Scared of plastic bags

My four month (almost five month) old catahoula, has developed a fear of plastic bags.

I don't know why, but when she hears me rustling a plastic bag she runs from the room with her tail tucked. It take a LOT of coaxing to get her to come back to the room. I can understand a little if I'm shaking a bag to get it to open up as that can make a loud noise.. But if I even pick up a grocery bag to clean out the ferret cage she goes running. I've been trying to desensitize her to the noise by feeding her high value treats with one hand while gently crinkling a plastic bag with another and she looks wary while eating the treats but sticks around, but as soon as the treats are gone so is she.

I don't want her to be afraid of anything, but she only seems to be getting worse about it and I'm worried that this may develop into other fears later on. Should I just keep trying to desensitize her and be patient, or is there something else I should be doing to help her get past this?

I had a belgium with that problem. What I did was put a ball in the bag- tie it up and it rolled on the floor. I would go " ohhhhhh what is that ( opens the bag) and toss out the ball.. It only took a few times for the dog to look for a toy in a plastic bag.

I had this problem with my old boy. It was not a big deal as long as he is in drive- then he's afraid of nothing and only wants to play. So, I did as borzoimom suggested and played with him anytime I brought in the mail (he was afraid of the mail). The end result was a dog that sees the mail and waits to see if he will be allowed to play- he gets excited, but there is still a nervous edge to him. I think the training just further sensitized him, but in a different way. If I stop playing with him, he starts looking more nervous about it again.

This experience with this one dog makes me suspicious of that technique. Maybe I did something slightly wrong, maybe it's just that one dog. I've had more success with more standard desensitization techniques that do not try to change the dog's mood. I would tie plasic bags all over the house, especially in places where the dog cannot avoid them- hallways, doorways, etc. Then I'd toss her kibble into those areas and let her work around it as she will. I imagine a few days of that will go a long way towards showing her that these things are not out to get her.

When she is really confident around them inside, you might also tie them outside and do the same thing. Outside the wind will tend to make them move, ratcheting the training up a notch or two.

I think this sort of training gets you out of the picture and lets the dog work through her environment on her own without any pressure. If she doesn't want that kibble she can avoid the area, but eventually her hunger and curiosity should win out. Giving her that time and space to work it out on her own really helps, I think.

My four month (almost five month) old catahoula, has developed a fear of plastic bags.

Is this a new thing? If he was fine with the bags previously, it could be a fear stage.

One thing I do is use little baggies for their treats when we train. I put the treats in the bag and that in my pocket. There's always some plastic rustling when I get treats out and the dogs actually learn that the sound of plastic means they're about to get a treat. My dogs always run over to investigate any plastic bag around.

You might want to try this one I did for Cooper about thunder. Most of our former dogs were all afraid of thunder that they go upstairs whenever they hear one or the weather is really bad. One time I was in the kitchen, I knew the thunder will be rolling by its loudest sound (and each one of those thereafter) for that moment. I called Cooper beside me and everytime I knew one is coming, I say "Woopie!! Another one!!!" then I shove a small treat in his mouth. I only have to do that on that particular hour we had a very bad weather. Before that I will call him inside when we have thunder and lightning. Now he has trained himself to go outside when he needed to and I am the one who get scared he might get hit or something.

I have done this with my husband using the vacuum cleaner and also the lawn mower, now we are scared we might hurt him unknowingly with them. Sometimes you just don't know what is good for them, like us now that we sometimes regret we actually made Cooper not scared of those noise...one laughable thing I did was actually do the same thing when it comes to sirens (police, ambulance and firetrucks). You see we live at the side of the hill with the road visibly down by our backyard. He used to be scared of them sounds. So I got him to go where we can see these services trucks coming (with a leash at first) and asked him to sit beside me to "take a look", "here they are..." "pretty-pretty lights..."..."look...look!!! lookeee!!! Wow!!!" Now he howls to imitate those sirens and doesn't stop until they are gone...

The same idea with the plastic bag. Have someone shake the plastic bag and anticipate when the noise will occur and that is when you give him a treat. Do this several times. Make it fun.

Good luck.

Bodhi was scared of her own food bowl!!!

All my own fault too.... It's metal, and I threw it on the floor once and we had the carpets taken up, and it made a HUUUGE clang.

I just didn't have my head screwed on at all, was a STUPID thing to do!! Bodhi was in the same room and it scared her half to death (as it would anyone and anything within a 500m radius!!).

Well, after apologising to her profusely, I continued as normal. She'd duck every time it made a noise afterwards and I just plain ignored it, and carried on as normal.

I praised her everytime she DIDN'T display any behaviour I didn't want, and I would encourage her to sniff it when it was empty and in my hands.

She was fine when it was full of food funnily enough ROFL.

She is not scared of loud noises and isn't even bothered by the gas powered bird scarers the farmers have in the fields (unlike me who walks past with my fingers in my ears).

Time and patience and she doesn't really care about her noisy bowl now!!

And I am VERY careful about how I put it on the floor!!!

I worked with a horse who was afraid of plastic bags. We fed her by grabbing a handful of food with the bag (like you pick up dog business lol) and gradually started rustling the bag more while she ate. Fixed it quick!