Helping a Dog Get Over its Fear of the Pool

By: David Codr

Published Date: July 21, 2020

Baxter Bailey and Cali swimming 1 - Helping a Dog Get Over its Fear of the Pool

When Baxter (left) and Bailey’s guardians reported neither dog will go into the pool, I recruited my Border Collie mix Cali (right) to help motivate Shepherd mix Bailey to swim in the pool for the first time.

If you have a dog who doesn’t like to swim, its important you dont force them to. This will cause a resentment tot he pool or swiming and make teaching your dog to swim much harder. At our previous session, I mentioned I had a dog who loved to swim (even though she is horrible at it) who may be able to help motivate Bailey to get into the pool.

Bailey displays a barking behavior when people splash in the water, likely commincating she thinks they are in danger or distress. I thought I may be able to use this to our advantage as Cali, well lets just say she has an interesting dog swimming style.

You can get some free tips on how to get a dog to get into the pool on its own by watching the free positive dog training video below.

Enlisting the help of a dog who likes to swim or do other activities is often an easy way to teach a dog to get into the pool. After all, if that dog does it, why can’t I?

After finishing the dog swimming lesson, we let the dogs play a bit to ensure good memories were stored by all. We will revisit this pair of dogs in a week and see what progress is made in getting the dogs to get into the pool.

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This post was written by: David Codr