walking puppy

Question
Hello. As a professional pet sitter, I've recently received a contract to walk a 3 month old golden retriever puppy daily. She is playful and healthy, but she just
doesn't seem to want to walk. Every day I take her a little further down the block, but inevitably she'll lay down (concrete or grass doesn't matter) and won't want to
walk. Up to now I've been gently coaxing her and getting further each day, but I can't help thinking there's got to be a better way. I should mention that over the Thanksgiving holidays I kept her at my house and walked her with my 4 year old dog. She did much better then and didn't even try to lay down once. What do you suggest I do to speed the process along?

Answer
Hello again, Britlyn,

Years ago, when goldens were very popular in Manhattan, I coined a term for the behavior you're dealing with: I dubbed it the "golden flop." You're also dealing with a fairly young puppy, who's still figuring out how much sensory input from the environment she can handle without lying down and shutting things out for a little bit to keep her little brain from getting overloaded.

Walking her with another dog (or two) is an ideal solution, as you discovered. The next best thing would be to take along a favorite toy or two, and when you see her focus on walking starting to flag, produce the toy, tease her with it, then get her to chase you a ways down the street. The more fun she has chasing you, the more likely she'll be to want to walk with you.

Another technique is to bring along some treats (or her kibble), and when she loses focus, have a treat ready in one hand, make a kissing sound, and as soon as she looks at you, give her the treat. Once she gets good at refocusing on you when you make the kissing sound, instead of just giving it to her, you can use it as a lure (much like you should do with the toy), and turn it into a game of chase. It doesn't have to be a full-speed chase by any means. Whatever pace is comfortable for you is fine, as long as it energizes her, gets her to focus on you, and makes her want to move in-synch with you. The more energized and focused she is on you (at least up to a certain point, she DOES like to jump up when she probably shouldn't), the better able she'll be to process all the novel energy in the environment that's bombarding her developing little brain.

I hope this helps,

LCK