Great Tips to Help a Beagle Overcome her Fear of the Vet

In this Omaha dog training session we worked with a pair of Beagles, Kiki a two-year old rescue dog and Ellie May a ten-year old who needed help to stop fear at the vet.

After I arrived I sat down to chat with the dogs’ guardians and I learned that one of their main dog behavior concerns was Kiki’s fear of going to the vet. As a rescue dog it is impossible to know what her previous experience was at the vet, but what we did know is that she developed a large fear of being restrained on the table or having any of the instruments (thermometer, etc.) used on her. To help her overcome her fearfulness at the vet, I used CER or conditional emotional response training, which you can watch below.

As you can see Kiki’s attitude was very different once treats were involved which is a great method for highly food motivated dogs and for Beagle training as they are known for loving food! The CER training method allows Kiki to feel like she is in control because she is choosing to move closer to the things that scared her previously such as being restrained and having different vet tools near her body.

By the end of the session Kiki was learning to overcome her fears and looking to her guardians for leadership and direction. To keep up with this good behavior I want to remind her guardians to keep actively training with Kiki in low stress time periods and be consistent with their training. We wrapped up this dog behavior session with Kiki’s Roadmap to Success video, which you can watch below.