:
I have a full grown 110lb Yellow Labrador who is having an awful time trying
to maneuvre on our newly installed laminate flooring. Any suggestions???
Please e-mail Thanks.

A couple of people have replied as regards keeping the hair on the feet cut
short and keeping the nails trimmed as short as possible.

Those are great suggestions, but also, many dogs, when they hit extremely slick
surfacing that they haven't had experience with, tend to ball up their feet
with tension, which means that even if the hair is clipped and the nails short,
the dog is still going to get no traction. If not worked with, there can be a
tendency for this to become a habit on slick surfaces and the dog may never
relax to walk comfortably. They'll eternally try to "scurry" across the floor
and the behavior becomes ingrained.

My Belgian Sheepdog had only carpeted surfaces in her life previous to my
adopting her at 10 years old. I have highly polyurethaned hardwood floors and
vinyl tile -- no carpets at all due to my allergies. This definitely wasn't to
the old girl's liking. I also had a Greyhound before my Belgian who came off
the racetrack with a strong dislike of vinyl surfaces.

I started with a lot of area rugs -- the longish runner types. Non-slip ones.
I slowly cut back on the number of them over a period of months while at the
same time calmly giving her tiny little food treats each time she successfully
"strayed" off an area rug and onto the flooring. Eventually I cut back on the
treats and treated only as she got further and further away from the area rugs.
I would stand a short distance from the rug and encourage her to come to me
but wouldn't push it whatsoever. And I began with very short distances. In
the beginning, only her front feet had to come off the carpet -- that's how
slowly I went. And I always kept treats in my pocket just in case she decided
to stray off the area rug on her own, without my encouragement.

My idea was to get her to think that being on the slick surface was a pretty
good thing. On carpet surfaces, life is boring. On slick surfaces, good
things happen.! But I had to be very calm about it because I didn't want her
to get excited, start bouncing, slip a little, which could set her ten paces
backwards in her progress. So since she responds to vocal praise very
"bouncily", I kept my vocal praise very quiet and just popped her treats. The
treats were always held at her head level so that she didn't have to unbalance
herself to reach them at all.

Eventually, over the months, I could see her becoming more and more relaxed as
she strayed off the runners, so I started to pick up, say, every other runner.
I just started picking up more and more of them as she relaxed. I still
actually keep runners between the doors of the the living room and kitchen for
the Belgian since she's a dog who likes to "charge" across the kitchen towards
the back door and I do worry about her slipping on the floor. She's just fine
in all the other rooms. With the Greyhound, I eventually needed no rugs at
all.

Good luck with your Lab!

Take care,
--
Cindy
Posted & emailed