# Leash walking troubles and furniture biting



## Super-Nova (Aug 4, 2017)

Hello, I am new here. I've been having some trouble with my pup and would love some suggestions. Our trainer is out of town for a few weeks on an emergency so I'm on my own for a bit. 

My pups name is Nova she is 14 weeks old and is a service dog prospect. She is awesome in most areas but there's a few things that we are figuring out. 

Our main issue is leash walking, per our trainer every walk is a training walk. However she does some things that I don't know how to respond to. First, she picks up everything, wouldn't be a big issue exept she lies down to eat/chew them. Second she sometimes will pay me no attention and walk/run circles looking at everything other then me (even in our house with no disctractions) Third she will get very interested in the leash and jump up to grab it and play tug, or grab it when it's hanging and lie down to chew. (Doesn't matter what kind of leash) she wears a front clip harness or flat collar. 

Our secondary problem is furniture biting. We can be playing or she's playing on her own (once when training) and there's a point that she will get to where she just has an overwhelming desire to bite my couch, mattress and bedsheets. She sometimes tugs and sometimes just stands there with her mouth on it. Any ideas why she does this? Attention, frustration, overstimulated, tiered? I can redirect but she will drop the toy and go back to it. What I've been doing is if she does it to many times Is end the play session and put her away for a nap. Is there a better way to handle the behavior? 

Any insight, suggestions, tips etc would be greatly appreciated!


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## CarolinaGolden (Jul 12, 2017)

Hi there! I have a 12 week old pup and we are working with leash manners/walking as well. I think it comes down to:
1.) Make the pup focus on you. (Treats, a toy helps). This helps if you have been doing training with her keeping attention on you ("Look here") at home with your other training. I used Kikopup You Tube video on focus training. It has helped a lot.
2.) On walks, make yourself seem like so much more fun than eating stuff (like mulch). That may be doing a play bow, a kiss noise, whatever to get her to walk. Finn gets focused and wants to walk when I hop and shuffle my feet like we are going for a jog, then he is intreasted and will join in the fun.
3.) When they look like they are going for something on the ground during a walk, say mulch on the sidewalk, I will cover the mulch piece with my foot and say "leave it". Then reward with a treat when he does a sit instead and leaves it. We also train "Leave it" in the house as well during training.
4.) I spray bitter apple on the leash if they are constantly playing tug on the leash while on a walk. At 14 weeks they are teething/chewing a lot but I don't allow it on walks because it makes training so much harder. I'm also not a big fan of tug games so we don't play that a whole lot in our house. I also use a flat buckle collar for walks. The front attached harness makes it so much easier for them to grab the leash too so that can be distracting to a pup so maybe try a collar or attach on her back?. Again, bitter apple might help here.
5.) With furniture bitting I do 2 things. Spray bitter apple and redirect with a stuffie toy right in his mouth. Eventually they get it that the furniture tastes bad and mom wants me to use this instead. I feel like if sometimes they need to get out more energy I will take him out to the yard and play a good game of ball retrieve or do a training session to calm him down. 

Good luck and hang in there!


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## gdgli (Aug 24, 2011)

You do not have a problem, you have a puppy! Not unusual behavior. Just be persistent with the training and don't expect too much too soon.


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## Swampcollie (Sep 6, 2007)

And she's teething.


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