Selective hearing....

eoinburke67

As the title says my dog has acquired a case if selective hearing recently. Any tips to get her listening again? She's a year and a half at the minute

baords dyslexic

I also await replies to your question.

My wife keeps saying he (our 12month old GSD x) can't hear you when I know full well he can, proved it when cutting the grass yesterday. He was the far side of the house so I couldn't see him and I called with the mower running next to me from over 200m away and he shot around to see what I wanted. On a walk he can be 50m away with no other sound other than the wind and he'll give no indication he's heard me at all

kylith

All dogs can develop selective deafness when there's something more interesting around. I find mine are miraculously cured when they know I have treats with me.

suziwalsh

Whistle training cures most selective hearing very successfully!

moving_home

OP what breed is the dog? I find that dogs bred for hunting are the worst for selective hearing! :-)

eoinburke67

Shes probably the worst for this issue... A beagle appartly the worst I'm told. But I'm willing to work on her. Been doing recall training for months now and no luck starting to doubt it's possible with her

LucyBliss

I have a terrier cross whose selective hearing made it practically impossible to get him to come in from the garden some nights, much less have him off the lead while out walking. I went the treat route with him as he is very food motivated and did a lot of throwing the treats around and telling him to find them. I figured I'd do it in baby steps - get him a taste for the treats and get him to (eventually) come back to me looking for more. Some nights took longer than usual and it was very frustrating. I'll admit that sometimes I let him do his final pee of the night in the garden on the long lead because I hadn't the energy to go through the whole thing with the treats and waiting for him to cop on about what I wanted him to do.

To be honest, there were times I despaired. He'll be four in June and for the past two months, there has been such a difference in him. His recall has improved dramatically. So much so that when I tell him to come back and he makes to walk away, I tell him stop and 'here!' and he trots over to me. The first time he came back without any drama, I couldn't believe it.

Granted, he's not a beagle, but he's a very headstrong excitable dog and even in that respect he's getting a lot better. They say that a dog isn't really fully mature until the age of three or thereabouts so my advice would be keep at it because they can get there. I mean, we used to joke that the only nice thing people could say about Jack was that he had a nice coat because it was touch and go when it came to training him to do anything besides eat! So if mine can suddenly get what I've been telling him all this time, I think there's hope for all dogs!

ABajaninCork

Yup! Sounds like our Shih Tzu!

talkin

our dog def has selective hearing she could be sitting in front of you and if you ask her to give the paw she sit there and slowly close her eyes as if shes falling asleep. i know that offering a treat when your dog listens to you works.

baords dyslexic

talkin wrote: »

our dog def has selective hearing she could be sitting in front of you and if you ask her to give the paw she sit there and slowly close her eyes as if shes falling asleep. i know that offering a treat when your dog listens to you works.

Mine can hear the noise my hand makes going into my pocket to get a treat out and if he doesn't hear it and sees it instead the reaction is the just the same hearing returns. Problem is if you can't get eye contact.

talkin

what about playing if you say '(dog's name) get the ball' in a really excited voice, will it listen then. i know my dog listens looks pays great attention when its something that will benefit her.
like if she runs off and ignores me i just go get the lead show her it and say walkies she'll listen then.

some dogs are stubborn. i know mine is. often when we'r indoors i could call her and she'l go to my OH or visa versa!

Cherry Blossom

eoinburke67 wrote: »

As the title says my dog has acquired a case if selective hearing recently. . . . She's a year and a half at the minute

baords dyslexic wrote: »

My wife keeps saying he (our 12month old GSD x) can't hear you when I know full well he can

Welcome to doggy adolescence posters

All you can do really is step up the training, try clicker training if you haven't already and whistle training is great for recall (although this is also the start of the beagles natural instincts starting to surface so any recall training for a beagle can only do so much), other than that if you can get your moody independent teens though the phase with reasonably good obedience they should settle into very well behaved adulthood - so well worth the extra bit of effort that's needed at the minute.