When people get a new dog or a puppy they're most excited about going out for a
walk and taking them for a walk around the neighborhood.
But people don't realize is that when you try to take a young puppy for a walk,
it does not look anything like that. They're pulling on the leash,
they're trying to pick up and put everything they can in their mouth.
And it's really frustrating and not really enjoyable.
And these are all really common challenges.
So today we need to discuss the unpopular truth about walking your puppy.
And it's probably not what you think. I'm Kayl McCann. This is McKenzie.
Welcome back to McCann Dogs.
So the unpopular truth about taking your puppy for a walk is you shouldn't be
taking your puppy for a walk. Now,
before you panic let's just talk about the reason why one of the biggest
mistakes that people make when they have a new puppy is they just strap the
leash onto the dog, hook the dog up and try to go for a walk.
And then it looks a little something like this.
And then people get really frustrated.
What you have to remember is when you have a puppy,
they don't come home understanding how to walk on a loose leash or be
respectful on the leash.
That's something that we actually have to teach our puppies to do.
The other thing we need to consider is that if I take my puppy out for a walk
before she has any experience,
any training any relationship with me I could run the risk of her
having some scary experiences.
What if a dog comes up or a big loud truck comes by and all,
while that's happening, she's rehearsing, pulling on the leash.
When we're having a young puppy,
we actually wanna take the time to teach them how to walk on a leash first,
before putting them into a scenario where they're pulling. Now,
a lot of people think, well, if I can't take my puppy out on a leash,
what am I supposed to do? They have to, to be unleashed.
Sometimes they have to go for a pee. There are going to be sometimes where,
of course you need to put your puppy on a leash and you need to take them out.
Oh, this is very good, good girl.
You wanna take the opportunity to let them know when they're making a good
choice,
but it's also really important that if I am gonna take her out on the leash
before she's had any training,
I'm not gonna walk out with an expectation that she's not going to pull.
I'm also gonna be careful that I'm not using any words that I might be hoping to
teach her to walk in the future. So I wouldn't say heel.
I wouldn't say let's go.
I would stay very neutral because I wanna make sure that when I'm starting off
with the training,
I'm starting with a bit of a clean slate and making it really easy.
The other thing that I can do too,
is try my best just to keep her focused on me.
The other thing I could do is switch out my leash for a long line or something
that wasn't gonna have constant tension on her collar.
But it's okay if they're rehearsing this a little bit.
What I don't wanna be doing is going out every day for a half an hour and
allowing my puppy to pull the entire time. Hi monkey. She's excited. Yeah.
because all that rehearsal is just is something that I'm gonna have to retrack
and retrain. Once I actually start my walking training.
How about building value on you?
That's something that a lot of people underestimate.
If your puppy wants to do things for you, if they want to listen to you,
it actually makes taking them for a walk a lot easier. Those two things go.
Hand in hand.
Now building value means that before I ever take her for a walk on the leash,
I've taken some time to teach her how to listen,
how to be with me and how to be on a loose leash.
A lot of people don't realize that some of the,
what people think are fluffy stuff like teaching tricks and you know,
smaller behaviors,
those exercises or those skills actually lead into your dog.
Being more interested in working for you and being more attentive to you.
And when you have a willing participant in your dog,
it's a lot easier to transfer that.
Working ability into something like walking on a leash.
So before I ever actually start my walking training,
which I actually can do right here in the living room,
I need just to start off with, of getting her to be comfortable working for me.
So I might even just do some luring. I might move the food here and there.
She needs to have this ability in order for me to train her,
to walk on a loose leash. This is not a problem for her. She likes treats a lot.
I might work on a sit.
I might work on a down and you may have started some of this stuff with your
puppies already, which is amazing.
I also might see if I can lure her in a circle. Oops.
So she got a bit distracted.
This is an opportunity for me to encourage her back towards me here, puppy. Yay.
Good girl.
Now the hard thing about this is I'm talking to you guys and I'm training a
puppy at the same time.
And one thing that puppies often do is they get distracted really easily.
So it would actually be more helpful if, while I'm using the food.
I also use my voice to encourage her. Here it go. I got a girl ready. Ready?
Ready? Right here. Good. What's this?
What's this good here. She says I'm smart.
I see a whole bait bag full of treats. There we go. Oh,
almost right here. We here we here. Yay. Good girl. Okay.
I'm gonna get up on my feet to help her again.
What happens is when people run into a jam, they sort of think, oh my gosh,
it's not working. Good girl. Yay. There we go.
I just wanted to circle. That's all good girl. Very nice. Let's try that again.
Good. Yay. Good.
So there is a little problem solving opportunity. She was like,
what you want me to in a circle. That's weird.
But if I just try it a couple times in the reward, when she's successful,
that particular task that I'm working on becomes easier.
The same thing is gonna happen with my walking on leash.
I wanna talk quickly with you about the use of food or how much food we use when
we're training a puppy of this age,
we are gonna use quite a bit of food in the early stages,
but the end game is to build so much value in here for moving at our side.
That by the time we take the show on the road and we go outside and walk in the
real world, the dog doesn't need to have quite so much food.
The food now is being used as a bit of a bribe or a lure,
but eventually it's going to be used as a reward.
It's really important that we're using a resource that the dog finds very,
or the puppy is very valuable in the early stages because I need her to like
being close to me. I need her to like having the leash loose.
And one of the best ways to do that is to use things that she loves,
like some of her favorite treats. Now,
the next exercise that I'm gonna work on is actually specific to teaching her,
to walk on a loose leash. And again,
I don't need to be in a big space to do this.
I'm gonna start building value for Mackenzie being at my left hand side.
So I know she follows treats now.
So I'm just gonna lure her into my left hand side. What's this?
What's this what's this. Yes. Good girl. On the beginning stages.
I don't care whether she sits or sands.
I just want her to think this is a good place. Now I'm gonna release her,
give her permission to move. Okay.
And then the rewards are gonna stop because I want her to think this is the
sweet spot. Now look at that. I just had a puppy say, Hey, that was kind of fun.
And she actually moved back towards me on a completely loose leash without me
asking. Yes, that was a good choice.
So we're gonna try going back to our left hand side. Again, this point,
I don't need to put any type of command onto it.
Dogs are really masters at reading body language.
She doesn't really know or care about the words at this point.
What I want her to do is get used to doing the behavior, the physical behavior.
Once she's good at it, then I can start naming it. Wow. Look at you.
A sit as well. Good. Okay. Good girl. And again,
once I move her away from my left hand side, I'm gonna stop rewarding her.
Now her leash is a little bit tight, so I'm gonna interrupt that. Hey pup ha ha.
There she is again, using that voice to keep her focused. Yes.
Wow. Look at you. Now. You'll notice when I'm rewarding her. Yes.
Good girl. I'm holding my food in way that her attention is coming up to me.
This is a,
also another really important thing for teaching her to walk on a loose leash.
If I was to do this yes. And feed her for looking away,
I'm taking away that opportunity for her to know all this good stuff. Yes.
Comes from focusing on me.
These lessons need to be taught and rehearsed in an environment or in,
in a location where it's okay, babe. Okay.
Where it's easy for your puppy to be successful.
If I was to practice this in the middle of a busy street,
with all kinds of distractions going by, I would be fighting for her attention.
When I'm puppy training,
I need to make it very easy for the puppy to be successful. And then from there,
when she's ready, I could build in more distractions. I could bring in toys.
I could let another dog be loose. I could make,
let the cat be moving around when ever it might be.
But I need to start off in some type of environment that my puppy says,
I can do this. And I love being near you. I love being on a loose leash.
Now I was just about to show you guys the next progression,
but we've run into a bit of a challenge with this puppy. And again, we've,
I've never worked with this puppy.
I met her about 20 minutes ago and I was simply trying to move into this
hallway,
but she's a little worried about going from the carpet to the hardwood floor.
So I'm just gonna take a second to see if I can build her. Okay,
girl build her confidence a little bit.
So I'm not gonna worry about the walking training. Yes. Good, good girl.
She was a little bit nervous about going through this little space here. Good.
Okay. Now let's go back out right here, right here. Oh,
she says get me outta here.
So I'm not gonna reward her for that because she was kind of like, eh, yes.
Good. I kind of want outta here so I wouldn't give her a treat for that.
But now that she's moving back towards the scary spot. Yay. It's not scary. No,
it's not scary. I'm gonna reward her now she seems to,
when we get here wanting to bolt back, so I'm gonna pull a fast one on her here,
here, pat, put this look. Let's get treats right in the scary spot. Nope.
Come here. Gotta come back and get it. What? This whoop. Careful what? This yay.
Good. She choked down a chicken weiner. Good. Here you go.
There we go. Good. So it's really important that when your dog,
you don't get stuck on one thing.
If you run into a situation where your dog may be confused or a little bit
worried, every moment is a training opportunity with a new puppy.
They don't have any worldly, high love.
They don't have any worldly experience yet.
So this is an opportunity for me to not only work on teaching her to walk on a
loose leash, but it's also to teach her how to, you know,
overcome I'm scary situations and that she can trust me.
She can lean into me and I'm gonna make things lots of fun.
And I'm gonna make it easy for her to be successful. That was good. Okay.
Can we try the next step now,
now for those of you who have been successful on the last couple steps that I've
showed you,
I'm gonna show you now how you can transfer to actually walking with your puppy
on a loose leash without having to be out on the street.
So to just take some food and I'm gonna lure Mackenzie at my left hand side
while the leash is loose. So I'm just gonna start with a bit of focus.
I'm just gonna place her into a sit here. Hi, what do I have here?
And every couple of steps I take, I'm gonna reward her. Yes. Good.
Yes. Good. I'm gonna bring her head up to feed her. Yes. Good.
And I'm gonna try and go back the other good. And again,
this is really slow because she has never done this before. Yes. Good. Yes.
Good girl. Now my goal here is that A, I have some attention.
Yes. Good girl. Let's go. Yes. Good.
And B my leash stays loose. Yes.
And we'll be able to pick up speed when she gets a bit more successful.
Now that was my last treat. So I'm gonna release. Yay. Good, good girl.
And I'm only gonna do it for a few moments at a time.
I might go back and forth two or three times and then take a break and then go
back at it again.
Puppy training needs to be short and sweet with a high rate of success to keep
things interesting because as you guys probably know already,
their attention span is so we need to keep it lots of fun and really easy for
them to do. As we know,
puppies are full of energy and they require a lot of exercise,
which is why people wanna walk their PS in the first place.
So if you want a few ideas on what you can do to exercise your puppy with their
brain and their body, best time to do that is in the morning.
Check with the video over here to give you lots of great ideas on how to do
that. If you're looking for some support,
that's specific to you in your puppy's training,
check out our online course called Puppy Essentials,
where you can work with me and any one of our McCann instructors to help you
with any of your puppy problems. The link for that is in the description below.
On that note, I'm Kayl. This is McKenzie, happy training.