Sirius is a Jack Russel, about seven months old. We’ve had him since the end of October. He’s an absolutely wonderful little dog, as calm as could be, gentle and sweet. All he wants to do is cuddle.
In the house, he follows me everywhere, and comes whenever I call, but outside, he acts like he’s afraid of me. Getting him to come back in from outside is a real chore. He acts like he’s afraid to come into the house, standing stock still in front of the door, and no amount of coaxing will urge him to come through it. I have to go outside and get him, and, of course, he runs. (And that little fart is fast!)
I’ve tried luring him with a treat. I’ve tried sitting down, thinking he might be afraid of me crouching over him. I’ve tried sweet coaxing sounds and stern commands. Nothing. He always runs from me. After about ten minutes, he’ll suddenly freeze, in a crouched position and let me pick him up.
The people we adopted him from are breeders, and are not abusive people. He was adopted once before and then returned less than a week later (who knows what happened to him during that time) and then a month later, came home with us.
I know we haven’t had him long, but he’s super-smart. I’ve been able to quickly train him on other things: he learned “sit” and “down” in ten minutes. I don’t understand why I can’t train him to come to me outside. I’ve never picked him up and punished him, so I can’t see why he would still be afraid of me.
Maybe he’s watching hopefully for you to come out, and play with him? Try going out with him (if you don’t already, that is) and playing fetch, tug-of-war or another active game and see if he’s more willing to come back inside once he’s tired out from play. It almost sounds like he’s initiating a chase, he wants you to chase him as play. Don’t Jack Russels need lots of play to stay calm and happy?
As far as training him to come when called, he does this when inside, but not outside? Are you consistent with giving positive feedback when he comes to you inside? Maybe you should do some work to re-inforce this inside, then move to outside? I might have him on a leash outside with someone else holding the leash and take turns calling him, then start work off leash. I might be off base with these ideas, though. I’m sure other Dopers will be here shortly to give their advice. (I’ve had pet dogs, but none very recently.)
He chases Polaris, and they run around a good deal outside. Inside, they plays a good deal, tug of war and wrestling, mostly. With me, he just wants to snuggle.
His running doesn’t really seem to be play to me. He’s not doing the play crouch or wagging his tail-- it’s almost as if he’s really afraid. When I finally corner him, or he gives up, he crouches down, and holds his ears down as if he’s afraid I’ll punish him. (I always kiss and coo to him once I pick him up, because I want me picking him up to be positive.)
Once I’ve got him in my arms, he always snuggles into me, licks my hands and such, so I think he knows being picked up is a good thing, but he always avoids it when he’s on the ground.
He is very submissive with we humans. A gentle “No, puppy” is enough to make him stop whatever he’s doing instantly. If I reach for his food bowl, he ducks back from it, and he submits silently to bathing, shots and nail-clips. I’ve never seen a dog with such a placid nature.
Not him, apparently. Polaris wants to play more than he does. He spends most of his time on the sofa or my lap, just looking around placidly at the world, or sleeping. I have to* urge* him to chew.
Polaris actually grabs his collar and drags him off the sofa sometimes to try to get him to romp with her. He will, for a while, and then it’s back up onto my lap.
I’m assuming you know how to train a dog to come when called. If not, you need to teach that first. If so, do some remedial work with him while you’re outside.
I think he may not be afraid of you so much as upset that you’re calling him in from his fun time outside. Make sure you periodically call him to you (I know you have to get him to do it first), then let him go back and play some more. If he’s as smart as you say, it may have taken only a couple times to learn “oh, I come when she calls and no more play time! Bummer! Not doing that again!”
Sounds like he had a gentle nature to begin with, and his previous owners took the “drill seargant” stance when trying to train him. I’d not coo at him after he ran from you, (I wouldn’t be gruff either, just neutral) even though you want to reassure him, you might be telling him that he’ll get postive attention for running and acting scared. I’d start trying to get through to him outside, begin on the leash, and when he comes when called, make a big deal out of it. (I wouldn’t give treats, but I’d “Good Boy!” and pet him.) Every time he comes to you when you call, make sure he knows you’re pleased and that this is what is expected of him. Reinforce the idea, until he understands that he wants to come when you call him. It’s going to take some time and patience, but if you work with him now, and show him that coming when you call is a good thing for him, he’ll come round.
Adding, I wouldn’t give treats for this part of his training, because it’s an “everyday” thing. It’s just what is expected of him. Give treats for things like “Roll Over”, but not for things like “come here”, or “heel”. Some dogs might come to expect a treat every time they do what is expected of them, and might not be so willng once you think they are trained, and stop giving the treats.
Yeah, that’s kind of what happened with Polaris. For a while, my solution was to just keep treats close at hand when I was giving her commands. It’s the lazy way out, I know, and now I’m reaping the whirlwind. We’re working on it.
Raising two puppies is hard work! Polaris wasn’t fully trained when we got Sirius, and now, trying to keep up with the two of them is nuts! Some of the things I let slide a little are now coming back to bite me in the ass.
Training time is hard to come by. If I start saying commands out loud, the other two dogs come running to obey. It sounds great on paper that my dogs are so eager to obey, but they jostle for postion and treats, totally disrupting the lesson. So, I tried just shutting them out of the room. Both sat at the door and whined, and worse, obeyed the commands out in the hall! (I could see them through the gap under the door.) I can’t exactly say why, but I felt kinda bad about that.
But it’s worth it, of course. Since Sirius got here there has been an increased number of IECs: incidents of extreme cuteness. Those two snuggling and tussling on the sofa is enough to make me go into awwww overload.
Honestly, I disagree about giving up on the treats … your puppy is only young yet, I’d keep reinforcing good behaviour with treats. As he gets older you can do it intermittently, but don’t give up altogether.
As to the not coming inside, a couple of things that might work … because they worked on one of my dogs who is very sensitive.
If you’re asking him to come inside, note how you’re standing in relation to your puppy. Are you standing square on? If so, no matter what you’re saying, your body language is blocking him … and dogs will pay attention to your body language in preference to your vocal commands.
Try turning sideways and standing out of the doorway when you call. One of my dogs persistently wouldn’t come through a gate when I called him, he’d just stand and look unhappy. It finally dawned on me that he was confused … I was asking him to come to me, but blocking him by standing in the gateway and straight on to him, and he was bewildered by the contradiction. By turning side-on and not staring into his eyes, I was inviting him through with my body language, and it only took that small movement to fix the problem.
So possibly the reason your puppy is unhappy because to his mind you’re giving two contradictory commands and he can’t work them out.
The other thing you could try, which is counter-intuitive but does work with most dogs is to turn in the other direction. Rather than chasing your dog, ask him to chase you. I turn, sort of bend from the waist and act really excited, moving away from the dog rather than toward him.
This right here is probably the answer. We stand to the side of the door and tell our girls “inside” while signalling them through the door. Works wonders. Also, when you are running after Sirius, he is in control. You shouldn’t chase him unless you are playing a game, and depending on his temperment you maybe shouldn’t chase him at all. Not all dogs can be played with the same way.