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It's starting to be an annoying problem - my whippet is scared of cats and will shout at them if she sees them. Cats chill around outside a lot here so I have to keep a sharp eye out while walking her so I spot the cats before she does, otherwise she barks. I feel pretty confident she's far too much of a wuss to do anything to a cat, but its still unpleasant that they worry her so much. This all started about a year ago when I walked her past a cat, which she looked at but didn't care about, and the cat went for her and scratched her up. I had to kick the cat away because it just kept trying to go for her. My dog wasn't injured much but it frightened her badly and now she barks at any and all cats. This is going to be more of a problem again as it gets warmer with more people putting their cats out, and me having to open the window and curtains more. The window is very low so she can see out of it, and if its open she will often hear cats outside in the middle of the night and wake up barking. We have no close neighbours fortunately, but its starting to get on my nerves. What can I do to calm her? I was thinking of taking something super tasty on walks to distract her when she spots a cat, but I don't know if that'll work and I'll just end up accidentally rewarding her for her scared reaction. Ideas?
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Mar 10, 2015 06:05
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| # ? May 21, 2024 16:24 |
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It's pretty hard to reward being scared; feeding when something scary is around regardless of her actions is a technique trainers use (classical conditioning). I would probably play 'Look At That': every time the dog looks at a cat, mark it and feed. If she doesn't't disengage from the cat to get the treat, back up.
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Mar 10, 2015 13:01
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I'll try that. It's just that as soon as she sees a cat she locks on and goes straight into barking, raised hackles, zero care for what I do or say. I guess I need to find a way of distracting her that is super strong, which is hard since she's not very food orientated.. Thanks for the reassurance about not rewarding her fear, I was worried I might end up making her reaction worse.
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Mar 10, 2015 16:47
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If she's giving you that strong a reaction, try to point out cats that are very far away so that you have a better chance of her maintaining control.
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Mar 10, 2015 16:58
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Your dog is a racist
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Mar 10, 2015 17:25
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Strap cat to dog until dog stops being a little bitch, or dies
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Mar 10, 2015 18:16
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Engineer Lenk posted:If she's giving you that strong a reaction, try to point out cats that are very far away so that you have a better chance of her maintaining control. Yeah I can probably do that, I've already memorised most of the spots they commonly hang out. It was bad last night though because neither of us spotted the cat until we were right next to it, and it stalked us down the road which really shat my dog up. Had to drag her away at some speed because she was worried this cat was following, eghh. This dog is stupid as hell, she used to be terrified of german shepherds (justified I guess, one nipped her and frightened her) and dalmatians (??????) and the way I fixed that was just walk her really close to them around the popular dog walking field over a couple weeks until she realised nothing bad happened and she got treats for it. I just can't do that with a cat and I don't want to do anything that might put a cat at risk, no matter how confident I am that my dog wouldn't do anything. You never know! But yeah if all else fails I have packing tape for attaching a cat to her.
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Mar 10, 2015 18:37
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| # ? May 21, 2024 16:24 |
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use the smelliest treats you can find so it's super rewarding. my dog was afraid of the cat when we first brought it home, but I spent a couple months just shoving tiny pieces of dehydrated beef liver into her face every time the cat was in view. it took a while because my dog is an especially heinous baby, but now she doesn't cry every time a cat looks at her.
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Mar 10, 2015 23:44
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