Our GSP, Digby is 13 weeks old and has become tall enough to cruise the counter tops.  She has not stolen anything yet...  We have attempted to correct this behavior by attaching a short lead to her collar and pulling it sideways with the command "off" everytime she jumps up on a counter.  At this point it appears that we are failing in our efforts.

Does anyone have any training tips or suggestions that can be used to correct this behavior?

Thanks

Marc

I had a friend who put empty coke cans along the edge so that when the dog jumped up on the counter the cans were knocked down and the dog was startled and got down (and mom didn't have to be around for correction).  For my girls I just stayed with the correction (and was consistent), and made sure there was nothing interesting for the dog to investigate on the counters. 

Is your dog getting up there to inspect/sniff stuff?  If so, remove it at least for now. Stay consistent in your correction.  You might also try your correction and then distracting him with a toy to get his mind on something else.  I also taught my girls when I say ANH they stop whatever they are doing and pay attention to mom.  That way I can correct from a distance.  Another good command to teach is leave it.  That is real handy when they find something they think might be yummy and you don't want them to put it in their mouth.

Good luck!!

Thanks for the suggestions.

I will try the coke can suggestion.  If I stick with the corrections how long did it take for your dog to change her behavior?

On the mousetrap suggestion how far back are they set from the counter?  Does the newspaper act as a barrier to keep the dog fromgetting cuaght in the trap?

Marc

Almost every single adult dog I bring into rescue will attempt counter surfing at first....I do not use mouse traps or cans on the counters, I am watching them at all times and grab them off, and tell them OFF, DOWN, BACK....if they can't stay off the counters, I put the stuff away where they can't get into it, until they figure it out.  But I've never had one that does it beyond one week.  If you don't encourage UP behavior, they will learn DOWN fast.  No mixed messages, plain and simple OFF, DOWN, and show them what is expected of them...redirect to another activity...they get it quick.

As I said in my first post, my friend used the cans primarily as she had to be away some and couldn't supervise all the time.  I don't know how long it took her.  For me I used the same method as Lisa and I would guess about a week or so, but still had to correct once in a while after that.  I also moved all the interesting stuff off the counters so they wouldn't inadvertently get a reward if I wasn't watching close enough.  If they don't find anything interesting up there, no reward.  Also, Belle took longer than Halo, so each dog is going to be a bit different.

Regarding the newspaper over the mousetraps. It only keeps them from seeing the mousetraps and avoiding them. Really makes a loud pop too when the mouse traps snaps against the newspaper