Chase the Cattle Dog X

[looseleeroy]

Hey everyone, I'm new to this reddit page and was hoping this could become a good resource for me as I navigate raising my new Cattle Dog cross, Chase!

Chase is just three days shy of seven months old, and I adopted almost two months ago from a rescue. He is 50% Cattle Dog and 50% Australian Shepherd but looks wise is certainly leaning more on the cattle dog side of things as you can see in the picture. He is sweet as pie and incredibly smart, but also stubborn as all hell and much more difficult to train so far than my retriever ever was. Realizing very quickly I need to alter my expectations of this dog!

If anyone can offer any advice or insights on how to train him effectively, or general quirks about cattle dogs that I may need to just accept as inevitable (lol) I would really appreciate it!

Chase

 

[kycatt007]

@looseleeroy My first heeler was smarter than me. I had to learn that if she took stubborn and would not listen to me, I better go see why. Dog refuses to leave house? Well, I'll be damned the fridge is wide open. Dog refuses to leave a certain corner of yard and is barking...looks there it's a snake. Mostly just little stuff, but I (a woman) also traveled with me and just the dog pretty often, and if my dog didn't like a particular person I listened. I felt safe going anywhere with her.

Also she picked up on my emotions very well. I didn't particularly like my father inlaw, he was a decent guy but his mouth just annoyed me, and my dog definitely noticed that and ran with it. She was rude to that poor man until the day he died. So just be sure to keep your emotions in check because they will pick up on it. My grandma on the other hand, I loved dearly, and anytime we visited my dog would calm the hell down and just sit with Grandma and me. Grandma always said she was the sweetest calmest dog and I could never convince her otherwise.

Fucking loved that dog.

 

[ajflyguy7]

@kycatt007 I really enjoyed reading your post, my wife and I have two heeler/Boarder Collie they are a year and four days apart. They turned two and three this month. Both of our girls are sensitive but also very intuitive, love these two to death. Our youngest challenges people, she will run up to someone and if they show any fear she will keep barking and running around them, she doesn't try to bite them, she just keeps intimidating them. A dog person laughs at her or stands their ground she gives up and runs back to the other animals. Now imagine there's two of them coming at you, that's what I've been dealing with and getting them trained not to be shit heads! To break their attention I've started using referees whistle and so far so good. I love how they challenge me, sometimes I think they are training me.

 

[andrew_htun]

@looseleeroy They are definitely stubborn and they're stubborn because they're smart. The trick is to be consistent and make it fun and a game for them. It not, they'll get bored and just not be interested and you'll get frustrated.

 

[looseleeroy]

@andrew_htun Thanks! This is great advice! I'll definitely start working on this more!

 

[hannahelizaw]

@looseleeroy You will never make his body tired, but you can make him mind tired. Use his intelligence to your advantage.

Find the things that motivates him. Food, love, praise, or toys are examples of this.

He doesn’t work for you, he works with you. Make him your partner in crime.

Being able to rest is a taught skill. Quiet time is vital for your mind and his.

It’s okay to leave him in a different room/his kennel for awhile. You getting frustrated and annoyed does neither one of you any good.

 

[imagebeastmarkbeast]

@looseleeroy im no heeler expert, but ive had my boy over 7 years. hes the sweetest, as well as most stubborn dog ive ever known lol. i never went extreme on training. just leash-work, come when i whistle, and socialization. before him i had a really trained doberman, and it was a big culture shock. the biggest difference ive seen between heelers and a lotta other working dogs is the independent mindset. even with dobes, if you say lets go for a walk etc they are up for it. nowadays we go for walks when he feels like it. and if i pick him up n try to get him leashed up, he just gets more grumpy and stubborn.

ive just learned to work with him. if im going for a car ride, i just ask if he wants to come. and dont get mad if he wants to be lazy that day. the joke i always about my dog is "most dogs think what can i do for you, but his thought is what can YOU do for HIM?" haha

all that being said, i wouldnt trade him for the world. little homie has stopped trespassers on my rural property, found an electrical line spitting fire in the forest(stopped a wildfire according to the firefighters) and has skirted being attacked on multiple occasions. last time a dog attacked him(every time old ladies with outta control dogs) he got away and ran all the way home.

 

[looseleeroy]

@imagebeastmarkbeast I love this! I must say Chase is so far very good on leash, but does have moments where he decides he wants to grab it in his mouth and pull. I've learned that when that happens I just keep moving forward and he usually stops after about 20-30 seconds when he realizes I'm not going to interact with it. Unfortunately he does it more when I walk him and my retriever together haha. Socialization wise he's also doing well, as I luckily have a large circle of friends with dogs that we walk together. His recall is still a work in progress though lol.

If I'm lucky he'll become a little hero like yours haha.

 

[imagebeastmarkbeast]

@looseleeroy yeah i had the same thing with leash training haha. what really helped us was a body harness and leader leash. my little guy loves all clothes and hates collars, so it really helped it to be a more positive experience. also, when he was younger, giving him 2-3 sessions of tennis ball/frisbee a day was pretty much mandatory for keepin him behaved and happy. nowadays a couple 30-45 min walks a day does it. but until he was about 5, those little play seshes were the key to keepin him happy and minimally neurotic lol

recall is a fun one. sometimes hell come at one split second whistle like my dobe used to, sometimes he will just look at me like im a jerk for inconveniencing him. but when i really want him to come, my pretty much guaranteed trick is to offer up one of his favorite toys or bones since hes not food motivated. a little negotiation can go a long way haha. best of luck!!

 

[ironmike663]

@looseleeroy Mine definitely does the same thing with her leash! She doesn't pull often on it with her body, but will instead grab at the leash and pull in her mouth when she wants to get going. And she also tends to do it more when my other dog is on a leash and she'll grab that leash instead.

The best thing I've found is to lean into it and make it a job/game. When she's in a leash grabbing mood, I'll let her take the looped end while I hold the middle of it and ask her to "lead the way". Then as long as she walks me in a generally okay direction and without playing tug of war, she gets to keep the leash. We've even got her now walking our other dog at times. It's a good game for practicing "drop it" too

It seems ACDs and maybe a lot of herding dogs like to carry something when going places. So might be you will also get luck and less crazy walks if you give him a toy to carry. If nothing else, it's a brain tiring game for them to keep track of their toy.

 

[looseleeroy]

@ironmike663 I was definitely thinking of bringing something along for him to carry so I will do this and see how it goes! Really appreciate the feedback

 

[deelo00]

@looseleeroy What a beautiful dog!!

Mine is half and half with lab. I got in way over my head with him, had no idea how much that ACD half mattered. When I talked to the vet about it at our second visit, because all my years of dogs meant nothing and I was about to rehome him, he told me my dog only identifies as a lab in his size and that his temperament is that of a heeler. He told me to read and then train him like a heeler.

It was 2021 in a very small town with no trainers, so I was on the internet constantly. The very beat advice I got was to ignore the herding like ifs the most boring thing, and quietly shut myself in another room for a minute, and to force naps with a crate. It helped so, so much.

He's 2.5 now and the absolute smartest dog I've ever had. But he is a lot. He's a lot of work. Add in him being attacked by a dog last summer, and now he's dog-reactive in addition. But they're worth it. He's worth it. We are working with a private trainer now and he's come so far with the reactivity.

Anyway thats neither here nor there. Keep him busy but don't try to burn off all his energy or you'll build an athlete. Try to find a balance. And enjoy the ride!

 

[mikedelmar]

@deelo00 This sounds so much like my girl! She’s the same mix, but at only 50 lbs, she looks like a mini-lab lol. She’s pure black & lab, but dainty & heeler brain through & through. When I got her at around 5 months, I was so overwhelmed. I’d take her out to play/run for like two hours a day. Then I realized that she was needing longer & longer play times to get anywhere close to tired - I was conditioning an athlete, not tiring out my pup! So yeah, the brain work is so much more effective at really getting her energy spent. We still play & do a ton of active stuff, of course, but yeah. I was also in way over my head when I got her!

 

[aquaticgeek]

@looseleeroy I have never had issues training a dog until I got a cattle dog. She looked at me like I was speaking a foreign language, and she just could not figure out what I wanted from her. Eventually, we took a basic obedience class through the local kennel club, and they taught us clicker training. Suddenly, this dog became an A+ student as she knew exactly what I was asking of her. I swear she would even sneer at the other dogs in class as she excelled at learning her trick while the others were still struggling to learn theirs. I suggest trying clicker training and see if that helps or enroll in a class and see if the teacher can determine what technique would work best to train your dog.

 

[lee102]

@looseleeroy A private trainer that comes to your house will break all of the bad habits you have, regarding how you train your dog.

When training a dog, use walks first. The first couple walks should only be focused on stop and go. Every time you stop the dog has to sit and wait to be told he can move again. Do this for a few days.

When your dog has his down, work on being able to drop the leash without him moving. To do this, you will have him in a seated position. Step and turn at the same time to be facing him, and then back away.

Make sure he doesn’t move. Make a stay hand signal. Have your palm up like a talk to the hand gesture. If he tries to move, make a lunging sort of step towards him and make the sound “uh uh”. When he returns to fully seated, take another step backwards. Do not lose eye contact. Then call him to you using a happy voice.

Once he has this down, work on being able to walk complete circles around him while he is seated.

The best place to do. This is in your own driveway, with things happening around him, but he is safe.

You will need to teach the dog a down and stay position. To do this you need treats. Put the dog in a seated position. Offer the treat, but only let him smell it. Then say the word “down“ and lower the treat to the ground near his front paws. This will cause him to lay down. Tell him he’s a good boy and give him lots of pets.

Tell him to stay, And back away.

Whenever your dog completes a stay command, call your dog to you as if it’s the happiest thing ever. This makes the reward for minding the command his favorite thing.

Work on these three things, and then, I’ll teach you harder commands.

 

[lucyrobb465]

@looseleeroy I always joke that you don't train a heeler, you agree to terms with them. Viewing my dog as a partner instead of a pet was a good shift in mindset for me. She has some Hard Lines she won't compromise on for all the training in the world, (eg: refusing to go to the bathroom on wet ground/in the rain) but has recognized the hard lines we have in place in return (no secretly licking people's food when they aren't looking). Training got a lot more effective when I started approaching her like a teammate, not a pet. Also, focusing on building her trust in me. She was a rescue, and had a good bit of reactivity, but once she trusted that I wouldn't let her get hurt, she was a lot more willing to let me take the lead on handling situations ranging from "loose dog running our way, (have been attacked by many dogs this way bc no one uses leashes)" to "that man is wearing a hat and cannot be trusted because of it" to "I see a child and I cannot understand why they are humans but small."

 

[jchaudoir36]

@lucyrobb465 I'm totally feeling this. My ACDs and I have mutual respect for each other. I cater to their every whim and they agree to leave my house standing.

 

[looseleeroy]

@lucyrobb465 Wow, this is such great advice! I will definitely use this going forward!

 

[icycool25]

@looseleeroy Persistence, patience, and consistency. Train for a bit, take a break. Repeat. Don’t let either of you get frustrated- it’s counterproductive

 

[youngwarrior]

@looseleeroy Great looking dog. Take him herding if you have the opportunity. Check for local places that offer instinct testing and classes.