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1. #Dog growling how to#
2. #Dog growling free#

Otherwise you may end up freaking your dog out more instead of calming him.īefore you begin training. O kay to say "it's okay"? What about trying to comfort your dog when he is upset with kind words and petting? Sure! Why not? The only thing to be careful about is that your voice does not sound worried or nervous.

It is much more effective to go at a pace slow enough that your dog is actually happy with the current step before you move to the next one. If, by contrast, you were to barge in too close and feed your dog with a treat after he snaps at you, you may still have some success with teaching him you are not a threat, but the process will go much slower due to the stress involved. After your dog is responding to your approach him with a happy tail wag, you can begin to come closer. To change your dog's underlying emotions about your approach, it is best to begin by approaching just close enough so that your dog notices your presence and then toss a treat and leave. If you are trying to help your dog feel better about something he is upset about, say, having someone approach when he has a yummy chew bone, you will want to go slowly enough in your training so that your dog does not get overwhelmed and bite.

But there is a bit more information that is helpful to know about changing the emotional state of your dog. JAFCO Comfortable Dog Muzzles, Hard Plastic & Soft Flexible VersionsĮasy does it. How would you then feel the next time he enters your "sanctuary"? You would probably be less likely to snap at him because you would be anticipating kindness instead of intrusion and anger. What if instead, upon his entering the room, you said that you wanted to be alone and he expressed sympathy, brought you a cup of tea and then left. Would his reprimanding you make you less likely to be snappish next time he comes to talk to you about household travails? Next time it happens, you might try to keep your annoyance to yourself or you might scream at him! Either way, your underlying emotion of anger at the intrusion would most likely remain unchanged by the fact that your husband "punished" you with the reprimand. You snap at him to leave you alone and he becomes angry and tells you off. Imagine you have gone to bed early because you don't feel well and want to be alone and your husband comes in to talk to you about bills.

#Dog growling how to#

Here's an example from the human perspective to help you to understand about how to change emotional states in your dog.

#Dog growling free#

Pretty cool, huh!?Ī free tip for husbands everywhere. So, by rewarding the growl, you have actually caused your dog to stop growlng because he feels happy. The trained growl would cease to have meaning as a warning signal in that context and would now be transformed into a happily offered "trick", (like the dog's face in the above picture!). If you really wanted to train your dog to growl it would actually be pretty difficult to do. What would happen? Would your dog growl at you more? Have you trained him to growl? Most likely your dog will start to growl less as he anticipates food and safety with your approach instead of feeling fear and worry. Just say "Cheese"?! Now let's say you reward your dog every time he growls at you by feeding a treat and then leaving him be. Teaching your dog not to growl by punishing the growl can make for a dangerous situation since your dog may feel that his only way left to communicate discomfort is by biting (and "without warning"). Or your dog may stop growling which looks deceptively like you solved the problem, but he is probably still uncomfortable and now less able to communicate his discomfort. What do you think he would learn? Probably that you are kind of scary and the growling or other defensive behavior may increase. Just say "No!?" Let's say that you do yell at your dog every time your dog snarls at you. In fact, it's just the opposite! If your dog is communicating to you that he is uncomfortable by growling, for example, it behooves you to help him to feel better about that thing so that he has less to growl about. This is because fear or anxiety does not respond to rewards and punishments in the same way that behaviors do. If you punish your dog when he steals your dinner, he may stop doing that, but if you punish your dog for snarling, you may get more growling, or worse, a bite. The simple fact is, however, that you can't reward or punish emotions and have it work the way it does for other behaviors like teaching your dog not to steal food off of the counter. When a dog growls at you, are you tempted to sternly tell him "No!"? It seems like the right thing to do and many trainers, (even famous ones!), will tell you to do just that. This article was inspired by the work of Amy Cook at shy-k9's yahoo group.