Bob's Dog Blog

Everything you do with your pup or adult dog is essentially training. It might not fit into the category of formal obedience work, but it is training nonetheless.  For example, when you come with your dog to the front door after a walk, does it sit and wait for you to open the door, or does it scratch the door and whine to be let in? Both of these actions are trained behaviors.  The difference is that the dog in a sit position was trained by you and the dog jumping up and down and ruining your front door was trained by itself.

This is why I frown upon leaving a young pup alone with an older dog to ‘keep each other company’.  If the older dog has some poor habits, you can be sure that within a few days, the pup will have learned them. Dogs learn by watching and then become conditioned through repetition, even if self taught. If you let a dog act like a dope every day, pretty soon, you have a problem on your hands that appears impossible to handle.

Forget about all of this ‘dog whispering’ garbage.  Dogs learn to do bad things by doing bad things, over and over. It’s not more complicated than that, I assure you. So, conversely, if you want to undo bad behavior in a dog, you need to recondition the dog, repetitively, daily, until the dog behaves differently. I emphasize the word ‘you’, because you are the only individual who can change the dog’s actions, behavior, habits, etc.

I have reconditioned four and five year old dogs, as well as puppies. Age is not as important as the handler’s willingness to repeat the exercise as often as needed to get the desired result. That means every day, four or five times a day, and so on. You can incorporate obedience and conditioning into daily routines. For example, training the ‘sit’ command can be done when  coming to the door (both inside and out), feeding , entering and exiting the crate, car and so on. After two weeks of this, the dog will get the idea that it has to sit before getting the reward (whatever your reward is for that dog).

Do not expect a dog to change because you yell at it or tell it ‘no’ a million times. That is not dog training. That is you being trained by your dog to react to its behavior.

Actual dog training is for real life situations and is done in real life.

Think about it.

Anyone working on training their dog in basic obedience or competitive obedience has at one time or another used motivation to get their young dog or pup to follow a command. Some dogs like the food more than the toy and other dogs really like the toy so much that they can go pretty far with the toy alone. Of course, training without motivation gives you a dog that simply goes through the motions, either through fear or submission.

However, sometimes using the toy isn’t enough motivation. For example, I have some pups that easily climb up steps to go into the house (you’ll see why later in the post). The problem came when we tried to get them down those same steps. There just wasn’t motivation for them to follow the toy as the stress that had to be overcome in figuring out how to climb down steps was greater than their drive for the toy. So, in this case, dropping bits of kibble on each step with a big kibble reward and lots of praise at the bottom did the trick right away. Five or sex reps later and they are getting the hang of it. At some point, I will move over to the toy/praise to continue conditioning and motivate to do the action called for. Which brings me to the next issue.

If you attempt to use food for motivation while doing, let’s say, heeling or leash work, then the pup will start to anticipate food as the motivational tool every time heeling or leash work is begun. They will expect the food and when you bring out the toy, they are suddenly not interested in the toy at all. This is not a drop in drive, but a conflict that the dog now has as regards the game you are playing. I mean, you just spent a week using kibble or hot dogs or whatever food to get the dog to heel or sit and now you are trying with a ball. At this early stage of training a dog, you are mixing basic drives and the dog may become confused.

The solution is to learn to think with your motivational tools. For example, I use food in the house, getting pups or young dogs to sit or come or load up in the crate. This gets the pups really excited about coming in at the end of the day, loading into their crates, etc. I already gave the example of walking down steps.

Outside, on the field, I use the toy most of the time, especially in the first stages of puppy training.  Some times I switch things up. For instance,  we sometimes use a bit of food on the field to motivate the pup in heeling, for position or to train more precise movement.  This is not consistent, so the pup is not always expecting food, so it is not conditioning the pup to constantly expect food on the field.

You will need to experiment with both methods to see where your pup or dog does best. This is a lot of fun as you can also learn a lot about your dog’s drives and motivation, which in turn will help you in getting your dog to do what you want, which is the point of dog training!

And, remember to always praise your pup for doing the command, regardless of the motivational tool.

Have fun!

Dog training is for everyone. It is for every dog and every household.  It is the key missing ingredient in any issue a person may have with his dog, regardless of breed type.

Obedience is not native to a canine mind. The issue here is one of the nature of a dog. Dog’s are inclined to do what they want, when they want. Without structure, a dog is lost. Man has spent thousands of years domesticating this animal and that bond is the key to obedience training.  The history of the canine is filled with examples of how man has trained his dog to do work and be a part of man’s life. Hunting, protection, transportation and even companionship all involve training the dog to suit both the handler and his environment.

As I said earlier, obedience is not natural for a dog. Leaving obedience up to the dog is a grave error and will simply ruin the dog. Dogs must have this area of their lives addressed before they can become valuable to their handlers. Some dogs learn faster than others. Some like obedience training better than others. That is the responsibility of the handler, using motivation methods to get the dog wanting to learn new things, and so on. It is also the handler’s job to correct the dog after it has learned what is expected of it.  Teaching and then correcting the dog  is 100% the handler’s job.

Omitting patience and repetition invites failure in training. By patience I mean taking a good, hard, realistic look at your dog and decide what you need or want to train it to do. Then, with that in mind work on it as long as it takes to accomplish that goal. That doesn’t mean fooling around with the ‘sit’ command  for a day or two, then giving up.  By repetition, I mean doing the exercises as many times as is needed to get that goal accomplished. I train my pups to sit and ‘watch’ every time they come to the door of my house. After a month, they’ve done that command fifty or sixty times, just at the door. They do it before being given food. That’s another sixty reps. It adds up.

Do you want to know why the majority of dogs used by police, military and other service organizations are imported from Europe? Because the culture of dog training in Europe includes an understanding of patience and repetition. There are probably very few ‘Dog Whisperers’ over there, mostly ‘Dog Handlers’ (yea, I know it’s a generalized statement, but you get the point).

Decide what you want to train the dog to do, then begin the exercises. Watch the progress and adjust the exercise accordingly. Keep doing it, daily, weekly as many times as you have to, in order to obtain the result. Maybe a thousand repetitions are needed, maybe more. Also, don’t expect things to look great when you first start a specific obedience exercise. It will be sloppy, awkward and uncomfortable. The dog may react or protest. The worst thing you could do at that point is to stop because ‘my dog doesn’t like what we’re doing’. The solution to that is to continue the procedure until it smooths out and the dog has gotten the point and understands what you mean.

Be willing, be patient and get results on your dog!

In working with dogs, puppies and handlers over the years, I have found a common issue in training.  This has to do with one’s lack of observation of what the animal is doing.

A dog is always doing something, both in life and in training situations. This is true before a command, during the command, after the command, during the reward or release and so on. If you are ignoring what the dog is doing, you will make the gigantic error of assuming what the dog is thinking, which is quite a leap for a human to make, even with other humans, much less with dogs.

If you do not watch your dog you may be missing one key habit or movement that he or she is doing that will tell you what to correct or condition your dog to do, or not do.  Too many handlers just go through the motions and expect those motions to pay off with the dog. These handlers are not having fun because THEY ARE NOT BEING INVOLVED IN THE PROCESS OF DOG TRAINING.  Instead, they are just casual spectators, waiting for the dog to do the  right thing.  This laziness is why the ‘method’ dog trainers make so much money and deliver such a poor result – they know you don’t want to watch your dog, so they develop bogus ‘methods’ to make you into a robotic dog ‘trainer’.

You should try this for a few minutes every day: sit or stand near your dog and just watch. See what it is doing, how it relates to its environment, how it relates to people, whatever you want to know about your dog.

I guess it’s ironic that we demand that our dog watch us when we don’t do the same with them.

Bob

I thought I’d share some things I’ve learned over the past few years, while training 3 month old, 4 month old, etc. puppies.

You see, I’ve tried to train eight week old pups. Not very much there to work with. I’ve tried working with ten week olds. Better, but still not enough attention and focus to do basic work. So, I’ve been just letting these pups grow a bit, gain some muscle tone through exercise and learn basic things, like how to climb up steps and walk through a doorway.

However, starting at around 14 weeks, for some reason, I started to see that the pups really come alive and begin to recognize that there is something more than eating, sleeping and random play. This is, truly, the time when the pup’s awareness of its surroundings becomes focused enough that the handler can create a proper bond between person and dog. This is when obedience training will sink in, when the connection between a light correction, a command and a reward will all begin to make some sense to the pup.

For example, today I took out a pup, at 15 weeks, who has had nothing more than some basic leash work and basic socialization. I put her on a big slip lead, brought along some of her kibble and began to coax her to come to me, rewarding all the time with the food. I did the same with the ‘sit’ command. After no more than five minutes or so, the pup was responding, doing the basics of a recall and a sit. Granted it was sloppy and sometimes hesitant, but she always did the command and got her reward. This is the beginning of actual obedience training and the pup will NEVER forget the five minutes I spent with her, as it was fun and gave her a reason to comply.

So, here is my first suggestion about puppy training:

Do not become frustrated if your pup does not respond to obedience training prior to 12-16 weeks of age. Be patient, continue to socialize and crate train and the pup will wake up and start working with you at some point between 12-16 weeks of age.

Here is my second rule, just to set the record straight:

Any attempt to do obedience training on a pup WITHOUT a leash is a waste of time. The bond between human and dog must have the leash to become totally real to the animal. This is so the pup recognizes that the correction has something to do with the human and that the correction will consistently occur when the dog disobeys. Very light coaxing and correction can be done on a four month old, with a fat, english style slip lead. To give a pup corrections with verbal only will not condition the dog to obey under ALL CONDITIONS, as, depending on the individual dog, disobedience may be the path more traveled than obedience.

I would hate to be the owner of a dog, who, after being ‘trained’ without a lead and collar, decided to run across the street or continue chewing on the furniture, or worse, at age one or two.

I sincerely hope this helps.

Bob

All too many times, dog and puppy owners register a complaint with whoever will listen: ‘My dog behaves badly’, or ‘I don’t know what to do about my dog’s behavior’.

This is not a small situation. Thousands of dog trainers attempt to help bewildered owners deal with the ‘behavior’ issue. Indeed, there are numerous cable shows dedicated to showing viewers how to ‘handle’ behavioral problems in canines.

Here’s a unique twist on the whole canine behavior issue: What if, just IF the behavior problem your dog or puppy is manifesting came from some place other than its own canine mind? What if, perhaps the owner/handler was in some way contributing to the behavior (good or bad) of their animal?

It is a fact that a very young pup is like a blank slate. They have very little experience, training or other information to use canine judgment to make most decisions. That is why you, as the owner, need to crate train, socialize, house train, obedience train your young dog and continue with this process throughout its adult life.

So, if you are the one imprinting the animal with all of this stuff, all of this repetitive exposure to various things, wouldn’t it make sense that you could possibly be imprinting (or allowing to be imprinted) the dog with unwanted behavior as well?

Here’s an example: Someone takes ownership of an eight week old pup. Having not fully grasped the above concept, they take the young dog out for walks, all the while allowing the pup to forge (pull) the owner all over the place. Now, by the time the pup is a year old, the owner cannot control this forging and the dog is now getting into fights with other dogs while walking, pulling the owner to the ground and so on.

If the owner could not see the issue they were creating with this permissive lack of obedience in leash work, they would certainly at this point see the result of over a year of repetitive bad training as they are dragged to the ground while their eighty pound dog makes a run for the UPS guy.

Could this have been prevented? Of course. But first, it takes an understanding that YOU are the one in charge of your dog’s behavior. The first moment you complain about your dog, you need to step back and take a look at exactly what the dog is doing. Destructive chewing? How about crate training the dog and giving it a bone in its crate? Pulling on the leash? How about properly leash training the dog to obey you and walk along your side or at least to stop forging? Dogs do stupid things because their masters ALLOW them to do these things.

If you think a dog has the native intelligence to do you harm or dream up some plan to ruin your life, then your are really, actually, not a person who should own a dog.

Remember this:

1. The handler, as trainer, is the ultimate cause of all behavior issues with their dog. If you do not wish to train your dog and instead allow it to train itself, you basically will reap what you sow.

2. All situations can be resolved with dog training. The type of training may be highly situational and may require a good amount of time to complete, but is nonetheless achievable.

Hope this helps.

Best,
Bob

Sometimes a person takes ownership of an eight week old pup and begins training and socialization immediately. This is correct and should be continued throughout the life of the dog.

There are other instances where the owner does very little with the pup during the 8-16 week period and then wonders why the pup is taking so long to train later on. This whole theory of not starting training on a pup until they are six months old is not valid, in my opinion. I mean, the pup is there, in your house, waiting to learn what his duties are and how to interact with the family, and you just leave him there to figure it out for himself. I’m not just talking about housebreaking here. I mean, the pup needs to be imprinted during this time for an optimum life as an adult.

Imprinting means the learning and socialization that the pup absorbs during the critical 8-16 week period. If you want your pup to chase a ball, you should probably start making it fun at eight weeks or otherwise at two years it’s not going to do it. Period. Please don’t blame the breeder for this, people. It’s handler caused and totally environmental. I’m not saying every pup can be titled in competitive obedience or Schutzhund – what I’m saying here is that you must bring out the as much of the pup’s working potential early in life for that potential to become active throughout life. It’s very important to know that a working attitude must be established for the pup to do work. This also holds true for the handler – if the handler does not have a working attitude, please don’t expect the dog to enjoy working.

As an example, recently I took a six week old pup with excellent nerves, food drive and overall great temperament and began imprint training.  The downside of the pup was that there was very little prey drive and lots of independent activity, which included ignoring the handler unless food was involved. I knew this was going to be a disaster later on, especially with an inexperienced handler taking him. A strong willed dog with no idea of obedience or play is not a good thing, especially at adulthood.

I began by introducing toys, which were ignored, as expected. I then, patiently, brought out another pup with high prey drive along with this pup and introduced a toy to both at once. As soon as the high prey pup went after the toy, the other pup began to follow suit, would wrestle to toy away,  then would get bored and go about his business. I did this about fifty times until, one day, this pup grabbed the toy and ran with it. Success! From that point forward, exciting prey drive has been a gradual, improving situation to the point where the pup will chase after a ball on a string while on leash and grip a rag as well.  In this instance, I had to bring out, through patiently imprinting, the prey drive that the pup had. This same pup will do a sit, sit/stay, recall and has begun basic tracking and heeling (all done with food and some ball release). He is now very connected to humans and although he will always be a strong willed dog, he will also continue to be extremely trainable and valuable to whoever eventually adopts him.  This pup can now walk onto any training field or into any household and do work. I know this because I helped put it there.

The moral of the story is: IMMEDIATELY BEGIN IMPRINTING, SOCIALIZING AND TRAINING YOUR PUP. Write down a list of all the things you want your pup to be able to do, in order of importance. Then, begin work on each, one at a time, until the pup is doing well with that thing. Then go on to the next one, remembering that you will need to go back and continue work on all of these things, every day, every week, until they are simply part of the dog.

Then you will be a real handler and your dog will live up to its expectations as a true working dog.

Best,

Bob