# RE: My GSD HATES coolers, shovels, brooms, swiffers, and mops



## daonlyillwiz (Mar 13, 2014)

*RE: My GSD HATES coolers, shovels, brooms, swiffers, and mops*

So, i have a 17 week old Male unneutered GSD that for some odd reason HATES coolers, shovels, brooms, swiffers, and mops. He will approach the items and jump back and start barking at them. Now he was never hurt or attacked by any of these things, is there any reason why he would be acting like this ?


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## Jax08 (Feb 13, 2009)

LOL They grow out of it. It's new, it's moving and it's making noise.

Mine, at 8 months, is now starting to ignore the vacuum. I had to crate him to do my floors. I would never get anything done if I didnt.


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## Pax8 (Apr 8, 2014)

They may be a weird shape to him, make odd noises or smell odd. There are a number of things that could make them upsetting to a dog that has little experience with them. For odd items that I want to get my dog used to, I play the "touch the thing" game. I teach him a touch command (to touch something with his nose or paw when I tell him touch) and then he gets cues to touch the (insert: shovel, cooler, broom, etc.). 

Especially for a puppy, building confidence to experience and habituate to new things is important to socialization and getting them in the habit of approaching new things makes each successive one easier. If you play the game with him, you'll notice after a few objects that he is more confident and excited to explore new things because they make positive stuff happen (a treat or a game).


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## Castlemaid (Jun 29, 2006)

You can HOPE he grows out of it, LOL! Common behaviour for a lot of dogs. My 10 year old still won't let me shovel snow. She is determined on killing the shovel and actually will wrestle it out of my hands and take off with it. 

I'm still not decided if it's cute or annoying.


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## daonlyillwiz (Mar 13, 2014)

Pax8 said:


> They may be a weird shape to him, make odd noises or smell odd. There are a number of things that could make them upsetting to a dog that has little experience with them. For odd items that I want to get my dog used to, I play the "touch the thing" game. I teach him a touch command (to touch something with his nose or paw when I tell him touch) and then he gets cues to touch the (insert: shovel, cooler, broom, etc.).
> 
> Especially for a puppy, building confidence to experience and habituate to new things is important to socialization and getting them in the habit of approaching new things makes each successive one easier. If you play the game with him, you'll notice after a few objects that he is more confident and excited to explore new things because they make positive stuff happen (a treat or a game).



That sounds like a good idea, im going to give this a shot. He already knows paw and high five along with a ton of other commands so "touch" shouldnt be all that difficult.

Thank you very much for this idea.

Jax08, we crate him whenever we have to clean the house too. If we didnt he would just follow us around barking lol.


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## LoveEcho (Mar 4, 2011)

My six month old could care less about the vacuum. A rake, however.... all rakes everywhere should sleep with one eye open. For her it's a play behavior. It looks different, it moves if she or I interact with it, it makes noise when it hits the ground.


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## volcano (Jan 14, 2013)

my dog freaked out at a rake this spring, Ive never heard that fast,aggressive bark from her before. Thinking back I threw a pile of leaves at her with it last fall.


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## ChetsDad (Nov 9, 2013)

Hahahaha! Yes! Mine too HATES rakes, mops, brooms, pretty much anything with a handle. If he sees it in my hand, he starts whining, immediately runs over and tries to take it away from me and break it. If it is just sitting there, he could care less. He also has an ongoing feud with the vacuum. It rains treats whenever I vacuum, so at least now he lets me do it, but he is always right in front of it, ready, should it attack. : )


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## Nigel (Jul 10, 2012)

Castlemaid said:


> You can HOPE he grows out of it, LOL! Common behaviour for a lot of dogs. My 10 year old still won't let me shovel snow. She is determined on killing the shovel and actually will wrestle it out of my hands and take off with it.
> 
> I'm still not decided if it's cute or annoying.


Our male does the same with our snow shovel, thought maybe it had to do with the sound of it scraping on the cement. 

One of our females likes to attack the snow coming from the snow blower. Our other female likes to lay in the middle of the carpet you are vacuuming. You can vacuum completely around her, then you have to tell her to move in order to finish, she usually move just enough and that's it.


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## Sarah~ (Apr 30, 2012)

Eko hates the broom, he backs up when I push it out but when I pull it back he grabs it, growls, and tries to take it out of my hands. Same with the vacuum.


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## Castlemaid (Jun 29, 2006)

Keeta, taking care of the unspeakable threat that the snow shovel poses:

Killing it good: 









Running off with her prize:


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## daonlyillwiz (Mar 13, 2014)

haha this is great, its good to know i'm not alone here heh.


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## Tratkins (Feb 15, 2014)

Samson hates the pool net. Goes crazy whining and barking when we have it...said pool net now has a duct tape patch to fix the one time he was successful in getting to it. :-(


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