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Following the Multi-Dog Conference, I think a lot of us are eager and ready to begin teaching our dogs how to wait their turns while we train our other dogs! It's such a useful skill for any dog to have, especially in a multi-dog household.

And as much as I support teaching the skill, one thing that I have seen often is that while a handler has good intentions and is rewarding the waiting dog for being patient, they are also simultaneously disengaging from their working dog. And though that may not lead to a big response, I do notice a change in the working dog's behavior whether it's signs of stress, disengagement, or decreased motivation.

So I ask you—have you ever checked with yourself, "how does my working dog feel when I'm also reinforcing or managing my other dog for waiting?"

When we think about a reaction that our dog may have to a trigger in the environment—a big outburst, shutting down, excitability—there's one key element that occurs which makes this scenario so difficult: our dog disengages from us. Not only has our dog become distracted, but they are no longer responding to our best attempts to help them. 

The core of the Control Unleashed program is the use of patterns to help our dogs feel more comfortable in our crazy world. Patterns allow a dog to use voluntary behaviors to initiate a simple, repetitive chain that creates a predictable pattern. This will help to normalize the environment and allow the dog to process information from the safety of the pattern.

If you could choose only one activity to enjoy with your dog for the rest of your life, what would it be?

My answer - I wouldn't think twice before choosing hiking with my dogs off-leash! And had someone asked me this question 20 years ago when I got my first dog as an adult, I would have answered the exact same way.

Over any dog sport, competition, or activity, there's nothing I'd rather do with my dogs than to go for a long, off-leash walk.

So for that reason, I put more work into raising my dogs to be wonderful hiking partners than absolutely anything else. I want our lifetime of off-leash walks to be fulfilling, meet their needs, and on top of everything else, safe!

It wasn't until I began teaching my dogs Control Unleashed skills (for entirely different reasons) when I began to notice the significant improvement in my dog's recall skills, as well as their general hiking etiquette.

So how does a program that focuses on helping dogs with arousal challenges work so well for our off-leash endeavors?