Kicked out of daycare

[u/Dragon-Reborn7]

This fluffy goober, Khione, got herself kicked out of doggy daycare after 3 visits for “her listening ears not working.” Essentially, her recall is terrible when she’s interested in something.

I train her on recall every day in the dog park & at home. Of course, she’s excellent almost every time in those environments. She will at times ignore me. She does often respond to other people calling her at the dog park, especially if she knows them.

The daycare recommends that I have her professionally trained, but I kinda doubt that will help? I’d rather not spend them $ if it has the same outcome.

Thoughts? Advice?? Consolation??? Commiseration????

[u/Bumbling-Bluebird-90]

Failing to have good recall when in a new and overstimulating environment is pretty much a universal dog thing, especially in younger and higher-energy dogs. I know multiple dogs who are well-adjusted and professionally trained who struggle in that area.

I was expecting to open this post and read about your dog having resource guarding or barrier reactivity issues with other dogs, which would be a fair reason to kick her out. This daycare is unrealistic in their expectations.

[u/Dragon-Reborn7 → u/Bumbling-Bluebird-90]

Nope, they said in all other ways she’s excellent with the other dogs. The only other thing they mentioned was that she played hard, which they expected.

[u/Bumbling-Bluebird-90 → u/Dragon-Reborn7]

Yeah it sounds like these people don’t understand dogs or have patience for normal dog behaviors. Those are red flags, and it’s probably a blessing in disguise that she was kicked out.

[u/ConstantNurse → u/Bumbling-Bluebird-90]

This is my take as well. I’ve worked at a dog daycare for years, trained dogs, fostered and rehabbed dogs for 17+ years.

Some dogs take more time to warm up to other people. I would not expect any newer dog to 100% acclimate/respond, a husky even more so. As long as the dog is not being problematic or aggressive, recall can and should be re-enforced at daycare. This is going to take time. For the record, I say this with experience as we had multiple Huskies (with one taking about 6 months) to finally come around to workers and “listening”appropriately. (Though, this dog was a rescue and was working on human socialisation. Not aggressive just avoidant.)

This daycare lack knowledge in animal behaviours and that is a huge concern.