall, which I worked really hard to build with her. 

So with all of that said, my very honest answer is this: Yes, I do think it’s harder to teach some dogs to reliably respond to your recall cues than others. Dogs have unique learning histories and may find different things reinforcing.

BUT, that doesn’t mean that it cannot be done or that “positive reinforcement won’t work because a dog is [insert whatever breed you want].” The strongest recalls are built by creating big reinforcement histories for coming when called. Did you know that discretionary effort is one of the unique side effects of R+? 

a marigold slide with the text "Discretionary effort is the level of effort [an individual] could give if they wanted to, but above and beyond the minimum required." - Aubrey C. Daniels, Ph.D.

The phrase discretionary effort comes from the work of Aubrey Daniels, a behavioral psychologist who specializes in applying behavior science principles in the workplace.

With some dogs, we may just have to be more aware of what the dog finds reinforcing, what antecedents are at play (i.e. motivating operations), and how we move the recall behavior into new settings. Some dogs may tend to find treats WAY more reinforcing than nature, and that can make it “easier” (perhaps more “forgiving”) to build solid recall.

I know how to train recall (I LOVE doing it), and I still find myself in a position where I have to start over … which is okay! So please know you are in good company if you find yourself there too.

Why Am I Starting Over With Sully’s Recall?

Put simply: I don’t want to fight the learning history she has with her current recall cue (“come”). 

It has become hit or miss whether she’ll come when we call her, and if she does come, the latency of the behavior is often high and the speed is often slow … not what I’m aiming for 😅. 

Here are the three main measures of recall I’ve been using: 

1. Does she come when called (defined as coming all the way to me)? This is a Yes/No data point. I should be logging mostly “yesses” here, but she was not coming at all when called about 50% of the time. 

2. How quickly does she START to come to me after I call her (this measure is called latency)? I measure this in seconds. I want her recall behavior to be LOW latency (aka very short time between me calling her and her starting to come). However, I was seeing pretty high latency behavior (i.e. when I called her, she would often take 4 to 7 seconds to start to move towards me).

3. How quickly does she complete her recall behavior (this is called speed)? The amount of time it takes for her to travel all the way to me is going to vary depending on how far away from me she is when I call her, so I am typically rating her speed as slow, medium, fast, or lightning fast. I was getting a lot of slow and medium recall speeds, which isn’t what I am aiming for. 

Her recall used to be much better than it is right now, so what happened? A number of things could have happened. 

We could have inadvertently punished her recall behavior by following it up with something aversive (which is defined as anything an individual behaves to escape or avoid). An example of this might be using your recall cue at a dog park and then leashing your dog to leave the park or calling your dog to come and then picking them up to put them in the bathtub. Those examples aren’t fitting for Sully, but punishment still could be at play. 

Perhaps more easily done than punishing recall, we might not have actually been reinforcing her recall when we thought we were. Just because you deliver a treat does not mean you reinforced that recall – you only know you reinforced it if you see the behavior strengthened or maintained in the future under similar conditions … and we are not seeing that play out. 

What I feel confident we did was use her recall cue in situations where she couldn’t perform the desired behavior (aka immediately and with speed run to me). To be clear, I know the rules here (only use the cue when confident the dog can respond), but Sully is harder for me to make predictions with (the value of food is a lot less static than it is with many dogs and the environment is just SO interesting), so plenty of these instances were just accidents (i.e. I thought she was gonna recall). Though to be clear, plenty of the instances were just me and my partner, Ben being sloppy (and maybe a bit greedy) by calling her when we had no business doing that 🤣.

To some degree, she’s likely learned that her recall cue is irrelevant under certain conditions (it’s basically just become background noise that doesn’t signal anything meaningful for her). We used the cue too many times without a response, so that means the cue didn’t lead to a reinforcer all those times … so it’s just weakening more and more. 

She now has a huge history (that I don’t love) with the cue “come,” and I’d be fighting it if I wanted to use that cue in my training to try to change her recall behavior. I don’t want to fight her history, so I am creating a new recall cue, Ewok (because she looks like an adorable Ewok) and starting at square one. This allows me to get the desired behavior (immediate response and fast run to me) and slowly move it into new conditions (more on this in the future)!

How Do You Start Teaching Recall?

There are a lot of ways to start, so I am going to talk about how I started (or restarted) with Sully. 

As a reminder, before I did any training, Ben and I agreed on Ewok as our new cue (because I didn’t want to fight the history with the old cue). A part of my criteria for picking a new cue was that it had to delight me 😅. Then we agreed not to use her recall cue in real life yet to avoid “ruining it” before it’s even ready to dazzle. In the meantime, we’re leveraging long lines, drag lines, and informal prompts like kissy noises and “pup pup pup.” 

I chose to begin by doing something called a stimulus-stimulus pairing. Put simply, I’m creating an association between two stimuli: the word “Ewok” and treats. You may have heard this talked about in dog training as classical or pavlovian conditioning. 

Ewok → Treats

In this session, I simply said “Ewok” and then delivered treats (I did this about 15 times). She wasn’t required to do any behavior to get the treats. I delivered treats after I said “Ewok” 100% of the time regardless of what she was doing. 

In the Instagram post I shared on this session, someone asked a great question, “I noticed that [Sully] was constantly looking at you. If you [said] Ewok and she was looking some other way, would you still give her the treat??” The answer is YES. But this person’s keen observations hint at why this stimulus-stimulus pairing procedure can be a great place to start your recall training: BEHAVIOR IS HAPPENING. I am using this pairing procedure to help produce operant behavior (voluntary behavior that is increased or decreased as a function of its consequences). In future sessions, I will adjust how I am using the treats. Instead of treats being delivered every time after I say “Ewok,” they will be delivered after I say Ewok and she performs some aspect of the recall behavior. Because I hope to train errorlessly, it may not look all that different at first, but it will in time! 

The Secret Ingredient

Sometimes you hear people talk about using lower value treats in less distracting environments, but I am actually using the best stuff I’ve got in our first session. 

a photo of a cast iron skillet with the pan towards the bottom and the handle at the top of the page and inside is ground beef

One of the things I do when I want something really high value is cook some ground beef in a skillet. That isn't a typical treat that we use, so the novelty adds some extra value!

Here’s why: Take away the idea of your recall cue for a moment, and just imagine how your dog might respond to you holding out the most delicious food for them to eat (maybe a nice big steak or piece of salmon). Are you envisioning your dog flying over to you with “enthusiasm” (aka more effort than needed since walking slowly would have worked too)? I want to bring THAT behavior and those emotions to our recall, and high value reinforcers help me with that. 

I cooked specially seasoned chicken and ground beef, and I asked Ben not to pull from those treat containers right now in everyday life because I want the boost in value that novelty can give reinforcers. (To be clear: I train her with food in her belly, and she still gets plenty of other high value treats in everyday life. I am not a fan of using deprivation generally speaking. I am simply using a treat that I wouldn’t otherwise make for her to take advantage of novelty’s effect.)

Questions From Our Community

I’ll try to pick a question from Instagram to highlight and answer in this section (or at least respond more thoroughly to … not sure “answer” is a fair word). I am basically thinking out loud here, so consider yourself warned lol! 

Question: “Thank you for another wonderful post! I'm struggling a little bit with the idea that you used the recall cue too many times when Sully couldn't perform the behavior - I understand how this could spoil the cue, but it also seems to me that the times when recall is most useful/important is in those difficult moments. My dog also finds the environment heavily reinforcing, with a high prey (or at least chase drive) and what appears to be an insatiable curiosity about everything! She has very good recall at the dog park, but I don't let her off-leash anywhere else, fearing that my recall cue might not work if she came across a wild animal that she wanted to investigate or chase. How do you determine if your recall cue is ready for these situations? Do you think it ever can be for a dog with such high interest in the environment?”

Answer: This is a GREAT question. Have you ever heard someone say that your dog needs to be able to recall 100% of the time (“have perfect recall”) before you let them off leash? 

But here’s the plot twist: While that old advice is meant to keep dogs and people and wildlife safe (or that’s my interpretation), I actually think the bigger threat comes from believing that any dog’s recall is 100%. I almost do the opposite of that old advice when I make a decision to let my dogs off leash: I assume my dogs will not recall. By making this assumption (or at least playing it out in my head), I can assess how big of a problem it would be in a given area if my dog blew a recall. If the risk to my dog and/or others is too high (and people will have different ways to evaluate risk and different risk tolerances), I don’t let my dog off. 

For example, my other dog, Otis, has GREAT recall. But I don’t let him off leash if we are near a busy road. That isn’t because I think he will fail a recall. It’s because I cannot predict the future with 100% certainty, and the consequences of a failed recall are way too dangerous in that setting. I’m flipping the lens a bit and instead of focusing first on how likely my dog is to recall, I’m first focusing on how problematic it would be in the area we occupy if my dog didn’t recall. This actually helps take a lot of the stress and uncertainty out of my decision because all of the weight isn’t on my dog to recall perfectly in that setting. 

Let’s chat about this point from the original question: “ … it also seems to me that the times when recall is most useful/important is in those difficult moments.” PREACH. I hear you loud and clear. This is what makes it so tricky to build recall. It also allows us to dive into the next decision layer with unclipping a leash. We have to have a pretty good understanding of our dog’s behavior and be able to read the environment well in order to make predictions. I would be remiss if I didn’t call out here that I have clearly failed at this since I am starting over 🤣. It’s so easy to blurt out your recall cue in a difficult moment and just cross your fingers that it works. 

As you are building the recall, you will butt up against this line a lot. I actually think it’s easier at the beginning of training because the line is a lot clearer - you can basically assume the dog is not ready for any real life tests yet. For right now with Sully, my rule is not to use her recall cue at all in real life. It gets harder the more training progresses because that line gets a bit blurrier. (I do think this is where my decision making process for unclipping a leash helps.)

Let’s chat about the next part of the question: “How do you determine if your recall cue is ready for these situations?”

This can be tricky, and there isn’t one right answer. To some degree, the human’s risk tolerance is a factor. I don’t think I have ever written this out before, so I don’t think this will be perfect … my confidence level stems from some combo of these things: 

1) My dog’s experience recalling under similar conditions.

In the course of training, I will systematically work in a variety of environments and with a variety of distractions. I will collect data (often in my head, but this time I hope to do it on paper) to help me determine what Sully is ready for. For a good long while, I will only use my recall cue when we are out and I want to get a recall rep in. I won’t likely use it in random, tough moments (I’ll accept that she may dip for a second and breathe knowing that I dropped the leash because I was okay with this happening here). I will only use my recall cue in real life when I think she has the learning history needed to respond by coming to me. I won’t be able to work directly with every tough distraction in controlled ways (e.g. deer), but I can set up similar conditions that I can control to work on recalling out of chase (like recalling off chasing a ball or a prey-like-toy on a flirt pole). If my dog has been able to recall mid-chase in a variety of contexts that I controlled, I have more confidence than I would otherwise (still not perfect) about recalling out of chasing other things in real life. If my dog has no experience recalling when they are mid-chase, I am not going to use a recall cue when they are chasing a squirrel. (More generally, I might also think about how many successful reps of recall my dog has done in total to gauge their overall R+ history. This is more relevant early on in the training journey.)

2) My dog’s past behavior around this distraction while on a long line. 

For certain tough distractions (like deer) that I can’t easily control, I may use real life moments when leashed to train and gauge my dog’s behavior. For example, I want to see a dog quickly and easily respond to me when they see a deer while leashed before I ever consider recalling them away from deer when off leash. I might even see a dog spot and deer and automatically orient to me, which is the first part of recall anyway! I might take a dog to a spot with squirrels where they can practice just watching them (rather than chasing). These types of experiences around tough distractions give me a lot more confidence about recalling away from them if/when the time comes. 

3) My dog’s offered behaviors.

This may not seem as obvious, but how my dog typically behaves in a given environment can contribute to my overall sense of confidence. For example, if my dogs have learned (generally) to stay on the trail, I may feel more confident than if they hiked by zooming around 100 yards off the trail. If my dogs auto-check in (aka stop and wait, look at me, and/or run back to me) as soon as they hit a certain radius from me on the trail, I might feel more confident than if they just keep running ahead. Right now, Otis’s typical trail behaviors inspire far more confidence than Sully’s. As soon as Otis gets about 20 yards away from me, he automatically stops or runs back to me. He is checking in all the time. Sully may walk for 45 minutes before she even looks at me 😂. Otis is essentially already performing the recall behavior - I would just have to add a cue in front of it. Most of the time, Sully isn’t offering any recall behavior (not even the initial components of it). I want to see pieces of that behavior showing up in the context of the environment before I try to cue it verbally. I will be working on offered check-ins on trails with Sully before I use her recall cue. (This can also give me info about whether my reinforcers are strong enough or not.)

4) Response checks. 

There are a range of simple behaviors I will use to gauge what’s going on with a dog on a given day and in a given environment. For example, I might cue a nose touch, sit, and paws up. If those are behaviors that my dog can reliably do in a range of environments, I would know something is up if suddenly they can’t do them or they perform them slower. With Sully, one of the behaviors I will always check is whether or not she can eat. If she isn’t enthusiastically taking a treat I drop for her (or isn’t then looking up at me to ask for another), that is not a good sign about how motivated she’s likely to be to recall. Data like this can help me feel more confident in my choices.

5) Distant antecedents.

What has or hasn’t happened lately in my dog’s life that could influence their behavior or the strength of reinforcers? Here is a good example: We live near the woods and have a fenced back yard that Sully is able to patrol all day. When we stay at my sister’s house in Atlanta, she loses that activity for a week. When we come home, the deprivation can make her sniffy-hunty behaviors WAY more likely since the value of the associated reinforcers went up (because of the deprivation). So when we first return home, I hold her long line for a while and don’t recall her until she has her fill of nature again so my reinforcers can compete better with nature. 

I heard something from a conference a while back that may be helpful as a framework (I wish I could remember the speaker’s name and exactly what they said). Write out a list of environments that are easy, medium, and hard in terms of level of difficulty for a recall. For example, here are Sully’s: Living room (easy), empty field (medium), woods (hard). I have expanded on this a bit and actually have a list of easy’s, medium’s, and hard’s. Then write out a list of as many distractions that you might recall your dog away from as you can think of going from easy to hard. For example, at the bottom (easy) end of the list might be a jacket on the floor and at the top (hardest) of the list might be a screaming fox running away. There are a lot of distractions between those two. Then you can start working through the distractions somewhat systematically to build the learning history you want with them. This can give you some confidence you might not have otherwise and help you decide when to let your dog off leash.

Now to be fair, I only worked through certain distractions (like recalling away from wildlife, recalling away from food, etc.) super systematically with my dog, Otis. Otherwise, I got to be a bit loosey-goosey and focus on building a big R+ history in general while still being intentional about when I used my cue. With Sully, I am going to be WAY more systematic (hello data collection!) – in large part to set myself up for success since I have a history of inaccurately predicting whether or not she will recall (or just throwing out hail mary’s). 

Now to the final part of the question: “Do you think [recall] ever can be [ready for difficult moments] for a dog with such high interest in the environment?” To be honest, I don’t know. I don’t think I will ever trust Sully’s recall the way I trust Otis’s recall. She finds different things reinforcing than he does, and I have a harder time beating the environment with Sully. And I think that’s okay! I am going to make very different decisions about where Sully vs. Otis can be off leash. I still have safe ways to get her off leash time in fenced spaces and can use long drag lines in areas that are not-populated and very far from roads. There are MANY ways that I can work with some of her predatory behaviors, so I’m sure we will make progress. How that progress translates to my decision making is yet to be seen, but I have a hard time believing that I will ever feel as confident in her recall as I am in Otis’s. 

This leads me to a final closing thought. Sully is going to fail recalls during this training journey. While I am going to use an errorless teaching approach, failures and mistakes are a normal part of the process. As we progress and the recalls get harder, I am going to make mistakes in my predictions and call her in moments when she can’t recall. To some extent, those failed recalls give me really valuable data that inform my training and helps me sort out where our gaps are. I won’t be using her new recall in real life anytime soon, but when I do, I am going to have to give her a little bit of freedom in order to recall her (it’ll be freedom on a long drag line). It’s a tough thing to balance! 

 Stay tuned for more!

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Opinion Briahna Hendey Opinion Briahna Hendey

The Journey to a Sustainable Life and How To Live it With Dogs

Editor’s Note: Hi, it’s Christie Catan here! It's so tempting to equate sustainability with recycling, but it's so much bigger than that (for example: I spend more of my energy thinking about what I chose to buy or not buy). Am I perfect? NOT EVEN CLOSE. My hope is that our new TOC Contributor, Brianha Hendey, will help our community learn a bit more about how this home of ours (earth) works and why talking about sustainability even matters. I want to acknowledge that there are a HUGE number of reasons why people behave the way they do, and they are all valid. We are here to talk & learn with you (not tell you what to do). I'm hoping that our conversations will help us all better understand what contingencies are at play (yay behavior nerds!) as we make choices related to our dogs and perhaps allow you to bring even more awareness and intention to what you do (even if your behavior remains exactly the same).

Have you ever stopped to think about who you’re serving when you post a cute gear pic with a discount code on your dog’s Instagram account? When my partner and I decided to start an Instagram page for our dog, Boba, we were excited to share dog pictures, connect with trusted dog professionals, and meet other pet parents in our community and the greater dog world. However, the more time I spent scrolling through “Dog Instagram,” the more concerned I became about the environmental impacts of everything I was seeing. In an effort to make Boba’s Instagram feed a bit less consumeristic, I searched for sustainability-related dog pages and the results were unsettlingly empty. Indeed, I found nothing but a few pages promoting vegan dog diets, which were unhelpful to sustainably-minded pet guardians and the dogs in question.

Full disclosure, I’m a vegetarian. My master’s research focused on sustainable consumption. I was specifically interested in factors that might lead people to reduce their meat consumption and opt for higher quality, more sustainably-sourced meat when they do eat it (as opposed to completely abstaining). Without going into the behavioral science of it all, I am generally interested in helping people live more sustainably in a way that promotes their own well-being and that of the collective. 

Dogs undoubtedly increase our well-being (in most cases at least). You don’t have to do much digging to find numerous studies citing dogs’ ability to increase our life satisfaction, as well as improve our mental and physical health in measurable ways. So while our dogs’ environmental “paw print” is far from negligible, for many people their benefits far exceed their costs (although I say this as a self-acknowledged dog-obsessed millennial woman).

This then begs the question, what are the environmental implications of dogs, and how do we lessen them?

Since I couldn’t find answers on social media, I took it upon myself to research and to share my findings with you, with the hopes of creating an open and ongoing dialogue on the topic.

How the Pet Industry Impacts a Sustainable Life and How To Live It With Dogs

mint slide w text "Environmental impacts of meat consumption in the US." Below is a pie chart with green (70%) & orange (30 %) sections. An orange arrow points to 30% + "Dog & Cat Food." Green arrow points to 70% "Human Consumption. Other."

In a country like the U.S., where dogs and cats are very common pets, the environmental impacts can add up. Indeed, dogs and cats consume as much dietary energy as ~62 million Americans, or one fifth of the U.S. population!

At a glance, domestic dogs are an environmental disaster. You can’t really sugarcoat the massive amounts of resources spent on dog accessories and what have you, but it’s their food (and the waste that follows it) that is the biggest environmental culprit. Roughly 30% of protein raised in the United States goes towards feeding domestic pets. If you’re at all familiar with the impacts of industrialized animal agriculture, then you know that these aren’t small environmental impacts we’re talking about. Yet even as a vegetarian sustainability professional, it’s very easy for me to mentally distance myself from the environmental and social impacts of Boba’s dry food as I scoop it, twice daily.

Indeed, the pet industry has somehow managed to completely separate dogs from the natural world to which we all belong. While the idea of connecting to nature has been commercialized across dog products, from food to toys, in practice it’s rarely more than marketing. Catchy advertisements with terms like wild, all-natural, and evolutionary, are slapped onto bags of dog food with images of wild animals, yet the food bears no visible resemblance to anything an actual wild animal might eat. And in most cases, it was manufactured with limited to no concern for any wild animals impacted throughout the production process.

 In reality, domestic dogs are not “wild” animals. They have been co-evolving with us for thousands of years, along with their diets and behaviors. This is not to say that they are not as much of a part of the natural world as their more wild relatives. On the contrary – dogs are a great reminder that we as humans are also a part of the natural world.

With that in mind, I don’t think meat is the problem here. I think it’s the means by which we produce it that is problematic. 

Why Considering Quality and Your Dog’s Needs Can Help You Live Sustainably

Our industrialized society is constantly pushing to be faster and more productive, compromising quality (and our ecosystems) in the process. This also persists at the individual level, where feelings of inadequacy persist if we’re not “productive enough.” So consider this a formal invitation to slow down with me and to connect with your dog in a meaningful way. If the pandemic has taught us anything, I hope it’s that we are all allowed to slow down. More than that, slowing down is necessary for our own health and the planet’s. I think it’s also something that dogs have been trying to teach us all along.

When you see ads on social media for pet gear, what are you considering before you tap "buy now"? Is it something your dog needs? Is it something you want because you saw someone else with it? Is it because it's cute and caught your eye? Are you hoping watching your dog with it will bring you some joy? I'm not here to tell you what to do but rather to invite you to pause and notice. What would happen if we took the time to genuinely consider our dog’s needs, and actually listen to them when they try to communicate those needs? Would they prioritize a bit of time outside with you more than a shiny new collar? When it is time to make purchases for our dogs, it’s much easier to mindfully select products that serve their needs if we’re actually familiar with them. Let’s take the time to observe the subtleties of their body language, and wonder at the way they engage with our natural world. 

While living more sustainably with dogs might seem like uncharted territory – especially given the lack of conversation around it – I will leave you with one simple message: slow down. Take the time to connect with your dog, understand their needs and preferences, and actually research purchases before making them. We will explore what it might mean to make "better" purchases in the future, but for now, my invitation for you is to take time to really connect with your dog. Talk to you soon!

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Picks Jessica Yergin Picks Jessica Yergin

Guide: The Best Products For Surviving Winter With Your Dog

If you live in a snowy and icy place, caring for your dog in the winter can be particularly tricky. A few weeks ago we posted on Instagram and asked you about the winter dog products YOU love that make life easier and help you survive winter weather. Once again we were blown away by your responses, and decided to turn them into an easy to reference guide. We will keep adding to this list as we get more great recommendations from YOU, the amazing pet parents and pro-trainers in our TOC Fam! [Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning TOC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through our links, at no cost to you.]

Winter Dog Clothing and Accessories

  1. Ultra Paw Boots

 
four red and black ultra paws boots side by side

From @littlesplines: “We've been using ultra paws boots for a few years. They’re a pair of rubber pads that helps grip the paws and they stay on even playing in the snow…”

 

2. A Waist Leash

 
A neon green and black fanny pack above a folded neon green and black waist leash

From @gimpyballerina: “…a waist leash to preserve the fingers…I've been borrowing this one from a friend. I like the control handle and that it's super easy to unclip to convert to/from a regular leash without having to deal with getting it on and off my body. The shorter length works well for our narrow sidewalks, and the shock absorption is handy for when my pup gets excited to see a friend and suddenly pulls. The reflective parts are helpful at night but with my light up stuff not necessary. I don't use the pockets on the waist portion but some may find them useful.”

 

3. A Fleece Pullover

 
an olive green fleece dog pullover by ruffwear

From @jesshorwitz: “…My girl Rooney has a fleece pullover and jacket-harness from @ruffwear that work great for very cold days. She’s a lab mix so I feel fortunate her short coat is rather low maintenance in the snow!”

 

4. Pawz Boots

 
a white fluffy paw in a yellow pawz dog boot

From @ouimaelle: “In the city where the streets are full of salt and other chemicals to melt the ice, I love the Pawz Dog Boots. They’re the only boot that they can’t shake off, and not the end of the world if they do eventually lose one. They get used to them real quick and they’re so thin it never really seems to bother them.”

 

5. The Ruffwear Cloud Chaser

 
the black cloud chaser dog coat with the reflective silver trim

From @peevepaisley: “…love the Ruffwear Cloud Chaser…”

 

6. A Gold Paw Fleece

 
a profile of a bulldog wear a black golden paw fleece and looking up

From @peevepaisley: “…love Gold Paw fleeces…”

 

7. Jawz

 
a yellow pair of jawz in the blue packaging

From @jabbowaki: “Jawz for easily getting Pawz booties on our dog! He struggles to hold still and the jawz cuts down the time it takes to put them on him.”

 

8. The Weatherbeeta Waterproof Dog Coat

 
a chocolate lab in profile with its mouth open wearing the yellow weatherbeeta jacket

From @boilermakeranna: “…a WeatherBeeta waterproof dog coat that covers a good amount of their belly!”

 

9. A Blazin’ Safety LED Collar 

 
a neon green Blazin Safety LED collar that's lit up

From @gimpyballerina: “…Blazin’ Safety LED collar for more well lit areas…”

 

10. A Non-stop Dog Coat

 
An orange and black nonstop dog coat

From @aaron_theangry_gsd: “Our winters aren't ever too cold. 9 degrees are the lowest temperatures we have. But we will live somewhere else soon with cold winters (Turin or somewhere in South Germany). Aaron has arthrosis so he needs to be kept warm. Therefore I've bought him a warm coat from nonstop dogwear that covers shoulders and legs warming his joints and big muscles groups. Its on his way to us in South Italy…”

 

11. A Jacket Harness from Ruffwear

 
a burnt orange jacket harness with grey and silver accents and trim

From @jesshorwitz: “…My girl Rooney has a fleece pullover and jacket-harness from @ruffwear that work great for very cold days. She’s a lab mix so I feel fortunate her short coat is rather low maintenance in the snow!"

 

12. A Carhartt Insulated Dog Coat

 
a profile view of an olive green carhartt coat with a dark brown collar

From @pacificpaw: “@carhartt keeps us toasty 🙌.”

 

13. Canada Pooch Boots

 
A Stafford Terrier wears black and silver canada pooch boots on each paw and stares at the camera

From @nickiiolivares: “It’s my first winter so this list is great. Although it rarely falls below 30 degrees (F) and if it snows it melts by the afternoon. We do plan on a winter cabin getaway so I’ve already started conditioning my girl to Canada Pooch Boots.”

 

14. A Muttluks Snowsuit

 
two identical brown dogs side by side looking at the camera and wearing a black jacket and a yellow jacket (respectively) and black boots.

From @lily_aka_bean: “Bean has a snowsuit, an entire body covering snowsuit, by Muttluks, I bought it second hand and had to sew up the pant legs but living in Alberta with -30°-40° weather I couldn't not buy her one…”

 

15. Muttluks Dog Boots

 
the blue and black muttluks boots

From @puppygeniusacademy: “…Muttluk Dog Boots - they never fall off and have lots of grip…”

 

16. Beacon Safety Lights

 
a beacon light on a silver carabiner

From @puppygeniusacademy: “…Beacon safety lights…”

 

17. A Wilderdog Fleece Jacket

 
an olive green fleece dog sweater with a blue multicolored belt

From @maural33: “And @wilderdog has great jackets that work with their harnesses- excellent for when it’s really cold!”

 

18. A Canada Pooch Raincoat

 
a profile view of a frenchie wearing a pink canada pooch raincoat

From @kronkadoodle: “Canada pooch rain coats because they're functional and cute, and don't have an awful zipper to fuss with…”

 

19. A Nite Ize Tag

 
nite ize light up collar charm in the packaging with a yellow lab looking up on the left of the cardboard

From @jewellgrnb: “Nite Ize tags for their harnesses (I’ve actually had people driving stop and tell me how visible they were)…”

 

20. A Rechargeable LED Collar

 
the clear night howl collar in the packaging.jpg

From @roverrehabnj: “Rechargeable LED collars for those dark nights…”

 

21. A Dog Sweater Suit

 
a doberman in profile wearing a sweater suit that only revels its head and paws.

From TOC: We found this dog sweater onesie on Da South Breeders Pet Supplies’s site. They are featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here.

 

Winter Human Clothing and Accessories

  1. Convertible Fingerless Mittens

 
black convertible fingerless mittens standing up side by side with white and silver accents

From @gingerbeer.dc: “Convertible fingerless mittens were amazing last winter! It kept my hands warm but when I needed to break up treats I could still use my fingers without taking the gloves completely off.” Note: TOC found these mittens on Amazon.

 

2. Squeeze Tubes

 
pink light pink purple and blue squeeze tubes standing side by side

From @mersey_theadventurebean: “A few key things that I find make our winters most enjoyable are using baby food in a squeeze tube as a treat so I can keep my mittens on…” Note: TOC found these squeeze tubes on Amazon.

 

3. Crampons

 
brown boots (including one on the side with the sole facing you) with red laces and accents with the crampons on the sole

From @leighpeigh: “Crampons for my boots! I have two large dogs and while they walk nicely on a leash, even the slightest yank on your centre of gravity can bring you down on a patch of ice.” Note: TOC found these crampons on Amazon.

 

4. A Good Winter Coat

 
a white woman starting with her smile (her head is cut off) wearing a black puffer coat that reveals the top of a grey sweater black leggings and black leather ankle boots

From @mersey_theadventurebean: “…a good winter coat for her when it gets really cold (for me too of course 😂)…” Note: TOC found this coat on Amazon.

 

5. A Pair of Fingerless Gloves Feeding Treats

 
An assortment of grey, black and white, and black pairs of fingerless gloves spread out in three rows on top of each other

From @e_chape: “…A pair of gloves that you only use for treat feeding.” Note: TOC found these gloves on Amazon.

 

6. Icebugs

 
the profile of grey and black icebug boot

From @littlesplines: “…I wear icebugs, shoes with cleats built in so both feet feels balanced…”

 

7. Ice fishing flip top mittens

 
2 ice top flip top mittens that are grey black and organge standing up side by side

From @littlesplines: “…Ice fishing flip top mitts so I can use my fingers tips to dispenser treats…” Note: TOC found these mittens on Amazon.

 

8. A Reusable Hand Warmer

 
4 rectangular hot snapZ green handwarmers next to 4 circular hotsnapZ handwarmers

From @littlesplines: “…Trying reusable hand warmers this year.” Note: TOC found these hand warmers on Amazon.

 

9. A Headlamp

 
a blue and black headlamp next to a box, batteries, and a blue wrist band

From @jewellgrnb: “A headlamp for walking in the dark.” Note: TOC found this headlamp on Amazon.

 

10. A Pair of gloves with the index finger and thumb cut out

 
2 black gloves standing up where the one on the right has a white thumb and index finger popping out the finger holes

From @peevepaisley: “Gloves with a cutout for the index finger and thumb - perfect for treating!” Note: TOC found these gloves on Amazon.

 

11. Yaktrax

 
a greyed out pair of boots with yaktrax the one on the left has its sole facing the camera

From @roverrehabnj: “Yaktrax for human foot traction.”

 

12. Kahtoola EXOspikes

 
a grey and black tennis shoe with the Kahtoola EXOspikes in blue on it

From @gimpyballerina: “…Kahtoola EXOspikes for traction…”

 

13. The Noxgear Tracer

 
the back of a black long sleeved shirt with the noxgear tracer lit up in purple on it and a green noxgear band across the middle of the shirt

From @gimpyballerina: “…Noxgear Tracer plus a headlamp for the human for less well lit areas…”

 

14. A TurtleFur fleece lined balaclava

 
a black turtle fur balaclava from the side

From @gimpyballerina: “…a TurtleFur fleece lined balaclava to keep my face and neck warm...”

 

15. Thermal Underwear

 
a brunette white woman wearing olive green thermal underwear barefoot

From @aaron_theangry_gsd: “I use thermal underwear and a warm coat…” Note: TOC found this thermal underwear on Amazon.

 

16. Baleaf fleece-lined leggings

 
a white bare midriff is exposed wearing the green fleece lined leggings below it with a white iphone popping out of the pocket. the model is barefoot and his one foot with a pointed toe

From @maural33: “For humans- Baleaf fleece-lined leggings are cozy as heck. 😊”

 

17. A Long Raincoat

 

From @kronkadoodle: “…A long old lady rain coat for me that everyone makes fun of me for until they wish they had one as long as mine…” Note: TOC found this raincoat on L.L. Bean’s site.

 

18. Waterproof Boots that Zip

 
the side of a black zip up waterproof boot

From @kronkadoodle: “Tall, zip up waterproof boots so my feet stay dry stomping through the water and mud.” Note: TOC found these boots on L.L. Bean’s site.

 

19. A Reflective Vest

 
a white woman with red hair in a long pony table over her right shoulder wears a white turtleneck and a dark green and black camou vest and black leggings. In the lower left of the image there is a zoomed in square of the vest fabric

From @kronkadoodle: “…reflective vests for the humans…” Note: TOC found this vest on Athleta’s site.

 

20. Wool Socks

 
a stack of wool socks folded in assorted greys, brown, and navy beside two stacked and rolled grey socks

From @trompingwithmolly: “…wool socks…”Note: TOC found these socks on Amazon.

 

21. Fleece Lined Pants

 
a pair of black fleece lined pants

From @trompingwithmolly: “…Fleece lined pants…” Note: TOC found these pants on L.L. Bean’s site.

 

22. A Merino Base Layer

 
a black merino fleece zip up pullover with long sleeves

From @jewellgrnb: “For me merino base layers…” Note: TOC found this long sleeved Merino top on Amazon.

 

23. flannel lined jeans

 
A pair of blue jeans on a white background

From @jewellgrnb: “For me…flannel-lined jeans…” Note: TOC found these jeans on Duluth Trading Co’s site.

 

24. A skida balaclava

 
a black skida backclava on a white mannequin head

From @jewellgrnb: “…Skida balaclava make my favorites.”

 

25. Ski Goggles

 
white ski googles with bright yellow and red reflective lens with a snow tree lined mountain in the reflection

From @lily_aka_bean: “…I am going to get ski goggles soon.” Note: TOC found these goggles on Amazon.

 

26. A Buff

 
black fabric that looks like a cylinder

From @lily_aka_bean: “For myself I use a … buff…”

 

27. A Hat with Ear Flaps

 
the back of a woman's head with her blonde ponytail showing through her black baseball cap that covers her ears. part of her white cheek and chin are exposed and you can see her herringbone collar

From @summers_dayinthe_sun: “…hats with ear flaps…” Note: TOC found this hat on the Trailheads site.

 

28. Snow Overalls

 
a black woman's face that's cut off showing only the bottom of her nose down and she's wearing a black long sleeved shirt and dark greyish blue snow overalls and black snow boots

From @summers_dayinthe_sun: “…a pair of snow-overalls made last winter so much more manageable!” Note: TOC found these snow overalls on Amazon.

 

29. A Beanie that advocates for your dog

 
a moss green pom beanie with yellow text that reads do not touch my dog embroidered at the bottom in yellow

From TOC: We found this beanie on EukaryaPaw’s site. They are featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here.

 

Enrichment and Snow Toys

  1. A Hol-ee Roller

 
a green hol-ee roller ball with the packaging above it.jpg

From @mersey_theadventurebean: “I also really love hol-ee rollers as an alternative fetch toy that is less likely to sink and get lost in deep snow!”

 

2. Bright Colored Toys

 
a lime green bumi toy by west paw that looks like a rubber S

From @sunshineaussie: “…Bright colored toys…”Note: TOC found this toy on Amazon.

 

3. Indoor Games

 
a golden retriever sniffing a grey snuffle matt that looks like a rug with long pieces of fabric sticking out everywhere

From @isteriae: “Indoor games and chews for the day where we cannot have long walks because we're already under 1m of snow (since december 1st actualy 😭).”Note: TOC found this snuffle mat on Amazon.

 

4. Enrichment Games

 
a bright blue west paw toppl attached to the packaging

From @raven_not_raisin: “And lots of indoor enrichment backup plans in case outdoors is an absolute no go!” Note: TOC found this toppl on Amazon.

 

5. An Indoor Agility Kit

 
assorted white poles put together, a blue storage vack, a red and white mat and a rec circle suspended by the poles

From @archkatie: “This is my first winter with my cold hating pup! She has a coat and I have mushers. I also got an indoor agility kit for the darkest days 🤞🤞🤞.” Note: TOC found this agility kit on Amazon.

 

6. Kong Tennis Balls

 
2 sacks of 3 kong tennis balls stacked vertically attached to the tag side by side

From @trompingwithmolly: “Lots of Kong Squeaky balls for indoor games.”

 

7. A Lickimat

 
a lime green lickimat splash in the packaging

From TOC: We found this lickimat on Lizo Bandana Co’s site. They are featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here.

 

For the Home and Grooming

  1. Musher’s Secret

 
an open jar of mushers secret with the lip off and resting to the left side of the jar

From @wigglebutt_bailey: “Mushers secret for the paws…”

 

2. A Thermos

 
a forest green thermos with a stack of muti clored thermos heads pointing out to the right with only their bottle tops and necks showing

From @otis_unleashed: “I also often carry a whisk in my bag to break up some of the snow balls and a towel and a thermos bottle with hot water (I can pour hat water on the hand towel and hold on a snow ball stuck to them if they get one in a painful spot that I can’t break off).” Note: TOC found this thermos on Amazon.

 

3. A Wire Whisk

 
a wire wisk with the handle at the top of the image and the whisk pointing downward

From @maural33: “She’s a snow lover and I’ve heard that a wire whisk is great for removing snow balls so planning to use that this winter.” Note: TOC found this whisk on Amazon.

 

4. A Quick Drying Towel

 
a brown and white dog being dried with a brown chenille towel on a white mat by white arms with a white tshirt peeking through

From @herstabetoff: “An absorbent quick drying towel, similar to ones used for hiking in the backcountry, to put down in the back seat dog hammock. It sucks the melted snow off him so he doesn't have to sit in a puddle of his own melt.” Note: TOC found this towel on Amazon.

 

5. A Waterproof Blanket

 
a golden retriever puppy sleeping on a grey blanket on a blue couch with a part of a white and black geometric patterned pillow on the right

From @roverrehabnj: “And lots of warm blankets for snuggling on the couch after being out in the snow.” Note: TOC found this blanket on Amazon.

 

6. Burt’s Bees Wipes

 
a burts bees wipe sticking out of the top of the yellow packaging.jpga burts bees wipe sticking out of the top of the yellow packaging

From @brimounteer: “But also Burt’s bees wipes for her paws for when we come back in, to get all the salt and everything else off!”

 

7. The Soggy Dog Doormat

 
the grey soggy dog doormat with a white bow outline in the middl

From @kronkadoodle: “…soggy doggy towels and door mats (which double as good "place" mats as well as snuffle mats haha).”

 

8. Paw Balm

 
the simply sage paw balm in a circular tin with a white and yellow label

From TOC: We found this paw balm on the Simply Sage Dog Treats site. They are featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here.

 
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Guide: The Best Thing I Ever Bought My Dog

A couple of months ago we were blown away by your responses to our post on Instagram entitled “The Best Thing I Ever Bought My Dog Is _.” We thought it would be helpful to turn the post into any easy to reference guide. We will keep adding to this list as we get more great recommendations from YOU, the amazing pet parents and pro-trainers in our TOC Fam! [Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning TOC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through our links, at no cost to you.]

Enrichment

1. The Kong Wobbler

 
From @vhgollatz: “The kong wobbler. We use dry food, nibbles of beef liver, and sometimes beef chunks dusted in liver dust so they don't stick. The wobbler comes out when he needs to be occupied for rainy days.”

From @vhgollatz: “The kong wobbler. We use dry food, nibbles of beef liver, and sometimes beef chunks dusted in liver dust so they don't stick. The wobbler comes out when he needs to be occupied for rainy days.”

 

2. The Snoop

 
From @finniganthewheaten: "“Orbee tuff snoop!!!”

From @finniganthewheaten: "Orbee tuff snoop!!!”

 

3. The Benebone Puppy Wishbone

 
@nickiiolivares: “@mybenebone puppy wishbone chew toy. It helped us succeed in redirecting her chewing to the right things. 6 month old and rarely chews the furniture anymore.”

@nickiiolivares: “@mybenebone puppy wishbone chew toy. It helped us succeed in redirecting her chewing to the right things. 6 month old and rarely chews the furniture anymore.”

 

4. The Paw 5 Snuffle Matt

 
From @dotcomgrams: “...My favorite snuffle mat is by far the Paw 5. I shopped around for something less expensive but nothing compared in terms of fluffiness.”

From @dotcomgrams: “...My favorite snuffle mat is by far the Paw 5. I shopped around for something less expensive but nothing compared in terms of fluffiness.”

 

5. The KONG Bamboo Puzzle Toy

 
From @mashazhuuu: “Best thing I bought: Bamboo Kong puzzle toy.”

From @mashazhuuu: “Best thing I bought: Bamboo Kong puzzle toy.”

 

6. The Toppl

 
From @lumosdogtraining: “We love @westpawsus for so many reasons! They're a B Corp with transparency about their BLM support, support for employees during the pandemic, they gave employees paid time off for voting, they're involved in their local community, and they happen to make fantastic dog toys. We love the bumi and the toppls.”

From @lumosdogtraining: “We love @westpawsus for so many reasons! They're a B Corp with transparency about their BLM support, support for employees during the pandemic, they gave employees paid time off for voting, they're involved in their local community, and they happen to make fantastic dog toys. We love the bumi and the toppls.”

 

7. A Lickimat

 
From @8bitchip: “We know a senior who's struggling to care for their dog as they lose mobility in their hands (weak grip, stiff and arhritic, tremor) and legs (uses cane). I think if more enrichment products were made to be easy to fill and clean, it would be more inclusive - so for example, Lickimat's new-er line of tough mats for chewers is easier to hold with one hand, especially when it's filled and goopy, so it's easier to handle while moving with a cane. It's easier to lay flat in the freezer because it is hard-backed, or bring over directly to a place for a dog to eat than its floopy original form. It's also easier to clean since it is dishwasher safe. I don't think they were considering mobility issues in the new designs, but nevertheless, it made their product more accessible than it was before.”

From @8bitchip: “We know a senior who's struggling to care for their dog as they lose mobility in their hands (weak grip, stiff and arhritic, tremor) and legs (uses cane). I think if more enrichment products were made to be easy to fill and clean, it would be more inclusive - so for example, Lickimat's new-er line of tough mats for chewers is easier to hold with one hand, especially when it's filled and goopy, so it's easier to handle while moving with a cane. It's easier to lay flat in the freezer because it is hard-backed, or bring over directly to a place for a dog to eat than its floopy original form. It's also easier to clean since it is dishwasher safe. I don't think they were considering mobility issues in the new designs, but nevertheless, it made their product more accessible than it was before.”

 

8. A Makeshift Sand Pit

 
From @lemonadeandmaddie: “Makeshift sand pit! Lemonade used to jump into our planters and dig. Eventually got her her own sandpit and she hasn't even looked at the planters since. She didn't even need redirecting. She just needed a digging space for herself.” Note from TOC: We found this sandbox featured above in the photo in case you don’t want to make your own!

From @lemonadeandmaddie: “Makeshift sand pit! Lemonade used to jump into our planters and dig. Eventually got her her own sandpit and she hasn't even looked at the planters since. She didn't even need redirecting. She just needed a digging space for herself.” Note from TOC: We found this sandbox featured above in the photo in case you don’t want to make your own!

 

9. The Snuffle Ball

 
From @z3r00h: “Snuffle ball! It's amazing you can stick treats for breakfast in there.”

From @z3r00h: “Snuffle ball! It's amazing you can stick treats for breakfast in there.”

 

10. An Outward Hound Puzzle Toy

 
From @miss.maca: “So hard to choose!! … The @outwardhound puzzles.”

From @miss.maca: “So hard to choose!! … The @outwardhound puzzles.”

 

11. The Pineapple Slow feeder from Zippy Paws

 
From @miss.maca: “The pineapple slow feeder from @zippypaws so Maca can eat slowly and be entertained.”

From @miss.maca: “The pineapple slow feeder from @zippypaws so Maca can eat slowly and be entertained.”

 

12. The Kong Classic

 
From @6lack6eautyy_:“…A dog product that's the best value, I would say the Kong. It's pretty indestructible and I can put all types of food in it…”

From @6lack6eautyy_:“…A dog product that's the best value, I would say the Kong. It's pretty indestructible and I can put all types of food in it…”

 

13. The Little Tree Root

 
From @rubyfurever: “We got this little tree root thing when Ruby was tiny! I'm convinced that she hasn't ever damaged our wooden furniture (only one tooth mark from when she had a fever so I don't count it) because there was that one wooden thing she was allowed.”

From @rubyfurever: “We got this little tree root thing when Ruby was tiny! I'm convinced that she hasn't ever damaged our wooden furniture (only one tooth mark from when she had a fever so I don't count it) because there was that one wooden thing she was allowed.”

 

14. The Gorilla Wood Chew

 
From @johannap25: “Our puppy had an urge to chew wood and ONLY wood. We discovered chew toys called Gorilla Wood that [are] safe for dogs (it's a pulpy wood that becomes mush and is safe to digest bits of once wet, but chews in a satisfying way for her wood craving). These saved our window sills, coffee table, chairs ... our house and our sanity basically. I wouldn't offer it to a dog who doesn't already have the hankering, but it was 100% what we needed to avoid destruction and provide her with the chewing enrichment activity she needed.”

From @johannap25: “Our puppy had an urge to chew wood and ONLY wood. We discovered chew toys called Gorilla Wood that [are] safe for dogs (it's a pulpy wood that becomes mush and is safe to digest bits of once wet, but chews in a satisfying way for her wood craving). These saved our window sills, coffee table, chairs ... our house and our sanity basically. I wouldn't offer it to a dog who doesn't already have the hankering, but it was 100% what we needed to avoid destruction and provide her with the chewing enrichment activity she needed.”

 

15. A Rubber Ball Dog Chew Toy and Treats Dispenser

 

From TOC: We found this rubber treat ball on Grumpy Puppy Bakery’s site. They are featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here.

 

Leashes and Harnesses

  1. The 30 foot Biothane Long line from Kirsten’s Canine Gear

 
From @karliemarianne: “…30 ft biothane line from @kirstenscaninegear…”

From @karliemarianne: “…30 ft biothane line from @kirstenscaninegear…”

 

2. The Wilderdog Harness

 
From @thelexitales: “…the wilderdog harness. (Lexi is an escape artist and chewed through a Ruffwear harness once!!! It was quite impressive but sad for my wallet)…”

From @thelexitales: “…the wilderdog harness. (Lexi is an escape artist and chewed through a Ruffwear harness once!!! It was quite impressive but sad for my wallet)…”

 

3. The Pro-Mohs Six foot Leather Leash

 
From @giothestandard: “…One of my all-time favorite dog products is a quality 6 foot leather leash - mine from promohs is perfect. Saves your hands and lasts forever…”

From @giothestandard: “…One of my all-time favorite dog products is a quality 6 foot leather leash - mine from promohs is perfect. Saves your hands and lasts forever…” PS: The promo code TOC15 is good for a one time 15% discount per customer through 12/31/21.

 

4. The PetSafe 3 in 1 Harness

 
From @krys10x: “…his PetSafe 3in1 harness. Easiest harness I've ever put on since it clips on like a collar and doesn't go over the head and the front loop was very helpful for LLW training.”

From @krys10x: “…his PetSafe 3in1 harness. Easiest harness I've ever put on since it clips on like a collar and doesn't go over the head and the front loop was very helpful for LLW training.”

 

5. The 10 foot biothane long line from high tail hikes

 
From @chickencherrypie: “A 10 ft. biothane long line from @hightailhikes…”

From @chickencherrypie: “A 10 ft. biothane long line from @hightailhikes…” PS: Use code TAILSOFCONNECTION for 10% off on all products!

 

6. The Hurtta Harness

 
From @smudgethesurreycockapoo: “Best things we've bought are probably … hurtta harness…”

From @smudgethesurreycockapoo: “Best things we've bought are probably … hurtta harness…”

 

7. The Doggy Backpacks From Reddy

 
From @kim.harlington: “My pugs love their doggy backpacks from Reddy. It has opened up their worlds. They can now go everywhere with us, from hiking to traveling on airplanes. Best thing we ever got them.”

From @kim.harlington: “My pugs love their doggy backpacks from Reddy. It has opened up their worlds. They can now go everywhere with us, from hiking to traveling on airplanes. Best thing we ever got them.”

 

8. The Spotted Nose Design Biothane Leashes

 
From @adoringatlas: “Oh and another personal favorite is biothane leashes. We get ours from @spottednose.designs [and have] been obsessed since we started using [it] and will never use another material. Fantastic to customize every detail and easy to clean. Super durable.”

From @adoringatlas: “Oh and another personal favorite is biothane leashes. We get ours from @spottednose.designs [and have] been obsessed since we started using [it] and will never use another material. Fantastic to customize every detail and easy to clean. Super durable.”

 

9. A Waist Leash

 
From @youngkaa: “We love our waist leash for long neighborhood, neighborhood, and farmer’s market walks…”Note: TOC found the waist leash above on Amazon.

From @youngkaa: “We love our waist leash for long neighborhood, neighborhood, and farmer’s market walks…”Note: TOC found the waist leash above on Amazon.

 

10. The Off Road K9 Biothane Long Line

 
From @pittieprincesspenny: “Off Road K9 biothane long line!”

From @pittieprincesspenny: “Off Road K9 biothane long line!”

 

11. The Halti Training Leash

 
From @ashlathemalinois: “The halti training leash at the moment is my favorite. I love its versatility and the price is achievable for most. Our original one is 8+ years and still going strong.”

From @ashlathemalinois: “The halti training leash at the moment is my favorite. I love its versatility and the price is achievable for most. Our original one is 8+ years and still going strong.”

 

12. The Beige Tartan Rope Leash

 

From TOC: We found this leash on The Lofty Leash’s site. They are featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here.

 

For the Home

  1. A Cooling Mat

 
From @rivertonhq: “Cooling mat!” Note: TOC found the cooling mat above on Amazon.

From @rivertonhq: “Cooling mat!” Note: TOC found the cooling mat above on Amazon.

 

2. The Gulpy Water Dispenser

 
From 8bitchip: “Gulpy Water Dispenser. Ours is ~8 years old, has never leaked and seen a lot of use/multiple dogs, and still going strong…”

From 8bitchip: “Gulpy Water Dispenser. Ours is ~8 years old, has never leaked and seen a lot of use/multiple dogs, and still going strong…”

 

3. The Moroccan Bed From Pet Play SF

 
From @miss.maca: “…Oh and also the Moroccan bed from @petplaysf so comfy, durable, and easy to wash.”

From @miss.maca: “…Oh and also the Moroccan bed from @petplaysf so comfy, durable, and easy to wash.”

 

4. A Dog Camera

 
From @barkuterieboards: “The dog camera. But's that's really for my separation anxiety because they just sleep all day.” Note: TOC found this dog camera on Amazon.

From @barkuterieboards: “The dog camera. But's that's really for my separation anxiety because they just sleep all day.” Note: TOC found this dog camera on Amazon.

 

5. The Houndry Bed

 
From @otis_unleashed: “…Otis is OBSESSED with his round soft bed from The Houndry. I've tried a million beds for this dog and this is the only one he's ever truly loved.”

From @otis_unleashed: “…Otis is OBSESSED with his round soft bed from The Houndry. I've tried a million beds for this dog and this is the only one he's ever truly loved.” PS: Use the code OTIS for 20% off on any order.

 

6. The Snuggle Puppy

 
From @petuniapickles_gsp: “…Her snuggle puppy would be right up at the top of the list. It's the one we used for sleep time when she was first brought home and she takes such good care of it and only takes it out morning and night for bed. It's the item I pack in her overnight bag…”

From @petuniapickles_gsp: “…Her snuggle puppy would be right up at the top of the list. It's the one we used for sleep time when she was first brought home and she takes such good care of it and only takes it out morning and night for bed. It's the item I pack in her overnight bag…”

 

7. The Majestic Pet Suede Bagel Bed

 
From @carmren: “Magestic Pet Suede Bagel Bed - she loves this bed so much, it's become a joke because we're pretty sure if it was between us and the bed she'd choose the bed.”

From @carmren: “Magestic Pet Suede Bagel Bed - she loves this bed so much, it's become a joke because we're pretty sure if it was between us and the bed she'd choose the bed.”

 

8. The Colaroo Elevated Cot

 
From @otis_unleashed: “For Sully, the Coolaroo elevated cot is the best thing! She loves that cot so much! I honestly got it mostly as a station for her, but it's her go to safe spot. Otis never liked his.”

From @otis_unleashed: “For Sully, the Coolaroo elevated cot is the best thing! She loves that cot so much! I honestly got it mostly as a station for her, but it's her go to safe spot. Otis never liked his.”

 

9. The Victure Baby Monitor

 
From @ariadneshmariadne: “A cheap video monitor for crate training - Invaluable!!! We have the Victure baby monitor. I would easily pay triple for what I ordered it for. It's been such a life saver and gives me so much peace of mind! It's also helped us ensure that she never has any bad experiences in her crate so only positive associations. Would recommend getting a monitor for any new dog owner.”

From @ariadneshmariadne: “A cheap video monitor for crate training - Invaluable!!! We have the Victure baby monitor. I would easily pay triple for what I ordered it for. It's been such a life saver and gives me so much peace of mind! It's also helped us ensure that she never has any bad experiences in her crate so only positive associations. Would recommend getting a monitor for any new dog owner.”

 

10. A Crate

 
From @thisgoodgirlcharlie: “A crate. It's been vital to help my nervous dog feel safe.” Note: TOC found this crate on Amazon.

From @thisgoodgirlcharlie: “A crate. It's been vital to help my nervous dog feel safe.” Note: TOC found this crate on Amazon.

 

11. The ‘Do Not Touch My Dog’ Pom Pom Beanie

 
Do Not Touch My Dog Pom Pom Beanie

From TOC: We found this human hat on EukaryaPaw’s site. They are featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here.

 

Toys

  1. A Ball That Glows In The Dark

 
From @milo_dcavalier: “[A] glow ball especially during winter, when it easily gets dark.” Note: TOC found this glow ball on Amazon.

From @milo_dcavalier: “[A] glow ball especially during winter, when it easily gets dark.” Note: TOC found this glow ball on Amazon.

 

2. Tug-e-nuff toys

 
From @erno_in_kernow: “His @tugenuff toys - we only use them out on walks so they are extra special and brilliant for recall.”

From @erno_in_kernow: “His @tugenuff toys - we only use them out on walks so they are extra special and brilliant for recall.”

 

3. The Outward hound Hedgehogz

 
From @owenthelobo: “…Outward Hound large and XL hedgehogz because they're Owen's absolute favorite toy so now we've got 6 of them scattered around the house.”

From @owenthelobo: “…Outward Hound large and XL hedgehogz because they're Owen's absolute favorite toy so now we've got 6 of them scattered around the house.”

 

4. The Whistler Balls from Chuckit!

 
From @pheebadoodle: “The whistle balls from chuck it…”

From @pheebadoodle: “The whistle balls from chuck it…”

 

5. The West Paw Soft Frisbee

 
From @anna.richardella: “The West Paw soft frisbee has been our boy's favorite. Because we had brought him home initially to a townhouse with limited backyard space and he was always leashed, he didn't know how to play outside. Once we bought a house with a fenced yard, he didn't seem interested in his indoor toys, but boy did he love when we played kanjam. Now he will go outside and play frisbee by himself.”

From @anna.richardella: “The West Paw soft frisbee has been our boy's favorite. Because we had brought him home initially to a townhouse with limited backyard space and he was always leashed, he didn't know how to play outside. Once we bought a house with a fenced yard, he didn't seem interested in his indoor toys, but boy did he love when we played kanjam. Now he will go outside and play frisbee by himself.”

 

6. The Jolly Ball

 
From @navigatebyheart: “Jolly ball.”

From @navigatebyheart: “Jolly ball.”

 

7. a flirt poll

 
From @6lack6eautyy_: “The one toy I would take to an island would be her flirt pole as she has a high prey drive and it meets her needs. After working her, she is mentally and physically tired and she is able to focus a lot better…” Note: TOC found this flirt poll on Amazon.

From @6lack6eautyy_: “The one toy I would take to an island would be her flirt pole as she has a high prey drive and it meets her needs. After working her, she is mentally and physically tired and she is able to focus a lot better…” Note: TOC found this flirt poll on Amazon.

 

8. The playology scented ball

 
From @liltish: “Playology scented ball! We hide them and they find them over and over.”

From @liltish: “Playology scented ball! We hide them and they find them over and over.”

 

9. The Pet Play SF Toys

 
From @miss.maca: “…and @petplaysf toys!! They are the best and cutest…”

From @miss.maca: “…and @petplaysf toys!! They are the best and cutest…”

 

10. Cardboard boxes and kitchen towels

 
From @puppanara: “Cardboard boxes and kitchen towels count?” Note: TOC found these kitchen towels on Amazon and you could differently put kibble on them and roll them up for some enrichment fun!

From @puppanara: “Cardboard boxes and kitchen towels count?” Note: TOC found these kitchen towels on Amazon and you could differently put kibble on them and roll them up for some enrichment fun!

 

11. Oven Mitts

 
From @bonniegeez: “Oven mitts. Grommet loves to wrestle and mouth my hands while he does. I've taught him that wrestle and mouthing time is totally cool when I've got the oven mitts on. We have so much fun playing "oven mitt wrestling."“ Note: TOC found these oven mitts on Amazon.

From @bonniegeez: “Oven mitts. Grommet loves to wrestle and mouth my hands while he does. I've taught him that wrestle and mouthing time is totally cool when I've got the oven mitts on. We have so much fun playing "oven mitt wrestling."“ Note: TOC found these oven mitts on Amazon.

 

12. Two Identical Soft Toys

 
From @plutodood: “Not something we bought but something we got for free - two identical soft toys. Taught him give/drop it/fetch better than any other technique I've tried.” Note: TOC found these soft toys on Amazon.

From @plutodood: “Not something we bought but something we got for free - two identical soft toys. Taught him give/drop it/fetch better than any other technique I've tried.” Note: TOC found these soft toys on Amazon.

 

13. The Ruffwear Frisbee

 
From @tails_of_toasty: “The Ruffwear Frisbee and only the Ruffwear frisbee ... will not play with any other frisbee.”

From @tails_of_toasty: “The Ruffwear Frisbee and only the Ruffwear frisbee ... will not play with any other frisbee.”

 

14. A Tug Toy With the Ball on the End

 
From @ajojodoodle:”…Buuut. If we're talking desert island ... We'd need a tug toy for sure. Our favorite has a rubber ball on the end…”Note: TOC found this ball attached to a tug on Amazon.

From @ajojodoodle:”…Buuut. If we're talking desert island ... We'd need a tug toy for sure. Our favorite has a rubber ball on the end…”Note: TOC found this ball attached to a tug on Amazon.

 

15. The Pro-fit Mega Ring from Coastal Pet Products

 
From @josielowry: “Pro-fit Mega Ring from @coastalpetproducts Our Golden has not mastered catching in the air but carries it everywhere and loves to fetch it. Best ever.”

From @josielowry: “Pro-fit Mega Ring from @coastalpetproducts Our Golden has not mastered catching in the air but carries it everywhere and loves to fetch it. Best ever.”

 

16. A Chuckit! Ball

 
From @otis_unleashed: “And then for Otis a good ole chuckit ball.”

From @otis_unleashed: “And then for Otis a good ole chuckit ball.”

 

17. Burrow Toys

From @telltaildog: “Burrow toys - I've got the unicorns and chickens for my terrier and she's obsessed.” Note: TOC found this burrow toy on Amazon.

From @telltaildog: “Burrow toys - I've got the unicorns and chickens for my terrier and she's obsessed.” Note: TOC found this burrow toy on Amazon.

18. The Chuckit! kick fetch ball

 
From @gingerbeer.dc: “Best toy we've bought is the Chuckit Kick Fetch ball! If we let her Ginger would play fetch with it for hours.

From @gingerbeer.dc: “Best toy we've bought is the Chuckit Kick Fetch ball! If we let her Ginger would play fetch with it for hours.

 

19. The Kong Tennis Ball

 
From @stanleysthoughts: “The Kong tennis ball! Stanley can literally entertain himself with it for hours lol. It's insane.”

From @stanleysthoughts: “The Kong tennis ball! Stanley can literally entertain himself with it for hours lol. It's insane.”

 

20. The GoDog Stuffed Chicken

 
From @taralfk: “Favorite toy - the GoDog brand stuffed chicken.” Note: TOC could only find the stuffed rooster on Amazon lol.

From @taralfk: “Favorite toy - the GoDog brand stuffed chicken.” Note: TOC could only find the stuffed rooster on Amazon lol.

 

21. the virtually indestructible ball

 
From @karenandcj: “The virtually indestructible ball!”

From @karenandcj: “The virtually indestructible ball!”

 

22. The Hide and squirrel

 

From @maclynnie: “A toy called a "hide a squirrel" I think it was an Outward Hound brand. At first we used it with the squirrels but then it became a really good tug toy and also we hide her balls in it. She lives to get the balls out of it. She also plays with it herself and tries to put a ball in the hole and then she will pick it up and if she has placed the ball just right it will get inside the hole and then she puts it back down and gets the ball out.”

 

23. The Passport Dog Toy

 
the dog passport guide

From TOC: We found this passport toy on the Lizo Bandana Co site. They are featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here. We love this toy because sometimes dogs like to shred important things. Now you can just give them an approved important thing to chew lol.

 

Training Gear

  1. A treat bag

 

From @taylor_hornung: “…a treat bag for out and about training.” Note: TOC found this treat bag on Amazon.

 

2. A muzzle

 

From @smoothandscrappy: “A muzzle. Hands down!” Note: TOC found this muzzle from Amazon.

 

3. Nervous collar and leash

 

From @lexis_bierle: “My dog was extremely scared of strangers, and getting her "Nervous!" collar and leash made it SO much easier to take her out to enjoy being outside without being constantly approached. Made it so much easier to not have to constantly be on the defense.” Note: TOC found this collar on Amazon.

 

4. The Tails of Connection Challenge

 

From @owenthelobo: “I wanted to say that I can’t even begin to thank you all enough for this program and the community you’ve built! I truly believe the TOC Challenge was the turning point for Own and I’m glad I made the decision to commit to our building our relationship over having a “good” or “well-behaved” dog. Last night’s progress would not have been possible without your program kickstarting this journey for us.”

 

5. A treat mold

 

From @owenthelobo: “Treat molds to bake homemade training treats…”Note: TOC found this mold on Amazon.

 

6. A human fanny pack

 
A fanny pack with abstract shapes and bright yellow, blue, pink, teal, black and white

From TOC: We found this fanny pack on the Afropawlitan site. Afropawlitan is featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here.

 

For the Car/Travel

  1. The Sleepypod Car Harness

 

From @meritthemini: “@sleepypod car safety harness. The only one on the market to pass a crash safety test.”

 

2. The L.L.Bean Zip Top Tote

 

From @youngkaa: “…I also got her an extra large ll bean zip top tote as a travel bag for when we go on trips, and honestly it's amazing just to have one spot for all of her stuff. Makes bringing her so much easier for me and it's a good experience for her!”

 

3. a dog sleeping bag

 

From @mashazhuuu: “…best value: @whyld_river sleeping bag.” PS: Enter TAILSGIFT at checkout for 10% off your purchase.

 

4. A cooling vest

 

From @natalyla: “Actually I was thinking about this yesterday on a hike! Cooling vest! My dog has long hair and he is really outdoors and with the high temperatures, even in the afternoon (after 7 pm) this has been a game changer! @euli.thedog is so happy now in summer.” Note: TOC found this cooling vest on Amazon.

 

5.  A ramp for getting in and out of the car

 

From @baileybythebay19: “…a ramp for getting into and out of our car in a safe fashion.” Note: TOC found this ramp on Amazon.

 

6. seat covers that attach to all four headrests

From @taralfk: “…Also a huge fan of back seat covers that attach to all four headrests.” Note: TOC found this seat cover on Amazon.

7. A soft folding dog crate

 

From @taralfk: “Best product we have is the EliteField folding soft dog crate. Ivy will sleep anywhere in that!…”

 

8. A Dog Travel Water Bottle

 
a mint dog travel water bottle on a wood log tray

From TOC: We found this dog travel water bottle on the Lizo Bandana Co site. It is featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here.

 

Grooming

  1. a shower head attachment that has a retractable comb

 

From @owenthelobo: “…shower head attachment that has a retractable comb so I can simultaneously brush Owen's long coat while rinsing the shampoo out of it.” Note: TOC found this attachment on Amazon.

 

2. a coral slicker brush

 

From @giothestandard: “If we were on an island ... I’d have to bring a brush probably my @chrischristensensystems coral slicker.

 

3. The Pet Wand Pro

 

From @kristin.l.e: “The @waterpikpets Pet Wand Pro. makes bath time SO much faster and more tolerable for my doodle who hates baths! A lot of reviews said the plastic diverter it comes with breaks easily, so I bought a $7 metal one to use instead and haven't had any problem.”

 

4. The mud buster

 

From @adoringatlas: “...My personal favorite is the mud buster to clean his paws. I get so much satisfaction seeing the dirty water pour out afterwards. This is super helpful especially since he doesn't like bathing/water.”

 

5. DE-MATTING RAKE

 
A de-matting rake with a black handle

From TOC: We found this de-matting rake on the Grooming Extraordinaire’s site. They are featured on our friend, Kassidi Jones’, Black Pet IG list here.

 
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Ideas for Getting Started With Loose Leash Walking Training

Loose leash walking (LLW) can be a really tough behavior to teach your dog. It can honestly even take years of daily work to get your dog to choose to engage with you on a leash because the world around them is SO fascinating. That’s why we put together this little guide of all of our favorite ideas for ways to train our dogs to walk on a loose leash. 

Why Is Loose Leash Walking Such a Hard Behavior To Train?

Once dogs get past a certain puppy age, they tend to walk faster than humans. Beyond that, the world out there is filled with lots of amazing things (smells, social interactions, things to chase, etc.). Heck, for most dogs, forward movement itself is reinforcing! Dogs are skillful learners, so if they pull right before they get to air scent or pull as they take a step forward, guess what gets reinforced? Pulling! It has a way of building a big reinforcement history really quickly as the behavior that works to access all the awesome things they enjoy outside. 

Recently we worked with Lance (featured in the video above), a 10-month old and 125-pound Great Pyreneese. Lance pulls to say hi to people (because he adores them) and to sniff things on his walks. When a dog that size pulls, simply trying to “not move” isn’t going to work (though it doesn’t work super well for a lot of dogs -- even those under 125 pounds - because the human body is bendy, so often the pulling still gets dogs a few inches as their human’s shoulder moves in its socket). 

We worked with Lance on choosing to walk with his human around his yard. His reinforcement was a treat in the grass, which means he got to sniff too! And what got him access to the reinforcer? Choosing to walk by his human. Since people are FUN to him, we taught him that people are a cue to automatically look at his human. This was all done out of the context of a leashed walk because we needed to get the behavior in order to reinforce it!     

Our List for Getting Started With Loose Leash Walking Training

We put together a little checklist of things you can work on with your dog to train loose leash walking and we’ve broken down many of these things below in our guide if you keep scrolling! BTW, we’ll keep adding to this page as time goes on.

  • Teach your dog the walking behavior out of context and slowly progress (aka start indoors)

  • Focus on reinforcing your dog for correct behavior before they make mistakes (this means proactive and high rate of reinforcement at first)

  • Train a “redirection cue” you can use before your dog pulls 

  • Have a plan for switching from food to naturally occurring reinforcers

  • Prevent your dog from practicing the pulling behavior

  • Train your dog to pay attention to you around distractions that are separate from walking 

  • Teach functional reinforcers like “go sniff” or “go say hi”

  • Meet your dog’s needs first! (Not on a six foot leash, ideally)

What It Means To Meet Your Dog’s Needs First Before Loose Leash Walking Training

Imagine being cooped up inside all day and then immediately expected to stay on a sidewalk in a slow walk when you finally go out. SO HARD! Did you know that if you meet your dog’s needs first, so many problems will vanish? 

Recently we worked with a 10-month old golden retriever named Daisy (featured in the video above in this section). She is a sweet girl, who has started to pull way more as she’s entered adolescence (yay teens). Daisy is lucky and has an awesome family with incredibly realistic expectations for a teenage pup. Here is what they do to meet her needs before they train loose leash walking. 

  • For the most part, they skip non-essential city walks on a six foot leash (it ends in frustration for all parties). 

  • They are lucky to live one and a half blocks from great hiking trails. For now, they are providing some cues for Daisy to tell her she is free to pull and do whatever she wants on the way TO the trails (realistic expectations). 

  • They let her explore, climb, sniff, go in the creek etc. in the woods (where they also capture attention). 

  • Then on the one and a half blocks home, they give their “walk with me” cue and practice the type of walking they want to become a habit. (Fun fact: They don’t have to do anything to get the good walking now! She just offers it now that her needs have been met!)

  • Slowly (and as errorlessly as possible), they are also building good leash walking behavior on the way TO the trail. They’re teaching Daisy that the behavior that leads to walking into the woods (which is what is naturally motivating her) is walking with a loose leash (rather than pulling).

How Teaching Your Dog to ‘Go Sniff’ Can Help With Loose Leash Walking

If you have a really sniffy dog, being able to cue “go sniff” as a reinforcer can actually make it MORE likely that you can get their attention and walk on a loose leash! Now when they give you attention while you’re walking, part of your reinforcement can be to simply release them back to sniffing (this is called a functional reward).      

Recently we taught the adorable little spaniel, Poppy (featured in the video above in this section), the “go sniff” cue. Like a good spaniel, Poppy has a strong nose and loves to use it (and that is GREAT!). Rather than fighting that nose, Poppy’s human can use what she already wants to do outside (sniff) to reinforce behaviors they want to be able to get (some attention). To teach Poppy, we went to an area she loves to sniff and moved away from it slightly (monkey grass is sniffy heaven). She captured a little attention and then would cue “go sniff” and walk towards that monkey grass (where Poppy was likely to sniff anyway). It only took a few repetitions for her to figure out exactly what “go sniff” meant! Note: Sniffing is super important. Teaching “go sniff” shouldn’t be in lieu of giving a dog ample time to freely move and sniff (crucial for their wellbeing). 

What the Heck Does It Mean To Prevent the ‘Pulling Behavior During Loose Leash Walking’

If you have been around dog trainers, you’ve likely heard someone say that you need to prevent your dog from practicing the pulling behavior while you teach them loose leash walking. We were chatting with someone about this recently, and they said, “Well, how am I supposed to prevent the pulling? The whole reason I am training the loose leash walking is because I want the pulling to stop! It feels like a chicken-egg problem.”

When training a loose leash walking behavior, we are really trying to build up a big reinforcement history with our dogs for walking near us. In the beginning, that usually means using treats to help us work up to letting the natural reinforcers take over. The world is filled with potential reinforcers - smells (as we just highlighted), grass to roll in, people to say hi to, etc. When we work on loose leash walking, we want to make sure that the behavior that happens before our dogs access those valuable things is a loose leash behavior = not pulling. Because whatever behavior happens right before our dogs get to sniff that plant is the behavior that gets reinforced.

Here are some ideas to prevent the pulling behavior while training loose leash walking:

  • Be super thoughtful about where you walk. Skip walking routes that are “pull traps.” 

  • Walk your dog with a ten or 15 foot leash* to give them more space to move around without hitting the end of the leash (potentially even longer depending on where you walk). 

  • Train a “redirection procedure” that you can use before they pull. This gives you a way to tell your dog to loop back to you if they are nearing the end of the leash but haven’t pulled yet. 

  • Meet their broader needs outside of the context of a six foot leash walk. 

  • Rent a SniffSpot where you can walk through nature without a leash or find some hiking trails where your dog can safely be off leash or on a long line.

  • Meet their initial immediate needs (as we highlighted previously) before your walk (e.g. game of tug inside, flirt pole shenanigans, food puzzles, scent games, etc.). This can reduce the frenetic energy that can show up at the beginning of walks. 

  • If you encounter a tough distraction, pull off to the side and give them treats as the distraction passes. (In other words, opt out of some of the leash walking tests life throws at you until your dog is ready!)

  • Know what your dog tends to pull towards and observe their body language on the walk. You can release them to access it BEFORE they pull you (may mean you have to pick your pace up, so be thoughtful about where you use this) so that the loose leash behavior is what gets them access. 

  • Proactively reinforce the leash behavior you want (aka feed often for loose leash)! Yes, this is training the desired behavior, but if you do this, it also can prevent some of the unwanted behavior. 

Most of our ideas above for prevention are centered around putting your dog in situations where pulling isn’t even possible. Beyond that, it’s about prepping ahead to have a trained behavior you can rely on to prevent that pulling and become a super skilled observer on your walks. Then you can skip hard distractions and release your dog early to others (e.g. “go sniff” or “go say hi”). Soon(ish🥴) that loose leash walking habit will form!


Some Tips For Structuring a Loose Leash Walking Training Session 

When you’re structuring a loose leash walking training session like the one above with Hana (who was a five month old puppy at the time), there are some key things to consider so you set your dog up for success. Here’s what we recommend thinking about before you start training: 

  • LOCATION: It matters. Train in a spot like a parking lot that’s away from some of the usual tough city distractions but still around some distractions. The right location can be the sweet spot between offering opportunities to grow and keeping your dog successful.    

  • CHOICE: Give it to the dog. We don’t recommend nagging or yanking your dog. If your dogs stops to do something else, just wait. Then when they choose to re-engage, reinforce that!    

  • GO SNIFF: Just as we highlighted above, it can be a powerful reinforcer. Dogs need to sniff, and we are not a proponent of denying them access to do that. But if you are giving your dog enough other opportunities to freely sniff, you can create a setup where you can use a release to go sniff as a way to reinforce your dog for walking with you (rather than pulling to sniff). Please be thoughtful about how you do this.  

  • ENGAGEMENT: If you want it, you should give it to your dog. If you walk your dog and stare at your phone or are making a million lists in your head, it makes it less likely that a dog learning to walk on a leash is going to engage with you. You don’t need to turn into a total ball of energy (but you totally can 😅), but being present matters. Chit chat with your dogs a lot as you walk and frequently change directions.

How Attention Games Can Help With Loose Leash Walking

Attention games make it fun for your dog to choose you. These games are all about choice, and have a lot of freedom and fun built in. They foundational for loose leash walking so that your dog chooses to engage with you vs. the rest of the world while they’re walking on a leash.

Our friend Jaya (who is only 13 years old!!) has been training her pup, Daisy (featured in the video above in this section), who is an adolescent golden retriever, since the day she came home. When Daisy was just a little baby, Jaya played a lot of engagement and attention games to make it fun for Daisy to choose to pay attention to her. From that foundation, Jaya started working with Daisy to teach her how to walk on a leash. Now that Daisy is hitting her “teenage years,” that adolescent brain has created some new challenges on walks -- namely that Daisy wants to use her newfound size to pull towards things she wants to smell!     

Rather than immediately practicing the type of leash walking they may use on the busy city street where they live (with narrow sidewalks), Jaya went back to basics. She played the types of games she practiced with Daisy when she first came home. Sometimes teenage dogs need a little fun refresher before working through particularly hard distractions.    

How You Can Try What Jaya Did With Your Dog:    

  1. Play a simple little engagement game where your dog gets reinforced for choosing to orient towards you.     

  2. Move right into a simple walking game! In this game, treats are tossed out so that your dog gets a chance to sniff a little bit and has the opportunity to CHOOSE to move back to walk with you.              

Note: In the video above, Jaya wasn't actually saying or doing anything to try to get Daisy’s attention (though she was changing directions a lot to keep the game interesting!), and Daisy was free to move anywhere. But where did Daisy continue to CHOOSE to go? Back to Jaya! With very little effort, Jaya reminded Daisy that it is fun (and pays) to walk with her. Now she can start working through some tougher distractions!    

PS: If you’re looking for more attention games so that your dog will voluntarily pay attention to you indoors and outdoors, around all sorts of distractions, check out our course Attention Unlocked, our self-guided video e-course that stars Juliana DeWillems (CPDT-KA, KPA CTP, CBCC-KA, CDBC). 

*[Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning TOC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through our links, at no cost to you.]

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Training Tutorial: How to Teach Your Dog to Drop It

When you visualize "drop it,” do you picture your dog letting go of something? What would happen if we started teaching drop it so that our dogs (at first) think it means something awesome is going to be given to them!? We learned this method from Chirag Patel, and it is our absolute favorite (for puppies and dogs). Keep scrolling for our step by step breakdown of how to teach your dog to drop it (which leads to a great enthusiastic drop behavior):

Step by Step: How to Teach Your Dog to Drop It

  • Step One: "Condition your drop cue" by saying your cue and then scattering treats on the ground (wave your hand in the treats for a second when you do this to draw their attention there and continue to make your hands near food a good thing). This may feel silly because your dog won't have anything in their mouth to drop! But remember, we just want them to think that "something awesome is coming" when they hear "drop," so we are making it predict food. Think about it - what do they have to do in order to eat food? OPEN THEIR MOUTH! Ta-da -- that is the foundation for drop! (Tip: Make sure you say “drop” before you show or reach for the treats. “Drop” must predict incoming treats, so they need to be two separate events.)

  • Step Two: Once you are seeing anticipation in your dog's body after saying the drop cue, start adding in some objects for them to actually bite onto. Start with more neutral objects and work up to higher value objects. At first, you may still have to almost immediately scatter those treats on the ground after saying your drop cue.

  • Step Three: Start to build a pause in after you say your drop cue to see if they drop the object on their own (because if they think great food is coming, they have to open their mouth to eat it ... so you will get an out if the cue is conditioned enough). If they do drop the object on their own after they hear the cue, mark the behavior (say "yes" or click) and then scatter treats on the ground! If they don't drop it right away, no problem - just scatter the treats without marking.

  • Step Four: Keep working through various objects (building in that pause) until you very consistently get an out behavior as soon as you cue it and are then able to mark and reinforce it with treat scatters (or whatever you choose). When you are ready, practice in new settings (try outdoors if you have been working on this indoors the whole time).

Why Reinforcing Drop It Pays Off Over Time

I also reinforce this drop behavior almost every single time. Because of how we teach it, dogs will drop things FAST even without a reward, but I want to keep "money in the bank" on this behavior since the city has a strange supply of chicken wings on the sidewalks. However, my reinforcement certainly changes over time as my dog gets good at this (aka I am not doing treat scatters forever, but hey, you totally could!). Here are some of the things I now use to reinforce a drop: my dog drops a chicken wing and I reward by finding a stick from the ground to toss or play tug with; my dog drops another dog's ball at the field and I reinforce that by tossing my ball to them; my dog drops a stick they carried outside before we go inside and I reward by running away and letting him chase me (and with lots of praise and scratches when they arrive). To be honest, I have even rewarded some harder "real life" drops indoors with "let's go get a treat" and I walk over to the cabinet with my dog to give them one (sometimes I am just not feeling inspired and this is easy). I still use treats plenty because they are fast and efficient! But I am offering the other examples because some people get hung up on not wanting to use treats for some reason. I can get away with just using praise and pets because I have built those up as good rewards over time, but I try to find some way to make the reward even higher value if I can since this behavior can be life-saving.

Pro Tip: Your Voice Matters When Training a Dog to Drop

Fun fact: I try to keep "drop" incredibly positive and happy. I actually teach it to dogs in a higher pitch because I can't angrily say "drop" in that tone (setting myself up for success!). If you are someone who is likely going to panic and scream this at your dog, you can actually condition your dog to that tone, so it is positive instead of scary. We don't want our dogs to think this is a scary or threatening cue. Because if dogs feel threatened or scared, you are more likely to get a dog who does the exact opposite thing you want and actually runs away with the object (and since this is a behavior that can save their life - we definitely don't want to accidentally teach that).

PS: Pin this article for later!

Christie hunches over while partially holding a corn toy Colby has in his mouth during a drop it training session.
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The Dog That Gave Me a Reason to Live: Chris and Vincent

Chris, a transgender queer male in his early twenties, sits with his rescue Pitbull, Vincent, on their couch.

Chris, a transgender queer male in his early twenties, sits with his rescue Pitbull, Vincent, on their couch.

Editor’s Note: Earlier this month it was Transgender Awareness Week which culminated in the Transgender Day of Remembrance. Lauren (@empath_n_drake), a member of our #TOCFam, introduced us to her openly trans friend, Chris (@straydoglife), who also has a reactive dog named, Vincent (@littlebuddyvincent). Chris graciously agreed to sit down for a q&a and we are honored to share his story with you all. (Warning: This content mentions suicide, anorexia, and depression.)

Would you please introduce yourself and tell us a bit about your story (you can share whatever you want to share about yourself)?

My name is Christopher, or Chris for short, and I am a transgender queer male in my early twenties. I came out when I was 16, and it was a hard transition for everybody. Vincent always seemed to recognize me and my voice, no matter how much I changed. I am called his "papa" and he actually responds to that word and looks around for me. I study psychology at university, and I love all dogs very much! I am passionate about helping others because I have been through a lot of mental health struggles. I am passionate about reactive dogs because it is a community that needs a lot of support and has been so welcoming to Vincent and me.

When did you get Vincent?

Seven years ago! I was 16 at the time.

“I picked Vincent because he was the most energetic and felt drawn towards him. I fell in love with him the first time I held him” Chris told TOC.

“I picked Vincent because he was the most energetic and felt drawn towards him. I fell in love with him the first time I held him” Chris told TOC.

How did you and Vincent “meet?”

He was in a litter with his siblings at a farmer's market - all his siblings were sleeping and he was being rowdy. My mom wanted me to pick a female dog, but I always wanted a male dog. I picked him up, and he calmed down in my arms immediately. We didn't find out his breed until way later because the farmer's market was pretty shady. We didn't even plan to get a puppy that day, we were just buying peaches, but I saw puppies and I wanted to look at them because I love dogs. My mom asked me, "Do you want one?" and I said yes. So she told me to pick, and I picked Vincent because he was the most energetic and felt drawn towards him. I fell in love with him the first time I held him.

What did bringing Vincent into your life mean to you?

“In this photo Vincent was about one year old and I was holding and kissing him. I was early in my transition” Chris said.

“In this photo Vincent was about one year old and I was holding and kissing him. I was early in my transition” Chris said.

Vincent gave me a reason to live and recover from my mental illnesses. Before Vincent, I was in and out of the hospital for being suicidal among other things. I was struggling to get out of bed every day and wasn't eating. When I got Vincent, I wanted to take care of him the best I could. I got out of bed. I played with him, fed him, and he slept in my bed with me every night because he hated being alone. Eventually, for my own mental health, I decided to move out of my mom's [house]. It was hard because I couldn't take Vincent with me. Eventually I got my own place and he lived with me for a year, …and people would yell at us and threaten us because he was a pitbull. I eventually made the decision to send him back to my mom's, where he could feel safe, as he had become reactive from the stress of living with me. Without Vincent, I spiraled into anorexia. I went into the hospital and got treatment. On my hardest days, I looked at my planner which had a photo if him on it. It said below, "Do it for him." So I worked my hardest and now my mental health is much better, and I am in remission from anorexia. Whenever I think about relapsing or suicide, I think of him and I decide to go on. Whenever I think about giving up in school, I think of him and how I want a career so I can get a house for him to live with me again. Vincent seems happier and less stressed at my mom's, and honestly I didn't have the money or time to take care of him properly, so I let him stay there. I visit him every Sunday, for his birthday, and holidays.

What are some of your favorite things to do with Vincent?

We love to cuddle, take naps together, and play with his toys. It is the best when he is relaxing, and I am relaxing, and we can enjoy each other's company. He loves to give kisses and lets me kiss his forehead. Every time I come to visit, he [puts] out his paws on me and stays there "hugging" me for a long time. When Vincent is at ease, I am at ease.

How has Vincent’s journey with reactivity impacted your life?

“Vincent is a good boy and enjoys taking treats from his muzzle. He is still working on his reactivity, but recently people outside said what a good boy he was. That made me really happy,” Chris told TOC.

“Vincent is a good boy and enjoys taking treats from his muzzle. He is still working on his reactivity, but recently people outside said what a good boy he was. That made me really happy,” Chris told TOC.

It was really hard. The reason he is reactive was because of the neighborhood we lived in when he lived with me, so I always feel bad about that. He was under a lot of stress to protect me. I didn't do anything about his reactivity for a while, until I found supportive groups online for reactive dogs. I learned how to train him, how to properly muzzle him, and he is making great progress. I hope he inspires other dogs out there who have fear-based reactivity. I used to feel anxious when walking him, but I don't anymore now that he has a muzzle. I don't care what other people think, I am focused on making him comfortable on his walks. When he reacts, I try to gently lead him back to me with treats and tell him to lay down. One day a dog was off leash (illegally) and ran up to Vincent on a day he was not muzzled. Vincent bit the other dog. The owner said it was her fault, but when I got home I cried because I knew if he did it to someone else he could seriously hurt them and he could be put down. So he has been muzzled every walk since. He's a good boy and enjoys taking treats from his muzzle. He is still working on his reactivity, but recently people outside said what a good boy he was. That made me really happy.

When I am with Vincent, I feel_________. (Please fill in the blank and feel free to elaborate.)

Chris and Vincent smile at the camera in their living room while Vincent enjoys a toy

Happy. For me, that's a big thing. I've dealt with chronic depression with major depressive episodes. Happiness was not something I felt for a long time. However, whenever I am with Vincent, I am truly happy. I cherish those moments, and they have gotten me through hard times.

Would you be willing to share a specific memory you have of Vincent?

A fond memory I have is a simple one that I think about a lot to calm down, it is my "happy place." I have narcolepsy, so I take scheduled naps on my mom's couch. He got used to the timing. Eventually, he would always take my naps with me. My fondest memory is him sleeping in the crook of my legs, warm and snoring. I would fall asleep happy knowing we were safe and he was there.

What are some of the ways you take care of yourself?

Vincent smiles at the camera

On my main instagram, I talk a lot about my experiences with mental health, and that helps me be solid in my recovery. I also draw to vent out feelings, as this has worked since I was little. I make sure to nourish myself properly, get plenty of rest, and try to be compassionate with myself. I take care of myself because I know Vincent would be sad if I didn't.

What are some of your hopes for the future?

I hope to get my masters in counseling psychology, get a stable job, and a house where Vincent can live with me again. However, that might take a while, so I am just hoping either with me or my mom he is comfortable and happy until his last days. I hope he continues to make progress in his reactivity, so he can be seen as the good boy he really is and not just a dangerous pitbull.

Any recent book recommendations?

“The Book Thief” was a book I really liked when I had the time to read for pleasure. These days I usually read manga, so I would recommend “Pandora Hearts” as a manga series. I read it since it came out, and it is my favorite and has beautiful art.

What song makes you want to sing along every time you hear it?

Como La Flor by Selena. My mom would sing this with me while I was growing up. I finally understand what the Spanish words mean, and it is quite sad. However, I feel happy singing in Spanish with my mom.

Is there anything else you want to share with us?

It is hard having a reactive dog. It is hard having a breed that is stigmatized. However, you can prove people wrong. You can show them your dog is not dangerous, just scared. You can show them your dog is good, no matter what breed, no matter if they wear a muzzle, no matter if they are reactive. Don't give up, it takes time, but it gets better.

To follow Chris’s life with Vincent, click here.

PS: Pin this article for later!

Chris kneels with his dog. Vincent in front of rays of teal lines that surround them and under the text "The Dog That Gave Me a Reason to Live: Chris and Vincent"
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DIY: How to Make Your Dog a Giant Nail File “Scratch Board”

Erika previews the steps to make a scratch board with a split pvc pipe a saw and intact pvc pipe and tread along with a photo of herself and Mack using the finished product

Editor’s Note: This week’s TOC DIY is brought to you by Erika Fields and her hound dog, Mack. Erika told TOC, “Mack was born in Alabama but his rescue brought him up to Massachusetts, where he lives now. He loves winters (snow zoomies!) and hates summers — we’re complete opposites in that respect.” In order to help keep Mack’s nails short and avoid frequent nail clippings (he’s not a big fan of having his paws touched), Erika made him a DIY scratch board, which is basically a giant dog nail file. Now she says that Mack loves nail time and they use the scratch board during training sessions, which Mack adores as long as he can have part of his dinner in the process! To learn the steps to make your own DIY scratch board, keep scrolling below.

 📎 The Supplies That You’ll Need to Make DIY Scratch Boards

“Mack has two trick titles and we’re working on his third (expert level)! He’s a mutt through & through but his hound nose is what started us on our journey of [also] making snuffle mats. Mack has yet to find a type of food he doesn’t love. Food…

“Mack has two trick titles and we’re working on his third (expert level)! He’s a mutt through & through but his hound nose is what started us on our journey of [also] making snuffle mats. Mack has yet to find a type of food he doesn’t love. Food is definitely the way to his heart (like mine!),”Erika tells TOC.

  • One 4 inch wide pvc pipe (found at most local hardware stores like Lowe’s and Home Depot)

  • 3M stair treads or 80 grit sandpaper

  • Double sided tape/similar adhesive (you won’t need this if you’re using the 3M stair treads)

  • Reciprocating saw (a handheld saw could probably work too)

⏰ Time Commitment

The scratch board will take you roughly 15 minutes to make.

⚖️ Skill Level

Making this scratch board should be relatively easy!

 

✅ Step by Step: How to Make Your Own Scratch Board

The pvc pipe is shown cut in half besides a reciprocating saw

Step One

First you need to cut the pvc pipe in half. I’ve used a reciprocating saw, but a handheld saw could probably work too.

Erika sticks the tread onto the pipe.

Step Two

Once you have the pvc cut in half, you just need to adhere the 3M stair tread to the inside of the pipe. These come with self-adhesive so you just line it up and press it against the pipe.

Erika holds up the adhesive on the back of the sandpaper next to the pipe

Step Three

If you are using sandpaper, you’ll need to cut the sandpaper to fit the inside of the pipe then put adhesive of your choice on the back of the sandpaper before you can stick it to the pipe.

Erika trains with her dog Mack to use the scratch board

Step Four

Grab some treats and invite your dog to start filing down their nails on their own!

If you have something that you’d like to DIY for your #TOCFam, please fill out our form here.

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The Dog That Changed My Life: Marcella And Shimmer

Marcella Ward (above with her dog, Shimmer), is a professional dog trainer and the owner of Dogs Speak Dog Training in Houston, Texas.

Marcella Ward (above with her dog, Shimmer), is a professional dog trainer and the owner of Dogs Speak Dog Training in Houston, Texas.

A twinkle flashes in Marcella Ward’s eyes, and she hops up from her chair and walks over to the wall behind her where a rack with twenty five name tags hangs beneath a painting of her dog, Shimmer. Knowing each tag’s place by heart, she swiftly grabs one and returns to her chair to show me the tag. She holds it up to the screen for me to see and with a delighted grin on her face, she says, “I'm sexy, I'm cute, I'm popular to boot. It goes through the entire beginning cheer and on the back, it says, well, we don't like you either.” These tags haven’t jingled from Shimmer’s collar in over a year now, but it is impossible not to feel Shimmer’s presence and the ripple effects she had on Marcella’s life. 

I plead with Marcella to help me understand what made her relationship with Shimmer so special. In that moment I can’t imagine losing the connection I have with my own heart dog, Otis. Her response surprises me.

“What if instead of trying to figure out what is so special about the relationship, we just enjoy the magic of it?” Marcella asks. 

What Happened When Marcella First Met Shimmer

Marcella grew up with a family dog and jokes that she was always “that kid” who would rather play with dogs than other children. When Marcella was 14 years old, she went to an adoption event with her mom where they first met Shimmer. 

Marcella says that Shimmer feels like happiness and home. She believes that she is a better human being because of this dog.

Marcella says that Shimmer feels like happiness and home. She believes that she is a better human being because of this dog.

Marcella remembers feeling an instant connection as she watched that brown dog turn on the charm. When it was time to put Shimmer back, Marcella sobbed and knew this was her dog. “I just remember from the instant we brought her home, I was just in love with her,” Marcella tells me.   

Why Taking Shimmer to College Led to Her New Role in Marcella’s Life

In high school, Marcella remembers walking around college fairs, and without a moment’s hesitation, she crossed colleges off her list that wouldn’t allow first year students to live off campus. Going to school without Shimmer was unthinkable. 

Marcella went to Texas A&M where she got to live off campus as a freshman and bring Shimmer to school with her. Shimmer and Reveille (above), the college’s mascot, became friends and would chase squirrels together.

Marcella went to Texas A&M where she got to live off campus as a freshman and bring Shimmer to school with her. Shimmer and Reveille (above), the college’s mascot, became friends and would chase squirrels together.

“I'd always had struggles in terms of both mental and physical health. I didn't really think about it until I was in college, but then I was like, maybe, she would make a good service dog,” Marcella tells me. 

Shimmer was already tasking for Marcella and had basic obedience down, so when Marcella was a sophomore, she decided to see how Shimmer would do in public spaces since service dogs have public access. Shimmer took to it instantly, so at the age of six, Shimmer officially became Marcella’s service dog. 

“Did your relationship with Shimmer change at all?” I ask her. 

“I think the only change, really, was that it got stronger. She essentially became my heartbeat, my lifeline. She went everywhere. It really just got stronger,” Marcella says. 

Shimmer loved to nap - especially if she could find something to serve as a pillow. She loved wearing the “Shim Jammies” that Marcella would put on her to keep her nice and cozy.

Shimmer loved to nap - especially if she could find something to serve as a pillow. She loved wearing the “Shim Jammies” that Marcella would put on her to keep her nice and cozy.

More than a Service Dog: The Unusual Way Shimmer Helped Marcella in Organic Chemistry

Marcella tells me that she often asks people who her favorite dog is, and anyone who knows her answers “Shimmer” without a moment’s hesitation. She goes into the sweet dog voice so many of us use and recites what she says to her two border collies, “You’re cute, but you're not the favorite,” as she starts to laugh with her whole body. 

Luckily Marcella shared this priceless photo of Shimmer in her O-Chem lab outfit.

Luckily Marcella shared this priceless photo of Shimmer in her O-Chem lab outfit.

Marcella went to college with plans to become a vet. Very matter of factly, she tells me, “Yeah, physics and organic chemistry and I did not get along.” While those classes may have changed her mind about her career path, organic chemistry lab proved to be a highlight for so many people at school. Shimmer went to O-Chem lab each day, and like the humans in the room, she also had to be safe, so she wore a pair of human goggles (doggles were not really a thing at the time), a lab coat, and booties in case of any glass or spills. Marcella gets so excited just thinking about this that she pulls out her phone and starts searching for a photo to show me. 

Marcella is right: That dog was meant to be a service dog -- her service dog. When Marcella graduated from college, Shimmer walked the stage with her. 

How Shimmer Helped Marcella When She Almost Died

Shimmer sits besides Marcella on her bed in the cardiac ICU.

When Marcella was 23, she had a pulmonary embolism and nearly died. She spent six days in the cardiac ICU, and Shimmer was with her for almost every single moment of it. Shimmer didn’t even want to leave her side to eat or go to the bathroom. When people took Shimmer out to go to the bathroom, she would potty quickly and then immediately pull to get back to Marcella. I can feel the amount of gratitude Marcella has in her heart as she tells me, “Shimmer was there for me through some of my darkest times.” 

Sixteen months ago at the age of 13, Shimmer died of cancer. “The day I lost Shimmer, I lost a part of who I was. I did. It really did feel like a piece of myself broke off and went with her,” Marcella tells me. 

I have done a lot of personal work to remove the shame around my emotions, but at this point listening to Marcella, I start to feel a bit uneasy about being the one with tears in my eyes when she’s the one who lost Shimmer. 

She looks straight at me and with kind eyes says, “Believe me when I say you have no worries crying in front of me. If Shimmer's story and the relationship I have help other people feel things, then I'm glad that I can share part of what I felt when I was with her.” 

I smile and let the tears come as I accept the generous gift Marcella just offered. 

Shimmer would always do a happy twirl and then fold her ears back and smile as she looked up at Marcella after an agility run.

Shimmer would always do a happy twirl and then fold her ears back and smile as she looked up at Marcella after an agility run.

Shimmer’s “Badass” Approach to Beating Cancer

Shimmer was almost 13 when she was diagnosed with cancer. Marcella tells me, “So many people would say it’s ill-advised to put a 13-year-old dog through surgery. I know this probably sounds so goofy to some people. But, I cleared my mind and I told myself I will fight for her… and do whatever I can … but Shimmer has to tell me if she wants to fight.”

Marcella sensed that Shimmer wanted to fight, so she began the process of helping her live. They went back to their alma mater, Texas A&M, for treatment of what doctors thought was sarcoma on her toe. They found out she had high-grade malignant melanoma on her toe as well as a different type of cancer in her chest. 

When Marcella was debating treating Shimmer for cancer, she says she told her dog, “‘I will fight for you, I will do whatever I can. But, you have to tell me if you want to.’” 

When Marcella was debating treating Shimmer for cancer, she says she told her dog, “‘I will fight for you, I will do whatever I can. But, you have to tell me if you want to.’” 

As Marcella spoke, it became clear to me that helping Shimmer live was about so much more than simply helping her survive cancer. It was about giving her more moments of joy. So on Shimmer’s 13th birthday, Marcella threw her a birthday party with some of her favorite people and dogs. Shimmer was a foodie who loved a nice pillow to nap on and was thrilled to open presents on birthdays and Christmas. So for Shimmer, this party hit on all three of those great loves (Marcella jokes that Shimmer just thought the inflatable donut collar was a personal pillow she got to carry around). 

Shimmer’s surgery to remove the thymoma in her chest left her with a ten inch scar on her side. While doing some related tests, the vet also discovered that she had some rare liver flukes -- so uncommon that Texas A&M didn’t even have a stool sample from a live dog with them. Marcella got a proud look on her face as she said, “Shimmer's poop sample lives on at Texas A&M at the College of Veterinary Medicine, teaching students about liver flukes.” 

When Marcella went to pick Shimmer up from the ICU to go home, Shimmer tried to jump into the car and slipped and fell on her back. In tears, Marcella took her right back into the vet, where they promptly told her that Shimmer was totally fine. “That’s the kind of dog Shimmer was. Badass little dog,” Marcella says. 

 
Marcella speaks fondly of “the extra nine months” she spent with Shimmer following her surgery to remove the cancer. She rattles off memories as her eyes gaze into that distant place where I am certain she is getting to experience the moments all ov…

Marcella speaks fondly of “the extra nine months” she spent with Shimmer following her surgery to remove the cancer. She rattles off memories as her eyes gaze into that distant place where I am certain she is getting to experience the moments all over again: puppuccinos, riding around in the car, ice cream, licking dinner plates. Marcella returns to the present and says, “I think that's what helped give me peace - knowing that we didn't waste a single moment together with the time we were given.”

 

Shimmer lived for nine more months following that surgery. When Marcella talks about this time, she calls it the “extra nine months” and tells me “every moment was filled with happiness - all of her favorite things and I know we didn’t waste a single moment together.”      

Three weeks before Marcella lost Shimmer, she had a friend do a photoshoot with her. Marcella picks her laptop up and moves it to show me a large canvas photo of Shimmer hanging behind her. I see a dog with a massive smile on her face and a literal twinkle in her eye. I notice that I am starting to fall in love with Shimmer too. “This is one of my favorite pictures,” Marcella tells me. 

This photo (one of Marcella’s favorites), was taken by one of her friends three weeks before Shimmer passed away.

This photo (one of Marcella’s favorites), was taken by one of her friends three weeks before Shimmer passed away.

How Shimmer Told Marcella It Was Her Time 

The week before Shimmer died, Marcella sensed that something was off. She sat with Shimmer and had a lot of talks where she said, “Wow, look at this body! It’s taken you so many places.” It is hard to hear those words as anything other than a gift. A part of my mind latches onto them as if she is saying them to me, and I feel an immense amount of gratitude for the person that Shimmer has put in front of me. 

Marcella still sleeps next to Shimmer’s blanket and jammies every night, and for just a moment, she will be able to smell Shimmer and feel reassured that she is still a part of her life.

Marcella still sleeps next to Shimmer’s blanket and jammies every night, and for just a moment, she will be able to smell Shimmer and feel reassured that she is still a part of her life.

The next morning, Marcella took Shimmer to the emergency vet after she collapsed. Marcella remembered telling the Texas A&M surgeon that she would help Shimmer recover from the cancer surgery but wouldn't ask her to fight beyond that. That day at the emergency vet, Marcella had a split second where she toyed with going back on that promise. Marcella heard Shimmer take a few of those agonal breaths and made one of the most difficult decisions she’s ever had to make -- to help Shimmer go.

“Even in the end, Shimmer and I made this decision together when she helped me make the choice because she chose to stop fighting,” said Marcella. 

Shimmer did agility until she was twelve and could rebound off of Marcella until almost the day she died. Marcella smiles and shakes her head as she tells me that Shimmer could jump fully up on top of the counter from a standstill at the age of 13.5…

Shimmer did agility until she was twelve and could rebound off of Marcella until almost the day she died. Marcella smiles and shakes her head as she tells me that Shimmer could jump fully up on top of the counter from a standstill at the age of 13.5. Marcella took great pride in keeping Shimmer in good shape and believes Shimmer handled cancer surgery so well because she was so healthy and happy. “We called her little buff Shimmy,” she tells me.

“Where the heck did that strength come from?” I ask her.

“I think, for me, it was knowing that I was giving her that final gift, and also knowing that if I didn't do that, I'd be going against everything I promised to her,” she explains. 

Marcella continues, “For the longest time, I was terrified of death, and, interestingly enough, Shimmer taught me to be okay with it. When it's my time, I have someone waiting for me now, so I'm okay with it. Now I'm okay with death.”  

It was just Marcella and her border collie, Vengeance, in the room when Shimmer took her last breath. When they came to wheel Shimmer out after that final goodbye, two of Marcella’s friends who had come for support saw Vengeance boop his nose to Shi…

It was just Marcella and her border collie, Vengeance, in the room when Shimmer took her last breath. When they came to wheel Shimmer out after that final goodbye, two of Marcella’s friends who had come for support saw Vengeance boop his nose to Shimmer’s. “I think that was like a rite of passage - ‘Hey, I’m taking care of her now.’ I didn’t see it, but I know it happened,” Marcella tells me and I believe her instantly.

What a Spiritual Communicator Told Marcella About Her Connection with Shimmer  

As the one year anniversary of Shimmer’s death was approaching, a friend of Marcella’s recommended she speak with a spiritual communicator. She quickly adds, “As much as I know that, we, as trainers, are all about science-based, I do believe that there are things that we don't know. Things that we may not have discovered yet.” 

“It was incredible. [The communicator] basically told me Shimmer was and is my twin flame - two souls that are so connected that they are meant to find each other and they will always find each other. She said that through all the different lifetimes I've had, I've always had Shimmer with me, and that before I came into this lifetime, Shimmer's soul and my soul decided what lessons I would learn in this lifetime. She shared that Shimmer said she will come be with me again in this lifetime. It may not be right now, but she will. I do feel her everywhere around me,” Marcella says with a deep knowing. 

Shimmer sits on her hand legs and lifts her paw for Marcella at a park.

I have never been someone who believes in reincarnation, but I am someone who rules very few things out. And regardless of what I believe, I can feel my whole body fill with warmth at the thought of a twin flame. Perhaps that is why some of these connections we have with dogs feel so magical -- they are soul connections. They aren’t rooted in intellectual conversations or status; they are two souls finding each other. 

“She’s always with me,” Marcella tells me. She has Shimmer’s actual paw print tattooed on her arm, has Shimmer art all over her walls, and puts Shimmer’s old collar tags on her keychains. 

How Shimmer’s Pure Joy Inspires Marcella 

As Marcella reaches for memories of Shimmer, it becomes clear to me that she is remembering so many of life’s simple little moments. She is reveling in all of the “naughty” things she did like stealing the tuna right off her mom’s salad and smiling …

As Marcella reaches for memories of Shimmer, it becomes clear to me that she is remembering so many of life’s simple little moments. She is reveling in all of the “naughty” things she did like stealing the tuna right off her mom’s salad and smiling at the way Shimmer would grab one of Marcella’s shoes to snuggle with. Marcella is proving how much magic exists in life with dogs.

“When you walk by the pictures and the things remind you of her, do you feel joy or does grief hit you sometimes?” I ask her.

“Joy. I would say more joy than anything. There are moments where I do still have grief, where it hits me for just a second, and I just think how unfair the world is, because if she could have lived forever, that would have just been perfect,” she responds. 

Even though Shimmer is no longer with her in the same way, it is Shimmer who helps her through her grief and struggles. She looks to how Shimmer dealt with cancer as a reminder that sometimes we just have to go through things. “I think that also helped model, despite what I'm going through, I can still find joy in things, I can still move forward,” she tells me. 

Marcella tells me that she owes almost everything she is to Shimmer. She pauses for a moment and then admits that a piece of her left when Shimmer died. Shimmer was with her through so many of her biggest life moments: graduating high school, going to college, graduating college, nearly dying, and starting and growing her own dog training business. It is impossible to talk to Marcella and not see how Shimmer shaped her into who she is today. “Losing that special heart dog changes us as a person, but we become more of the person that we're meant to be in that journey,” she said.

If you look at the logo for Marcella’s dog training business, Dogs Speak Dog Training, you will see Shimmer and her current service dog, Vengeance. And when people ask her to send her professional photos for various higher profile dog training opportunities, she sends a photo of herself with Shimmer “because that dog got everything started.” 

When we wrap up, Marcella looks at me and says, “Well, I don’t know how you feel about this, but I feel like I’ve gained a new friend.” I smile because it feels like I have gained two: Marcella and Shimmer. Their connection was so strong that I feel certain that a part of Shimmer lives on through Marcella. I leave feeling grateful for all the ways that their relationship continues to create waves of connection in a world so often determined to make us all feel disconnected. 

To follow Marcella’s life with her two border collies, Vengeance and Fibonacci, while training other dogs, click here. 

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Marcella kneels over her dog, Shimmer, on the grass in front of trees.
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Training Tutorial: Learn a More Painless Way to Give Your Dog Eye Drops

Editor’s Note: Not long after I adopted my dog Sully, I had to give her eye drops, and I was nearly in tears. She was so afraid that she was snarling and snapping, and I wished I’d had the time to make the experience more pleasant for her before actually needing to give her eye drops. This week we’re so excited to bring you a special training tutorial focused on desensitizing your dog to eye drops from our friend Lisette Rossman, who lives with her eight month old red and white parti goldendoodle, Lucy, in Washington, DC (she is currently an apprentice trainer under our friend and owner of DogTrained, Gwen Podulka, CPDT-KA). We hope that after watching and reading Lisette’s work, you can partner with your dog to make the whole eye drop process more painless well before they would ever actually need the drops. 

✅Step by Step: How to Desensitize Your Dog to Eye Drops

When people get a new dog, have you noticed that cooperative care is rarely at the top of the list of things they are excited to do? It tends to be something they save for later, but there are so many reasons why it is something worth prioritizing! Spending time working on cooperative care can save you and your dog so much heartache and stress if and when your dog needs a medical procedure in the future.

Step One: Work on Consent Behavior With Your Dog

Lucy, Lisette’s Goldendoodle, offers her eye contact at their apartment in Washington, DC.

Lucy, Lisette’s Goldendoodle, offers her eye contact at their apartment in Washington, DC.

When Lucy was a puppy, the first thing that we worked on was consent behavior. For Lucy, that meant giving me eye contact, so I knew that she was ready to engage with me. You can go with whatever consent behavior makes sense for you and your dog, but if you want to use eye contact too, simply wait until your dog gives your eye contact and then mark and reward them with a treat. We will turn this behavior into a “start button” in the next step. 

Step Two: Introduce Your Hand Coming Toward Their Face Using a Start Button

This first step is simply getting them used to your hand coming toward their face. Wait for your dog to look at you (this is the “start button” your dog will use to tell you they are ready) and then start moving your hand in your dog’s directions and mark and reward them (go nice and slowly here if you need to).  If at any time your dog looks away or gets up and leaves, let them do that because that means that they 1) aren’t ready to engage; 2) it is too much for them; or 3) they just want a break. (Pssst...You can toss a treat when they opt out too!). Here is the order: Your dog looks at you → you present your hand (possibly move it toward their face) → mark and treat. You should also give them some treats for not looking at you to make sure they know they have a choice. 

In step two, after Lucy looks at Lisette, Lisette shows her hands and then gives Lucy a treat.

In step two, after Lucy looks at Lisette, Lisette shows her hands and then gives Lucy a treat.

Step Three: Work On Getting Your dog Comfortable with General Face Handling 

In step three, Lucy rests her head on Lisette’s hand as a way to tell her that she is ready for more face handling. Then Lisette begins touching her face and rewarding her.

In step three, Lucy rests her head on Lisette’s hand as a way to tell her that she is ready for more face handling. Then Lisette begins touching her face and rewarding her.

As soon as they are comfortable with your hand coming toward their face, move onto actually touching their face. For Lucy, the main areas that I worked on were her muzzle, her eyes and then the top of her head. You can still use eye contact as a start button behavior. If your dog has a chin rest, that can be an awesome constant behavior or start button for face handling. Either way, wait for consent and then touch your dog’s face gently, mark, and feed. Note: Lucy is used to this but your dog might not immediately put their head in your hand. This takes time.

Step Four: Select and Present the Eyedropper Tool to Your Dog

Next, find the object that you are going to work with. When Lucy was a puppy, I used a close-capped pen because that is what I had around, but you could also use a cotton ball or any object that you think would be helpful for this exercise. Because Lucy did get conjunctivitis, I do have an empty eye-dropper bottle here, which I will use, but again choose whatever object you want to for this exercise. You want to do some basic classical conditioning to create a positive association with the object, so present the object and then give them a treat. Ultimately, your dog should have a positive or neutral response to the presented object as it is part of their normal routine (we don’t want this bottle to turn into something crazy exciting).

In step four, Lisette shows Lucy the eye dropper and then gives her a treat to create a positive and calm association with the object.

In step four, Lisette shows Lucy the eye dropper and then gives her a treat to create a positive and calm association with the object.

💡Tip: One thing to note is that when I was working with Lucy as a puppy, we worked really hard to capture calmness. Whenever you are doing a medical procedure, calmness is really important. For example, if Lucy was super excited to see this eye-dropper bottle and was moving everywhere, that would ultimately make it really hard for me to put in her eye drops. So calmness, in conjunction with having a positive association with whatever object you are using, is crucial.

Step Five: Work on Moving the Eyedropper Object Toward Your Dog’s Face 

Once your dog is comfortable with seeing the object, work on moving it towards their face. Move it a couple of inches and give them a treat. Again, Lucy is used to this, but look for your dog to give you eye contact to let you know that they are still comfortable with what you are doing (you could also use a chin rest as you consent behavior, which will give you a very clear indication of how your dog is doing). The order you want here is: your dog offers you consent/start button behavior → you move the object toward your dog’s face → mark and give your dog a treat. Remember, if they pick their head up or look away, stop (and still give a treat because opting out is a fine choice and actually makes it more likely for them to opt in). 

Step Six: Simulate Using the Eyedropper Object on Your Dog 

In step six, Lisette’s hard work with Lucy culminates with her simulating administering an eye drop to prepare Lucy for the future.

In step six, Lisette’s hard work with Lucy culminates with her simulating administering an eye drop to prepare Lucy for the future.

Once they are comfortable with the object coming toward them, work on simulating putting in the eye drops. In the beginning, when Lucy was a puppy, her consent behavior was giving me eye contact. As she got older, we transitioned that consent behavior to a chin rest. If your dog doesn’t have that behavior yet, it is fine (you can stick with eye contact/looking at you). Simply wait for the start button, begin your simulation, and then give your dog a treat. When you are simulating eye drops, it is really important that you work on both eyes. You don’t want your dog to just get comfortable with doing their left eye for example, and then be funky about their right. I made sure when Lucy was little that we did both sides to prepare her for what I would need to do in the future.

To follow Lucy’s adventures with Lisette, click here.

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Lisette sits crosslegged and puts eye drops in her dog, Lucy’s, eyes.
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Training Tutorial: How to Teach Your Dog to Orbit Around Your Body

Editor’s Note: This week we’re so excited to bring you a special training tutorial from our friend Emily Anderson, who has been training professionally for seven years. She lives with her two dogs Ripley (a Border Collie and Terrier mix) and Nova (a cattle dog and hound mix). 

✅Step by Step: How to Teach Your Dog the Orbit Trick

Orbit is a fun, impressive looking trick where your dog rotates around, or “orbits,” your body, while walking backwards. It requires a lot of patience from you, as well as some really good rear end awareness from your dog. This trick is great to build into your next freestyle training routine if that is your thing!

Step One: Make sure your dog has good rear end awareness, which is critical for mastering this trick.  

There are a couple of activities that you can do to build more rear end awareness: 

  • Work on getting your dog to move backwards (try teaching them to back up and target something behind them). 

  • Work on getting them to pivot - aka taking steps in a circle (try having them pivot while standing on top of a food bowl or a book). 

Focusing on building solid rear end awareness is going to benefit your dog in so many ways and will ultimately play a big role in how easily you can teach this trick to your dog!

Step Two: With food in both of your hands, work to lure your dog backwards around your body in a circle (reward multiples times along the way). 

To start, focus heavily on luring your dog with food through the motions. You’ll want to start to introduce your dog to the feeling of walking backwards around your body and maintaining a somewhat tight circle in the process. To do this: 

  • Start with a treat in both hands. A medium value treat is probably best, but you know your dog! Just make sure it’s interesting enough to follow for a lure, but not so exciting that your dog gets frustrated.

  • Line your dog up on the side of your body where you’d like them to begin the orbit (I start on my left side). 

  • With the treat at their nose, you’re going to bring your hand from their nose back towards their outside ear (so the treat would travel from their nose to their left ear, in this case).

  • Make sure they are following the treat lure, and as you move your hand toward their ear and out away from your hip, they should be stepping backwards. 

  • The number of times you reward is really going to be dependent on your dog’s comfort with walking backwards; but, you want to make sure your rate of reinforcement is high to help them understand what you’re looking for and reduce any confusion or frustration! I would recommend rewarding your dog as they line up at your side and take their first step backwards, behind your body, and on your opposite side. 

  • Always try to finish the orbit back on the original side where you started. Don’t forget to use your marker when they get there (I use a YES instead of a click from a clicker because of the treat luring) and give your dog a treat.

  • Keep working on this, so your dog builds confidence and becomes more fluid following the lures around your body.

  • As your dog begins to gain confidence with this step, add your verbal cue before you begin luring (I say “orbit”). Some people may prefer to use a hand cue rather than a verbal cue. 

  • You can begin adding in multiple rotations and incorporating some speed (still using lures). When you add in multiple rotations, still reward at each necessary step! I like to use a “good!” or “go!” to encourage my dog to continue doing what they’re doing, and a “yes!” on the final rotation. 

  • As I work on adding rotations, I also look for my dog to begin to take independent steps. While still keeping treats in both of my hands, I start to move the lure away from their nose and see if they can follow the lure from more of a distance.

💡 Tip: Starting with some type of barrier behind you or beside you (like a wall or a chair) can help with creating a tighter circle if your dog is backing away.

Step Three: Once your dog can confidently orbit around your body following treat lures in both of your hands, move to using only one lure to get them to complete the rotation. 

  • Begin by getting your dog to start orbiting around you using a treat lure. 

  • When your dog gets behind your back, instead of switching to a treat lure in your other hand, just use your hand (with no food) as a lure to get your dog back around to where they started.

  • When your dog is ready, try to get them to complete two or three orbits around your body. You can use a continuation marker like good or simply some praise along the way, but when they complete the two or three orbits, use your final marker followed by a treat to let them know they are done (I use “yes!”). 

Our goal here is the same as above - look for independent steps where you don’t need to lure as heavily. As you add rotations, remember not to push your dog too quickly!

Step Four: The final step - no need to use treats! 

  • When I fade away from using a treat lure, I still lure with my hands pretty heavily. You may even need to go back to using both hands to complete the rotation here. That is totally okay! 

  • Go back to rewarding on your side after a single rotation, really building your dog’s confidence and understanding. 

  • And then repeat the steps above, but with no treats! 

  • Again, I like to use verbal praise or “good” and then “yes!” and reward when they complete the final orbit and have returned to the starting side. 

As they gain that understanding, start to make your hand luring less obvious and work towards using a verbal cue only (trainer preference!). 

🔧 How to Troubleshoot Teaching Your Dog to Orbit

This can be a difficult trick, and can take time! It took my dog, Nova, two years, on and off, for it to really click and I have still not completely faded her from one treat lure. You may need to bounce back and forth from two treats, to one, to hand luring, back to two treats, especially as you increase the difficulty here! Don’t rush your dog - and most importantly, have fun! 

To learn more about Emily (who is launching her own professional training business soon) and her life with Ripley and Nova, follow her on instagram here.

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What to Do for a Dog With Separation Anxiety

In this video you’ll see a time-lapse of Logan Buie, a dog trainer from Raleigh, N.C., working with her dog, JJ, in a real life separation anxiety training session.

Editor’s Note: We were so blown away by your responses to Logan Buie’s piece on our site “Dogs and Coronavirus: Will My Dog Get Separation Anxiety After the Quarantine,” that we decided to sit down with her for a follow up. As a dog trainer from Raleigh, N.C, Logan graciously offered a realistic plan for you to help your dog tackle separation anxiety. Even if you may have thought it wouldn’t be possible, she tells us in her guide below (keep scrolling) that there is definitely hope.

If you are like me and have a dog with separation anxiety (SA), being able to run an errand without your dog panicking is a big deal. The good news is that over time you can help your dog with SA feel calm when left alone by using a process called desensitization, where you gradually expose your dog to the scary stimulus (in this case, your absence), so that it ultimately becomes boring to her. Desensitization is the most effective method for training dogs with separation anxiety to be left alone because the process actually changes your dog’s emotional response to your departure. The key to this process (which we’ll breakdown for you) is to keep your dog below threshold, which means that you’ll practice leaving your dog for small increments in special training sessions and return before she starts showing signs of of stress like lip licking, pacing, panting, scratching, salivating, and digging.

My Guide for Separation Anxiety Training Sessions that You Can Do at Home

Through a series of structured SA training sessions, your dog is going to learn that it is no big deal when you leave. The time it will take for your dog to feel this way varies widely depending on the dog, but if you do this work, SA dogs have a great prognosis. In order to get started with the actual separation anxiety training sessions, you’ll need to pick a location to leave your dog where 1) your dog feels comfortable while you’re home; 2) you think your dog will be safe; and 3) you limit your dog’s exposure to avoidable departure cues (more below). For my SA training sessions with my dog JJ, I train in my bedroom. Once you’ve picked your location, you’re ready to begin!

1. Figure out your dog’s baseline. 

In order to know where to start with your SA training, you’ll want to get a baseline for how long your dog can be left alone without getting stressed. To determine this, set up a doggy camera (if you have two people in your home you could even leave one person’s phone pointed at your dog, FaceTime that phone, and then leave the house). As soon as you see even the slightest sign of stress (for some dogs this is as small as just staring really intently at the door, so pay attention!) come back inside. Take note of the exact number of minutes/seconds that you were out before your dog got stressed. Don’t panic if this number is zero seconds or very tiny; some dogs may even panic before you leave the room. If this is the case, you may not even get a baseline number since you’ll be able to tell that your dog is panicking before you get out the door. In this situation, you’ll want to work on door desensitization (more on this below) so that the door is no longer scary.

2. Create a training plan for your session. 

You will want to have a plan for each training session that maps out how many departure reps you plan to do and how long each rep will be. For your first SA training session, you will use your baseline to help you build that plan. We will explain what you should write out ahead of time in step five below.

3. If possible, eliminate or desensitize your dog to departure cues that could stress him out during your training sessions. 

Logan, seen above with JJ, says some dogs who have never shown symptoms of separation anxiety can develop it after a big life change like moving or a large shift in routine, like self-quarantining.

Logan, seen above with JJ, says some dogs who have never shown symptoms of separation anxiety can develop it after a big life change like moving or a large shift in routine, like self-quarantining.

Departure cues are any of the little things that we do before we leave the house (think picking up the keys, putting your shoes on, taking a shower, packing your bag, brushing your teeth, changing your clothes, turning on the radio/TV, etc). My recommendation is that you eliminate as many of these avoidable departure cues from your training sessions as possible to make your practice more manageable. For example, I leave JJ in our bedroom so that she doesn’t see me getting my keys or putting shoes on. If I have to change clothes, I try to do that at least an hour before I train, or I throw my clothes downstairs and change out of sight. 

However, some cues are unavoidable, like closing the baby gate, turning the car on, and setting up the doggy cam for training. If you can’t remove a cue and that cue stresses your dog out, you will need to desensitize her to the cue before you begin training. For example, your dog might become anxious at the sight of the camera being set up. You’ll have to use the camera to train, so do a training session where you practice setting the camera up a few dozen times without leaving the room. Once your dog becomes bored and uninterested in the camera, move onto leaving after setting the camera up. Or as another example, if your dog gets stressed before you’ve even left the room, work on door desensitization before you try leaving. This just means opening and closing the door several times until your dog is no longer bothered. Then try opening the door, stepping out, closing the door, and immediately returning. You may need to go through this process with the front door as well as an internal door if you are leaving your dog in your bedroom or another room with a door. 

While treats are commonly used in other types of desensitization work, you don’t need to use treats for these SA desensitization sessions; we don’t necessarily want our dogs getting excited when they see you opening the door, we just want them to be calm (I want to see a dog who is uninterested, so I just watch my dog’s response as I open and close the door). The process for desensitizing to other departure cues is the same. It’s a bit tedious, which is why I like to only desensitize to those cues that we absolutely must incorporate into the training sessions. 

4. Put your dog in the room, prep the space, and make sure you have everything you need for your session. 

Here’s a quick checklist to run through before you start your training session.

Here’s a quick checklist to run through before you start your training session.

About ten minutes before my SA training sessions, I head up to my bedroom with JJ to get ready. To get the room ready for training, I make the bed, shut the bathroom door, close the baby gate, turn white noise on, and close the blinds. The actions you take will depend on your own room and your dog’s preferences. All these little preparatory steps will also eventually turn into cues that tell your dog that you are doing separation training and that all of your departures will be safe and not scary. If your dog begins to show anxiety toward any of these actions, you will need to desensitize your dog to the cue through the process above. This could also be a sign that your training has become too stressful, and that you should take a step back. More on this later.

I also make sure I have my camera set up (so I can observe JJ during each departure), along with a stopwatch to track how long I have been gone, my training plan that lists out my reps and durations (more to come!), and a notebook or laptop to take notes on each departure.

5. Once everything is set up, you can start executing your training plan. 

Your training session is basically a series of repetitions which consists of you leaving your dog and returning to your dog before she gets stressed. 

A typical SA training session has three main phases: warm up, goal duration, and cool down. Whether you do a warm up and/or cool down and how many reps you do depends entirely on your dog. It will definitely require some trial and error and paying attention to how your dog responds. 

The Warm Up (2 - 7 reps):

Warm up reps are much shorter than our goal duration rep and should feel a bit random (your duration should fluctuate up and down randomly to prevent your dog from thinking that each rep is going to be longer than the one before it).  The warm up has two main purposes. The first is to add many short, easy repetitions to the “bucket” of positive experiences that your dog has with your departures. The second is that the warm up reps serve as a cue for your dog that tells her that we are doing the strange thing where we just come in and go out again and there is nothing to worry about. 

Goal Duration (1 rep):

The goal duration rep for a single session is the longest duration that we will leave our dogs for. We will only do one of these reps per session. Your starting goal duration should be a few seconds shorter than your baseline number. For example, if my dog’s baseline was 45 seconds, I would want my goal duration rep for my first session to be 35 seconds. Remember: we want to end training reps and sessions before our dogs get stressed, not right as they are getting stressed. 

Cool Down (1 - 2 reps):

If you find it helpful for your dog, you could add one to two short departures after your target duration rep so that the session doesn’t always end with the hardest repetition. 

Pictured Above: A sample Separation Anxiety Training Plan for a single session with your dog.

Pictured Above: A sample Separation Anxiety Training Plan for a single session with your dog.

When I do separation anxiety training, it basically looks like several repetitions of this:

  1. I leave the room, telling JJ “be right back!”, and shutting the door behind me.

  2. I walk down the stairs, exit the front door, and stand on the front steps for the duration of the rep in the plan that I am working on. While I stand on the porch, I watch JJ closely on the camera. 

  3. After the duration of that rep is up (e.g. seven seconds, 35 seconds, three minutes), I open the front door, walk back upstairs, and enter the room JJ is in. 

  4. When I enter the room, I have a habit of giving JJ two gentle ear scratches if she is laying on the floor by the baby gate. If she’s lying far away from the gate, I don’t bother greeting her, since it sometimes makes her too excited. (Note: You don’t need to totally ignore your dog, but don’t give them the zoomies, either! The exact greeting you do will depend on your own dog).

  5. Then I sit down and enter my notes from that repetition in my spreadsheet and check my duration for the next departure. After about 30 seconds to 45 seconds (or however long it takes JJ to settle back down) of sitting at my desk, I stand up and leave again for my next departure rep. 

  6. Repeat this for all the reps in the training plan! 

  7. After the session is over, I take a look at how JJ did that day and then I construct my training plan for the next session (either later that day or the next day). 

As a note, I don’t recommend that you use treats, chews, or food puzzles when initially doing this work. For many dogs, the food only serves as a bit of a distraction, and then the dog resumes being anxious about your absence once the food is gone. My own dog, JJ, would eat the contents of a frozen food toy then scratch at the door and scream until we came home. So my goal with training is to get her to relax when we leave without the presence of a food toy. Once you’ve reached a good duration of a few hours, you can try adding food toys back into your departures if you want.

6. What if something doesn’t go right during my training session (aka my dog looks frustrated or my neighbor interrupts us)?

When I wait outside during a departure rep, I watch JJ on my phone and keep an eye on the time on my watch.

When I wait outside during a departure rep, I watch JJ on my phone and keep an eye on the time on my watch.

Your plan is simply that: a plan. Don’t panic if you have to adjust or stop your session altogether. The most important thing here is to be prepared to respond if your dog becomes stressed. I’m not necessarily talking about your dog having a full blown panic attack here; I’m referring more to the small signs that the duration is too long. For JJ, this means small vocalizations like grumbles, excessive yawning, pawing even just once at the baby gate, staring too hard at the baby gate, or tucking her ears back against her head. When I see these things, I immediately come back into the house and return to the room where I left JJ. If my dog is too amped up when I come back into the room, I see if I can wait a few minutes for her to calm down before trying another (shorter) repetition. If she’s still stressed out when I try to leave the room again after a few minutes, then that’s a sign that I should end the session and try again tomorrow. I would most definitely make tomorrow’s session easier (i.e. the target duration and warm up reps will be shorter durations). 

If something in your external world interrupts your training (like a neighbor showing up), just end your session. If your dog also struggles with reactivity like my dog, you have to be extra careful about not doing SA training when their triggers appear (for JJ, I have to stop an SA session if the lawn crew arrives). 

7. How often should I do SA training sessions? 

I wouldn’t do more than two training sessions per day, five days a week. If your SA sessions are over 15 minutes in length, I recommend only doing one session per day instead of two. Our dogs need breaks - and we do too! 

I usually aim for one session per day, four to five times per week. 

8. How do I know when to increase duration for the next training session? 

If your dog is super chilled out and bored-looking during training (relaxed eyes, neutral ears, maybe laying down, etc.), then you can progress to the next step. Don’t jump in duration too quickly though! When you are under a few minutes, your goal duration increases from one session to the next should be only 10-30 second increments. Once you start acing longer durations (several minutes) then you can start jumping by a minute or so. Once you reach about thirty minutes or so, you can try increasing the goal duration by about five minutes, and so on. I know this seems like such small steps, but progress will be faster if we go slow and respect our dogs’ pace.

9. How do I track our progress? 

During an SA training session, when I return after a departure rep, I sit down at my desk to enter my notes on that rep into my spreadsheet. Then I look at how long my next departure should be. After about 30 to 45 seconds (or however long it takes …

During an SA training session, when I return after a departure rep, I sit down at my desk to enter my notes on that rep into my spreadsheet. Then I look at how long my next departure should be. After about 30 to 45 seconds (or however long it takes JJ to settle back down) of sitting at my desk, I stand up and leave again.

I am a spreadsheet geek, so I suggest that you use a basic spreadsheet where you can plot your progress. At the very least, I would have one that tracks: date, time, and the longest duration achieved for that session (this would be your goal duration, unless your dog only achieves a portion of that time). I also like to track how many reps I do in each session (usually 6-7 for us) and the total length of that session, from start to finish. Then you can plot your duration versus your date for a nice plot of your progress! Check out this sample spreadsheet I created!

10. Reminder: Start where you are. It is okay if you can’t even make it out of the house. 

We all have to move at our dog’s pace. If you have to shut an internal (i.e. bedroom, office) door before you shut your front door, you may want to get a few minutes of duration with just the internal door before you move onto leaving the front door. Lots of people think,“will this be helpful if I’m not even leaving the house?” The answer is yes! It’s a great confidence builder for both you and your dog. Plus, some dogs can’t handle you making it all the way to the front door yet. Baby steps! 

11. Something is better than nothing.

And sometimes, even with our best intentions, our time just slips away and we don’t have enough hours in the day to sneak in a full SA training session. This is an opportunity to do something easy for both you and your dog; how about two minutes of door desensitization?! Or maybe you do three warm up reps but no goal duration rep. There’s no harm in a few minutes of super, super easy practice! 

12. Management

The scariest part of separation anxiety training for most people is the fact that you can’t leave your dog over threshold. This means that if I’m working on leaving my dog for three minutes during our practice sessions, I can’t leave her for an hour to go to the store. Yes, really. I know. This is scary and hard. But you’ll never make the progress you need to while you’re still leaving your dog to panic. This is because every time we do departure training, we are essentially telling our dog, “Hey, you can trust me. I’ll be back soon, and I’ll be back before you need to panic.” If we add in departures where our dogs go over threshold and panic, how can they trust that those training departures are safe? 

So if you are going to commit to separation anxiety training, you have to make a promise to your dog that you will always do your best to never leave them over threshold. This means ordering groceries online for delivery and getting a sitter for date nights. This means taking your dog to daycare during the day instead of leaving them at home alone while you work. Some people have even found college kids or retired folks in their neighborhood to watch their dog a few days a week. You might have to get creative with your support system -- you’ll need one. It requires a lot of management and a lot of scheduling to make sure that you’re never leaving your dog to panic alone. But I promise that it’s worth it. Management in real life gives your training the space it needs to actually work.

13.  Finding a qualified trainer

I highly recommend finding a certified separation anxiety trainer (CSAT) if you can swing it. I recommend CSATs in particular because they undergo an intensive training program that focuses on treating separation anxiety using the methods that I’ve discussed here. I also recommend working with SA Pro Trainers™. They have to complete an in depth-course and are assessed by CSAT Julie Naismith before they are granted the SA Pro Trainer™ certificate.

If you have a positive reinforcement trainer that you’d like to work with, I suggest asking them how they address separation anxiety cases. You’ll want someone who uses systematic desensitization to departures (everything I’ve talked about here!) and never trains with aversive tools like a bark collar. I have found that the hardest aspects of separation anxiety training are reading body language (our dogs can be subtle!) and staying motivated. A CSAT or an SA Pro Trainer™ are a second pair of eyes to make sure your dog isn’t stressed, and they can help you stay on track!

There are also a few programs that are self-guided (and more affordable) to help you get started with training on your own. The ones I know about are Mission Possible, Home Alone: Treating Separation Anxiety, and Subthreshold Training.

I also recommend Julie Naismith’s book, “Be Right Back.” It’s a great starting place for owners who have dogs with separation anxiety. She provides some sample training plans, as well! 

You can follow Logan’s work and her adventures with her dog, JJ, on Instagram.

PS: Pin this article for later!

Logan Buie kneels on the ground with her dog, JJ, who is lying down.
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The Kindness I Learned From My Dog Otis

Christie wearing TOC earrings with Otis

“You should be able to handle this. You are weak.” This is the song that plays a lot on the radio inside my head. It plays at a nice low volume -- almost imperceptible, but I feel its reverberations throughout my entire body. I feel it in the tightness in my chest that makes breathing difficult. I feel it in the giant lump in my throat that keeps me from speaking. Without thinking, my system starts shoving the fear and shame down, as it's been doing for a lifetime, and I carry on with my day, mistaking my persistence for bravery. 

I walk my then seven month old dog, Otis, and I get beet red as he starts barking at a young child on a scooter fifteen yards away. This is not a playful bark. It’s a back-the-fluff-up bark, and I decide I have had it: “This is not acceptable, I have to fix him.” I am not sure I recognize it then, but I know now it is another hit song on that same radio station inside my head. I begin walking down a metaphorical road of trying to shove my dog into the “good dog box,” where only easy, happy, obedient dogs can fit. 

After some time, I look over at Otis to find a dog who looks flat from all of my metaphorical shoving. There is less life. Less joy. But that damn fear is still there. It just looks a little different. I realize that what I am doing doesn’t feel loving at all.

I decide in that moment that I am going to help Otis from a place of love. I have no idea what that actually looks like though. So I start to learn.

How Partnering with Otis Changed Our Relationship

Otis (seen here with the author, Christie Catan) is an 80-pound Sheepadoodle, which is a cross between an Old English Sheepdog and a Poodle.

Otis (seen here with the author, Christie Catan) is an 80-pound Sheepadoodle, which is a cross between an Old English Sheepdog and a Poodle.

First, I listen and accept. Instead of telling Otis that he shouldn’t be afraid, I ask him what he is afraid of. And when he tells me, I show him that I really hear him by walking to the other side of the street where we can watch scooters pass from a safe distance. I tell him that he is allowed to have feelings and needs and promise him that it is safe to tell me about them. I look at who he is, and I learn to love every part of him. Even the parts that drive me nuts. Because they are just the shadowy sides of the things that make him so beautiful to me. 

Second, I “hold his hand” and tell him we are in this together. We take baby steps, and I listen to him carefully so I don’t push him too hard. We sit in the grass, and he eats chicken while we watch scooters pass by from a safe distance. I am a bit bored, but I smile because the whole experience feels like love. I realize I can honor his feelings while also helping him. And I learn that sitting beside him and helping him feels a lot different than fixing him. 

Third, I add things into his life that fill up his cup. I pay attention and learn what sort of things he enjoys and what sort of things calm him. I very intentionally start adding those things into his life and feel incredibly grateful to be able to give him this gift. I notice that he starts to communicate more and more as he learns that I will at least always listen (even if I can’t always give him exactly what he wants).

How Training Otis Helped Me Find Acceptance in Myself

Otis and Christie wearing t-shirts

As I sit here at my desk with a now three-and-a-half year old Otis at my feet, I start to feel that old classic hit song reverberating in my body again. I decide I don’t like this song very much, and almost as though by muscle memory, I change the station. This action is new for me, and yet somehow, it feels familiar. 

The song on the new station goes something like this: “I know you are afraid to feel what you are feeling, but I promise it is safe. We can handle it together.” 

Looking at these past few years working with Otis, I realize it was never just about training my dog. In the many many hours I spent training him, I strengthened some really important muscle groups: acceptance, compassion, humility, grace, and love. The more I use those muscles in my relationship with my dog, the better I get at recruiting those same muscles for my relationship with myself. 

I am very slowly learning how to accept and honor some of my own fears and feelings. It turns out that what I have wanted all along is what I give to my dog: someone to listen and accept me and what I am feeling, someone to sit with me and help me when I am ready, and someone to enjoy life with. It turns out that I am capable of being that someone for myself - I have had lots of practice. Just ask Otis. I am his favorite someone. 

You can follow Christie’s adventures with Otis on Instagram here.

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Why Teaching Your Dog to ‘Read the Room’ Can Help Simplify Your Life

Imagine if you could get your dog to read the inside and outside world and make smart decisions that make both of your lives easier? It’s definitely possible and we’re going to break down how to do this. In the how-to video above you’ll see me teach Otis to lie down (without any human instructions) when I open the dishwasher. If you keep scrolling down below we have even more quick and fun examples from our friend and professional trainer, Juliana Willems. Once you learn this concept, you can apply it in so many ways to prevent or solve problems or even just create a more harmonious life with your dog. 

How to Be the Translator that Helps Your Dog Read the Room

For more on cue transferring, check out this IG live we did with Juliana on April 20.

Do you remember what it was like to start a new job? Imagine that it’s your first week at a new company, and when you show up to your first morning meeting, your boss Johnny walks in. Sarah, your peer who has been at the company for several years, turns to you and says, “Close your laptop.” Sarah translated what Johnny entering the room indicated, so that you would know how to behave (she knows from her years of experience working for him that Johnny’s pet peeve is when his employees are distracted and looking at their computers during meetings). Now, when Johnny walks into your morning meetings, you automatically close your laptop without Sarah having to translate for you. From a behavioral perspective, Johnny walking into the meeting became an environmental cue for you to close your laptop. 

If we want our dogs to behave in certain ways around environmental cues, we will have to channel your hypothetical colleague Sarah and translate for our dogs until their new learned behaviors become automatic. In dog trainer speak, we are doing something called a “cue transfer.” 

How a Simple Acronym Will Help You Be an Effective Translator for Your Dog

OOO. SMART. SHIT Sandwich. Don’t you just cringe at all of those weird corporate acronyms that people love to throw around at work?! Well we figured we’d keep the party going here and give you one for this context! LOL!! 

In this graphic, I break down NOB with the example of teaching my dog, Otis, to lie down when I open the dishwasher.

In this graphic, I break down NOB with the example of teaching my dog, Otis, to lie down when I open the dishwasher.

Here is the acronym you need to remember when you serve as a translator for your dog (a.k.a. when you want to transfer a cue): NOB

New Cue - This is the new environmental cue that your dog doesn’t really know yet. In our office example, the new cue was Johnny walking into the morning meeting. 

Old Cue - This is a cue that your dog already knows. In our office example, the old cue was Sarah saying “close your laptop.” 

Behavior - This is the behavior your dog does based on the cue you give him. In our office example, the behavior was closing your laptop.

This order matters, which is why we’ve given you the NOB acronym to remember the sequence! 

Here are some basic steps for your NOB (a.k.a. cue transfer) training sessions: 

  1. Make sure you clearly define your desired behavior and what specific thing in the environment you want to serve as the cue. (Hot tip: “Not barking” is not a specific behavior. Focus on the behavior you want rather than on the one you don’t want.)

  2. Present your dog with the new cue (the environmental cue). 

  3. Wait a second and then present your dog with the old cue (the cue they already know). 

  4. When they offer the behavior you want, reward them. 

  5. Repeat. 

  6. Then pause for a longer period of time after presenting the new cue to see if your dog will automatically offer the behavior without you having to give the old cue. If they don’t, no problem - just present the old cue. 

  7. Reward when they offer the behavior. 

  8. Repeat these steps until your dog automatically and consistently offers the behavior when presented with the new cue. 

Three Amazing Examples of How Dogs Learned to Read the Room

When Opening the Back Door Becomes a Cue to Go to Bed

  1. Open your back door.

  2. About one second later, say “go to bed” (Note: This must be a known cue for your dog). 

  3. Reward your dog when he gets into the bed. 

  4. Reset (release or do a reset toss) and repeat. 

  5. When you think your dog is ready, open the back door and wait a bit longer silently to see if your dog will go to his bed on his own. If he does not, simply say your old cue “go to bed.” 

  6. Either way, reward your dog when he gets in bed. 

  7. Repeat until your dog consistently and automatically goes to bed when you open the back door (without you having to say “go to bed.”) 

When Opening the Dishwasher Becomes a Cue to “Go to Your Crate”

  1. Open the dishwasher door.

  2. About one second later, say “crate” (Note: This must be a known cue for your dog.). 

  3. Reward your dog when he gets into his crate. 

  4. Reset (release your dog or do a reset toss by tossing a treat away) and repeat. 

  5. When you think your dog is ready, open the dishwasher door and silently wait a bit longer silently to see if your dog will go to his crate on his own. If he does not, simply say your old cue “crate.” 

  6. Either way, reward your dog when he gets into the crate. 

  7. Repeat until your dog consistently and automatically goes into the crate when you open the dishwasher door (without you having to say “crate.”) 

When Ringing the Doorbell Becomes a Cue to Come Sit in Front of You

  1. Ring the doorbell. 

  2. About one second later, say “come.” 

  3. Reward your dog when he comes to sit in front of you. 

  4. Reset (toss a treat away) and repeat steps one through four. 

  5. When you think your dog is ready, ring the doorbell and wait silently for a bit longer to see if your dog will come and sit in front of you on his own. If he does not, simply say your old cue “come.” 

  6. Either way, reward your dog when he sits in front of you. 

  7. Repeat until your dog consistently and automatically comes and sits in front of you when he hears the doorbell (without you having to say “come.”) 

Why Reading the Room is the Gateway to Problem Solving with Your Dog

If you hate nagging your dog then you’ll love cue transferring. Eventually you’ll be able to remove yourself from the equation and let the environment tell your dog what to do. This concept can be used in so many situations! Here are just a few of the ways we’ve seen it used to help: 

  • Reduce problematic barking

  • Reduce the risk of a dog running out of an open door

  • Stop annoying behaviors like sock stealing or getting onto an open dishwasher 

  • Teach your dog to automatically look at you when he sees a [insert cue...dog, person, squirrel, deer, car, etc.]

  • Teach your dog to automatically sit and wait before crossing the street 

So What Happens in Real Life When We’re Outside of Our Training Sessions?

Most of our dogs will encounter "new environmental cues" outside of training sessions before we have fully completed our work as their translators. In some cases, you may even have an environmental cue that you find difficult to replicate in a training session. So what do you do then? You have two options: 

1. Try to get the ideal behavior as quickly as possible after your dog perceives the "new cue." Let's use a real life example from my own experience working with my dog, Sully. She is completely fine with our vacuum cleaner, but she cannot stand the one that the caretaker uses to vacuum our apartment building hallways every single day (that hallway vacuum is a completely separate environmental cue for her). At first, when she heard the hallway vacuum, she would go nuts barking at the door. I decided I wanted that scenario to tell Sully to run to her bed instead of barking at the door, so I had to translate the environment for her. While I never knew exactly when the vacuum would show up, I could predict it was generally in the afternoon. I made sure to have some very high value treats that I could grab in a moment’s notice. The second Sully noticed the vacuum, I would cue her to go to her bed. At first, I often had to stick a smelly treat in front of her nose and lure her away from the door and to her bed, where I made treats rain from the sky for as long as that vacuum was in our hallway. Over time, I no longer had to lure her away from the door when she heard the vacuum. Instead, I could redirect her pretty easily with a verbal cue asking her to go to her bed (aka the "old cue"). And eventually, I no longer needed to lift a finger. Now when Sully hears the vacuum she will walk away from the door and to her bed and I don’t have to say anything! (Side note: Because the hallway vacuum only appears once a day and it is a real life situation that involved some reactivity, my progress was much slower initially than it would have been if I was able to do actual training sessions on a more neutral cue. But it still worked!)

2. Manage the situation by keeping your dog from being able to practice the behavior you don't like around the new cue. Let's use my same hallway vacuum example from above. Some days I had important calls in the afternoon that I couldn't easily step away from to work with Sully if the vacuum appeared. On those days, I would put Sully into the bedroom (farther away from the hallway) and play a little white noise or music to reduce the chance that she would actually hear the vacuum. I wasn't making progress with her by doing this, but I also wasn't allowing the situation to get any worse.

We can’t wait to see you start to translate the environment for your dog and help him read the room. Be sure to tag @tailsofconneciton on Facebook and Instagram.

A big thank you to Juliana for chatting with us about this fun topic! If you want to learn more about Juliana, you can visit her website.

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Christie Catan stands in front of her open dishwasher while Otis the dog lies down on the wood floor looking at her from just outside of the kitchen with the text “Why Teaching Your Dog to ‘Read the Room’ Can Help Simplify Your Life”
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Training Jessica Yergin Training Jessica Yergin

How Can I Get My Dog to Stop Barking During a Zoom Conference Call?

“Can the person with the barking dog please go on mute?” These days what used to make for a funny story over drinks with friends, has become a near constant headache for many dog parents who simply can’t figure out how to get their dogs to stop barking during their marathon of Zoom meetings. For help we sat down with Gwen Podulka, a certified professional dog trainer - knowledge assessed (CPDT-KA), who recently joined us for a special Instagram Live devoted to all things reactivity. During the Live she told us in passing that reducing barking during Zoom meetings is the number one topic on her clients’ minds these days, so we knew we just had to follow up with this special Q&A.

Let’s start from the beginning, Gwen, because barking is actually really fascinating. Why do dogs bark in general? 

Because they can! It is totally normal for dogs to bark and not all barking is bad. Barking is also an amazing form of communication. If you take it away and tell them never to do it, you have to be incredible at reading dog body language, and typically humans are not great at that. If our goal is a quiet conference call, we have to first understand what kind of barking our dog is practicing before we come up with a plan to help.

I like to break down barking into nine different categories. In training, we try our best to stick to describing behavior rather than interpreting for our dogs, but for the sake of simplicity, I am going to insert a bit of human thinking here to make it easier for people to get the basic gist. Here’s what our dogs are trying to tell us:   

Types of Dog Barks.png

So why do dogs bark during Zoom conference calls?

This is a loaded question, and there isn’t one simple answer. I do think it is an important question for people to think about with their own dogs because it helps them to understand what is driving that barking behavior if they want to teach a different one. For the purposes of this article, let’s talk about some of the factors that could be at play.

Gwen, seen here with her dogs, Lemon and Bug, has over 20 years of experience as a certified professional dog trainer.

Gwen, seen here with her dogs, Lemon and Bug, has over 20 years of experience as a certified professional dog trainer.

Your dog may be excited or frustrated and want your attention. In video conference calls, we tend to be fairly engaged. Your dog might be responding to your tone and energy on the call and could be getting excited or frustrated that you are engaging with a silly screen instead of them. Your dog may have initially made more subtle plays for your attention that went unnoticed and now is amping up to barking. And if you think about it, when your dog barks while you are on an important call, it tends to immediately get your attention as you attempt to prevent a giant racket. Barking quickly increases as soon as your dog realizes he has the power to shift your attention from the screen in front of you. 

Your dog may be noticing and reacting to things on the video conference call. If you are on speaker, your dog may hear another dog bark on the call and start responding to that. Your dog may even be responding to the tones of other voices on the call. Some dogs even pay attention to what they are seeing on the screen, and that could lead to barking. 

Your dog may be reacting to triggers totally separate from the call. Some dogs are very sensitive to noise and motion outside of your windows and doors and will bark when they see or hear things. This type of barking may have been happening long before today, but it is only becoming something you notice as an issue now that you are home all day. 

Your dog may be sensitive to your complete change in routine. The world likely feels quite different to your dog -- both inside and outside of your home. If you’ve never been home 24/7 like this, you’ve never really engaged with the world in this way in front of your dog, so it is a completely new “picture” for him that he is trying to sort out. Depending on how your routine has changed, your dog may also be feeling a bit uneasy or may not have the same mental, physical, and social outlets that he used to have. 

So how can I get my dog to stop barking while I am on my video conference calls?

Like most everything that we work on with our dogs, we want to think about both training and management. Training is where you will proactively teach the behavior you want, but since that can take some time and we are realists here, you also need some management tactics to help you get through your calls in the interim.

What should I do in the moment if my dog starts barking during a call and I haven’t had the opportunity to train around this scenario? If possible, mute yourself and then quickly and calmly find a way to redirect your dog to something that is not barking (for example, you could give them a chew or pull them up into your lap to love on them). You could also put your dog in his crate or in a separate room as long as that is not something that will increase the level of barking when it comes to your dog. If your dog has a strong “go to mat’ behavior that is associated with calm, you could also cue that. You are human and doing the best you can in this bizarre new situation, so just pick the least aversive option to manage your dog’s behavior in that moment and keep yourself sane. 

Now think of this call as a test that you and your dog took. Your dog barked a whole lot, so you failed. But that is totally okay! This is the kind of test you get to take again. You now get to use what you learned from this failed test to prepare for your next test (aka your next call). 

But If I give my dog attention or a chew to manage his barking during a meeting like this will this behavior from me reward his barking? Probably. But in the moment, you just need to get through your important call, and that is okay. However, let’s clarify one thing: If the barking is fear-based reactivity, giving your dog attention or a chew will not “reward your dog for barking” (that is a false premise since fear is an emotion, not a behavior, and therefore cannot be reinforced).  

What kind of training can I do to prevent my dog from barking during my calls?

Training is your chance to be proactive and really teach your dog the behavior you want from them when you are on these calls. Let’s talk about just a few of the things we can do to try to create more peaceful calls. 

  • Train during pretend Zoom calls. Have you ever done a training session while you are on a Zoom call? If not, that “picture,” meaning what your dog sees and experiences while you are on a call, feels new to him, and dogs are not good at generalizing behaviors. You can try to replicate the picture of a Zoom call in a training session and teach your dog the behavior you want. This may mean going into the room where you work, turning on the computer, putting down your coffee, and starting to talk and gesture at the computer screen while you reward your dog for the desired behavior. You may want your dog to lie down calmly on a mat while you are on calls, so practice that. Start talking to your computer and drop treats on your dog's mat pretty frequently as long as he is calm. As you practice more, you won’t need to give as many treats. Then when it comes time for a real Zoom call, your dog will recognize this picture and likely make a choice that works better for you. (Tip: Have some treats ready to reward him for calm on a real call when you are first working on this.)

  • Proactively teach with an element of management. You may want to include a leash, crate, or baby gate into your practice training sessions in case you need to put your dog behind a gate on a real call. This way, if you have to use management, you and your dog already feel good about it. 

  • Start working toward a settle on practice calls. Grab a good amount of food or treats and walk with your dog over to where you work (it may be good to have them on a leash here too). Say “settle” once as a way of letting your dog know that you plan to be here for a while. Then start capturing all of the behavior you like as you work toward a dog who is lying down and relaxed. To be clear, this is not a moment to be stingy. Find anything to reward. Is your dog standing up quietly? Give him a treat. Did your dog just sit down? Give him a treat. Did your dog lie down? Give him a treat. Is your dog still lying down? Keep giving treats. Then you can start talking at the screen like you would on a call. Did your dog stay quiet? Give him a treat. Tell your dog all the things you love by giving him treats during these moments. 

  • Think about how you can pay your dog. If your dog is calmly lying on his bed, you can give a chew as a big reward (this also tends to keep dogs quiet since it gives them something to do). Don’t be afraid to also drop some treats in front of your dog to reward him for quietly chewing. Think about it: that is an awesome behavior to reward! No matter what, make sure you have lots of food or treats available for practice on real calls. We don’t want to miss the opportunity to reward our dog for something we like -- especially as we are first working on this. 

  • Set up a Zoom happy hour with friends to create a more realistic practice for your dog. Just remember to bring your treats and reward your dog. 

  • Keep your dog successful. If you are doing a practice call and your dog starts barking, I would probably just end the game. This tells you that you are not paying him at the level he needs. You need to shift how frequently you give paychecks (treats) and/or what you are paying them with (maybe they like a different type of treat more).

I've also noticed that my dog is barking a lot more out the window during the quarantine. Is there any way to help reduce this too?

For more on reactivity in general, check out this IG Live we did with Gwen on April 6.

This is a good question because this type of barking can require a different approach. 

  • First, if your dog is barking out the window, you can try calling him over to you or asking him to go to his bed. If he responds to you and leaves the window, reward him since he did the behavior you asked. 

  • If your dog is barking out your window a lot, I would look to do some management since we don’t want our dogs practicing a behavior we don’t like. You can add a white noise machine so he doesn’t hear as much noise outside or use a cover to block his view out of the window. You can buy film on Amazon that still lets some of the light in but obstructs your dog’s view outside. As a more DIY option, you could use tin foil, wax paper, etc. to cover the part of the window your dog can see out of. 

  • It’s also important for you to see if you can identify why your dog is barking in order to find the right resource to help. Can you try to study his body language to see if he is offering you physical cues? Would some desensitization and counter conditioning help? 

You can find out more about Gwen by visiting her website here. 

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Gwen Podula, CPDT-ka, sits on the ground with her laptop open in her lap and a dog resting on her knee.


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Training Jessica Yergin Training Jessica Yergin

Dogs and Coronavirus: Will My Dog Get Separation Anxiety After the Quarantine

In this video you’ll see a time-lapse of Logan Buie, an assistant dog trainer from Raleigh, N.C., working with her dog, JJ, in a real life separation anxiety training session.

Editor’s Note: Over the last couple of weeks we’ve received questions from members of our community wondering if their dogs can develop separation anxiety from spending too much time with them during self-quarantine. For answers, we sat down with Logan Buie, an assistant dog trainer from Raleigh, N.C, who is especially passionate about separation anxiety education. She is also a co-host of our recent Tails of Connection Training Party.

Can my dog get separation anxiety from spending too much time with me during the quarantine?

The answer is a definitive … maybe. Some dogs who have never shown symptoms of separation anxiety can develop it after a big life change like moving or a large shift in routine, like self-quarantining. But some dogs are able to seamlessly return to their old routine after a big change. I don’t know that there’s any way to predict which dogs will struggle with a life change, and it is likely related to a set of genetic factors, the same way that certain puppies are predisposed to separation anxiety very early in life. 

Please do not panic about this, though! We can’t control everything about our dogs, and we certainly can’t control how long we are under social distancing precautions in our communities. We can just do the best we can, right now. 

When my partner and I adopted JJ, (pictured above), in October of 2017, it soon became clear that she had some behavioral problems. She is reactive to almost all dogs and has separation anxiety.

When my partner and I adopted JJ, (pictured above), in October of 2017, it soon became clear that she had some behavioral problems. She is reactive to almost all dogs and has separation anxiety.

What are the steps to reduce the possibility of that happening? Is there something I should do with my dog for a few minutes every day?

The good news about my answer to the first question is that we can practice departures with our dogs to maintain a sense of normalcy. You can practice short departures around the time of day that you would normally leave for work, driving around the block if you can, or just sitting on your front porch. You can also practice these short departures at different times of day, so that your non-separation anxiety dog is reminded that sometimes you just randomly “pop-out” and it’s absolutely no big deal. This could be a great time to work on a project in the garage, mow your lawn, or take a walk around your neighborhood without your dog. 

Even if you don’t have a dog with separation anxiety, I would suggest monitoring your dog on camera for these departures. You can use a laptop webcam or an old phone; it doesn’t have to be fancy. The change in routine can be hard for our dogs, so even if your dog has never shown signs of anxiety during previous absences, it’s a good idea to check on them via camera to make sure that they are still comfortable with you leaving. If they show any signs of discomfort, like whining, barking, crying, scratching/digging at the door, pacing, etc., they need to be left for a shorter period of time the next time you leave. And don’t forget to use the camera to check on your dogs when you go back to work, too. If they do end up showing any signs of separation anxiety, you’ll want to know immediately, so that it can be treated! 

What if my dog already had separation anxiety prior to the quarantine, and we’d been making strides to reduce his anxiety? How do I make sure he is not set back by this? What should we be working on every day?

I won’t lie, this was the first thing I thought about when my partner and I both moved to working remotely. I know I had bigger problems to worry about, but instead I was focused on this: “What if my dog, JJ, can’t handle us going to work after all this is over?” Since then, my worry has decreased a bit, for a few reasons. One is that I just can’t control how long we’re stuck at home or how JJ will respond to going back to her old routine. So I try not to dwell on that stuff. 

Another reason my worry is a little lower now is that I am trying to get back into the swing of separation anxiety training! If you can, keep training exactly the way you were training before self-quarantining started. If you aren’t able to get in your car and go out (your city doesn’t allow it, you are avoiding the grocery store for safety reasons, etc.) you can practice leaving your dog while you hang out on the front porch with a cup of tea or a book. 

And like I mentioned above, the change in routine has been hard on most of our dogs. So even if you are training at the same time of day as usual and following the same training plan, you might see a bit of a setback from where you were two weeks ago - that’s okay! Go at your dog’s pace. Focus less on the duration you’re getting, and try to focus more on the number of good, safe departures that you are giving your dog each time you practice. It can be easy to aim for departures that are longer than our dogs are comfortable with, so have some flexibility. It’s always important, but especially now. 

This might also be an awesome opportunity to train your dog to be left alone at times that you normally can’t train. During normal life, I can only get in about one separation anxiety session a day (aiming for five days a week.) I’m hoping to use this time working at home to do one practice session in the morning and one practice session in the evening. 

I just brought a puppy home. We are working from home right now, so my puppy only knows what it's like for us to be around all of the time. Is there anything I can do to help prepare my puppy for a more “normal” routine? Any advice for small things we can work on together?

YES! You can work on the exact same thing that I mentioned above - practice departures. You can do a pared down “getting ready for work routine,” and then leave your dog while you take a walk or sit on the front porch and get some fresh air, which we all need right now. Or maybe you need to go (safely!) pick up groceries from your local market - try to fit this in here, like you’re “going to work.” This won’t be the same as getting them ready for the entire workday, because we can’t be out of our homes all day long right now, but it is a great chance to prepare them for the fact that you’ll leave at a particular time each day. 

Many people also don’t have enough time to gradually ease their puppies into being left for several hours at a time, due to the limitations of going to work. So the silver lining of this is that you probably have more time to train your puppy to be okay with your absence than you normally would! 

JJ has taught me immense amounts of patience and compassion, and it is safe to say that without her, I would not have discovered my passion for animal behavior and dog training.

JJ has taught me immense amounts of patience and compassion, and it is safe to say that without her, I would not have discovered my passion for animal behavior and dog training.

If you’re planning to crate train your puppy, you can work on that now, as well as training them to be okay with being in a separate room from you. Again, we all know that this isn’t the same as the training that happens when you actually go to work, but it’s important to add all this into the “trust bank” that you have with your puppy. And when you do go back to your normal routine, don’t expect them to be okay with you being gone for six hours immediately. You’ll want to slowly work up to the full amount of time, to set them up for success and avoid panic. When you do go back to work, be sure to check on your puppy periodically via camera, so that you can identify any possible signs of stress, if needed.

Is it possible to “cure” separation anxiety?

I love this question. No good dog trainer will ever promise you a cure that’s 100% guaranteed. But there’s also an outdated myth that a dog with separation anxiety will always panic, for the rest of his life, end of sentence. This just isn’t true! There’s a good prognosis for most dogs with separation anxiety if it’s treated properly: with a desensitization plan that makes the owner’s absences “No Big Deal” instead of “Super Scary All The Time.” This means always practicing departures that keep your dog under threshold (i.e. returning to the room before they panic). Many dogs with separation anxiety can eventually be left alone for a few hours, like a “normal” dog. It just takes dedication. 

A Special Note From Logan

I want to add a little author’s note on taking care of ourselves. If you are feeling tired, overwhelmed, and anxious, and you can’t picture fitting training into your life right now, that’s okay. The maximum we can train for separation anxiety is generally two times a day, for five days a week (but that can vary by dog.) And oh boy - that feels like way too much for me, as a human, right now. Aim for something easy. Maybe just once a day, a couple times a week! Maybe it’s just once a week right now, or you just pop out for a few minutes to check the mail every couple of days. Maybe you work it into your morning routine, right before you start working from home. Or maybe you sleep in a little instead, because we’re all trying to cope. Please do not feel like you have to pressure yourself to be the perfect trainer or dog parent right now. We are all just trying to survive. Now is not the time for perfectionism. We should all be considering how we can set our dogs up for success when we get back to normal, but we also need to be taking care of ourselves. Take a few deep breaths, do what you can, and give your dog a big hug for me.

You can follow Logan’s work and her adventures with her dog, JJ, on Instagram and on her website here.

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Community Jessica Yergin Community Jessica Yergin

#TOCStories: What It's Like Living with a Great Dane

This past Monday we sat down with Leeanne Sciolto and her one and a half year old Mantle Great Dane, Jude, at their home in Washington, D.C. Leeanne opened up about the "hilarious and humbling" nature of her life with Jude for this first installation in #TOCStories, our special series featuring members of our TOC community.

When Leeanne Sciolto first met her Great Dane, Jude, he was only six weeks old. She drove two hours outside of D.C. to a breeder, and even though he was in a litter of ten other dogs, she immediately fell in love. "He just had a kind of exuberant free spirit to him and he liked to play. He was a big love bug and he still is today," she gushed.

Before getting Jude, Leeanne was going through a tough time. "I had just had a really devastating breakup that still chokes me up to this day talking about it ... and I had a bad situation at work. I was working 12 plus hour days. I needed something for myself. I needed something that was going to make me leave the office. I needed something that was going to make me get out of bed on the weekends and not just close myself in and cuddle with my cat," she remembered. It wasn't long before she realized that Jude had “saved her life.”

How Problem Solving and Consistency Are Key to Jude’s Training Routine

Jude has an incredible wardrobe of hats, snoods, bow ties, collars and more.

Because of Jude's size (he's 125 pounds and still has about 20 pounds left to grow), Leeanne quickly decided that training would be an integral part of their daily lives. In the beginning, she hired professional trainers. After that she continued to work with him everyday to maintain what he learned and grow their bond.

When it came to training Jude at home, Leeanne faced a big challenge: he is not food motivated. After buying him pretty much every treat on the market (think soft, hard, smelly, and non-smelly) she discovered that he only really enjoys cheddar cheese and ham. When Jude is stressed, he will not eat. To complicate things, he is also reactive to sounds, so if he and Leeanne stand outside of their front door, he likely won't take cheese or ham out of her hand because there are too many things going on outside around them.

“I've really had to figure out what motivates him, what makes him tick, and work with him as he presents himself with whatever else is going on ... That's one of things I was drawn to with the Tails of Connection Challenge ... It really emphasizes that you just need five minutes a day, and it gives you something to focus on with your dog every day. It's a great reminder and a good excuse to spend five minutes working with this big little guy working on our relationship.”

Why Leeanne and Jude Find Joy on the Water

In the summer, Leeanne and Jude like to go to Annapolis or to Baltimore and meet up with friends and go standup paddle boarding.

In the summer, Leeanne and Jude like to go to Annapolis or to Baltimore and meet up with friends and go standup paddle boarding.

According to Leeanne, even though Great Danes are known for being giant couch potatoes and not needing a lot of exercise, Jude is always up for an outdoor adventure, especially if it involves the water. The pair have road tripped up to Cape Cod and stayed on the beach, and one of the things that they like to do in the summer is standup paddle boarding. From the beginning, Leeanne worked hard to help Jude fall in love with the water. Now he loves the water so much that there's been more than one occasion that he will actually jump in the shower with Leeanne. Jude also has his own kiddie pool for the summer, and when it rains, he loves playing in the "liquid sunshine."

You can follow Leeanne's life with Jude through their instagram account. If you're interested in future Tails of Connection Challenges, let us know here.

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Leeanne and Jude walk across a crosswalk in a residential area of Washington, DC.
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Behind the Scenes: The Making of the Tails of Connection Challenge

Filming with dogs made for some interesting bloopers.To keep things realistic, we chose to embrace imperfect takes. In fact, you will notice in the challenge that we used a #ShakeItUp video where Otis fails to do the exercise Christie set up.

Picture our first day of shooting this challenge: As I sit in one of those high barstool chairs, three large studio lights are about two feet from my face. The camera is so close that I worry it must be capturing every single pore. My co-founder, Jess, counts down with her hands, “three, two, one,” and I sit in silence, completely unaware that I missed my cue. She chuckles and begins her countdown again: “Three, two, one.” Silence. This time I know I am supposed to speak, but I lose all ability to form words. Eventually, the words come, but so do some very (and I mean very) awkward eye movements. “What in the world is happening to my face? It has a mind of its own!” Before we continue with this director’s cut and the story of my meteoric rise to on-camera stardom (I hope by now you’re picking up on my sarcasm), I want to go backwards and tell you the story of how we landed on launching a challenge in the first place.

Why We Never Dreamed of Launching a Challenge

This is a look behind the scenes at one of our first days of filming the challenge in my living room.

This is a look behind the scenes at one of our first days of filming the challenge in my living room.

When Jess and I envisioned Tails of Connection (TOC), we weren’t thinking of a challenge. We’d already assembled an awesome community of dog parents on Slack and wanted to keep taking steps toward our larger goal of launching the dog community of our dreams. Truth: our initial ideas for progress were more like building a jet and flying halfway around the world than taking a baby step forward. Perhaps it was the wisdom from our mentors - both those we met in person and those we felt we knew personally thanks to podcasts (Alli Webb, if you are reading this, we basically believe you’re our friend) - or maybe it was the fact that we couldn’t (yet) afford to build our metaphorical jet, but thankfully we course corrected, so to speak. We eventually hunkered down to figure out how we could produce something realistic that would provide value and give us a chance to get some feedback from our audience. Our brains immediately arrived at building an ecourse of sorts. 

How I Ended Up on Camera

We realized that in order to move forward, I needed to be on camera. I never wanted to be “the talent” and had been fighting this concept for months. I even dismissed countless mentors who told us that this was the best way to start. Since we were out of options, I finally agreed, with the following conditions:

  • We create an ecourse that feels more collaborative than a “me-telling-you” thing. 

  • The focus is on having fun and helping people make training a regular part of their lives. I did not want to promise perfection. 

  • We are clear that I’m not a professional trainer. Don’t get me wrong, I have learned A LOT over the years (and wow do I wish I’d known so many of the simple dog training concepts I learned later in life much earlier), but being transparent and authentic mattered to me. 

Our Creative Process for Producing the Challenge

The ex-consultant in me created this spreadsheet to organize our initial concept for the daily topics for the challenge. This definitely evolved as we filmed!

The ex-consultant in me created this spreadsheet to organize our initial concept for the daily topics for the challenge. This definitely evolved as we filmed!

We sat down at The Wing in Washington D.C. to storyboard the content for the course, and as we were going back and forth we tossed out the idea of a challenge, where users could learn together during a set period of time for five minutes a day. We realized that format would allow us to create something fun with community (similar to what we’d built on Slack) around the information that we presented. As a recovering ex-consultant, I built a spreadsheet of all the dog training things I wanted to share, categorized them according to the type of skill (i.e. foundation, basic obedience, advanced obedience, and tricks) and then drilled down into those categories even more. The list got big in a hurry. We initially thought about creating a month-long challenge, but it didn’t take long for us to realize that a 30-day challenge (with new content every single day) might overwhelm people (later, we realized that it would have meant double the amount of work for us - ha!). 

So we landed on a two-week challenge and worked to narrow down all of the topics that we wanted to cover. We knew we had to pick the right mix of entertaining and informative activities to fill the 14 days and then provide some space for more experienced people/dogs to progress. I always enjoyed revisiting foundations, so we decided to slot those in on some days as a value-add for any dog, regardless of their experience level with training. Format wise, each day we decided to help make this challenge work for a variety of levels by providing both a “how-to” section that explains how you teach the behavior or game to a dog who doesn’t know it and a “#ShakeItUp” section where we show fun ways to progress and offer other options participants can try to advance a behavior even further. We also invite users to show us the special way that they like to practice each skill in our private Facebook group dedicated to the challenge. Just like Slack, how cool would it be if people started sharing their own videos and other participants could really get motivated and inspired?

What It Was Like Filming the Challenge in My Apartment

Otis and Sully were amazing to shoot with during the challenge. Sometimes they would beat me to their marks “on the set.”

Otis and Sully were amazing to shoot with during the challenge. Sometimes they would beat me to their marks “on the set.”

Each day, we transformed my apartment into a set and shot videos in my living room. We decided to invest in a professional camera and lights (which we stored next to my bed - hurray for city apartment living). 

Luckily for my relationship with Jess, I got significantly more comfortable on camera. Jess also played the role of wardrobe supervisor and raided my closet. She had me wear the same shirt for every day of the challenge (it’s now collecting dust in my dresser). 

In general, filming with dogs made for some interesting bloopers. On more than one occasion, Otis was sitting next to me as I nailed a segment, and then suddenly decided to leave the shot to kiss Jess. For the most part though, Otis and Sully actually did really well. We had to watch the schedule and their behavior to make sure they were willing to continue filming. To keep things realistic, we chose to embrace imperfect takes. In fact, you will notice in the challenge that we used a #ShakeItUp video where Otis fails to do the exercise I set up. We easily could have reshot that segment to capture Otis succeeding, but we wanted to show real dogs having fun rather than being perfect all of the time. 

Why We Kept the Daily Challenge Videos Short 

Here’s a peak at Jess’s edit bay at home. She spent hours editing the challenge after we finished shooting every day.

Here’s a peak at Jess’s edit bay at home. She spent hours editing the challenge after we finished shooting every day.

From the beginning, we filmed each daily challenge segment separately (e.g. the intro, how-to, perks etc.). We initially did this to reduce the number of “lines” I had to deliver in a given take and give Jess a chance to reframe shots if necessary. We actually envisioned splicing those segments together into a single video for each day of the challenge, but as Jess edited them, we realized that people might also like to watch them separately. For the most part, I improvised each segment and Jess constantly harped on keeping it short (no wasting words) and human (less technical “trainer speak” and more conversational advice). So often when I watch a long dog training video, I need to go back to a specific section of the video when I actually go to teach my dog. However, I can never find the 45 seconds I need in the 29 minute YouTube video. We hope that by creating a better experience, it’s easier to finish the challenge. 

This is Just the Beginning

While our vision extends far beyond this challenge, we are really proud of what we have built and are so excited to launch. What we created is far from perfect, but after testing the challenge with a group of dog parents like you, we know how fun and effective it is. 

We hope that you will join us!

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