Refusing to Walk

[Guest]

[Chris]

I run a small online community for French Bulldog owners and often link to your excellent articles here -so first of all thanks for providing such great information on your site.

One common problem with our owners is a dog sitting and refusing to walk -  I often refer them to your Loose Leash Walking article for basic principles but I wonder if you have any additional insight or advice about how to solve this problem.

[Grisha Stewart]

Hi Chris,

Sorry for the delay - I didn't see this post.

I see a lot of Frenchies with Donkey Dog syndrome, as one of my clients calls it.  One way to work on this is to teach the dog "Let's Go."

Start in the house.  Measure out the dinner and put little cups or whatever of dog food (this even works for raw, but you'll need spoons) in different places throughout the house (up on a table or shelf).  As you move from dish to dish say "let's go" just before you turn to walk away.  Make some kind of hand motion; I like a kind of sweeping forward motion.  Dogs learn hand signals very quickly.  You may need to make kissy noises or hand claps or whatever.  Point your body in the direction you want the dog to go and don't lure the dog forward with a treat, if you can avoid it, especially at this stage. 
 
Click and/or praise the dog when she moves with you.  Feed a kibble from the dish, then go to the next dish.  Repeat until the dog has her whole dinner.

You might also have little jars of kibble or treats around the house all the time, so you can do this whenever you move from room to room, not just at meal time.  Watch the dog's weight, though!

Also try a few of the  above sessions with the dog inside, on leash.

Once you do that for at least a couple of days, you're ready to start training "let's go" outside.  If you have a yard, do the same activity as above in the yard, off leash.  If not, you'll need to do it on leash.  The kibble or treats can be on top of cars or in helper's hands. 

If that's not possible, skip to the next step.  Put the kibble in your own pocket or treat bag.  Do the same let's go routine - say let's go, give the hand signal, and then walk on, possibly making kissy noises or bending your knees a bit.  Try not to tug on the leash - a little pressure, followed by gently snaking the leash back and forth is good.

As an additional bit of work, you might try teaching the dog that pressure on the leash means to go in the direction of the tug.  In a boring place, put the leash on and have some treats and a clicker handy.  Pull very gently in one direction - keep a steady pressure, not enough to drag the dog, just enough to make the leash tight.  When the dog goes in that direction, you'll feel the leash go slack. Click and treat. Repeat in many different directions, with different kinds of pressure.

Let me know how it goes!

-Grisha