How To Fix Leash Pulling (in under 15 minutes)

If you have a puppy who is absolutely pulling you on the leash with every single walk, putting tension on that collar non-stop or their harness, coughing, choking, not letting you walk at all, we're going to show you how to fix this leash pulling in less than 15 minutes with any pup of any age. This is Olive. She's a six-month-old golden retriever. And as you can see, this leash is completely tight because she is quite the leash puller. So we're going to show you guys exactly how to fix that. Before we get into training the leash pulling and show you how we fix it, we first need to make sure that we're properly set up and we have the right equipment. So before you train your dog to do any sort of leash training, it's very important that your dog goes to the bathroom, gets outside for a couple minutes, and you let them sniff and do their business. Let them pee, let them poop, because I promise you, trying to leash train a dog who really has to go to the bathroom is not going to go well. If you had to really go to the bathroom and you were trying to run to the bathroom, but I was telling you, hey, you got to walk slowly to the bathroom, we all know how that's going to go. So make sure your dog goes to the bathroom, play with them inside a little bit, let them burn off a little bit of steam. So now that we've gotten that out of the way, your pup has gone to the bathroom, let's talk about the tools you're going to need to make sure your puppy's not pulling on the leash. Because obviously if you have the wrong leash, you have the wrong collar, and you have the wrong treats, none of this is going to work. So let's talk about the leash just to start. Whatever leash you're using, you need to make sure that when you pull on it, there is no stretch to it. Although this leash looks like a rope leash, this is not a typical rope leash that you would find in a pet store. A lot of the leashes in the pet store that have this ropey like material have this horrible stretch when you pull on them. And that's not going to be great for your training. Why? Because when your dog pulls on that leash and that leash gets two inches longer, your dog's going to feel that, which means they're going to be reinforced, rewarded for pulling because it gives them more freedom. If I'm on a bungee leash and I want to go over there and I pull on the leash and the leash gets longer, well, I'm always going to pull on the leash because it gets longer when I pull on it. So you need a leash that has no stretch. I recommend using a six foot flat nylon leash that looks just like this. We're going to throw it up right on screen here. These flat tightly woven leashes, these ones don't stretch and they're going to be perfect for your training and they can withstand incredible amounts of weight. Now let's talk about your treats. You need to make sure you're using high value food rewards whenever you're training outside. Now, what does this mean? So many people talk about high value treats and everyone's always asking what a high value treat is. And what I like to use is really high quality dog food. I don't use typical treats that you find at the store like Zooks, the Crazy Dog Training Treats. Any training treat you find in the Petco PetSmart section is going to suck for training your dog because one, they don't use really good ingredients. They're loaded with vegetable glycerin, vegetable glycerin and other different fillers, and they're not healthy for your dog. One brand I've been using a lot lately is called Vitals. They make these patties that are meant to be actual dog food, but they're great for training treats. And since it's actual dog food, they're loaded with vitamins, nutrients, minerals, and everything your dog needs to have a balanced diet. So if you give your dog like a whole pound of these things during training and you feel like you've given them too much treats, you can just cut back on their regular diet and your dog is still going to have a balanced meal. We're using the duck recipe today. This stuff is stinky. It is gross. But as you can see, Olive, are you interested in this? Oh my God. Yes, she is. She is checking the floor, making sure that I didn't leave any. She is very, very into this stuff. So you got the right leash. You got the right treats. Next thing you're going to need is the right collar. And I can tell you right now that this flat collar we're using for Olive is not going to be effective for her. A lot of times with dogs, flat collars are not effective because when we pull on them, there's this massively large gap right here. And then all the pressure is being on their trachea. And a lot of dogs, especially Goldens who have these thick blubbery necks, you can see I'm yanking on this neck and she don't even care. She don't even want to walk away from me. She is not going to be sensitive at all to feeling this pressure. If anything, she's fighting it. You can maybe switch your camera angle just to see right now I'm pulling on this leash. Like I'm pulling and she is pulling back even harder. This is what's known as opposition reflex in dogs, where when you pull, they pull back and it can be really, really hard to fight this with a flat collar. So if you find that you're pulling on your dog's flat collar and they're choking, highly, highly likely you want to upgrade to a prong collar, not just any prong collar, but a Herm Springer 2.25 millimeter prong collar is going to be the best applications for 99% of dogs who are over the age of four to five months old. If you're doing this with a three month old puppy and a really young puppy, I would stick to using a regular flat collar or a slip leash. But since this puppy is six months old, we are going to be the prong collar on her. So I have the collar right here. We're going to fit it nice and high on her neck. And then we're going to get started with training. Herm Springer 2.25 millimeter prong collars always have one big ring, the one I'm not holding. And then a little ring, which is the one I am holding. You want this to be up high on your dog's neck behind their ears. And you're going to attach your leash to that ring right there. So we're going to get this prong collar right up behind her ears, clip that thing on, and then we're going to clip it on to her neck. So now that we have all the right tools in place, our high value food, our non-stretch leash, our 2.25 millimeter prong collar, we're going to show you how to use these tools effectively so that you're not yanking, cranking your puppy. You're not going to hurt your puppy and you're going to train them effectively to not pull on the leash. The only reason dogs pull on the leash is because it works. Every time your dog pulls, you go like this. And what you're doing is you're rewarding them for pulling by giving them more distance. So I'm going to start walking with Olive and I'm going to pay attention to how quickly Olive moves. If Olive moves faster than me, I'm going to stop and I'm going to use my body weight to lean in the opposite direction as her. Since this is day one of leash training, if she comes back to me, I'm going to say yes and give her food. I'm going to teach her that when you feel pressure on your collar, don't fight it, follow it. So we're going to start walking now and I'm going to pay very close attention to Olive's speed at which she moves. Right now, she's doing a great job, but she's picking up her pace. So I'm going to stop, pull, yes, good. And then I'm going to reward her for following that pressure. And we're going to do this a few times. You might be asking yourself, why are we giving her treats after she makes a mistake and comes back to us? And the reason we're doing that is because we're conditioning her to follow the pressure on the prong collar. Every time people bring up prong collars, they say, if you use it wrong, you'll end up hurting the dog. And this is true. You can hurt a dog by using a prong collar wrong. What I'm doing is very gently pulling. Yes, good. And then showing her food the moment she follows the pressure. I don't want her to be afraid of the prong collar. I'm just teaching her when you feel it tighten up on your neck, that means I need you to come back to me. So we're just going to start walking and randomly, I'm just going to stop, pull. Yes, good girl. Good job, girl. And we're going to do this a few times. Already, you can see we're eliminating that response she has to the collar where she's pulling on it and fighting me. So again, randomly, I'm going to stop, pull. Yay, good girl. She's such a good girl. Yes, she is. Good job, Olive. And we're going to do this a couple more times. I'm giving Olive a lot of verbal praise and a lot of love because I want her to know that I love when you come back to me. And already, look how much better this is. She's doing great. I'm going to stop and pull. Yay, good girl. Good job. And whenever she's feeling that pressure, she's not showing signs of fear. She's not showing signs of pain. She's looking at me attentively and waiting for her reward, which is exactly what we want. Right now, you can already see this is looking great. Olive, yes, good girl. So I'm going to give her treats and I'm going to reward her for doing such a good job. We're going to do one more rep of that pull and reward. So check it out. Boom. Yes. Good girl. Good job. And now she's got it. Now she knows that when she feels pressure, she's meant to come back to me. She's been in our training program for a bit. We've already started a bit of prong collar conditioning work with her. So she's already got that. Now that she understands that, we're going to have to phase out the treats eventually because I don't want to have a dog who keeps doing this over and over on the walks. I want her to just stay next to me the entire time. So how are we going to achieve this? What we're going to start introducing is a method known as quick unexpected U-turns. Olive is going to drift ahead of me, but instead of me slowly pulling and then treating her for coming back, all I'm going to do is U-turn and walk the other way. We're going to give you a different camera angle from the side so you can see exactly what this looks like. So what I'm going to do instead of giving her a treat is I'm going to stop, pop, and turn the other way. And as you can see, since I have a prong collar, I can do this very gently. I don't have to put much pressure into it at all. What I'm going to do now is I'm not going to give Olive a treat unless she looks at me before the pop comes. So yes, good girl. Right there, she started to turn with me. So I'm giving her a treat. And a big thing about U-turns is you can't do it when the leash is already taught. You got to wait for her to drift ahead of you, or you just got to ask yourself, hey, is Olive paying attention to me right now? Kind of, right? Kind of. You saw that she almost came back. Kind of didn't come back though. Good girl. I'm going to reward her because she's checking in with me. And then we're going to try this again. So as Olive walks, I'm going to stop. Hey, good girlie. Good job. And notice right there when I stopped, Olive stopped too. That's a big theme we're going to have in leash training is you should be the one who is leading the walk, not your dog. It doesn't mean you're dominant over them. It doesn't mean you're better than them. It just means, hey, when I stop, I need you to stop too. It's important to understand too that as I'm doing this, I'm not yanking and cranking my arms. When I stop, all I'm doing is I'm bracing myself for the impact and I'm lunging into Olive so that if Olive were to make a mistake, yes, good. She would receive a correction. But if Olive doesn't make a mistake, then she's not going to receive a correction. Now let's just plain do it. Plain's not even distracting Olive at this point. It's distracting me. So we're going to do this a few more times, guys. And anytime your dog is next to you, yes, paying attention to you, feel free to reward them with food. Olive is already doing wonderful. Oh, but check it out. She sees something. So we're going to turn around right there. And since we've done that conditioning work, when she gets that correction, she knows to pay attention to me. So I'll turn here. Yes, good girl. Good. And a lot of leash training is really boring, to be honest with you guys. It's a lot of doing U-turns, walking in circles and teaching that dog, hey, when I go this way, I need you to follow. Yay, good girl. Good job. She's going to get a lot of verbal encouragement because I want her to do well. I want her to do a good job. So we'll turn again and look at the difference. In just 10 minutes of training, I already have a dog who's perfectly walking with me. As you know, walks are not just about walking next to you. You want your dog to sniff. You want them to check stuff out. We want them to be dogs at the end of the day. Olive, sit. So when we believe that it's time for our dog to go enjoy the world, I'm going to use the cue, go sniff. So I will say, Olive, go sniff. I'm going to give her a little leash pressure, and then I'm going to completely ignore her. If she asks me for food, I'm not going to give it to her. This cue is going to be her time to walk around, check out the grass, go potty, and just be a dog. Check stuff out. Right now, you can see she's going to sniff the ground, walk around, look at all the crazy stuff that's happening at the park. And this is just her time to just be a little puppy, be a dog, maybe stare at the off-leash dogs that could be running up on us right now. Once Olive's sniff time is over, she's got her nose in the grass and I want to keep walking, I'm going to use the cue, Olive, let's go. Olive, let's go. And this is going to be my way of telling Olive, hey, we're back to business mode. We're back to working now. I need you to listen to me. So instead of ignoring her, I'm going to be giving her treats. I'm going to be giving her corrections. I'm going to be giving her turns. I'm going to be communicating to her that I need you to pay attention to me and I need you to follow me. So again, quick recap. If I say Olive, go sniff, that means you're free to be a dog. I say, go sniff. Then I ignore her completely. After I say, Olive, let's go. I bring out the food. I bring out the leash corrections and I bring out all the stuff that we're used to doing right there, a little bottle cap. So I had to use my leash to stop her. I start doing all the things that we were doing earlier. Yes. To let her know that this is her time to follow me. She's doing a great job right now. So Olive, sit. I always want to get eye contact before I tell her to go sniff, go sniff. And now it's Olive's time to go do whatever. This can be her time to say hi to people. You can give her that go sniff cue whenever she wants to say hi to someone, or you can say, go say hi. It doesn't really matter too much. The word that you say, it just matters that you say it. And then you ignore your dog. One last tip I'm going to give you guys, especially for your new puppy owners at home, is that you do not want your puppy extremely tired before walks. Puppies like Olive do not have long battery lives, right? Olive is a six month old puppy. So what I do is I take my puppy's age and multiply it by five. So six month old times five is 30. And that means Olive can go on a walk for 30 minutes without becoming what I call out of battery. When a puppy is out of battery, oftentimes they won't just flop in the shade and tell you, but they get distracted. They don't listen. They don't want your treats. They have puppy ADHD on steroids. And you're like, what is going on? Why won't my puppy listen to me? So if you got a four month old puppy and you're trying to go on an hour long walk, well, yeah, after 20 minutes, your pup ain't going to listen to you. After going on walks with your puppy, it is very, very important that you put them in the crate. You bring them to the living room. You let them settle down and you let their little puppy brains recharge because these guys, not only do they need a lot of love, but they also need a lot of sleep and they need to rest and they need to relax. So guys, there you have it. Simple stuff, how to walk your puppy on a leash. If you have a puppy at home that you're trying to raise, train to be the best puppy in the world, we have a full in-depth guide, hours long of in-depth content called the perfect puppy program, which is a step-by-step guide on how to raise and train your puppy at home from potty training to crate training, to socialization, all the way from obedience to downstays in public, leash walking, all this great stuff that we're doing with Olive. She is one of our perfect puppy students and she is going to be an amazing adult dog as she gets older. If you want to get a 50% discount while it still lasts, all you have to do is click the button in the description below. There's going to be a link for you to get a discount and I hope you guys can take this stuff, run with it, get your puppy to walk nicely on a leash and we'll see you in the next video.