How To Make A Sighthound Sit + Jealousy Problems

Hi Chaz!

While training is mostly going well with the clicker, and I find Nahla to be very food motivated, I have run into two problems that I'm hoping someone might be able to chip in on!

How to make a sighthound sit???

Or sighthound-type cross, anyway... She does not sit voluntarily, so I'm unable to shape it with a clicker, and when I try to lure her she just backs up or rears up. I've tried alternating the speed and height at which I lure, but I get the same response both times. I've only used these two methods previously to teach Sit, so I'm a bit stuck! Does anyone have any tips?

The other thing I've run into I'm loosely terming "jealousy", as I haven't seen any kind of reactivity/aggression from her right now. However, whenever I'm hugging my significant other, or interacting with my cats, she comes up and tries to push herself between us, or redirect my attention onto her. I've so far been ignoring these attempts and am hoping to see the "extinction burst" soon, but I am a bit concerned. Is it possible this could escalate into reactivity? If so, how do I take the necessary steps to ensure this doesn't escalate into reactivity/aggression? If it helps, she ignores the cats for the most part, and is submissive when she does interact with them - she just seems to have "jealousy" issues.

Thanks for the input, everyone! :]

Sitting can be a little unnatural for some sighthounds, while others sit on their own all the time. Generally, I find the small females tend to have better sits than the large males, but it really depends on conformation. Also, it tends to get easier as they do it more. Since their butts typically never actually touch the ground, I can only imagine the kind of muscle strength required to squat for prolonged periods of time.

Easiest ways are to stack several beds together to create a shorter distance required for the sit. Stand the dog just in front of your stack of beds and lure for the sit. The butt doesn't have far to go to hit the beds, click and treat as soon as it happens. Over time you reduce the number of dog beds until there are none and the dog is sitting on level ground.

The other way is to use a hill. Stand the dog facing downhill, lure for the sit. Again, the butt doesn't have as far to go on the hill so it tends to be easier.

I had never heard of sight hounds having a problem sitting. I had no idea. you learn something everyday!

As far as the jealousy- I think it depends on the attitude he seems to have. Sometimes when my fiancee and I cuddle, Hugo tries to jump up in between us and lay directly between us on the couch. He's all kisses and tail wags. Pretty sure he just wants to be part of the cuddle party. Still, I make sure that he is banished to the floor every once and awhile so that he knows there are times when we get to be alone and he has to deal.

My super long and tall GSD girl had that issue with sitting because of the way she is built. I did do a lot of luring the sit for building tuck sit muscle memory, but using perchwork and hind end awareness were key! It takes some some to build with dogs built like that. In fading my hands/the lure out I used a post-it for her to target my stomach in front and a hand target at my side. Actually if you have a good hand touch that is easier than using food lures from the get go! Scout just didn't have a lot of confidence bopping my hand at first.

This is how my dogs and my roommates/FWB is. He's got two dogs, I've got two dogs (It's a weird situation lol, not getting too much into it) but if we're cuddling or sitting together too close on the couch, all four dogs want to join in. It essentially becomes a dog pile, where we're petting whatever dog is closest to us, and then the next dog with the other hand. We don't mind it sometimes, it's actually a pretty fun bonding experience, teaches my pup what personal space and boundaries are, and everyone enjoys the contact from it. All four dogs are cuddle bugs except one, who will only cuddle if everyone else is, or it's just him.

I feel like it helps maintain order in the sort of artificial pack we've created, because it's usually I have my two with me, and we all cuddle together, and he's got his two dogs, and they sleep together, so getting them all in a doggie pile requires some finesse, but once we're all settled it's pretty nice.

With a Dutch and a Mal, of course, it doesn't last terribly long, but it's nice when it does.

I'm not sure if I can describe this well, but I've trained all my hounds to sit this way.

Sit on the floor beside your dog, on his left. Have a treat in your left hand. Left hand near his nose, right arm over his back at his tush. At the same time as you're bringing your left hand over his head, causing him to back up, run your right arm around his tush and behind his legs (just behind the upper leg joint). He should lower into a sit after a few tries. As soon as his tush settles on (or close because of the sighthound thing Krissy mentioned), release the treat and praise him like heck.