Leashes, collars and harnesses are some of the first accessories most dog owners acquire when they get a dog, and very soon they come to depend on these tools. But, in this guide to teaching a dog to walk on a loose leash, Annie suggests teaching where you want your dog to walk in relation to your body (right next to your leg), and what you want your dog to be doing on leash (checking in with you often) before you start relying on equipment to control your dog's behavior. This episode contains suggestions on training exercises to help teach nice walking (with or without a leash), protocols for encouraging good behaviors on leash, and gear recommendations.  

Products mentioned in this episode:  

Found My Animal double-ended nylon leash: https://storeforthedogs.com/collections/collars-leashes-harnesses/products/found-my-animal-leash-1 

Mendota Lightweight Braided Leash  https://storeforthedogs.com/collections/collars-leashes-harnesses/products/braided-leash

Freedom Harness https://storeforthedogs.com/collections/collars-leashes-harnesses/products/freedom-harness

Liquid Treat Dispenser https://storeforthedogs.com/products/liquid-treat-dispenser

Partial Transcript:

Annie:

Hey, everyone. Thank you for tuning in. Today’s topic is loose leash walking.

Now I’m going to talk about how to walk the dog, like how you should be walking and what equipment you can use. I want to talk about what behaviors you’re going to reward and where you're gonna reward and then I’m going to give you two exercises that you can work on when you're trying to practice your dog’s loose leash walking.

But first, I want to talk for a minute about what you want your dog to look like on leash or what you want your walks to look like on the leash?  What do you want to look like with your dog on leash? Take a moment to conjure up sort of the perfect image of what a walk should be there. I don’t think there is really a right or wrong answer; I just want you to think about what you want your walks to look like so you can work towards that goal.

I mention this because there is a man in my neighborhood who for years I’ve seen him walking his dog in this sort of militaristic- style. The dog, who is a big dog, his neck probably is close to the guy’s hip and this guy holds the leash super tightly- there's maybe 1 foot of leash between his hand and the dog’s neck or  I think maybe he walks him on some kind of like head harness, anyway,  they just look so tense, both of them, that they stress me out every time I see them- I want to like give both of them a massage. Anyway, at one time I was sitting in the park with my dog on a bench and this guy came and sat down on a park bench near me with his dog and we started chatting a little bit and I couldn't resist saying something, I was nice about it, but I said something like, “I notice your dog walks really close to you”, or something like that,  it wasn't super judgy and he said something like, “ well how a dog  is supposed to walk. Outside time isn’t about fooling around. “ So fair enough.

But that’s not my idea of how my dog is supposed to walk. My vision of the perfect walk, if I were to paint a watercolor of it, would be my dog walking near me with a very loose leash, ideally no tension on the leash and I want us to kind of be paying attention to each other's needs. So if I need to go in one direction, I want him to be aware of that and go in that direction with me.

Full transcript at Schoolforthedogs.com/Podcasts

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