Practice after board and train: Stage Fort Park

The City of Gloucester's parks page says it plainly: dogs are allowed in Stage Fort Park but not on the beaches, all dogs must be on a leash, and owners must pick up after them. The same page places the dog park in the park's parking lot. Over all of that sits the city's general rule that dogs must always remain under the control of their owner or keeper, with fines of $300 per violation listed at the time of writing, doubled in season for beaches and other off-leash areas.

The dog park keeps its own rules, which its volunteer organization says are enforceable as city ordinances. It opens from dawn to 9 PM, dogs are leashed going in and out, and every dog wears current license and rabies tags. Choke, prong and spike collars are banned inside, and so are food, toys other than tennis balls, puppies under 4 months, unaltered males and females in heat. One snag concerns Cressy's Beach: the parks page keeps dogs off the park's beaches, while the city's dog regulations list Cressy's as open to dogs off leash from October 1 to April 30, so ask the city before you set foot on that sand.

A fenced field of dogs running, barking and wrestling is about as loud a distraction as Cape Ann offers a young dog, and Stage Fort lets you work beside it without joining in. Stand on the lawn far enough from the fence that your dog notices the dogs and can still eat. Each time it looks at the group and then back to you, mark it and pay. Getting closer is a reward you hand out slowly, a few steps at a time, across several visits.

Watch for the signs that you are too close: a stiff body, a fixed stare, whining, a refusal of food it normally loves, or a pull toward the gate. Any one of them means back up until eating resumes. The park also lists a Special Needs and Training Area for dogs not ready for the main park or needing time to adjust, so read its posted rules before you consider it. Remember that food is banned inside the fence; a session that relies on treats belongs on the lawn outside.

Walking straight from the fence exercise through the gate undoes it, because your dog learns that staring at the group gets it inside. Going into the dog park is a separate decision with its own page in this series, and it should wait until neutrality outside the fence is easy. Keep off Half Moon and Cressy's sand while the city's two pages disagree, and keep your dog off the beach paths even when the lawn feels empty.

Leave the old prong or choke collar at home too. The dog park bans choke, prong and spike collars inside its fence, and Dogtown's training is fear- and force-free, built on positive reinforcement, so nothing in the go-home lesson relies on one. Skip the busiest summer afternoons, when the lot fills and strangers come over to say hello, and skip any session where your dog arrives tired or already wound up from the car.