# Chasing cars....



## Chowgal (Dec 21, 2009)

Well, since I've had Dixie, she's always tried to chase cars. And at first I was like "ok, I can handle her when she tries..." yadda yadda yadda... Well, now, I've tried her regular collar, the easy walk harness, and even the chain slip collars to try and help with regualr leash training, but nothing stops her, and today she would've been hit by a car coming through behind the car the attempted to get after had I not been quick enough to yank her out of the street. And she was only in the street because she was strong enough to pull me there... I just don't know what to do at this point...


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## hunterisgreat (Jan 30, 2011)

properly fitted prong collar will stop that from happening. Probably want a backup collar as well


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## lisgje (Sep 3, 2010)

I use a prong collar since I have had neck and wrist injuries/surgery and can't afford to get hurt. Shane was 97 lbs and Chance is 107. They work when used properly and do not hurt your dog. Make sure to use the proper sized prongs as well. Shane was a big dog and the large prongs did nothing, had to use the smaller ones to create more of pinch. Chance uses medium sized prongs. Each dog is different. The prongs should be snug but not too tight and never jerk too hard or use like a choke collar (ie, never lift the dog when it is wearing a prong as some trainers do with a choke), a firm quick snap and release with a firm no should work the first time. Once I did that the first time, they never tried to pull me again. The only time I use the prong is when walking. I do not use it in the house. Chance actually runs to the collar hanging on the hook when he wants to go for a walk. I am no expert by any means and if you are not sure about using it, contact a trainer who you trust to help you with it. Hope this helps.


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## Stosh (Jun 26, 2010)

I also used a prong to fix the car chasing problem. Stosh would lunge at the car when it got close without any warning, so the prong worked wonders! If he lunged, he self-corrected without me doing much besides standing there. It really helped break him of the habit, along with redirecting, 'leave it' and everything else I could think of. I still use it when we go walking at a new place or a public walking trail, anywhere I want extra control and Stosh is like Chance- he gets so excited when he sees it. Just make sure it's properly fitted and worn high-- check out Leerburg's Dog Training, 16,000 pages of dog training information, 300 free streaming videos, DVDs and Free Dog Training ebooks for directions on how to fit and use it


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## Good_Karma (Jun 28, 2009)

I put Niko in a sit when I hear a car coming. I have treats, and I keep his attention on me by tossing them into his mouth. We do the "Look At That" game too, so when he looks at the car, he knows he should look at me next because I'll have a treat for him. The closer the car gets, the more treats I throw, so as the car is going by us, I am literally stuffing treats in his mouth. He gets a few more treats after the car has gone by, and then we are on our way again.

It has taken a while for us to get to this point, but he no longer lunges at the passing cars. Instead, he goes into a sit and looks at me for treats.

Good luck, I know how scary it is when that happens.


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## Chowgal (Dec 21, 2009)

Thank y'all for the info! Sorry I didn't get back and reply sooner, I actually forgot about this thread. ~lol~ Whoops... 

I've decided that I would wait to use a prong collar as a last resort and got a gently leader head collar, and it has worked well thus far(as much as Dixie hates it...). But seeing as I wanna be able to ween her off of the head collar at some point I might go to the prong to do that.


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## MrLeadFoot (Jan 4, 2009)

Years ago I had a big male shepherd that was protection trained and a great patrol dog. Trouble was, was that he was so darned confident, he thought he could take on a car, literally! We tried every conventional training method we could think of to get him to stop thinking he could take down cars, including the old-school yank out of the path of an oncoming car method. Nothing worked. If you think about, as dog owners we tend to think too much from a prevention mindset, rather than a teaching standpoint, so it's no wonder those methods didn't work.

We decided we need to find a better way to EDUCATE the dog, which is most of what good training entails. Here's what we came up with:

We found a parking lot that was empty in the middle of the night. We took a long chain and tied him out to a grated manhole in the middle of the parking lot. We had someone drive a car up to him slowly. Sure enough, he jumped out in front of it and stood his ground. The driver just kept inching forward until he made contact with the dog. Once he did, he just kept creeping foward. Once the dog realized the car was stronger than him, he moved out of its path. From that point on, whenever that dog saw a car coming his way, he made sure not to get in its way; he didn't run, or anything. In fact, when we crossed streets after that, I noticed he ALWAYS looked to make sure he wasn't going to get hit. It almost seemed like he judged their distance like a human would.


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## kidkhmer (Jul 14, 2010)

This isn't much help for helping an existing chaser but I can just say that where I live - Phnom Penh - is super hectic with thousands upon thousands of 100cc scooters, tuk tuks, trucks,buses,SUVs etc etc and Karma has been walked in and out of it and has been riding in the back of the truck amongst it since she was young. The result is NOTHING phases my dog noise wise. My kid popped a balloon right near her the other day and whereas I think a lot of dogs would have flinched or jumped up and moved, Karma just lay there calmly . And no....she is not deaf. She can hear me whistle from hundreds of meters away !

I think this must be one of the worst traits to develop in a dog given the danger it presents and I really hope the prong collar helps you !


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## valreegrl (Nov 11, 2009)

Good_Karma said:


> I put Niko in a sit when I hear a car coming. I have treats, and I keep his attention on me by tossing them into his mouth. We do the "Look At That" game too, so when he looks at the car, he knows he should look at me next because I'll have a treat for him. The closer the car gets, the more treats I throw, so as the car is going by us, I am literally stuffing treats in his mouth. He gets a few more treats after the car has gone by, and then we are on our way again.
> 
> It has taken a while for us to get to this point, but he no longer lunges at the passing cars. Instead, he goes into a sit and looks at me for treats.
> 
> Good luck, I know how scary it is when that happens.


Exactly how I would handle it. 
Halti's and Prongs are band-aids but they do not address the real issue. 
You need to begin working him around cars consistently. Start from a distance and reward quiet calm behavior. Then move forward, but before the point that he is lunging. Begin with parked cars then onto moving cars. He is reacting and then rewarded when he lunges and gets distance from you. Since this has happened over and over again he has actually become conditioned to do this. 
Utilize the Halti so you have better control but never allow him to react (lunge). If you see the possibility and you cannot redirect him with the "look" then turn and go the other direction. 
Consistency is key and will give you results.


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## Chowgal (Dec 21, 2009)

Thank y'all! Dixie has actually come a LONG way since I started working with her on sitting and watching me and getting treats as a car passes. Over the past week or so I've started working on keeping walking when there's a vehicle coming or going(time was becoming an issue with trying to train and walk her for exercise at the same time). And she's doing AMAZING! She'll look at the cars but then she looks right to me for a treat.


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## valreegrl (Nov 11, 2009)

Good job  
Patience and positivity work every time.


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## AgileGSD (Jan 17, 2006)

Chowgal said:


> I've decided that I would wait to use a prong collar as a last resort and got a gently leader head collar, and it has worked well thus far(as much as Dixie hates it...). But seeing as I wanna be able to ween her off of the head collar at some point I might go to the prong to do that.


 You may want to read this article about head collars: Flying Dog Press - Suzanne Clothier - The Problems With Head Halters


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## Chowgal (Dec 21, 2009)

Thank y'all!



AgileGSD said:


> You may want to read this article about head collars: Flying Dog Press - Suzanne Clothier - The Problems With Head Halters


Thanks for the article. However, there's a few points in there that I don't agree with. My girl doesn't get anxious or nervous when it comes to the halti. She actually RUNS to it when time to go for a walk, and she carries herself even more confidently with it on than she does without it. And she actually doesn't pull without it, I just wanted a way to turn her attention away from the vehicles and to me because not even treats could avert her attention.


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## MrLeadFoot (Jan 4, 2009)

This might be too much for a venue like this, but you might want to consider TEACHING the dog WHY he needs to be wary of cars, and not limit your efforts to just employing prevention or re-direction techniques, as those will not be all that effective in helping keep your dog from getting in the path of an oncoming car if he happens to get loose, nor will they help if we finds himself in the path of an oncoming car. Just a thought.


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## jaggirl47 (Jul 18, 2009)

Good_Karma said:


> I put Niko in a sit when I hear a car coming. I have treats, and I keep his attention on me by tossing them into his mouth. We do the "Look At That" game too, so when he looks at the car, he knows he should look at me next because I'll have a treat for him. The closer the car gets, the more treats I throw, so as the car is going by us, I am literally stuffing treats in his mouth. He gets a few more treats after the car has gone by, and then we are on our way again.
> 
> It has taken a while for us to get to this point, but he no longer lunges at the passing cars. Instead, he goes into a sit and looks at me for treats.
> 
> Good luck, I know how scary it is when that happens.


 
This is how I taught Leyna as well. I would actually take her near cars just to work on it. After about a week she stopped lunging.


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## Castlemaid (Jun 29, 2006)

MrLeadFoot said:


> This might be too much for a venue like this, but you might want to consider TEACHING the dog WHY he needs to be wary of cars, and not limit your efforts to just employing prevention or re-direction techniques, as those will not be all that effective in helping keep your dog from getting in the path of an oncoming car if he happens to get loose, nor will they help if we finds himself in the path of an oncoming car. Just a thought.



Keeta went from being afraid of cars to wanting to chase them - my solution? Extreme obedience! Never put her in a situation where she could chase a car, worked on control, control, control! Did the sit and focus, but overall lots and lots and lots of obedience work - until she was reliable. If she so much as looked at a car, she got to do obedience drills - at the point now that she has absolutely ZERO interest in chasing a car. She never not once got the chance, so that behaviour never developed, and she is primed and ready to listen and heed me because of the work we have done. 

I think it would be a false security to set up a scenario where the dog "almost" gets hit to teach the dog to stay away from cars - the dog may not generalize that lesson to other environments and situations.


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## MrLeadFoot (Jan 4, 2009)

Read my other post where I describe how to do it. You'd be amazed at the results you can achieve by simply EDUCATING a dog, just like we educate people, only different. How's that for an oxymoron?  Seriously, try it. It can be a real life-saver. Of course, that doesn't mean you should later send your dog for his own walk in a metropolis. And, they learn it quick, instead of you toiling for months with re-direction and what-not, and at the end, while you dog may obediently be not chasing cars, you're STILL employing prevention, and your dog still doesn't know the danger of a car. I made a suggestion of something that's PROVEN to work; it's up to the reader whether or not he/she wants to try it. If anything, t's a wonderful sense of relief not having to be paranoid ALL THE TIME when your reactive dog gets in the vicinity of car, let me tell you.


Castlemaid said:


> Keeta went from being afraid of cars to wanting to chase them - my solution? Extreme obedience! Never put her in a situation where she could chase a car, worked on control, control, control! Did the sit and focus, but overall lots and lots and lots of obedience work - until she was reliable. If she so much as looked at a car, she got to do obedience drills - at the point now that she has absolutely ZERO interest in chasing a car. She never not once got the chance, so that behaviour never developed, and she is primed and ready to listen and heed me because of the work we have done.
> 
> I think it would be a false security to set up a scenario where the dog "almost" gets hit to teach the dog to stay away from cars - the dog may not generalize that lesson to other environments and situations.


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## GSKnight (Oct 18, 2011)

*I knew there would be good advice here*

The "search" button is my friend 

On our walk last night, Viktor started lunging at passing cars  

In the 18 days I have had him, we have walked this road everyday, with no issues related to passing cars whatsoever. Last night, he lunged at at passing car. Took me by surprise. I corrected with a firm leash tug. He did it again... a stronger leash tug and a verbal repremand. By the 3rd time, it was starting to pi$$ me off... now he was getting a warning before the car got to him. I purposfully walked him longer, to get this out of his system, and fast. Made him sit by the road as cars passed. he seemed to be getting the idea by the time we went in. I will be keeping a close eye on him tonight and see if it is still an issue. 

The advice given here and in other "lunging at cars" threads has been helpful.


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## Chowgal (Dec 21, 2009)

GSKnight said:


> The "search" button is my friend
> 
> On our walk last night, Viktor started lunging at passing cars
> 
> ...


I'm glad this has been helpful for you. My girl is now to the point I can have her sit at the end of my driveway or in the front (un-fenced) yard with me, unleashed, and she completely ignores the passing cars, even if she's looking dead at them.


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## Stella's Mom (Mar 8, 2011)

After reading the comments on this post, I see I have been doing the right thing with my 17 month old who in the last few months has become DA and a car lunger/barker.

We now do obedience drills of sitz/platz sitz/platz ..over and over until she gets into a calm state and focuses on me. When I see she turns her focus more to me and not just doing the sitz/platz without focus, I give her treats.

Not sure where her dog aggression is coming from. She was such a sociable puppy and once had lots of playtime with other dogs until I could see her demeanor had begun to change as she matured.

I hope it's an age thing and not a permanent component of her personality.

At our Shutzhund club the dogs are not allowed to socialize with one another, so she does meet other dogs now unless on a walk or at Petsmart..which has become our new obedience training zone. Lots of distractions, lots of dogs around.


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## Moshamoon (Jan 10, 2013)

With other breeds I have owned, I have taught them to run next to my car down a dirt road. They stayed away from the front of the car and stopped when we stopped. I have not kept this up with my GSD because she always tries to run infront of my car. I see this "education" method can work if you give it the time. Meanwhile, Mika occassionally lunges at cars while on the walk.


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