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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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Guide: How Should a Harness Fit on a Dog and More

Otis the sheepadoodle runs forward wearing a neon orange y shaped harness in a mint circle under the words TOC Harness Guide

Keep reading for tips for selecting a properly fitting harness and cooperatively putting it on your dog (plus, our favorite harnesses!).

A harness is a great way to keep your dog safely and comfortably tethered to you with a leash. An ergonomic harness can help prevent injuries and should be comfortable for your dog when they have it on. A well-fitting harness will allow for free shoulder movement and minimize breathing constraint.

This guide is focused on general use dog harnesses rather than harnesses for specific sports like bikejoring. [Disclosure: This article 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.]

How To Find a Good Harness for Your Dog

Yellow lab wearing an olive green harness. Text on image says: The basics of a good harness fit. SHOULDERS: Free to move! Neck straps don't impede shoulders even when the dog pulls/lunges. GIRTH: Around rib cage. CHEST: Connection point of chest &

When looking for the correct fit of your Y-shaped harness on your dog, look for the meeting point of the chest & neck straps to land on your dog’s chest bone to keep the trachea safe and the shoulders unimpeded, the armpits to have enough space, the girth strap to be around their rib cage, and the chest strap to be narrow enough to avoid rubbing their front legs.

  1. Look for a Y-shaped harness 

    We call them Y-shaped harnesses because if your dog is standing and facing you, the harness strap coming up from their belly, over their chest bone, and around their neck should look like a Y rather than a T. When well fitted, the Y shape gives your dog’s shoulder blades free range of motion - that’s really what we’re after here. 

  2. Look for the “Meeting Point” of the chest and neck straps to be on the chest bone

    Where the chest strap (the one that comes from under the belly and up the chest) meets the neck strap (the one that goes around their neck area) should land on the chest bone (this is the prominent bone you can feel on their chest), not the soft tissue. This helps protect the trachea and ensures good pressure distribution of the dog pulls into the the harness.

  3. Make sure the shoulder blades are unimpeded

    Harnesses come up from your dog’s belly to their chest bone and then go around below their neck. Check to make sure the harness isn’t going over their shoulder blades. 

    If your dog is a big puller, you’ll want to ensure that you have a snug enough fit (without being too tight) in the neck strap to keep it from sliding down and restricting their shoulders when they pull. Generally look to be able to fit two of your fingers stacked vertically under the neck strap. 

    If your dog isn’t pulling much in the harness, it’s likely okay to have a bit more room here.

    TIP: Take a video of your dog walking without a harness on and then with the harness on. Their gait should look the same! 

  4. Look for space in the armpit 

    Rubbing under the armpit can be really uncomfortable and also restrict movement, so when you try a harness on your dog, make sure it isn’t resting right in their armpit. Alternatively, if there is too much space here, the harness slides around a lot more when the dog stops before the front legs stop it. You are looking for your dog’s arms to be able to move backwards freely and to avoid chafing in their armpit.

    As a general guide: look for two to three finger width’s distance from the armpit crease and from the chest strap for medium dogs and three to four for larger dogs. It’s tough to give a general rule here because dogs and human fingers are shaped so differently, so looking at where the straps are actually hitting is key.

  5. Check the fit around their abdomen 

    The girth strap should lie over your dog’s ribs, not behind them on their soft belly tissue.*

    While the harness should be secure enough not to slide around a ton, you want to at least be able to comfortably slide your hand (or two fingers stacked vertically) under the harness once it’s all buckled up. 

    *Note: If you’re getting a harness with a third belt (often called a waist or safety belt), some of the third straps still sit on the ribcage while others sit right beyond the last rib on the waist (which can be useful if you’re really worried about your dog slipping out of the harness since that is the narrowest part of their abdomen). If the third strap sits beyond the ribs, check that the leash attachment point is on the main girth strap that goes over their rips (and make sure that third strap isn’t too tight).

  6. Consider chest strap width

    Some harnesses have thicker chest straps. If your dog is a bit narrower between the front legs and you have a wide chest strap, the harness may rub when your dog moves, creating discomfort and potentially changing how they walk to avoid the feeling (which can lead to abnormal pressure on their joints). This is another example of where video is your friend!

  7. Consider adjustability 

    This can be a great option if your dog’s proportions don’t fit a lot of standard harnesses.

    Plus, just because a harness fits right now doesn’t mean it’s going to fit in a month for any number of reasons. It’s important to continue to check that a harness is still a good fit for your dog - especially if you notice their body has changed. 

    If you have a fast growing puppy, a harness that has more adjustable straps may give you a bit more wear than one that does not. 

    But … just because a harness doesn’t have adjustable straps everywhere doesn’t mean it couldn’t be a great fit for your dog.

  8. Check for “twisting” when you add a leash

    This is a big reason why I like some harnesses more than others. There are plenty of harnesses that fit great when you don’t have the leash attached but then start to twist to the side when the weight of the leash is added. This can fundamentally change where the straps are landing on your dog. In general, I recommend testing most harness with a leash on (and perhaps even with a little tension) to make sure the general fit is still good.

    The type of leash you use may play a factor here too. For example, I like biothane leashes (typically longer ones), and I sometimes let them drag, which can add some weight. I’ve used harness before that always wound up lopsided towards whichever side the leash was on. Some of this is a fit thing, but I’ve also found that some harnesses are just better at staying in the center on dogs’ backs than others. You can read reviews to see if people mention this and can try the harness on with a leash before you tear off the sales tags. 

  9. Consider material & general design 

    This one comes down to you and your dog’s preferences and needs. Here are some things to consider:

    • Wide vs. Thin Straps

    • Padded vs. Not Padded

    • Heavy/Hefty vs. Light/Minimal

    Straps can be made from all sorts of materials too. Some materials may make more sense if your dog, for example, often gets wet on walks. 

    You may also want to consider whether or not you need bright colors or reflective design components. This can be helpful if you hike in the woods where hunting is allowed or if you walk at night. 

  10. Consider safety / security

    Escape Artists: If your dog is at risk for slipping out of their harness, consider a harness that has a third strap around the belly that makes it much more secure. 

    Pullers and Lungers: If you’ve got a big strong dog who has a tendency to lunge or pull, look for harnesses with multiple attachment points. While we don’t recommend using a front clip to teach loose leash walking, having both a front and back clip option may be helpful for some people. You can attach to the front clip if you feel like you need a bit more leverage when they pull or lunge in order to feel safe walking them. In addition, having a front and back clip allows you to attach a double clip leash or emergency handle. Having a handle on top to hold onto may also give you an extra sense of security.

    Mobility Support: Harnesses with handles on top can also be helpful if your dog has mobility issues or if you sometimes want to hold onto the handle for more security in certain situations.

  11. Overhead vs. Buckle Neck straps

    Some dogs really don’t like harnesses coming over their heads. If your dog falls in this category, know that there are some harnesses out there that allow you to buckle the straps around their necks instead of pulling them over their head. 

Introducing a Harness to Your Dog 

When introducing a harness, the key is to take baby steps and allow your dog to opt in and discover all the good things that happen when they approach a harness. 

A white dog sits and looks to the center/right. It's sitting on a tree stump and wearing an ill fitting harness with words that point to it and how it goes over the shoulder blade and impedes range of motion

Try to avoid harnesses like the one above that look like a T shape in the front. The straps on this harness go over the dog’s shoulder blades and restrict the dog’s range of motion, which can be uncomfortable and create physical health problems down the line.

Perhaps begin by simply having the harness out on the floor and allowing your dog to investigate. Give them some treats or a fun toy after they’ve come over to check the harness out. 

If they seem comfortable with the harness on the floor, you can pick it up. This is where I like to use a bit of a cooperative care framework to allow them to control the harness coming towards them. 

You can use something like Chirag Patel’s Bucket Game or do something as simple as using orientation to you as a start button behavior. When your dog approaches you and looks at you/generally orients to you, lift the harness and give them a treat. When they look at you again, lift the harness and move it an inch towards them. Take baby steps. When you first make contact, try just touching their shoulders with the harness rather than going over their head with it.

If you’ve got a head shy dog, consider separating out the motion of moving your hands towards their head from holding the harness. 

You might even consider first practicing bringing a large t-shirt or a big belt or looped leash over their head before you move into the harness. 

Pay attention to your dog’s body language. If they tense up, tuck their tail, pull their ears back, or look away, pause and give them some space. If they leave, let them walk away - heck, perhaps even give them a treat for calmly walking away (that’s a great skill in life!). Having the ability to easily say no can actually make it more likely for them to say yes. 

When they do come back, take a step back from whatever you were working on to make it easier! And keep those reinforcers flowing. 

If you go nice and slow, you’ll likely be able to fade the treats from the picture (if you want), and approaching the harness and having it put on will be reinforced by access to the good things that come with a walk. 

Troubleshooting When Your Dog Seems to Hate Their Harness 

If your dog runs away when you pull the harness out, you aren’t alone. While harnesses often predict lots of awesome things (outdoors), it’s clear that they can also predict some things the dogs don’t seem to love - hence those escape behaviors. 

One of the first things to check is the fit and design of your harness - see above. If it’s not a well-fitted Y-shaped harness, it may be uncomfortable for your dog. (Note: your dog may have some preferences in terms of materials and general design, so you could also experiment with this even if your current harness fits well.) 

Another thing to investigate upfront is underlying pain. Sometimes dogs have something going on with their ears or teeth that can make putting the strap over the head really uncomfortable. There could be underlying pain elsewhere too. If you’re seeing other signs of potential pain, it’s worth checking with your vet. 

If you’ve got a well fit Y-shaped harness and have ruled out pain, we can move onto training. Here are some ideas to consider when thinking about how to get started:

  1. Change the context 

    If your current “put the harness on routine” is cueing your dog’s escape behaviors, it will be much harder if you try to train approach behaviors with the exact same environmental conditions. 

    You can change things like the location you work in, how you stand/sit, what object you hold, what’s out in the room you’ve been in (for example, sometimes having drawers open might be enough of a difference), etc. 

    This post highlights how hard it can be if we work in an environment that is already cueing some other behavior (we end up fighting extinction). 

    The good news is that you can eventually bring the new approach behavior into the old problematic conditions (just go slowly). 

    This post talks about how “ … what is selected is always an environment-behavior relation, never a response alone.” Donahoe & Palmer (1994). LCB, p.68 (via Dr. Jesus Rosales-Ruiz’s talk “Learning in Context: Expedited Learning Through Environmental Design”)

  2. Break it way down (split criteria) 

    Think about all of the actions you perform when putting a harness on your dog and work on them one at a time. For example, if you’re standing up when you put your dog’s harness on, you’ll have to bend over them. You could work on that without holding a harness first. Another example could be touching their shoulder with the harness before you work on getting it over their head. 

    This post shows how I split criteria to ultimately get a cone on my dog, Otis. The same basic principles can apply to putting a harness on. I had to go to this extreme due to how aversive the cone was, so you may not need to do all of this for a harness - just depends. Hopefully this helps you think about how to approach splitting criteria though.

  3. Work with an object other than their harness 

    Use a looped leash or a belt and make a BIG loop to start. Gradually make the loop smaller. You can throw on some reps where the loop is bigger too to take some pressure off. 

    Here is an example of training using a looped leash leading to a dog eventually voluntarily sticking their head through a harness loop. 

  4. Have clear ways for your dog to opt in or out 

    Regardless of your approach and how you break it down, having ways for your dog to control what you do can increase the likelihood that they opt in. Yep, your dog being able to say no matters for a lot of reasons! 

    To do this, you want clear contingencies. Check out this post for some general information about how to create an opt in behavior and fade IN the object or action. 

    This post highlights how big of a difference subtle shifts can make on behavior and emphasizes the importance of giving your dog control (avoid chasing them if possible). 

    Here is another post on getting started with start button behaviors. I like having people play around with the concept in a low stakes setting (let your dog control when you move your hand or when you hold up a coffee cup) before trying to use it in real life. 

  5. Protect your training 

    While you’re working on building those new, wonderful approach behaviors with the harness, what do you do for walks?! It depends. 

    If a collar is a safe, comfortable option, you can walk your dog on a collar while you work on the harness. 

    If you absolutely need a harness on your dog, make sure your routine walk-prep context looks quite distinct from your training context. This might mean using two different harnesses (one for those no-choice moments and one for the choice-filled training moments) or it could mean making sure the environment looks different (i.e. where you put harness on for walks vs training location or that you have glasses on in one situation and not the other). Over time, the goal will be to bring the behaviors from the training context into the routine walk-prep context, but that should be done intentionally. In the meantime, having the two situations look different will help protect the progress you are making in your training. 

Note: Trainers can be a big help here! Don’t be afraid to reach out if you need some extra help. So many wonderful people providing excellent support out there.

Our Harness Product Recommendations

The harness that’s best for your dog is the one that works best for THEM. What works for one dog may not be the best for another. Leveraging the list above can help you determine what harness might be best for your dog. The good news is that there are a lot of really wonderful harnesses out there. Here are some of the ones that we love or the dogs and people in our TOC Family love.

a brown dog sits in profile looking to the right on a grassy field with his blue harness on and a muzzle

Ruffwear Flagline

“One of the best fitting harnesses I've found for Boobert. Most harnesses tend to twist or rub or just don't quite fit right in one area, the flagline is very adjustable and fits great everywhere, especially lots of room around the armpits. Also has lots of great features like multiple leash attachment points, built in handle, loop to clip light to, and the straps behind the ribs make it extra secure.” - @boobert_the_bully

[Boobert is a bully breed mix wearing a size medium]

Haqihana Harness - Multicolor

“It leaves the shoulder very open. Adjustable around the neck and chest, and the under belly piece as well. Well made (though has plastic clips, not metal). Doesn't have extra adjustment straps hanging all over. Cleans easily.” - Alex O.

[Ruby is a pit mix wearing a size small long. Ruby is 50 pounds, 26" chest, 16" neck, 21" at the withers, muscled with some looser skin on the neck.]

a black and white dog stands in a stream with a purple harness on

Non-Stop Dogwear Line Harness

“It is lightweight (so lightweight!!), durable, brilliant for dogs that get muddy, super padded, and has 3 options for leash attachments. Plus the colours are cute. For us it was one of the only harnesses in 10 years that we found fit her chest right/didn’t ride in front legs.”

[Lexi is a Springer Spaniel wearing a purple line harness in size 5.] USE CODE TOCFAMILY for 20% off from the 17th - 24th of April 2024.

corgi in the car wearing orange perfect fit harness

Perfect Fit

“Padded, colorful, neck and chest clips. Highly customizable and adjustable for odd body shapes. Also front and back D-rings.” - @dogtormordinsolus

[Mordin is a corgi and his three pieces are medium girth, medium back, and small front and has reflective stitching]

lab in the dirt wearing brow hurtta harness

Hurtta Casual Padded Dog Y-Harness

“It goes over the head like a collar, clips on the back, reflective, has lasted 6 years so far, very little that can rust, plastic clips clip on the back of the dog not the sides more comfortable, very soft, machine washable, plastic sliders adjust easily and stay in place.”

[Bailey is a large, deep chested Labrador wearing a size 32”-35”]

brown dog on pavement looking at camera wearing yellow hurtta wkd warrior harness

Hurtta Weekend Warrior

“The padding is really nice, especially on the front chest. My boy's chest bone protrudes and I feel the ones with just a strap there probably are uncomfortable and/or hurt him, plus they really shift to one side of it and he is a PULLER. While this harness does shift a bit if he pulls to the side, the front padding is still distributing that pressure I feel. The padding is nice and thick, and soft material. Since he pulls so much, other harnesses have rubbed him raw instantly near his arm area and under, and he does also have thin fur on his underside - this one only rubs a bit when he has his REALLY crazy pulling moments. My boy is very strong (Frank the Tank) but this harness is up to the job!”

[Franklin is a 40 pound muscular dog with a long body and short legs and wears a 60-80/24-32"]

black dog sitting on sidewalk near grass wearing purple harness and red leash

Chai's Choice Double H Trail Harness

“As a very small dog with a large chest, it can be hard to find harnesses that fit well, are unrestrictive to her movement, and don't let her escape by backing out of the harness. We tried a number of options before this one and they all were too restrictive and put pressure on her shoulders as well as were not secure no matter how tight the harness fit. This harness is amazing for us because it's super easy to put on as it goes over the head and then buckles on, is super unrestrictive since it only has a few straps instead of large fabric areas, and is super secure thanks to the third strap that buckles behind her chest.”

[Ellerbie is a 10 pound Yorkie and wears a size XS]

light blonde dog looking to the left wearing blue harness and green and white check collar on brown and white carpetted stairs

Hurtta Razzle-Dazzle Y-Harness

“We love this harness because nearly every part is adjustable so we were able to get a pretty good fit and her movement doesn't seem to be impacted or restricted at all while she's wearing it. The straps are pretty narrow and have a little bit of padding to them, so it's a good balance of being lightweight while still being comfortable. Phoebe is able to run, jump, play, train, and nap as usual in this harness and doesn't seem to be bothered by it, even when she's wearing it for extended periods. The handle on the back isn't something I usually look for in a harness, but the handleless version Hurtta makes is less adjustable and just didn't work as well for us and the handle is actually quite convenient for grabbing her quickly if needed.”

[Phoebe is a small 11 pound mix (Terrier? Chihuahua?) wearing the 14-18 inch size]

brown dog lying on rocks looking left wearing green harness

Dog Copenhagen, Comfort Walk Air

“The straps are thin and the harness is not bulky in the front, great for narrow dogs, but still it remains stable. The harness has high visibility stripes that work very well. Exists in many bright colors. There is an additional clip on the shoulder, so that you can avoid going over the head for gear shy dogs. And bonus, the back clips are really silent when you close them.”

[Thalia is a 30 pound mix breed dog who is narrow between the feet but has a deep chest and wears a size M]

bulldog sitting on grass with black harness

Pop and Ted

“Beautiful! Washable. Adaptable sizing. Matching products. Quality. Attention to detail. Y Shaped.” - The Pet Behaviourist, Vanessa Ward

[Bear is a bulldog wearing a size large]

brown dog sniffing in grass with blue harness and collar on

Wilderdog Harness

“I got this harness because a lot of the reviews talked about how it was gave longer bodied dogs more armpit space and it does! I really love the freedom of movement this harness offers. It’s fairly lightweight but still has padding in the chest and back. Plus, I love all the colors!”

[Jester is longer than she is tall, but shorter than a corgi. She’s deep chested, being 26” at the widest, and about 40 pounds. She’s wearing size M in pacific blue.]

lab sititng on grass and looking to the left with red harness on chest

Ruffwear Front Range

“I love that it’s easy to put on and take off. The buckles and leash connections feel sturdy and have stood up to some tough use. I use these harnesses with long lines through the woods and have never had one break.” (Note: This is a bulkier harness, so may not be as comfortable on smaller breeds.) - Leslie Taylor

[Tor is a 62 pound Labrador Retriever with a big chest and short body wearing a size Medium but can fit into a Large.]

golden doodle sitting on pet seat looking backwards with black harness on and leash

Ruffwear Webmaster

“We love that it has a second strap that buckles lower on her abdomen that keeps her secure. Maple gets scared of loud noises and tries to run. It also has a handle.” - @doodles.maple.sadie

[Maple is a 45 pound Goldendoodle wearing a size Medium]

shiba inu sitting on snow with grey harness and collar

PetSafe 3-in-1 Harness

“My dog Milo can be a bit gear-shy and harnesses with more material/padding tend not to fit him well (especially along the chest). The PetSafe 3-in-1 harness has been excellent as an alternative: no extra fabric (just webbing and thin neoprene padding), 5 points of adjustment, front and back D-rings, two girth buckles and a buckle for the shoulder strap (*very* helpful for gear-shy dogs). I think it's one of the best accessible Y-front harnesses that allows my dog to have full range of motion while staying comfortable. Minimal yet adjustable harness design. It is not bulky, does not retain heat due to extra fabric and does not have to go over my dog's head when I'm putting it on him. He can freely run, sleep, walk and swim with this harness on. Front and back attachment points are great. PetSafe also sells a double-attachment-point leash for dogs who use this type of system. Angle of shoulder straps and chest strap is not fixed (straps move around an o-ring), unlike some other harnesses. This makes it fit better on my dog, clearing more space for his freedom of movement. This is an extremely affordable and accessible non-restrictive harness option. The harness is usually $30, sometimes on sale, and available in major pet stores as well as online. If you are on a budget, the PetSafe Sure-Fit Harness has a similar shape but no shoulder buckle or padding (~$18).” - @whats.the.pupdate / Milo

[Milo is a 35 pound Shiba Inu mix wearing a size Small (most straps on largest setting).]

a white dog wears a blue harness standing in profile in front of a wood fence on cement

Blue-9 Balance Harness

“It’s recommended by [a vet]. It allows for full range of motion in the shoulder. It sits on the sternum and not on the neck. There are places in the front and back to clip the leash. For some reason my 10-lb pulling machine doesn’t pull in this harness and I clip to the back. It has a buckle at the neck so it’s easier to get on and allows for a better fit at the neck for my big/headed girl. It has length adjusters in every strap.”

[Cricket is a 10 pound Shih Tzu mix wearing a size XS.]

Spark Paws Comfort Control

“I like that they are VERY sturdy. They’re designed for stronger bodied dogs, but the fit is just *chefs kiss* plus I love the colours they come in. It has a front clip and two back clips.” - @stonecity.spaniels

[Gamora, brown, is 40 pounds and wearing a size small; Elphaba, black, is 48 pounds and wearing a medium]

Houndstown Safety Banner Harness

“These are great three point attachment harnesses for dogs who are narrower or who may be at risk of slipping a harness. They also make me feel a bit more secure walking my reactive dog.”

A big thank you to our TOC Family for helping us come up with the products in our list. If you have a harness you think should be added, please email us at hello@tailsofconnection.com.

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The Life-Changing Magic of Dog Enrichment

Dog enrichment has a whole lot of buzz these days and for good reason: it’s really important. But WHY is it so crucial for our dogs? First, let’s define enrichment. It actually originated in the zoo world through the efforts of zookeepers who were focused on zoo animal welfare. Dr. Markowitz, who was a leader in zoo animal welfare, said, “Enrichment should be a synonym for ‘more like nature.’” Believe it or not, dogs are captive animals too. Enrichment is about meeting all of your dog’s needs as closely as they would be met in the wild (aka letting them do super natural dog behaviors). [Disclosure: The page 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.]

These days, it’s easy to associate a lot of expensive toys, puzzles, and pretty looking photos on social media with enrichment and while those things are awesome, (yay frozen Toppls* ha!), they are not the only type of enrichment. Nature is $0 and usually extremely enriching! Keep reading for examples of enrichment, why it’s so important, and why it can be magical for your dog.

How Natural Enrichment Activities Can Help Meet Your Dog’s Needs

What do you notice about the little dog, Sully, in the post above? While Instagram Reels only allows for 30 seconds of video, I will tell you that she spent 30 minutes systematically gathering the best sticks she could find. This was all her idea. Do you notice how many reinforcers she comes into contact with?! She is independent and has agency (this is a big deal for a dog who lives in captivity in a one bedroom city apartment). She hears the creek and the bugs and the rocks moving. She feels the water and the variable surfaces. She smells all sorts of things. So much sensory stimulation. She had to use her brain to figure out how to dislodge and carry some of the sticks. She used her muscles to climb all over rocks. She shredded the sticks after she gathered them. All I did was put her in an environment rich with reinforcers (where she felt safe) and let her choose what to do.

What is enriching for one dog may not be what is enriching for the next (meet your dog’s individual needs), but health and meeting needs are always our first two goals and considerations. Check out “Canine Enrichment for the Real World”* by Allie Bender and Emily Strong from Pet Harmony to learn more about enrichment!

Why Natural Dog Enrichment Behaviors Aren’t ‘Bad’

What’s on your list when you think of all the little (and big) things you need to do today to take care of your dog? Maybe it looks something like: Breakfast ✅, Bath Time ✅, Vet Appt ✅, Training ✅, Decompression Walk ✅, Exercise ✅, and Dinner ✅. Bringing a dog into your life comes with a HUGE amount of responsibility. It starts to shift how you look at some of those responsibilities when you remember that your first job is to show them love. And that isn’t just a task. It is a gift that we GET to love these incredible animals who teach us so much about life.

Loving them is not just how we feel about them. It is how we treat them and how we show up for them. It’s how we make THEM feel -- safe, empowered, and fulfilled. The world often lifts up dog behavior as “good” when it is centered around humans’ needs. We LOVE training and will always celebrate it (and to be honest, done well, it is a deeply loving thing to do with your dog). We *also* want to keep celebrating dogs doing natural dog things and remind ourselves that behavior does not need to be centered around humans in order for it to be considered good. Giving dogs opportunities to engage in these natural dog behaviors like running, chasing, shredding, and digging is not only incredibly important for their wellbeing, it is also one of the ways we get to love our dogs. Dogs need to be able to behave in ways that are natural to them. As it turns out, getting to experience watching dogs do that works wonders on our own wellbeing. The video above features some awesome dogs from our TOC Fam doing some delightfully dog things.

For some of our favorite enrichment products like toppls, snoops, and snuffle matts, check out our Amazon store.*

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Getting Started With How To Train Your Dog To Wear a Harness

For a lot of dogs, harnesses can be crucial to their success outside while walking on a leash. It’s not uncommon for dogs to be sensitive to things touching their body, so we put together this mini guide (it’s not intended to have all of the answers - but we’ll keep adding to it!) on how to get your dog to wear a harness. We’ve included a link (keep scrolling to the bottom of the piece) to the harnesses we love as well. [Disclosure: The page 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.]

How to Desensitize Your Dog to a New Harness Before It’s Needed

In the post above, Beth, a member of our TOC Fam, has been working on desensitizing her dog, Dug (he was six months old in these videos) to his new harness. (Good news: These videos are from several months ago, so he is happy in his harness now!) Dug is sensitive to things touching his body, but having a harness is important since he spends a lot of time on a long line.

If you swipe through the post above, you’ll see some home videos from Beth and Dug! Here is what Beth shared with TOC:

“It’s taken a long time for Dug to feel comfortable with his current harness so when it looked like he was going to grow out of it soon I bought a new one in advance so we could spend time helping Dug to really love wearing it. We’ve been working on this for about four weeks now.

Video One: Here we are playing a nose targeting game with the harness. Dug runs to the harness, puts his nose in the hole and then is marked and rewarded with a treat toss. The purpose of this game is to build confidence around the harness and for Dug to move towards the harness (his default is to run away from it).

Video Two: Here we’re using a behavior Dug already knows well - a chin rest on the sofa (PS: you can learn how train your dog to do a chin rest in the TOC Challenge) - to encourage him to put his head further through the hole in the harness. I’m not luring with a treat - Dug volunteers this behavior and then is marked and rewarded.

Video Three: This was a huge breakthrough moment for us. Dug got to the point where he was happy to put his nose in the harness but not happy for it to go past his ears. I saw a trainer on Instagram ( @noblewoof ) use different novel objects to help teach her dog this behavior. By using something that Dug was already completely comfortable with – his collar - we were finally able to make the association that head through equaled a jackpot. This quickly translated to the harness and other novel objects, like the T-shirt shown.”

How To Turn a Scary Harness Into Something Fun for Your Dog

Listen, there’s nothing fancy about this video above. Everyday of the week that I filmed it, I pulled out my dog Otis’s car safety harness and simply played fetch with it. And then I put it away! WHY?! Well, because I made an oops. I got this harness right before a road trip and didn’t ever desensitize him to it before tossing it on him. It’s heavy and has metal buckles (road safety!). He didn’t seem super uncomfortable in it, but when I decided to loop back to it and do the consent-based work I should have done initially, he BOLTED as soon as I pulled it out. I tried a few times and each time he spotted or heard it, he was gone. He didn’t even want to stick around to see if there were treats. WOAH NELLY! Now I could have done a million different things here, but I think we both were in need of something fun and low pressure.

So one day, I pulled it out, set it down on the ground, and gave his retrieve cue. Otis knows his cues are all invitations (aka he won’t be forced into anything), so I was just curious what he would do. Something about the “fun game” premise made his body language shift COMPLETELY. He softened and started wagging as he realized we were playing a game instead of trying to do something that felt like a lot of pressure to him. Sure enough, he picked the harness right up and handed it to me. After just a day, I could make pretty big tossing motions with the harness in my hand without seeing any concern from Otis. He was naturally desensitizing to the sound of the metal clasps through this game too! And the only time that harness touches him is when he grabs it, so he has full control over the interaction. Pulling the harness out no longer predicts having to work with something scary. It predicts a game he loves! Now that he is not panicked at the sight of it, I feel a bit more free to start the real work of using consent to put it on him 🤣!

So the moral of this story is twofold: 1) Desensitize AHEAD of using a new harness (I know better 😳); 2) It is okay to not always be super serious! Sometimes silly games can actually be incredibly helpful! (Pssst...There isn’t just one right way to do something. You can do what works for YOUR dog!)

What if Your Dog Already Hates Their Harness?

Have you ever worked on something and just felt stuck? That was me with the new harness I got for Otis. He rarely wears harnesses anymore, and when I tried to put this new one on, I was pretty surprised to see him sprint to the other room. Like all of you, I genuinely care about how my dog feels, and I prioritize giving him choice. For a couple of months, I tried all sorts of things: basic classical conditioning (pairing harness with treats), teaching him to put his head through it (first through other objects), and all sorts of start button behaviors. No matter what I did, he never chose to put more than his nose into the actual harness and would run away if I moved it even a little bit. Looking back, I see A BAJILLION ways I could improve on what I was doing (and some of them likely would have worked!). I think I was so incredibly focused on how Otis felt about the harness that I never stopped to actually define my goal behavior and break it down into a training plan (pssst...we can do both).

So when my training didn’t work, I felt genuinely stuck. As luck would have it, I had an unrelated conversation with Kiki Yablon, who asked me a question that stuck with me long after our conversation: “How do you know if your dog actually likes something?” The only thing I have to go off of here is his observable and measurable behavior. Then I watched an awesome presentation from Lindsay Wood Brown with a demo from Scotti Harvey where she socialized a six month old puppy to kids. Scotti absolutely cared about how the pup felt, and she also knew that there is no way to separate operant and respondent conditioning. She was really intentional about how she set the sessions up, so she could get and reinforce the behavior she wanted around kids (rather than only thinking about giving treats around kids). The combo of all these things made a lightbulb go off in my head.

I started to think more operantly (knowing full well that classical conditioning was coming along for the ride). Thinking like this unstuck me. This video above shows a highlight of the initial steps! Here’s my TLDR play-by play:

  • I tried to simplify the whole thing when I thought about the goal. Here’s what I decided on: I wanted Otis to remain still with loose body language (aka “comfortable”) while I put the harness on him. Then I went and really defined what that meant (perhaps even thinking about what does “liking” the harness look like?). I wanted a soft, still body. I wanted a relaxed face, neutral ears, and his head to remain still and eventually for it to move forward. I knew specifically that I did NOT want any backwards movement (even a subtle weight shift), but it is easier to focus on what I want. Because of how I train, putting these things into the criteria actually helped prevent me from moving too fast. Then I thought about how I could break this down into an actual training plan. I knew I wanted to start with us both on the ground (that’s where we’re even in height, and he is most likely to “be calm” when lying down in a training context). I started by simply sitting down on the ground and capturing the basic position I wanted (calm body language in a down and oriented to me.

  • Then I actually skipped a step that I had to come back to (but thanks to thinking about this operantly, it was really clear how to troubleshoot). (NOTE: The video shows the adjusted order after I corrected my mistake.) I moved from the base position to introducing a leash that I could create a HUGE circle with and put over his head. I started by simply raising my looped leash up (but not moving it towards him) and marking and reinforcing for the criteria I had already defined. Because I knew my criteria, I was crazy careful to set up conditions that I thought would set him up for success (aka I didn’t push for speed). I worked in baby steps. Before I even tried moving the looped leash over his head, I tried holding the leash flat and just moving it slightly over his head. That was when I saw his head move back just a little and his ears pin back. I tried one more time and the same thing happened. That’s when I realized I hadn’t actually broken it down enough.💡

  • The step where Otis wasn’t able to meet criteria came when my hands (with a leash) were coming over or around his head. Funnily enough, this is the same step where our start button work broke down (he was always willing to put his nose in, but then darted if I moved the harness even a smidge) - coincidence???...I think not! But this time, I was thinking operantly, and this helped me get into a problem solving mindset. I realized I was actually lumping criteria by introducing my hands coming over his head at the same time as introducing a leash coming over his head. So I nixed the leash. I went back to the base behavior, and I worked on fading my hands into the equation. Pretty soon, I was able to move my hands over and around his head while he had calm body language.

  • Then when I went back to the leash, suddenly I saw different behavior from Otis. I was able to move the large looped leash towards him, and he kept a loose body and face, neutral ears, and his head still or even forward slightly. That is what I wanted to see from Otis in order to move forward. I said “putting it on” out loud before I made any move to put the looped leash over his head (predictability removes a lot of stress) and “taking it off” before I took the leash off.

  • I gradually made the leash loop smaller to mimic the size of the harness opening. When that was easy, I switched to the harness. Using a harness changes the conditions, so I lowered some of my criteria. I started by simply presenting it (without moving it towards him) and marking and reinforcing that same behavior and body language. My job was to set up conditions so that Otis was successful. This meant I had to be super observant about all the little behaviors and to go at his pace. It didn’t take long for me to be able to put the harness over his head. Just like with the leash, I said “putting it on” before moving it over his head and “taking it off” before pulling it off of him. What happened over time was pretty interesting. Dr. Friedman talks about selecting behaviors in the flow. Well Otis naturally started to offer putting his nose into the loop, so I started to select for that.

  • We got to the point you see in the video in two 4-minute sessions. I laugh a little bit because of how much time I spent working on this in previous months. I have tried to think about what I did differently this time. I actually think the biggest difference is that I just did a better job training - LOL! I absolutely could have been this thoughtful in my previous attempts using start button behaviors, but I got so hung up on Otis’s feelings that I forgot to think through behavior like I know how to. Respondent and operant conditioning always happen together. I will ALWAYS care about how my dog feels. ALWAYS. And I am a better problem solver when I think operantly because it forces me to be intentional. Could I have caught the same gap (pressure of hands over head) when I was using start buttons? YES! But I was using them without having a real plan for building a behavior. I was just assuming that the end behavior I wanted would magically evolve if Otis had a choice. Sometimes I get away with that. I didn’t here.

  • In terms of next steps, I think I want to clarify the sequence of events. I hadn’t planned on a start button behavior, but one is naturally evolving (Otis sticking his nose through the harness). I naturally started waiting to move the harness until he put his nose to the opening, so it started to operate as a start button behavior anyway. I think I like having that built into the sequence, so I want to get more intentional about it. Then I will need to change the conditions and bring this to a stand (I doubt in real life I will have him lie down...though I could). I am pretty sure I will start from a kneel while he stands though (less physical pressure and more of a baby step). I will likely go back and move through hands, leash loop, and harness with him standing and me kneeling and then with both of us standing.

What’s funny is that this experience actually taught me a lot about how I can be more intentional with start buttons. I LOVE start buttons. But I was not thinking much about my criteria (I was jumping straight to the harness as the consequence for the start button behavior when I could have actually gone through a similar progression that mirrored what I did here). It’s also funny that a start button behavior of sorts (nose to harness opening) naturally evolved anyway. I had gotten to the point of Otis putting his nose through the harness before when I was focused just on start button behaviors, but I never was able to actually move the harness fully over him. By thinking operantly and being super duper clear about my criteria and taking ownership of setting up conditions where Otis would be successful, it forced me to break the behavior down much more. Now, when he puts his nose in the harness, I can move it over his head, and he doesn’t sprint away from me. In fact, I see so much softness in his body.

I’m definitely not an expert on dog emotions. I share this story simply to relay a moment where I got stuck and had to unstuck myself. We can’t ever separate respondent and operant conditioning. Because of that, I should always care about the associations I think my dog may make and about the behavior that is operantly being selected (because some behavior always is). In my case, thinking operantly empowered me in a way and got me into a much better problem-solving mindset than when I left that out of the equation in my effort to get my dog to like the harness. I can make arguments in either direction, but I am hopeful this approach accomplished both selecting the behavior I want while building a better association with the harness.

BTW, here are some of our favorite harnesses, collars, and leashes.*

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How Can I Start Training My Puppy

First of all congratulations on your new puppy! We are so excited for you! Now if you’re feeling overwhelmed and unsure of where to get started with training, don’t worry. You’re not alone! One of the most frequent questions we get from our TOC Fam is if we have any resources on how to get started with puppy training. There’s a million things to focus on, so we figured we’d start to pull together a mini guide for you with tips to start you off. This is by no means comprehensive, but we have ideas for you of how to begin with puppy socialization, putting a stop to all of that puppy biting, and training loose leash walking. PS: for even more puppy training tips, including how to think about your puppy’s routine and how to prep them for alone time, check out our Show & Tell pandemic puppies feature.

How to Properly Socialize a Puppy by Starting Simple

There’s a ton out there about puppy socialization, and it can start to feel a bit intimidating. This mini guide is certainly not the holy grail, but hopefully it gives you some helpful info and maybe a few ideas.

First, socialization is SUPER important. But please know that it is not the ONLY thing that impacts how your dog shows up in the world. Puppy genetics, environment during gestation, and early life experiences all factor into how your puppy grows up and interacts with the world around them.

The socialization sensitive period begins at three weeks and goes on until about 12 or 14 weeks (exact end is unknown and may vary based on breed). At its core, our socialization efforts are about making the world “normal” for our dogs. Dogs today live in a pretty diverse environment, so we try to slowly introduce them to the situations they’ll encounter in their lives. We are aiming to do this without creating stress -- we want them to have positive associations!

The life you plan to live with your dog may impact what priorities you have for socialization - it’s good to think about what their world will look like and help them feel comfortable in it. Dogs continue to learn after their sensitive periods, but they are most accepting of novel stimuli during these early weeks (aka these early weeks matter). Here are a few things to think about:

  • You want their experiences to be positive, so it is important not to force scary things on them. We want our dogs to be optimistic about new things as adults, so we want to build a history of new things being good for them!

  • Print Dr. Sophia Yin’s Socialization Checklist for some ideas of things to socialize!

  • Socialization doesn’t always have to be some huge event like a trip to the hardware store (though that can be good too depending on the pup). Sometimes it is teaching them that it's normal for objects to fall over (like in the video above)!

  • Avoid using food to “lure” your dog towards scary things as much as possible. They may start to think food in your hand is a “trick” and that is a tougher problem to solve.

How to Start to Socialize Your Puppy So They’re Calm Around People

One of the most important things you can do when you bring a puppy into your life is to help them build positive associations with the world around them. It’s also great to reinforce them for offering you attention. (PS: we have tons of games to help your puppy learn to offer attention in Attention Unlocked). In the video above, Jaya (who is only 13 years old!) is working with her three month old puppy, Daisy, on a city sidewalk to help her learn how to feel good and calm around people. Prior to taking their show onto a busy sidewalk, Jaya built a strong reinforcement history with Daisy for offering attention (eye contact) in lower distraction settings, which makes it a behavior Daisy is likely to offer. Here is a breakdown of what you’ll see in this video:

  • Out on the sidewalk, Jaya captures any eye contact that Daisy offers by simply marking and rewarding.

  • When Daisy spots some people walking by, Jaya waits (doesn’t nag Daisy). Daisy chooses to look away from the people and back at Jaya, so Jaya marks and rewards that eye contact.

  • Daisy looks back at the passing people a couple more times and each time, chooses to disengage from them and offer Jaya attention (which Jaya reinforces with a treat). Seeing a new person is becoming a cue for Daisy to offer Jaya attention.

There is SO MUCH to love about what both Jaya and Daisy are doing in this video, including:

  • Jaya’s marker and reinforcement timing is awesome! She does a great job of reading Daisy and chooses to give her space to process the people passing. (If she didn’t think that Daisy would disengage from looking at the people on her own, she could have marked the moment Daisy noticed the people rather than waiting for Daisy to look at her.)

  • Daisy is building positive associations with people (socialization!) as she learns that people predict good things for her (treats!), and she is also learning that the behavior that pays in this situation is giving her human calm attention.

  • Being able to engage with her human let go of the stimulus (new people), sets Daisy up well for SO many other behaviors: loose leash walking, recall, chilling outside a cafe, etc.

How To Teach a Puppy Not To Bite

If you’ve ever questioned if your adorable puppy is actually a shark in disguise rather than a dog, you are not alone. It’s super normal for puppies to nip.
Two of the most important things you can do to help with your puppy’s nipping are 1) management (aka setting up the environment to avoid a lot of that nipping when possible) and 2) sleep! Puppies often nip when they are tired, and puppies need A LOT of sleep! It’s really important to create spaces where they are comfortable and can take a snooze. And if you know they have a witching hour every night, that is where a pen and a nice frozen Kong can be your bff (just avoid the situations where you KNOW the nipping is going to be too much).

If your puppy does start nipping you (especially while you play), you can try redirecting them to a toy or a chew. I try hard not to correct biting (puppies are super impressionable). You also can’t guarantee what you are actually punishing. So often, that nipping is playful, and they are just trying to engage with you. As your puppy grows up, you are going to WANT them to want to do things with you. So see if you can help them find a better way to interact with you! If you are about to have your fourth pair of pants ripped, try to calmly separate yourself from them (perhaps just step over a baby gate) and give them some nice puppy enrichment in your place. And then take a mental note to keep trying to set them up for success, so you aren’t always having to dip out.

In addition to all the management and everyday life moments, I love to do intentional sessions where I teach a puppy how I DO want them to interact with me and my hands. So often, the question is “how do I get my puppy to stop biting my hands?!” But what happens if you change it to “How do I teach my puppy to calmly hang out when my hands come towards them?” There are lots of ways to go about this, but the video above shows you a progression with an adorable baby shark named Hana!

Getting Started With Training Your Puppy To Walk On a Loose Leash

The video above features, Otter, a standard poodle puppy, and a beloved member of our #TOCFam along with his crew, Alexis and Bunny. Like all puppies, he is learning about SO MANY THINGS (leash walking hardly scratches the surface). Even though leash walking may very well become an important part of your dog’s life, it is important to give your puppy space to explore and develop balance and fine motor skills.

Did you know that a canine’s “normal walk” is a trot with an S-curve to it?! In other words, they walk faster than we do and definitely do not walk straight. Asking a puppy to walk straight and have their head lifted up to you all the time can actually be quite wonky for their developing bodies (may lead to a really unnatural gait). It can also rob them of the ability to learn about the new world they find themselves in!

So what might loose leash “training” look like with a puppy:

  • Vast majority of the time outside can be spent in spaces where they can safely be off leash (or have a long line on) and are free to stop, lie down, and explore.

  • You may even consider using a ten or 15 foot leash for any walks you do to simply prevent pulling and to meet their needs.

  • In the context of these free walks or outings, keep an eye on them to see if they choose to offer you attention or check in with you. If they do, reinforce that behavior, and watch how they start to show up near you more and more! Who knows, you may get loose leash walking just from this!

  • You can build in really short training sessions (30 seconds to two minutes) where you simply take a step or two and then give your puppy a treat if they took a step or two with you. This allows you to build the “leash walking” behavior before you ever put that leash on (so the leash doesn’t become a steering device).

For more loose leash walking tips, check out our mini guide here.


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Getting Started With How To Read Dog Body Language

Our dogs communicate through body language. Since we ask them to live in this human world, we think it’s super important to learn to “speak their language.” Keep scrolling for different examples of dogs that we’ve captured. You’ll also see our observations, so we can help you learn to read dog body language in real life.

In Dog Body Language, a Wagging Tails Does Not Equal a Happy Dog

We thought it would be fun to tackle the old misnomer that a wagging tail indicates a happy dog. In the video above, you’ll see two slow motion clips of the same dog (Otis). In both videos, Otis is wagging his tail, but the way he wags his tail and what the rest of his body is doing tell two very different stories.

Here’s what his body language actually means:

  • In video one (red text blocks), Otis is alert and upset (human labels) because of the mail truck that pulled up (context). You’ll notice his tail is high, and he does short, stiff wags. The rest of his body is stiff and tense, and he is making himself appear large. His mouth is closed shut and his lips are puckered as he leans forward.

  • In the second video (green text blocks), Otis is happy and excited (human labels). Someone he loves just showed up in the driveway (context). He is doing big, sweeping tail wags, and his whole body is loose and wiggly. His mouth is open and he has a soft face and eyes.

Tails give us a lot of information, but it is really important to look at the dog’s whole body in order to get the bigger picture. The context also helps us better understand what we are seeing. “Wagging tail = happy dog” is such a common myth.

How To Read Dog Body Language on a Playdate

Dog body language is like a dance, and it is super fun to watch! It’s also quite helpful to be able to read dogs, so you know when you might need to intervene.

In the video above, you’l see two adolescent female dogs who have known each other since they were puppies. They'd been playing around in the yard for about an hour before this video was taken. Play can look quite different depending on the dogs involved. In general, we have to look at the whole picture to determine if it is play (for example, a lot of dogs give a goofy fierce face during play that might look scary out of context with their soft, wiggly body).

In the video, we’ve labeled what you’ll observe, but it moves pretty fast (tip: if you tap and hold on the screen, you can pause). We recommend watching it once where you just pay attention to the dogs, and then again where you read the text, and then go back and see if you can spot the body language that we highlighted.

Here are some takeaways about dog body language during play that we can learn:

  • Play should be consensual. Often, this means dogs take turns in their “prey” and “predator” roles, but not always. Some dogs really prefer one role over the other.

  • You want to see loose, wiggly, soft bodies!

  • You want to see occasional breaks (they pause to take a break themselves).

  • It is often a good thing when you see mirroring (they look like they are doing the same thing).

  • Lack of direct eye contact & soft (probably even squinty) eyes are good signs!

If you’re ever unsure if play is consensual, it is helpful to look at the dog in the “prey” role. Do they appear frightened, or do they seem calm about the dog on top of them/chasing them? If you’re still unsure, separate them for a few seconds. Release just the dog who has been in that “prey” role to see if they choose to go back for more play. If they do, then you can release the other dog. If they don’t, then you can help keep them apart for a bit so the dog doesn’t get overwhelmed.

What To Do if You’re Not Sure About the Dog Body Language During a Playdate

If you aren't sure if the play you are seeing is mutual (typically when one dog seems to be relentlessly pursuing the other), one of the simplest ways to check is to do a simple “consent test.” To do this test, you need to get a hold of the dog who is doing the pursuing (you can gently hold and then give them a treat, stick a treat to their nose to lure them away, or recall them if you feel confident they’ll respond). The dog who has been pursued is allowed to run free -- this gives them the choice to walk away from that “play” or to return and invite play again. If the “free dog” keeps coming back for more, then you can more safely say that it is play (noting that the dog may need help getting some breaks still), and you can release the dog being held back to play. If the “free dog” walks away, they are communicating that they don’t want to participate in that play, so you can keep the dogs separate. If you aren’t sure about either dog, you can alternate which dog is the one given a choice to leave.

How a Dog Can Calm Things Down With Their Body Language

Y’all ready to watch a really socially savvy dog and learn even more about dog body language?! As background, it may be helpful to know that the little dog featured in the post above (Sully) can still exhibit some “fear reactive” behaviors (charging, barking, lunging) towards dogs. We were walking through this field on our hike when we encountered this lab. Sully barked a few times (not in video) and started to run straight at the lab (not polite). The lab’s body language diffused Sully’s tension IMMEDIATELY (literally, she stops in her tracks and moves onto sniffing). FYI this post has a play-by-play called out in text on the video - it moves a bit fast, but you can tap and hold to pause the Reel and/or watch it again to make sure you catch it all!

Here are some dog body language observations we wanted to point out:

  • When Sully runs at the lab, the lab LOOKS AWAY while maintaining a soft, still body. The lab is a confident dog, who reads Sully correctly and uses his body to appease her and de-escalate. The rest of the dog’s body language makes it clear that this look away isn’t done out of fear (look away can be because of discomfort).

  • Sully and the lab stand still while looking away for a few more seconds. Sully feels comfortable enough to move onto sniffing (and the lab correctly does not come to interact).

  • When Otis went to greet the lab, notice the trajectory he took (before the butterfly distracts him LOL) - it is arcing to the side. This is a softer way to greet than the trajectory Sully was initially taking (straight on).

  • Notice how the lab has a low head and does some sniffing as he comes to greet Otis. This sniffing can say “I come in peace” to other dogs (hence why letting your dog sniff is CRUCIAL on walks).

  • They do a quick nose to nose greeting. This is often done as an initial step before they sniff genitals or butts. Here, they don’t progress beyond a nose sniff. They keep it short, andOtis walks away. The lab correctly reads that no further interaction is wanted.

Dogs are highly effective communicators. And guess what?! We can take lessons from them in how people can politely greet dogs: From the side & w/out eye contact! (Obligatory note: Many/most dogs don’t actually want to be greeted by strangers despite how cute they are.)

How To Read Dog Body Language During Off Leash Greetings

Ready to break down some dog body language during off leash greetings?! The video above has three clips (numbered in the video) of off leash greetings between unfamiliar dogs on a trail. Here’s some of our observations and commentary:

  • Clip One: The grey dog and the white dog approach each other at a pretty casual pace (there’s no rushing on either side). The grey dog’s tail is raised up, but the rest of his body language is pretty neutral. The white dog has ears at half mast (and back a bit). Based on the rest of the body language, this feels like friendly positioning. Both dogs curve around the side to the back for a quick butt sniff (with some distance - aka no noses jammed in butts) and then they both carry on their way. This clearly isn’t a greeting between two dogs who are best friends, but it is a really cordial, polite greeting between two dogs who don’t know each other.

  • Clip Two: The same white dog from clip one does a big arc towards the back of a small blonde dog. The white dog’s tail and ears are at half mast (friendly, neutral). The blonde dog speeds up a little bit to move away from the white dog and does a couple of baby head turns back towards the white dog (as a way of saying “don’t approach”). The white dog does not follow her. This white dog is a dog-savvy dog in case that isn’t clear and correctly reads the blonde dog and gives a TON of space in the approach and then reads the “no” from the blonde dog loud and clear and isn’t ’t pushy.

  • Clip Three: A brown dog comes in with a lot of speed. He runs around the side to the back of the grey dog for a sniff. The grey dog turns to also do a butt sniff (circle dance ensues). The grey dog leaves the greeting by walking away, and the brown dog follows him with nose to butt. The grey dog allows this for 11 or 12 steps. After that, you can see the grey dog’s back curls up and its tail comes down (aka we are closed for business). The gray dog then turns to face the brown dog, and the brown dog correctly reads that and gives the grey dog space.

It is useful to be able to read dog body language in case you need to step in if your dog is being pushy or advocate for your dog if they are uncomfortable. We’ll be sure to keep adding dog body language examples to this guide.

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What Is a Decompression Walk for Dogs?

Decompression walks are one of the most amazing things you can do for your dog. The term was coined by Sarah Stremming, who defines them as, “a walk where the dog is allowed freedom of movement in nature.” Ideally this is done off leash, but it can also be done on a long line* clipped to a y-shaped harness*. You can get quite creative about where you go (to the woods, fields, beaches, creeks, etc.). Keep scrolling through our guide that breaks down the benefits to decompression walks and how I’ve applied those learnings to my normal walks with my dogs.

What Are the Benefits of Decompression Walks?

Living in a human world can be really hard on dogs -- especially for those who live in cities. Imagine walking your dog on a city sidewalk using a six foot leash. They experience all sorts of sights, sounds, and smells, and quite often, aren’t able to go investigate them (they are also often working hard to stay near you instead of exploring). This type of walk often provides little opportunity for your dog to “just be a dog” and can be incredibly taxing on them. Enter the answer you may be seeking: decompression walks.

Here’s How a Decompression Walk Can Benefit Your Dog:

  • Decompression walks are a way for you to let your dog unwind and just be a dog. They involve so much freedom and choice and allow your dog to engage in natural dog behaviors like sniffing, digging, shredding, and climbing in a calming way.

  • These walks can have profound physical, emotional, and behavioral effects. They can actually set your dog up to handle their normal human world a lot better because they help dogs reset to a more neutral state.

  • Dogs sniff way more when they are free to move, and sniffing comes with LOTS of benefits. Sniffing lowers dogs’ pulse and has a pretty immediate calming effect on them. If you’re trying to wear your dog out, lots of sniffing can actually be the most efficient way. The part of the brain devoted to processing smells is about 40 times larger in dogs than humans, so letting your dog sniff is actually a lot of “mental exercise” that will leave them feeling tired and fulfilled.

  • It’s not just the dog who benefits: These walks also happen to be deeply calming for many people!

Why Decompression Walks Are the Best Thing I Did For My Dog and They’re Not Actually Training

The role of dogs in our lives has changed a TON in the past few decades. Dogs are now part of our families, and with that, comes new living conditions. At the same time, nature has selected behaviors for dogs for a LONG time, and humans have artificially selected behavior (breeding) for hundreds (and even thousands) of years. When we remove dogs from the environment those behaviors were selected for, it doesn’t mean the hardwiring for those behaviors goes away. That’s why decompression walks are so important. Kim Brophey is doing incredible work and driving important convos in this area (we are BIG fans of her L.E.G.S.® model).

Let me tell you about my dog Sully (who is in the video above). She’s a street dog from Indonesia and is fiercely independent. If you spend any time with her, it’s clear how at home she is in nature. A city walk with her used to look like this: Nose to the ground, chased every squirrel, and barked at every person and dog. It took me a little time to realize that I needed to find safe (!) ways to get her off leash access to nature (even if her “obedience wasn’t perfect,” which is often the pre-req). She came to LIFE in nature, and that matters to me.

Those behaviors that were tough on a city sidewalk suddenly made sense. Sully actively hunts. She has her nose to the ground and follows scent trails through bushes and over logs with incredible agility. I haven’t done a DNA test, but it’s so clear that this is natural behavior for her. Imagine if the only outlet she got for all those instincts was a city walk on a six foot leash. Her natural behavior could easily show up as problematic there. The more opportunities I gave Sully to express her natural behavior, the easier it became to get all those other “pet behaviors” we tend to want. Some desired behaviors came without any behavior modification work, and the training I did became a lot more effective once her needs were already met.

There are no doubt ethical considerations around why we need to remember they are dogs with species and individual needs. In addition, when we look at the whole dog (rather than thinking of them as the “pet” that the “pet industry” sells us), it goes a long way towards setting us and our dogs up for success.

What You Can Learn From Walking Your Dog

When you think about a good on-leash walk with your dog, what do you picture? For all the time we spend working to fit out dogs into our human-centric world, what would happen if we tried to fit a bit more into theirs?

If you picture people walking without dogs, what do you see? Perhaps you imagine humans walking briskly wearing headphones and their faces buried in their phones. They usually have a destination in mind (or goal for distance), and the stuff between the start and end is just the process. Now think about how dogs walk. Their ears catch every sound, their noses cover every square inch of plants ... they experience each moment. Humans label dogs who stop to watch birds or sniff every blade of grass as distracted, but maybe it’s the other way around.

What would happen if we tried to walk more like our dogs? What would it be like to feel the earth below us? What would we hear? What would cause us to stop in our tracks to simply watch with wonder? If we actively look for things that delight us, how many of them will we find?! We humans have a funny little habit of relating everything back to ourselves and using human “measuring sticks” for non-human animals. But in a lot of ways, we think dogs might actually be on a pretty cool path with the way they want to walk.

So keep training walking (and whatever else you want)! Training is FUN, helps build connection, and is important for the wellbeing of our dogs who are asked to live in this world. But what does it feel like if we open up space for our human way to not be the only way? What does a compromise look like to you?

Poet Mary Oliver famously wrote, “What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” This quote often gets used as a motivator to “DO ALL THE WORK!” But if you read her poem “The Summer Day,” her answer is basically to wander through fields and notice things. Our dogs might be able to help! Have you tried shifting your attention more to the environment around you (including your dog) on walks? Where is your attention? Do you slow down easily or find it tough?

The Surprising Thing I’d Rather My Dog Do on a Leash

When it comes to leash walking in general, my views have changed quite a bit over time. Both of my dogs are labeled “reactive” (Otis, the one in the video, will bark and lunge at bikes, scooters, and skateboards under the right conditions and will somewhat inconsistently bark and lunge at novel stimuli if startled). I’ve taught him that those stimuli are actually cues for him to orient to me. And by and large, that is what he will do. We can walk around the city where we live without reactions, but I generally need to support him a little bit (which I’m happy to do).

Not long ago, we were on a walk and Otis was particularly sniffy. I saw a scooter ahead and watched his body language to see if I would need to help. But he noticed it in such a soft way and was back down to sniffing again right after. I opted not to do my usual post-scooter treat because I liked his choice so much (and treats often cue Otis to really focus on me). He coped so well with all the various city things he noticed on this walk and didn’t actually need my help. He noticed changes but wasn’t scanning in search of changes. He offered me less attention than he does on other walks, but the only reason I wanted the attention in these conditions was because it’s incompatible with barking and lunging.

Over time, I may have inadvertently reinforced some of this alert, scanning behavior thinking that I was simply reinforcing his choice to orient back to me without barking (reinforced the chain). I’ve had to really think about the precise behavior I want (down to body language -- “what does calm look like?”). I now actually prefer walks where Otis sees changes in the environment and they cue him to sniff rather than to always orient to me for a treat. I think our reality will be a balance of the two, but I’m trying to be more intentional about building the soft noticing and then sniffing behavior. That may mean I need to change conditions to get the soft body language I want and build back up with that as a part of my criteria.

What works best for one dog is not necessarily what will work best for another (or even the same dog in different conditions) -- YAY NUANCE! I am having fun learning and thinking about this. Would LOVE your thoughts in the comments!

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Tips for Getting Started With Reactivity Training

When it comes to reactivity, it’s tempting to try to use BIG solutions for BIG problems. Reactivity can feel BIG -- especially when it involves barking and lunging. Like a great many things in life, “the work” doesn’t end up looking as big or flashy as we may think. It’s why most of the time, videos showing someone working through “reactivity” with their dog look fairly boring. “Boring” or “basic” can actually be fairly good indicators that you are on the right track! That’s why we put together this little guide with tips for getting started with reactivity training with your dog.

How to Figure Out When Your Reactive Dog Is Over Threshold

Thresholds is a word that gets tossed around a lot in dog training. They matter, so it makes sense. But what is a threshold?! You’re likely to hear the word from people working through a “behavior issue” (often related to reactivity, aggression, and/or fear): “Work under threshold!” But thresholds are relevant for training even when we aren’t dealing with “behavior issues.”

You can think of a behavioral threshold as a boundary of sorts -- where you move from one space, over the threshold, and into another space. Sometimes those spaces are emotional/states of being. Thresholds matter because learning happens UNDER threshold. When dogs go over threshold, they experience physiological changes that can put them into a state of fight, flight, freeze, or fool around (this is a state of reacting, not thinking/learning). So recognizing where a dog’s threshold is is vital to any type of training - building new behaviors or changing existing ones - and to a dog’s wellbeing.

What does being over threshold look like:

It depends on the dog and situation. It’s helpful to notice when your dog shifts states (often a bit suddenly). Some expressions of over threshold include:

  • Barking, lunging, snarling

  • Jumping, mouthing

  • Stopping taking treats

  • Stopping playing

  • Zoomies

  • Suddenly freezing

  • Being completely distracted (like you don’t exist)

It’s important to remember that thresholds are not static. Unlike the threshold of a door, our dog’s behavior thresholds move all the time -- by the situation, by the day, by the minute. In the video above, you’ll watch my dog, Sully, go over threshold and come back under threshold in the same location over 30 seconds. It is why it’s so important we observe our dogs -- so we can do the best we can to keep them under threshold. Ps: we get into this in much more detail in Attention Unlocked.

What Does Reactivity Training With Dogs Who Bark and Lunge Look Like

When it comes to desensitization or counterconditioning in dog training, we generally want our dogs to be able to notice the presence of the “trigger” but be under the threshold where that stimulus becomes aversive if we want to change their response. Some behavior is going to be reinforced in this process. What behavior do you ultimately want from your dog in the presence of that trigger? Working “under threshold” can help prevent you from reinforcing behaviors you don’t actually want strengthened.

As an aside, management is always going to be a part of the overall equation! Because we can’t always keep our dog’s under threshold, we train management procedures that we can use in real life to get us out of sticky spots! To be honest, management sometimes looks more “active” than the planned training sessions😂.)

Here’s a breakdown of the clips featuring reactivity training in the video above:

Clip One: Sully, is watching people and dogs from a distance where she can notice them without reacting. She is free to look all she wants. Ultimately, she chooses to come over and play with her human instead. COOL!

Clip Two: Miles is lying down on his mat (totally voluntary) in a Dog Trained reactive dog class with visual barriers up. That’s it. That’s the whole behavior. He is just eating on a mat. GREAT!

Clip Three: Toby is lying in a field when he notices triggers in the distance. He can look all he wants. He chooses to be silly and roll instead! WHAT A COOL BEHAVIOR around triggers (and fun new emotions with it)!

How I Navigated My Dog’s Trigger (Another Dog) In Real Life

My dog, Otis, is what the world often labels as a “reactive dog” (his triggers include bikes, scooters, skateboards, and a select few dogs). I thought it might be interesting to workshop a real life moment on our walk. For context, Otis is generally good with other dogs. But he has BIG feelings about one dog -- if he smells or hears him, he’ll bark and lunge (sometimes in spite of my best attempts at management). We live in the same apartment building as this dog, so elevators and stairway doors are TOUGH. The video above involves that dog.

Here’s a play-by-play of how we navigated Otis’s trigger in the video:

  • What I chose to do in this situation with Otis was specific to the exact moment. I would likely make a different choice on another day or with another dog.

  • I factored in not just the immediate antecedents (e.g. we were away from the hot zone of our building, my friend had my other dog’s leash, we had some cars as barriers, my friend was with us) but also the distant antecedents (we had just finished a trail walk filled with all sorts of decompression) that were likely to position both Otis and I to better cope with this trigger (yes, I factored in my own emotional state).

  • I thought about Otis’s history with this dog (he often reacts worse when he hears or smells the dog but cannot find him), and I looked around for possible escape routes just in case.

  • On most other days, I’d avoid or distract (management for the win!). But today, I not only thought Otis and I could handle seeing this dog, but it was our best option.

  • I consciously kept myself calm -- if I were to tense up, Otis 100% would notice.

  • I took a final look to locate the dog before we cleared the van (without frantically scanning), and then I watched Otis. I looked for the smallest shift in his body language to tell me he noticed the dog. I wanted him to notice the dog first before I choked up on the leash and/or grabbed treats (so I’d reinforce behavior rather than making treats predict a scary dog).

  • Otis can walk by most of his old triggers without treats, but when he needs support, I ALWAYS give it. He needs support with this dog.

  • I continued to read Otis’s body language to determine when and where to feed him to get him through it. And I talked to him to help him out.

How I Reduced My Dog’s Barking at the Front Door

Dogs bark - for all sorts of reasons. Hopefully we aren’t surprising anyone with that statement. It’s super duper normal. Some dogs bark more than others (we will spare you a convo on genetics and temperament for now). The type of barking we are talking about in this post is alert barking (perhaps even reactive barking) that dogs do when they notice some environmental change. It’s quite common for dogs to bark when they hear noises or see new things outside their home. It isn’t possible to eliminate all alert barking in every dog, but it’s very possible to reduce it in a way that works for both the dogs and the humans in the house.

My dog, Sully (featured once again in the video above), has BIG feelings about the vacuum in our apartment hallway everyday. She used to run to the door and bark like a maniac anytime she heard it. I don’t have visual access into my apartment hallway, and the vacuum doesn’t come at a set time, which makes it REALLY hard to implement any sort of management or proactive training. But as you’ll see in the video, even without much control over the setup, Sully’s behavior changed. Here’s what I did:

  • I made sure I had treats out on top of my dog cabinet (easily accessible).

  • The MOMENT that Sully noticed the vacuum, I made it rain treats on her cot. (I looked for her body perking up rather than waiting for the barking, but sometimes her bark beat me if I was doing other things -- still fine!)

  • I repeated this every single day.

  • After enough days/reps of this, I built a little pause in after she noticed the vacuum. Because the vacuum always predicts treats on her cot, she automatically walked to the cot on her own expecting them. I reinforced that choice by making it rain treats on her cot!

Now, most hallway noises cue Sully to go to her cot on her own. Sometimes she lets out a few barks at the door first before she walks to her bed. Sometimes she needs a little help from me (a quick verbal cue). I still try to reinforce this choice every time in some form!

Watch This Tiny Reactive Dog Learn To Pass Other Dogs

Meet Ella and her five month old Chihuahua, Freddy, (featured in the video above). Ella told TOC from London, “I’ve had Freddy for two months now, and he came to me very anxious of the world and mildly fear reactive to dogs (hard stares and barking, mild lunging). After a very stressful first encounter...he started barking at almost every dog he saw/hard stared at all of them. We unintentionally flooded him with an outing to a park where he barked and lunged at every dog that passed and I had to persuade my family to leave. This was a really tough time with arguments among the family thinking I was being too blunt with advocating for Freddy’s space, I was over threshold myself with all the new information I was taking in and trying my best to make sure I was doing everything right for Freddy while also giving him time to decompress. I honestly felt like giving up at many points…However with my journey learning about R+ training, I’ve realised Freddy is just Freddy, and he will bark sometimes. [His] dog reactivity has gotten a lot better with training!”

Ella hasn’t been able to simulate passing dogs in more controlled scenarios (“setups”) yet, so she's been working through situations in real life. The video shows two random dogs Freddy passed in one of those real life scenarios, where you will see all that work lead to some really cool choices from Freddy!

Here is what Ella has focused on w/ Freddy:

  • LAT (Look at That from Leslie McDevvit) to turn noticing dogs into a conversation (aka it leads to that beautiful behavior from Freddy where he spots the dogs and then voluntarily looks up at Ella).

  • Learning more management techniques for when Freddy is in a reactive red zone for too long.

We feel so grateful to share a bit of Ella’s journey with Freddy with you and our #TOCFam . Reactivity is hard, and advocating for your dog can feel exhausting. There is a learning curve for us humans too - not just our dogs. It is a REALLY cool thing to watch little Freddy out there thriving in a giant world. Little dogs deserve support too -- even if their barks aren’t as loud.

How I Trained My Reactive Dog Around People

Ready to peak into some more reactivity work in a real life setting?! Once again my dog, Sully, stars in the video above, and she is fear reactive to new people - especially men (she exhibits barking and lunging). So when a construction crew of men arrived, it meant that we got to put some of our training to use (note: I would have avoided this situation if I thought it would be too much for her).

Here is a breakdown of what you’ll see us do in this video (⚠️construction noises):

  • I use an up-down treat pattern when we first get outside and when we first move to watch the workers. I don’t wait for her to give me eye contact here. I just make those new people predict treats for her and reinforce her while she is still calm. I don’t take any chances at first, so I reward early and often.

  • As she gets comfortable, I build in a pause and wait for Sully to choose to look away from the men (and look at me) to mark and reward, so I can reinforce her for the behavior of orienting to me around men.

  • When a man starts walking toward us, I use a treat magnet (I put a treat up to her nose) and u-turn with Sully to create more distance because I know that she would likely bark and lunge if that man gets any closer. Once we have distance, I let her sniff and move about (and her body language is quite nice).

Here’s a summary of my thought process during the training session:

  • Sully is alert and close to her threshold = up-down pattern with high rate of reinforcement (aka mark and reward when she notices trigger).

  • Sully is comfortable = I allow Sully time to look at the men and choose to look away from them (and look at me) on her own and then mark and reward

  • If a trigger is getting too close and Sully will likely react = distract and create distance calmly and quickly.

  • My mechanics aren’t perfect (and that’s ok!), but hopefully it gives you some ideas!

We will add more content to this little guide in the future. Drop us a comment below if you are looking for something specific for us to add.

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Getting Started With Resource Guarding

Resource guarding is no joke. But it doesn’t make your dog bad. In fact, it’s natural for an animal to want to retain possession of something they find valuable. That applies to humans too (seriously...stick a spoon in my ice cream and watch what happens). While it’s normal, it’s important to pay attention since it can lead to dangerous aggression. Technically speaking, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) defines resource guarding as “the use of avoidance, threatening, or aggressive behaviors by a dog to retain control of food or non-food items in the presence of a person or other animal.” Keep scrolling through our guide for tips related to resource guarding and how to help your dog through management and training.

How To Recognize Resource Guarding Through Your Dog’s Body Language

In the video above, Stanley is drinking from a water bowl at his house (Hana is the visiting dog). Hana approaches and lingers by the bowl. Stanley freezes (this is a HUGE warning sign in dog body language in general) and then snaps. What do we (humans) do? We help Hana move away from Stanley. AKA, we LISTEN to Stanley. We do not correct or scold him. That snap was inhibited. We want our dogs to be “heard” at their lowest level communications, so they don’t have to escalate.

Here are some important takeaways to remember about resource guarding body language:
1. Resource Guarding Body Language/Behavior → There is a huge range of behaviors (from “possession” to serious aggression):

a. This includes Grabbing and running away with resources, freezing, head lowering, stiff body, eyes moving but head still, growling, snarling (teeth shown), snapping, lunging, and biting.

b. If you see these behaviors, it’s a good idea to find a certified dog trainer.

c. We cannot give out specific plans for resource guarding responsibly, but here are a few things to think about (ideally, a trainer will help you create an actual plan):

  • Identify Resources: Make a list of things that your dog guards/has guarded/might guard (space, food, chews, people, balls, etc.)

  • Come up with a management plan that prevents rehearsal

  • Make sure everyone knows the signs and how to listen to your dog (aka give them space the MOMENT you notice any guarding!

  • Make sure everyone understands how to safely remove objects (e.g. high value treat toss AWAY and then do a couple fun things after the resource is removed) → If dog won’t trade, assess if it's actually that big of a deal for them to have the object

  • Work on classical conditioning of approach when around resource → build to desired operant behavior when approached around resource

  • Teach: Leave it, drop it, retrieve (helpful for stolen items)

  • Remember to be more of a giver than a taker 😎

Why You Should Never Punish Growling in Resource Guarding

It is important to understand that resource guarding is your dog’s emotional response to someone approaching them when they have a resource. This is why correcting your dog for growling is never something you should do. Growling is a normal way that dogs communicate (humans are the ones who have big feelings about it). If you punish growling and suppress it, you’ve not actually changed how your dog feels about someone approaching them when they have a resource -- you’ve simply eliminated the non-violent way that your dog can communicate before potentially having to escalate. It is also important to note that the resources dogs guard vary widely from food or toys and objects to people or spaces.

Resource guarding is complex and can be dangerous, so we can’t responsibly demo how to address it in a single video. In the video above we show you how Sully (a dog who used to resource guard toys from people) looks now when a person approaches her. When Sully was adopted, she would get stiff and then growl and snap if anyone walked within five feet of her when she had a toy (she would get stiff and still if you even looked at her while she had a toy). But now, she gets excited and even brings her toys to people when she sees them approach! When resource guarding is addressed the right way, you should see visible signs that your dog thinks a person approaching them (when they have their resource) is a GOOD thing! This means a dog who is soft, loose, and wiggly (no signs of stress). You will likely see signs of [happy] anticipation because they think that a person approaching them predicts good things! Create an environment where there is plenty to go around. Make people approaching predict the addition of good things, not the removal of things your dog loves.

Why Resource Guarding Has Nothing To Do With Your Dog Being Dominant

Resource Guarding behaviors have nothing to do with an animal being dominant. The function of these behaviors is to retain control of something deemed valuable. It is really critical that we listen to the least aggressive resource guarding behaviors we can spot by creating distance. If we punish the growl by coming closer or administering some sort of correction, guess what? The dog may learn growling doesn’t work. So next time they have something valuable, they may skip right over growling to something that has a history of working (like biting).

Since Sully (featured again in the video above), has a history of resource guarding behaviors when people or dogs come near her while she has something valuable, I have done a lot of work with her on this. It’s rare that she practices resource guarding in our own home now. But I ALWAYS have some management in place (e.g. she only gets chews she can eat in one sitting and she is fed in a separate room by herself if other dogs are around). This video was the result of a management fail (commotion from visiting my sister). I trained a recall away from valuable items (which she offered beautifully) for this EXACT reason (but then I failed to secure the other dogs -- fail on my part again🥴).

The moment when a dog is resource guarding is rarely the training moment (it could potentially be if there is light resource guarding and you work at a distance). First priority should be to create distance!

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Ideas For Getting Started With Recall in Dog Training

When it comes to recall, in dog training it’s a topic that can strike fear, joy, and pride in people’s hearts! Truth: It can take years to really solidify recall (e.g. your dog comes to you when called) and it requires a lot of (systematic) training. In this guide, we share simple things you can do right now in everyday life to improve your dog’s recall and troubleshoot your training (note: there is much more that goes into recall, but these tips are easy and will help).

Some Simple Tips To Get Started With Recall in Dog Training

  • Capture attention: While this phrase may sound mysterious, it is quite simple in practice! When your dog chooses to look at you (aka you aren’t asking them to), mark that exact moment (e.g. say “yes”) and then reinforce them (e.g. give them a treat). In the video above, you will notice that it actually looks a whole lot like recall -- just without the actual recall cue (“come”). This lets you start to build a reinforcement history for orienting and moving to you (hey, that is what you need for recall!).     

  • Warm up with easy recalls! If your first recall of the outing is when you dog is 20 yards away rolling in poop, you are asking a lot of them. Try doing a few quick recalls out of the gate when they are close to you and not really distracted! Set them up for success early and help them remember that reinforcement history.     

  • Mark the moment your dog flips around to you (rather than waiting until they come all the way to you). The first piece of the recall behavior is turning to orient to you!       

  • Be intentional with WHEN you say “come.” If your dog is an intense sniffer, try waiting for them to disengage from that scent just a little bit before you recall. If your dog is rolling in poop, maybe you just have to accept the bath that’s coming and recall in one of the moments when they stand up. If you constantly use the recall cue when they aren’t able to respond, the cue can actually become irrelevant to them (it is an actual science thing that happens!).     

  • Use higher value treats! Often, we just aren’t using something that is actually reinforcing! Your dog decides what is reinforcing - not you. The only way to know if you are actually reinforcing the behavior is if you see more of it. If recall isn’t increasing, the reinforcer isn’t strong enough.  

Watch What Happens When I Recall My Dogs off of a Deer

This video above is from a recent encounter with deer on our trail walk.

Here’s what we observe in the video: 

  • Is this video perfect? No. But there’s a whole lot to celebrate. So I’ll celebrate, and take notes about the things we can keep working on. Sully’s (little dog) recall is not as good as my other dog, Otis’s. Sully only gets to be off leash sometimes. I am intentional about finding empty trails and make sure she seems like she is able to respond to me on that day before I unclip her lead. I ALWAYS have something high value if I let Sully off leash, & I immediately do an easy recall after unclipping her to make sure she knows I have the good stuff. I’d done all of those things on the day of this video.

  • When we ran into a family of deer and I saw my dogs start to chase, I actually only recalled Otis. Why? I didn’t think Sully could recall at that moment, so why teach her that my cue is irrelevant. Otis recalls quickly, which I expected but that still makes me happy. He has a strong chase instinct, so we’ve worked HARD on being able to recall out of chase (we’ve worked for years on this in a variety of ways).

  • What I like even more is that I didn’t have to ask him to hang near me after the recall - he just did! There is plenty that went into that behavior, but it's a story for another time.

  • When I saw Sully paused instead of disappearing into the woods (🤯), I tried recalling her. I had to help her out by repeating her name, but given the conditions, I will take it!

  • Sully used to never even eat outside, much less look at us. Simple, imperfect, but still awesome moments like this have years of work behind them and lots of pre-unclipping-the-leash prep that make them possible.

Troubleshooting: What To Do if Your Dog Doesn’t Come When Called

Let’s chat about what happens in real life when your dog doesn’t respond to your recall cue. If your dog is like Sully, they may return to you two minutes after you call them covered in poop! What do you do?! 

Here are some ideas to get started with troubleshooting:     

  • Remember, your dog isn’t giving you the metaphorical middle finger (even if it feels like it). They’re behaving based on their genetics and learning history. 

  • When you unclip their leash, you’re making an agreement to hold yourself accountable for whatever happens (not your dog). Unclipping the leash means you’re comfortable that your dog can realistically offer the behaviors you need in those conditions, or you’re in a safe environment where you’re okay with the consequences if they can’t.

  • Pause and think about whether you want to use (or repeat) your recall cue. If you don’t think it is realistic for your dog to respond, don’t use it (or repeat it) because you’ll just teach them that it’s irrelevant. 

  • Just wait. (Depending on your dog and the situation, you may actually want to run away from them.)

  • As they move towards you, talk to them in a happy voice! Even if you’re saying “you naughty little thing, I can smell you from here,” say it in the voice/tone you praise them with! A “come OR ELSE” tone isn’t inviting.

  • When they do show up, keep praising them (or at least talking in a happy tone) and give them a treat!  

If you are wondering iwhy I would reinforce Sully for “ignoring me and rolling in poop,” (in the video above) it’s important to recognize that isn’t the behavior we’re really looking at. She already made the choice to ignore my cue and go find the poop (a choice which has ALREADY been reinforced by getting to roll in it) -- that ship has sailed. If I were to scold her when she showed up, the behavior that I’d most likely punish is walking towards me. That’s definitely not what I want. So I remember the agreement I made when I unclipped. Then I talk happily, give a treat, and plan a training session to work on the recall gap I just found. 

When You Recall Your Dog, Are They Coming Just Because You Asked

When you call “come” out to your dog and they run to you, did they come just because you taught them to listen to you? We thought it might be fun to peek under the hood of what goes on when we “ask our dogs to do things” (believe us, this is the smallest peek under the hood possible -- behavior is a complex topic LOL).

Let's look at these things we call “cues.” Some people call them commands -- we don’t for a number of a reasons, but we aren’t gonna get distracted by that shiny object right now 🤣. Have you ever heard someone say, “I said sit, so my dog should sit.” Why should saying “sit” lead to your dog sitting? What should your dog do if you say “pancake”? Or “starfish”? Perhaps you’re thinking that your dog doesn’t know what those words mean but does know what “sit” means. If we’re in the behavioral level of analysis, the meaning of words is a funny thing. What does it look like when your dog “knows what a word means”? And even if we say your dog “knows what a word means,” why would that lead to a specific behavior? If this feels like a jumbled mess, you’ll be glad to know we’re about to untangle it!

According to Dr. Susan Friedman, a cue is an “antecedent stimulus that signals the availability of reinforcement, contingent on the appropriate behavior.” A cue does not tell your dog to do something (per se). A cue tells your dog that a reinforcer is now available IF they do a specific behavior. in other words, a cue tells them that a behavior-consequence contingency is now in play.

So if the cue is not what’s “getting them” to do the behavior, what is?! Past consequences for performing that behavior in those conditions! This is why people say “reinforcement drives behavior.” If you want to understand current behavior, look at past consequences (in those conditions).

Why Breaking Down Recall Into Components Can Help You Strengthen It

The recall end goal for many people is likely that their dog runs to them and stations (hangs out). But did you know recall is actually multiple behaviors linked together that occur after a single cue (e.g. “come”)? Thinking about those components is quite helpful because we can train the parts separately and then chain them all together! And for a bit of nuance, even as your dog’s recall strengthens, you may choose to lower criteria by only looking for the first part of the recall behavior if the environment is really tough!

Recall takes consistent work. There are so many recall games you can play, and even within those games, you can adjust which component of behavior you focus on. I can play the same cookie tossing pattern game and mark and toss the moment my dog turns to me or mark and toss when they get all the way to me -- two very different things. I find getting a super strong whip around when my dog hears the cue to be incredibly helpful to the larger recall behavior, so I spend a fair bit of time there! When you intro tougher distractions in training, marking for just turning away from the distraction can set your dog up for future success!

The conditions you recall your dog in change. Asking your dog to come from ten feet away in your living room vs. asking them to come (when you’re 40 yards away) as they’re chasing their dog friends are two wildly different asks. For harder recalls (they could be harder for any number of reasons), I tend to mark earlier in the recall chain and use my reinforcers to bring them the rest of the way in.

There is SO much more we could get into, but we’re going to leave it here. We will keep adding to this little recall guide from time to time and we hope that it’s helpful!

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Getting Started With Cooperative Care in Dog Training

When you watch a video of cooperative care in action (aka a dog calmly opting in to getting their ears cleaned by sitting on a mat first), it can be easy to think, “That is amazing but my dog would never do that.” Maybe you aren’t practicing cooperative care as much as other members of our #TOCFam, but you can 100% incorporate some cooperative care and start buttons into your life and reduce a lot of stress for you and your dog!

Cooperative care is not just kind but also extremely effective. If you give your dog a choice to opt out of something (and reward them for it), they actually opt in more! Why? ✨Control is a primary reinforcer for behavior✨ just like food, water, shelter, etc. When we give our dogs choice, it actually helps us get the behavior we want faster (in addition to being humane). Keep scrolling for more ideas for starting to simplify your life with your dog through cooperative care.

Getting Started With Cooperative Care For Grooming

For a lot of dogs, grooming is a part of life. But it doesn’t have to be stressful -- for you or your dog! One of the best ways to make grooming easier is to use a start button behavior (or consent behavior), which is essentially a way for your dog to give consent.

Recently we shared the video above featuring Moose, a four month old puppy -- not some experienced adult dog! Cooperative care can look fancy, but don’t let that intimidate you. You can work to build this type of cooperation with any dog!    

Moose’s start button/consent behavior is a chin rest on the chair. Nobody cues him to do this behavior; instead, this is something he offers. He understands that if he puts his chin on the chair, it will lead to grooming and then treats because that is the association that was made for him. Perhaps most importantly, he doesn’t feel forced into doing a chin rest. He gets a treat for saying no too! How does he say no? By not giving a clear, enthusiastic yes! If you watch closely at the end of the video, you will spot how rewarding his pause (his “no”), leads to a very fast yes right after.    

Note: Moose may be young here, but he understands how start buttons work since they have been incorporated into his training since the moment he came home at nine weeks. He also already had a trained chin rest behavior (PS: You can train your dog to do a chin rest in the Tails of Connection Challenge), so this setup made chin rest a likely behavior for him to offer. Our hope is that this video gives you some ideas or gets you curious about incorporating start buttons!

The Magic of Giving Your Dog Control Through Start Buttons

Recently we shared a start button story on Instagram that got a lot of interest, so we put together the video in the post above as a fun way to show the magic of giving your dog control. This isn’t a demo or tutorial, but it shows some cool behavior naturally evolving! 

Here’s a play by play of what we featured in the various clips:   

  • Clip One: A few weeks ago, we shared this same clip in our stories of a desensitization session Christie was doing with one of her dogs, Otis, and a suitcase. Otis is fine with suitcases in general, but she wanted to get him comfortable walking beside a rolling one (for future travel). She used a nose target as a start button to roll the suitcase (aka she only rolls the suitcase after he targets her hand). What happened was kind of fun to see: he naturally started offering a different behavior as a way to say “don’t roll the suitcase.” He would look away when he didn’t want the suitcase rolled (and then look back at Christie because he knows that “no’s” get rewarded too!) and boop her hand when he was ready for her to roll it. This session told Christie really quickly that he didn’t feel great about her moving the suitcase, so she stopped (and took a few steps back in our training). 

  • Clip Two: Some of you asked how a start button might evolve naturally (as opposed to the “don’t start button” that Otis showed with the suitcase). This clip shows a start button naturally evolving while bringing clippers out with one of Christie’s dogs, Sully. Here the start button behavior is a paw raise. 

  • Clip Three: This clip shows a start button for bringing nail clippers out naturally evolving with Otis. His behavior is super subtle -- sticking his tongue out!  

These clips show how quickly dogs learn the consequences of their behavior. With that understanding, they have the ability to opt in or out of things by simply offering or not offering a behavior. This rocks because it allows us to get a real glimpse into HOW THEY FEEL about something. Whether you are using a trained start button behavior or letting one naturally evolve, empowering your dog is a cool thing to do! We’re using pieces of a process from Emelie Johnson Vegh and Eva Bertilsson of Carpe Momentum on developing start buttons in clips two and three. 

Getting Started With Tooth Brushing Through Cooperative Care

Have you ever thought about the behaviors that your dog need stop be able to do in order for you to brush their teeth? Standing still is the main one (though you could certainly break this down more). What about the behaviors that you will need to do in order to brush their teeth? This depends on how you go about it, but here are a few: Bend over, reach towards their face, touch their face, lift their mouth, pick up toothbrush, put toothpaste on toothbrush, bring toothbrush towards their face, touch toothbrush to their teeth, move your arm back and forth to brush their teeth, etc.

We have to thank the incredible Laura Monaco Torelli for really helping us think more about all of human behavior (Christie was lucky enough to get mentored by her)! By thinking about human behavior, we know how to split criteria better (aka break “brushing my dog’s teeth” down into smaller component parts). 

 Here’s a breakdown of the play-by-play in the video featured above:

  • Otis and Christie have a solid dialogue going that they built up over time. He has full control over whether or not he stations in front of her (and Christie will only begin my behavior if he stations), so his behavior in this framework gives her LOADS of info.  

  • She’s only doing small components of the teeth brushing behavior. 

  • Her reinforcement involves increasing distance from her (to relieve any pressure he may have felt and give him a choice to opt back in). 

  • She threw in some fun, easy behaviors. 

  • The entire session was five click points. Super short.

Some Takeaways (apply them to more than just teeth!): 

  • We can usually break our training down MUCH more than we think. Try listing out every single tiny thing you (or whomever else) will do to train. That gives you ideas about how to split criteria in your training. 

  • It’s okay for your training not to look perfectly linear. Is touching the toothbrush to Otis’s back an actual step Christie will take when she brushes his teeth for real? No. But it gives Otis information in a less intrusive way. (By the way, there are lots of other things Christie does, but she budgeted only five click points for this session.)

  • Laura Monaco Torelli is next level good at this stuff (she makes this look so smooth when she does it with wild animals). She is a great person to learn from

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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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