Do you have a dog that reacts negatively to things in the environment?

Unfortunately the world is a scary place for dogs that are reactive and everything fills their bucket - good or bad.

This activates their fight or flight response and you end up with a dog that is like a slippery fish on the end of a line flipping around and trying to get free. There is nothing you can do to get their attention and focus at this point, it is too late for that and you just need to manage the situation.

Have you ever looked at another dog parent calmly walking their dog down the street or maybe in the pet store, are you a bit jealous of the cool pet parents that get to take their dogs to the breweries with them? Well I totally understand your sometimes deflated feeling of being stuck with a dog that you can’t take with you anywhere as they react to everything and I am here to help you!

What if interactions with your dog could be different?

Would you try games based concept training to help your dog learn that novel things in the environment, that stimulate their fight or flight response, can be a more neutral if not positive event.

What can games based concept training teach your dog?

• that novelty isn’t scary

• how to deal with new things in the environment or new events occurring

• problem solving skills

• that different and challenging situations are fun

• to look on the bright side, transforming a pessimist to an optimist

• confidence

• self control 

  We like to shape dogs brains by training concepts to our dogs. These 3 concepts will help your dog to positively grow their response to novel or scary events or things in the environment.

1. Calmness

2. Optimism

3. Self control

To training these concepts we play games that are specifically designed to help your dog use their brain to make smarter choices. This helps to grow their skills and be better prepared to handle whatever crazy event the world will throw their way.

First concept :

Calmness

Reactive dogs are often running at full speed all the time. Always on alert for any danger, or invader ( like a bug LOL) and they will have a hard time relaxing enough to get a good nap in the daytime. This means that they are basically throwing things into their bucket constantly throughout the day, meaning that over flow is a given, this creates the negative reactions you will see.

Dogs that are constantly “on” will not get enough rest to empty their bucket and therefore you could come home and want to go for a walk and 2 minutes into the walk your dog is acting like the floppy fish and you are left puzzled as to why when they have been home “sleeping” all day.

So let’s teach your dog how to be calm!

Scatterfeeding - Do you know that 20 minutes of sniffing for your dog is equivalent to an hours walk in term of enrichment! Isn’t that amazing! So let’s let our dogs sniff and get their meal. Scatterfeeding is all about using your dogs food and enriching their meal with sniffing and interaction with their human. You can use a snuffle mat or rolled up towel if inside or in nicer weather take it out to some nice grass and scatter the food and release your dog for the hunt! I call these Sniffari’s (sniff safari) and this is a game that I play with Indy all the time. Indy has some trouble with meeting other dogs and this game helps keep her bucket level low so if we meet another dog she is less likely to over react.

Second concept:

Optimism

Reactive dogs are often pessimists and this creates a muscle memory that quickly takes over when put into situations that are scary, new or challenging. Once your dog starts to feel these pessimistic feelings their brain quickly turns those feelings into actions to save themselves and you end up with the floppy fish affect.

The good thing about brains is that they can be shaped to think differently and that is where games based training comes into play. Once you realize your dog is a pessimist you can start to play games that build their optimism and change the way they think and react to scary, new or challenging events.

Let’s learn how to grow optimism in your dogs brain!

Noise box - I love this game and have used this to feed Indy for many feeding sessions( especially when I worked in dentistry for 10 hr days). This is one of the cheapest ways to enrich your dogs meal AND get them to grow their optimism. Grab a box or small tote ( no taller than your dogs elbow -which is the “armpit”) and gather a couple empty water bottles or pop cans, toss them into the box and then scatter your dogs meal into the box. This is a great way to show your dog that noisy, moving objects aren’t bad or scary and that you can get a tasty reward for being brave enough to hunt through all those items.

Third concept:

Self Control

When dogs get scared their brain goes into fight or flight response and this is not a good headspace to be able to make rational choices. So we need to teach our dogs to think instead of react. Teaching your dog that good things happen when they learn to control their energy and make good choices is going to set them up for success. Self control isn’t something that comes naturally to most dogs- they love to seek out pleasurable things so waiting for the delivery of food is hard.

This is where self control comes in handy; here is a great game to help your dog start to use their brain to get the outcome they are hoping for, food.

Lets learn how to teach your dog self control!

Mouse - Place a few treats on the floor, make a cage with your hand over the food. Don’t let your dog get to the food. When your dog backs off from your hand/takes their attention off of your hand, flick out a piece of food for them. Reset your hand over the food and the game begins again. If they really struggle with self control this may take a while till they “back off” a bit. Don’t nag or say anything just let them use their brain to figure out what you want.

Life with a reactive dog can be tough. Seeing your dog so unhappy and fearful is distressing, and the smallest things can trigger “the floppy fish affect” and that makes huge withdrawals from your Relationship Bank Account. But by playing games and using concept based training, you can change your dog’s life and transform the life you live together. 

Training is a lifestyle not a season, there is always something to learn .

Gamefy your life!

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