Squitchley

This French Basset Hound is cute – and he knows it! But his behaviours were making life at home difficult for his owners. Squitchley would bite his owners hands, feet, clothes (whatever he could get hold of!); steal and destroy high value items (including a designer handbag!) and become aggressive if his owners attempted to take it away; mount people’s legs, backs, arms; pull on the lead, bite the lead and would not recall to his owners. There was a lot for us to work on!

First port of call for us was to look at the routine that Squitchley had as it was clear that he was over-stimulated. We looked at implementing a routine where Squitchley had ample opportunity to sleep, relax and have quiet, calm time. We also spoke about how enrichment could be used to increase Squitchley’s calmness. 

Next, we looked at introducing some impulse control exercises and well as basic obedience so that Squitchley could control his urges and listen to his owners, rather than tuning them out completely. This massively reduced his biting behaviour whilst increasing his ability to listen out on walks. 

We spoke about how we needed to manage our behaviour to set Squitchley up for success and discussed how to best tackle his resource guarding. This was tricky for his owners as the items that Squitch was prone to stealing were so high value to us – glasses, tv remotes and even a steak knife!

Squitchley’s owners were 100% dedicated to his training and he is now a different dog. He is calm at home, no longer bites for attention, rarely feels the need to steal items and is able to listen to his owner and behave beautifully on his walks. 

This training journey took us three months from start to finish, with 6 sessions in total – his story really is a testament to the power of positive training. A very big well done to Squitchley!