Anyone used a dog behaviorist?

[tripleshot]

We have one scheduled to come out to the house Sunday to work with our dog. If there's another dog outside when we are, he barks like crazy and flips out. I think it's because he wants to play, it's not aggressive or protective. So we can't go for walks and sometimes have a hard time getting through a potty break.

He was abused and neglected his first 1.5 years before we rescued him.

I hope this lady can help. Our neighborhood is very family friendly and active.

If you've used one, how many sessions/hours did it take to make a difference? She offers a 10%discount is we pay for 5 hours upfront.

[Saint Monica]

RoxMonster

[bluelily]

I've never gotten away from a behaviorist for less than five hours. But my dog is cray.

[pinkpinot]

I used a behaviorist/trainer for 6 weeks and on a follow-up basis as needed. She came to my house once a week and we worked on the issues my dog had. It was worth every penny, IMO. I learned so much - especially about MY behavior and how I react to my dog. We still have bumps in the road but I feel so much more educated and well equipped to handle my crazy, hotdog.

[RoxMonster]

Sorry, I just saw I was tagged. I was chaperoning the Homecoming Wiener Roast and just got home.

Your dog sounds a lot like Rox. She was abused the first year and a half of life, was very nervous and slow to trust us, and now very protective and defensive of us/our home. She does NOT like new things, new people, new dogs. Once she warms up to you and gets to know you, she loves you fiercely and is so loyal and sweet. But she has exhibited fear aggression to strangers and is very leash reactive/aggressive toward other dogs.

We worked with a dog behaviorist...well since January, but since May we've been in group class. We worked with her privately in-home from Jan-May. She would come over every 2-3 weeks for an hour and work with Roxie. Then when she felt Rox could handle a small group class (to get her exposed to new dogs), we did that for six weeks and actually decided to repeat the class for more exposure and just finished that up last night.

Roxie still has her issues and probably always will with strange dogs and people. But it is night and day from when we adopted her in Dec. Our behaviorist was an absolute God send, and she said we can call/email any time with a question or concern. If you can find a good one, I cannot recommend them highly enough! Giving Rox back was NEVER an option for me, but I was very scared we could never get her to be comfortable and safe in our home. It has been an amazing transformation to watch and we couldn't have done it alone. Good luck!

[tripleshot]

Sept 25, 2013 20:36:17 GMT -5 RoxMonster said:

Sorry, I just saw I was tagged. I was chaperoning the Homecoming Wiener Roast and just got home.

Your dog sounds a lot like Rox. She was abused the first year and a half of life, was very nervous and slow to trust us, and now very protective and defensive of us/our home. She does NOT like new things, new people, new dogs. Once she warms up to you and gets to know you, she loves you fiercely and is so loyal and sweet. But she has exhibited fear aggression to strangers and is very leash reactive/aggressive toward other dogs.

We worked with a dog behaviorist...well since January, but since May we've been in group class. We worked with her privately in-home from Jan-May. She would come over every 2-3 weeks for an hour and work with Roxie. Then when she felt Rox could handle a small group class (to get her exposed to new dogs), we did that for six weeks and actually decided to repeat the class for more exposure and just finished that up last night.

Roxie still has her issues and probably always will with strange dogs and people. But it is night and day from when we adopted her in Dec. Our behaviorist was an absolute God send, and she said we can call/email any time with a question or concern. If you can find a good one, I cannot recommend them highly enough! Giving Rox back was NEVER an option for me, but I was very scared we could never get her to be comfortable and safe in our home. It has been an amazing transformation to watch and we couldn't have done it alone. Good luck!

Yeah, our dogs sound very similar.  He's fine at the dog park, but at home or Petsmart, if there's another dog, he flips his shit. He's the sweetest cuddle bug and not a mean bone in his body. Thanks for replying. I'm very hopeful.

[TC]

We took reactivity classes from April - June for this kind of reactivity and now we do other things to keep fine tuning his skills (drop in classes, walking club, things like that). All in all, if this ends up anything like ours (and most reactivity work runs along the same curriculum time line), you will probably be looking at around four weeks of training at one hour a week, but possibly closer to eight weeks. In addition, it requires about three hours of training outside of the sessions a week to truly be successful depending on your dog's level of reactivity. Books on BAT training and Control Unleashed will help expedite your progress