Of cats and dogs

I was interested in Sarah Whitehead’s article in your February 2014 edition about names, “no” and nagging. My 14 month old GSD, Max, has always been obsessed with my two cats ever since he joined me as a 10 week old puppy.

The cats will sit provocatively behind railings, and when they are within his reach, Max becomes deaf to my commands and gets into an excited state, whining and trying to reach the cats. For a while I was telling him “no”, “off”, “oi”, “come”, but now the only thing that works is if I blow a whistle or pretend to run away. Food doesn’t work.

I’m wondering what will happen when those strategies fail, and indeed whether I should be saying anything at all. Perhaps I am nagging him, and he’s thinking “blah blah blah”. 

Otherwise Max is calm, obedient, gets normally excited during play and new experiences, when I get him to track scents he goes into a quiet stealthy mode, and he has no separation anxiety while I’m out. I would have thought that Max’s behaviour towards my cats would have become calmer over a year, but it is relentless, and I’m sure it’s because I’m perhaps encouraging this behaviour somehow by trying to stop it.

Here is Max just over a week ago!

Best Wishes

Peter Rafferty, by email

Big cat problem

Can you help please? We are the proud owners of a beautiful rescued GSD-collie cross bitch, Kira, who is about 18 months old and we have had her six months.

When she came to us she hadn’t been very well socialised, and after a lot of ground work she is now a dream to own. She loves everybody; the more dogs she meets to play with the better, and she comes back as soon as we call her. The problem is cats.

Our daily walk to the park becomes a nightmare if she sees one. At the moment she is on a Halti but if she sees a cat she tries to get out of it to chase the cat. I’ve owned three other GSDs before her and have competed in obedience and working trials with them, and I am now at my wits’ end. Please help!

Babs Sanderson, Stockport, Cheshire



Karen Wild, behaviourist, advises...

Hi Babs,

Well done so far on your efforts, I congratulate you as it sounds like you have already worked hard.

Chasing cats can be such a difficult issue mainly because the cats themselves are hard to control, and the dogs can smell them out and spot the movement (as they then run away fast!) long before we even notice what is happening.  It is a powerful predatory instinct and this is probably why you’ve found it harder to control as you are clearly an experienced trainer.

As you have already taught some basic control exercises, it is time to extend these to be part of a new skill. You have your toolkit – so let’s make it work for this problem. You have several options, and I would work on one at a time. Firstly, I would look for something that you can make into a cat ‘stooge’. This can be a cardboard silhouette or cuddly cat toy. Basically we are breaking down the task into easy to handle stages, so you would start somewhere quiet and enclosed so you are not fearing her escaping from the Halti. Have the ‘cat’ placed a good distance away. This might need to be 100 yards away! Then, practise your sit stays and recalls just as you would normally do, and expect your GSD to concentrate on you as she would normally in this exercise. You might have to play around with distance from the ‘cat’ to find out what the basic ‘dog does not react’ distance is. Remember that the stooge cat does not smell like a cat, nor does it move like a cat. Nevertheless you have to start somewhere!

You will find that as you get a little closer, your dog will start to look like she is about to chase. Don’t wait for a full blown chase. You know your dog’s reactions, so immediately call her away and put her in a sit stay. Then, reward her well as she is likely to become very frustrated otherwise! If you are using a toy to reward her, make certain you throw it in the other direction AWAY from the stooge. Chasing her toy needs to become far more exciting than trying to chase the cat!

It is hard to describe this whole process in detail here but what you will end up with is a dog that will be able to sit closer and closer to the ‘stooge’ cat, and to turn away from it back to you for a game. You can gradually extend this by placing the stooge cat somewhere on your normal walk (again where you know it is going to be, but your dog does not!) and working along the difficulty gradient once again.

I realise that using a real cat is going to be tricky – and unethical – but the control work will give you a really useful foundation. You can also work on calling her away from a toy you have thrown. It will teach your dog that no matter what she sees, if you call her back, it is not a chase object and is not something to get frustrated about either (because you have kept the training sessions fun and rewarding all the way along!)

An excellent book that describes similar training in detail is ‘STOP!’ by David Ryan www.dog-secrets.co.uk -  I recommend this, not only because it is a great book, but you sound like the sort of person that really cares and will put in the effort to help your lovely dog.

Scared kittens, fascinated pup. How to make it work?

I wonder if any of your readers or experts can help me with a serious problem which I would like to stop in my Border Collie pup, Jake. I have two adorable kittens as well as Jake, intending for them to all grow up together.
Tibbs the little tabby one spits at Jake so until now he has given her a wide berth, but has now started going down in typical Collie style and bouncing round her barking, I think this is his way of trying to get her to run away so he can chase her.
Chloe on the other hand is very timid, and whenever they are together Jake mouths her making her look like a wet dish rag instead of the gorgeous fluffy white kitten she normally is, you can see that she
doesn't like it but she just lays there till either, I find them, or she can escape.
He has recently started to try to pick her up by the scruff of her neck or her tail, and once when I caught him he had her by the throat. I know he likes her, but I also know she is frightened of him, hence the baby gate to allow them to be able to escape from him.
He knows he is doing wrong because when I chastise him he looks like butter wouldn't melt in his mouth and then walks away making sure he stands on her or her tail, almost as a retaliation.
I think he is a bit jealous because I pick the kittens up - usually to save them from him, but he gets most of the attention, we walk a lot and we are going to training classes and we are learning new tricks each week.  He has Kongs, and lots of toys. Is there anything I can do to integrate these three?
Thank you.
Janet, Preston