Training a Pack of Dogs to Listen to Commands

For this Omaha dog training session we worked with Oscar, Oliver, Ozzy and Otto, who needed to be trained to listen to commands; ignoring the guardian when they call them inside and demanding attention.

When I first arrived most of the dogs were outside because of their excitable energy. Ozzy, the youngest dog in the pack, had the hardest time listening to commands. The dogs’ guardian have a wonderful backyard for them to run around and play in. However, Ozzy thought it was so much fun to run and play that he wouldn’t want to come inside when called. I talked to the guardians about using positive dog training by rewarding all of the dogs for coming when called by giving them a treat each time they come in. This will motivate the dogs to listen the first time and compete for getting to the treat first.

Often times when dogs don’t want to listen to commands they see themselves as an equal or as a leader in the home. Ozzy was a special case because he was rescued at a very young age, around four weeks old, and didn’t receive all of the benefits of being with his littermates and dog-mom as long as most puppies do. This created some boundary issues so I taught his guardian how to gain leadership in the house, using our Leadership Exercise. You can see how I achieved this by watching the video below.

The guardian will want to routinely use this exercise with all of the dogs in the home. This exercise helps the dogs adopt a follower’s mindset and look to their guardians for leadership and direction. They will also want to include the rules and boundaries that I suggested, such as sitting before going through the door and no furniture for a minimum of 30 days.

By the end of the dog behavior session the dogs were routinely coming to their guardian when called. To help them stop attention demanding you can use our Escalating Consequences to disagree with their behavior and use our Petting with a Purpose technique to reward them for calm and polite behavior. We wrapped up this session with Oscar, Oliver, Otto and Ozzy’s Roadmap to Success video, which you can watch below.