At home, on the street, on public transport …In the day-to-day life of our dogs it is almost inevitable to find a ladder, how many times do you see a frightened dog in front of a flight of stairs and dragged by his keeper by his arms because he is paralyzed as soon as he sees the stairs?
In this article by Animal Expert we explain why your dog is afraid to go down the stairs, what makes him afraid and what solutions you can apply so that little by little your pet gains confidence and safety!
- Fear of going up or down stairs is very common in dogs and many causes are the cause.
- For starters.
- It is important to note that fear often occurs in the final stage of the socialization of the dog.
- Around 12 weeks of age.
It is very important to accustom your dog to all kinds of stimuli during this phase of his life: people, noise, objects, animals, children, to avoid the manifestation of negative emotions, such as fears and phobias, precisely because of this, the lack From exposure to stairs at an early age, dogs end up feeling fear in adults.
Another cause that can cause your dog to see the stairs negatively is to have suffered a traumatic experience, who knows if a leg has ever been injured or if a cushion has become stuck in the wood while climbing.The noise on the stairs or simply the image of the staircase represents an immensity for your dog worthy of chills.
The genetic factor is no less important: a puppy of fearful parents will tend to behave in the same way as their parents and reproduce by imitation the attitudes of their mother, acting as a mirror from an early age.
As the popular saying goes, “those who are still waiting are coming.”Unfortunately, there is no quick fix to solve your problem, but you will find that in time and calm, the nightmare of the stairs will quickly become a bad memory.
Even if you’ve never trained your dog to go up and down stairs when you were a puppy, don’t worry, it can help you see the stairs in a positive way, making it understand that it poses no danger or threat to it.
This learning will be based on positive reinforcement and consists in rewarding our friend whenever he has a desired attitude, calm or correct, without using at any time aversive techniques, punishment or obligation, since these methods generate inhibition behaviors.Worse, they can cause an accident in which you or your dog is injured.
Remember that, in fear, the dog has two options: flee or attack, if we force it to do something that it does not want to do, the more likely it is that it will give us a good bite, or lose confidence.and have a completely inhibited attitude, unable to learn and move forward.
We recommend that you follow this step by step, which will gradually help you scare the stairs. Remember that you can apply the same guidelines both for fear of going up and for fear of going down:
Once you get used to the house, it will be much easier for your dog to lose their fear elsewhere, although it is advisable to bring rewards for future walks!
If you would like to read articles similar to, we recommend that you visit our Behavioral Problems section.