What causes Bad Dog Behavior

It is important to sit down and work out what the triggers are that set off your dog. When you can pinpoint the things that make your dog react in a way, which is unacceptable, then you can plan out how to teach your dog the correct reaction in these situations. Trying to teach your dog when he is in the middle of a crazy spell will not have good results. When your dog is frantic he is not listening nor in a receptive mind frame. When does your dog lose control? What is happening at the moment? What occurred right before the incident? Were you walking and met someone? Had you been sitting when someone approached? Is it children that your dog finds irresistible? Looking at these factors will help you decided what it is that distracts your dog the most.

After you have figured out what the biggest distraction is and what triggers your dog's wild and uncontrollable antics, sit down and map out how you plan to teach your dog to disregard the triggers and instead provide other behavior. You should break big distractions down into small steps. Start out slow and help your dog to learn that these distractions are controllable with self-control. If a person coming to the door triggers your dog to go out of control then try these simple steps:

• Practice with your dog the Sit/Stay commands in front of the closed front door.
• Now add a family member as the guest but without using the door.
• Ask the family member to wait outside the front door.
• Have the family member knock or ring the door bell.

Finally when your dog has mastered all of these distractions and can still perform the Sit/Stay ten times out of ten he is ready to practice with a real visitor. If your dog's trigger is playing ball outside then you could try these steps to help him.

• When excited ask your dog to Sit.
• If he obeys, click and throw the ball.
• If not walk away for a minute saying "too bad."
• Try again after waiting for a few minutes.

What you are doing is teaching your dog that there is both a reward (the ball is thrown) for sitting and a consequence (you walk away) for jumping. Of course if your dog is not heavily reinforced with the Sit/Stay commands to begin with you are going to have problems. He must understand what it is you want and expect from him. If you haven't yet fully taught him Sit/Stay then this should be the first order at hand. Make sure you start him off in a distraction free location and slowly progress to include multiple distractions. Don't punish dog jumping