Leash Skills
Sylvia Koczerzuk 
Does your Dog Pull? here is one factor that may a factor
Leash Walking
Is your dog pulling your arm off! Ouch🤪.
That’s not a fun walk.
Do you dread walking your dog?
You shouldn’t and I will say why are you walking your dog if you feel that way?
There are many reasons that dogs pull on the leash.
First off your dog is rehearsing the behaviour so you might need to rethink continuing your walks until you can teach your dog the concept of a loose leash.
There is also the understanding we need and that is where we want our dog to walk, the leash is just a tool. Leashes do not teach where your dog to be. We want to build engagement and proximity. For sure we want to let our dogs enjoy their walks but teaching them they can do this without creating tension on the leash needs to be done in steps.
It's always an advantage to practice the concepts inside the house with food rewards or a toy if your dog has a toy drive. Practicing this without the leash is helpful for us to work on our technique without the leash. Then we can add the leash.
Transferring this learning to new environments is our next step. We may need to do this in a quieter environment like our backyard or our driveway. This helps us practice and teach our dog this same concept in the new environment. Now when we move to high-traffic areas where distractions are big and plenty you will want to think how long and far you can go while keeping your dog engaged with you. This can be a struggle with an adolescent dog due to the developmental stage they are in. So strategize this.
Leash walking our dogs can often be less about the leash.
Focus is another concept that you will need and if you have not built this foundation skill you may continue to struggle. Focus for you is something you need while on your walks As above you will want to build this in steps just like above with the environments. Focus on you is a huge goal of mine and one I want to work on before I step out with my dog on a leash.
I hope this helps and thank you for reading this.
Sylvia Koczerzuk, www.walkaboutcanineconsulting.org
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