[nagdu] problems with new dog

[Cheryl Osborn]

Hi everyone

Sorry, but this is going to be a long message.

A little background first.  I received my new dog, Inga, this last
December and though she works well in harness, I have been having
several behavioral problems with her when she is out of harness.  She
is very puppy-like and gets into everything.  She loves to chew up
anything.  She is my third dog from Seeing Eye.  Of course, I expect
her to behave as well as my last dog.  <grin>

The Seeing Eye sent a trainer down to work with us about 2 months ago.
 He brought me a pinch collar so that I could have a little better
control of Inga.  I had explained to him and the Seeing Eye that most
of the problems I was having were in our home.  Since I have mobility
issues, the pinch collar helped to keep Inga from dragging me around
and suddenly darting away when I was trying to park her.  There were
several times that she jerked so hard that I landed on my face.  The
collar also helps in that I am unable to give a strong physical
correction.  There are many times when I wonder if the puppy raiser
just allowed Inga to do whatever she wanted, because her behavior is
so bad.  By the way, when not working, she does get plenty of exercise
playing with our Great Pyrinese.

My main concern now is that I cannot keep Inga from jumping on people
when she is not in harness.  When someone comes to visit, especially
if they are shy of dogs, Inga is surely going to jump on them.  This
is bad behaviour, of course, but especially bad when some of our
friends are afraid of dogs.  I correct Inga, when I can, but it always
seems to happen before I can get to her.  You see, we have a very
large yard, so when people come through the gate, I am not there to do
anything about it.  I have told everyone to give her a knee in the
chest whenever she jumps on them, but those who are shy won't do this.



Cheryl in Mexico
chapalacheryl at gmail.com

Any suggestions will be appreciated.