I adopted Molly from my now 3 year old GSD from a couple who had her from a puppy, and regretfully at the age on 1 year old could no longer cope with her behaviour. Yes another dog let down by their owners. Her first year of her life she spent in the garden and was not introduced to anything or taught anything. Her bad behaviour was rewarded with custard cream biscuits and human peanut butter.
I adopted her from them, and as I had experience with three other GSD and so I knew the breed pretty well. I thought that Molly just required boundaries, routine, and structure in her young life. I didn’t think it would be easy but I also didn’t realise how bad she was. She was also an adolescent y by now and testing her boundaries even more so. Introducing her to the outside world was heart breaking for me. She had so many problems car phobia, biting, growling, frightened, prey drive, lunging barking etc. “you know how it goes” not good..
I spent the next 2 years working through everything with her and it was not easy. At times I felt like giving up, but I also knew that was not an option. People would give me the looks and tut, but this made me more determined than ever to help Molly. I knew that there was a good dog in there and I would do my best for her.
Things came to ahead when Molly escape the garden, and ended up on a busy road I ran into the middle of the road to stop the traffic its a wonder we both didn’t get killed. I spent what felt like hours recalling her but nothing worked. I was near to tears, anyway a chap walked passed with his dog and fortunately Molly went over to the dog and the chap caught her.
From then on it was secure field for exercise and recall training. We practise but any distractions would always win..
Having met Andi at K9 Bootcamp for training with her car phobia, which was successful. We discussed the issue with recall. Andi suggested e collar training would help resolve the recall and distraction issues. We went ahead and booked 5 day course, Andi got to work with Molly straight away worked through the different levels pretty low considering her prey drive and Molly in a short time began to respond to the corrections, (on a long line at this point) she actually was enjoying the coming back and being given the freedom of not having to be 6ft lead away from me at any one time. Then came the big test came on day 3 and the longline removed I was a nervous wreck but I trusted Andi judgement when she said Molly was ready for total off lead. Molly excelled in her recall it was wonderful I will never forget the joy in Mollys face bouncing about doing her own thing I could not believe it… The important thing was that Andi did not only train Mollys 100% recall, but she also trained her handler who was nervous and lacked leadership and confidence because deep down I had been traumatised by the fact that Molly could have been injured or even killed in the past..
We are going from strength to strength. The outcome as changed our lives in a way we couldn’t have imagined. Our bond as become so much stronger and I have a happy dog who enjoys her freedom to run free in open fields, and me the handler has the reassurance that the e collar will give me 100% piece of mind that should Molly ever become distracted. I have the backup with the e collar, and most importantly I am keeping her and others safe.
A massive Thank You Andi for all you do to help the dogs and owners!