Good news?
-He has progressed leaps and bounds since he's learned how to communicate with me that he wants out. He looks up at me, and I scoop him up/we leave....we haven't had a single incident in very long and he has so much fun at the park now. Which is amazing!
-We are back at the park during non-peak hours and making sure we have an exit strategy and it's more FLUID (we move around a lot more instead of kind of forcing interaction unless he wants to stay)
- No longer doing meetings on leash and his reaction to other dogs on leash around him (bark, stop, stare, tense) is down to almost nill.
Maybe it's age, maybe it's change of environment, a lot is the behaviorist and management but either way, things are A LOT better.
Bad news?
Merlins general play style could use some work. While most of it is just chase/be chased which is great... he insists on spending the entire play session barking.
It's very strange to me because he isn't a vocal dog at all (doesn't alert bark or really bark any time except during these situations). But get him at the park in play mode and it's like BARK IN EVERYONES FACE THIS IS SO AMAZING
dogs don't tend to mind at all... but owners and those who live in the buildings surrounding the park might and would love to get some ideas on how to curb it without hurting his enthusiasm, he is just SO HAPPY
we have also had some pouncing/running over issues with the smaller ones..
He doesn't get corrected by the other dogs, so the behavior tends to continue..
Any idea on how to rein it in?
Right now we just leash up anytime we see a dog less than 20 pounds because if they want to play chase it always ends up with Merlin jumping over/on them. No harm done but no exactly polite playtime for the owners...
-He has progressed leaps and bounds since he's learned how to communicate with me that he wants out. He looks up at me, and I scoop him up/we leave....we haven't had a single incident in very long and he has so much fun at the park now. Which is amazing!
-We are back at the park during non-peak hours and making sure we have an exit strategy and it's more FLUID (we move around a lot more instead of kind of forcing interaction unless he wants to stay)
- No longer doing meetings on leash and his reaction to other dogs on leash around him (bark, stop, stare, tense) is down to almost nill.
Maybe it's age, maybe it's change of environment, a lot is the behaviorist and management but either way, things are A LOT better.
Bad news?
Merlins general play style could use some work. While most of it is just chase/be chased which is great... he insists on spending the entire play session barking.
It's very strange to me because he isn't a vocal dog at all (doesn't alert bark or really bark any time except during these situations). But get him at the park in play mode and it's like BARK IN EVERYONES FACE THIS IS SO AMAZING
dogs don't tend to mind at all... but owners and those who live in the buildings surrounding the park might and would love to get some ideas on how to curb it without hurting his enthusiasm, he is just SO HAPPY
we have also had some pouncing/running over issues with the smaller ones..
He doesn't get corrected by the other dogs, so the behavior tends to continue..
Any idea on how to rein it in?
Right now we just leash up anytime we see a dog less than 20 pounds because if they want to play chase it always ends up with Merlin jumping over/on them. No harm done but no exactly polite playtime for the owners...