Will my dog grow out of bad habits?

Management is a word that you may not be familiar with in dog training but it is so important! In essence, management means setting up the where and how your dog lives and plays to stop them from practising things you don’t want them to do. It’s an especially useful and important technique, particularly when rearing balanced puppies and throughout adolescence. It has an important place in welcoming a rescue dog too, to support them in creating new habits.

They say that practice makes perfect. The more your puppy jumps up at the worksurface, the better they will get at it. The more often they gnaw at the table legs, the more of a taste they will develop for furniture demolition!

My young retriever was overwhelmed at her first sight of flapping chickens and shot after them in hot pursuit. She had little or no recall at 10 weeks of age and it took a flying rugby tackle from me to save my beautiful Brahma cockerel from her frenzied chasing. After that I was careful to keep her away from the chicken run and always to have her on a lead if we went anywhere near the hens, distracting her attention from them every time she looked at them. Instead, we worked on retrieving a ball and sniffing in the undergrowth. Over the following months she lost interest in chickens and now will happily walk through the middle of the flock as they all squawk, and flap away from her. She didn’t practise her chasing habit as a puppy, was given more suitable outlets for her energy and so grew up as a much calmer and better-balanced adult.

The fact is that dogs DON’T necessarily grow out of early habits as they mature, so diverting your dog to activities you want to encourage will help them to develop habits that please you istead, as well as beng fun for them. It may take months or even longer, of barriers in the kitchen, child gates at the door and hiding the children’s toys, but as long as you replace the problem behaviours with more positive chewing, play and obedience activities, your dog will grow up to love these new games and will forget all about the frustrating behaviours that had you so stressed when they first arrived.