Tonight on our walk a fox ran by and the dogs started to chase. I called them back, the girls came but Bruno kept on chasing.Its not unusual that we come across fox, deer, rabbits and Bruno will start to chase, but comes back when I call. He did come back after about 2 minutes, but I am worried now, and I dont understand why after 5 years he decided to ignore me.
Chasing a fox.
- Thread starter corsomom
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In this instance the motivator, the fox and chasing it was stronger than the motivation to come to you when called. Chasing furry things that move is an awfully strong instinct in dogs and it is not possible to get 100% reliability. There's always a chance that a dog will obey his instincts over you.Your dog has been well trained and well motivated for the most part. This time, for some reason the urge to chase over came him. If you read Culture Clash, there's a part in there which describes in detail how to train for such things to improve the reliability. I think it was in Culture Clash. I've read a lot of books and sometimes I get them mixed up....pretty sure that was the one. Excellent read anyhow. I recommend it.
My Doberman has been very reliable too when chasing animals; deer, rabbits, squirrels and other dogs. One time though, he didn't "hear" me when he was after a bear. Boy, did that freak me out. Luckily bear can outrun a dog and he did come....just not before he got the bear to leave the property. Grrrrrr. Scary! My male Chihuahua did the same thing a couple of summers ago. The bear ran for his life, let me tell you.
My Doberman has been very reliable too when chasing animals; deer, rabbits, squirrels and other dogs. One time though, he didn't "hear" me when he was after a bear. Boy, did that freak me out. Luckily bear can outrun a dog and he did come....just not before he got the bear to leave the property. Grrrrrr. Scary! My male Chihuahua did the same thing a couple of summers ago. The bear ran for his life, let me tell you.
It is but wouldn't have been if the bear decided to take a swat at one of them. Luckily the bear Jose chased was a small bear, probably a yearling. Then to add to the poor bears' motivation to run was me standing on the porch yelling at the top of my lungs, "JOSE!!!!!!!!! NO!!!!!!! COME!!!!!" Not one of my better training moments. But this was no time for training. This was about management and about sheer panic. LOL. Jose quickly gave up the chase. Bears can run like 35-40 mph. Not Jose. This summer, Jose and Lyric ran after a bear together. They do seem to give up the chase in short order though. The bears don't usually hang around much but there were not very many berries this summer and they were getting desperate. I am very careful not to leave one crumb outside, but they've already been "reinforced" by humans enough near by to know there's a chance.
Thats how Bruno was, like he didn't even hear me. I worry becouse most the land around ours is owned by hunters and I dont think they would hesitate to shoot a dog if he decided to chase a deer on their property.I will buy Culture clash next time I'm in town.That is scary about the bears, I would be terrified if we came across one.
They have these drives which are instinctive and when they get focused on "prey," they really don't hear us, that's how focused they are. Some have stronger drives than others. I hope I'm right about that which I read being in Culture Clash...I'll skim it and see. But at any rate, the book is invaluable....excellent, excellent! 5 stars!
Well, the bears don't scare me as much as the moose. But I hardly ever see a moose...never saw one right on my property. But they're around. And the scariest of all to me would be the cougar.
Well, the bears don't scare me as much as the moose. But I hardly ever see a moose...never saw one right on my property. But they're around. And the scariest of all to me would be the cougar.