Naturally Well-Behaved Dogs?

Hello Dog Owners!

How quickly a month goes by.

The snowdrops came and went, the daffodils have awoken from their winter snooze and the crocuses now carpet the ground like colourful cupped jewels that have been sprinkled randomly here, there and everywhere, brightening up the largely persistently-dreary days.

Spring is springing though, that’s for sure and I am hoping that we will get some decent non-rainy weather very soon.

These past few weeks have been personally challenging for me. Things happen that are totally out of our control sometimes, which has prompted me in needing to make a few unexpected decisions.

This got me thinking about mental toughness and how resilient we really need to be throughout life in order to effectively cope with unexpected situations, and dog training is no different.

Each dog is different. Each of their life experiences is different.

Just as no two people are alike, no two dogs are alike either, but generally we tend to try and use one or two techniques to train every dog.

It doesn’t work.

So what’s the answer? Compassion? Understanding? Tolerance? Love?

These can all have a massive impact on the dog we are training and although there are common methods that can be employed to get us started, the journey we set out upon when training each individual dog is both a learning experience and an honour.

As we help them to learn how to live their life in our complicated human world, they also teach us things that we never knew about them and ourselves.

They teach us tolerance, patience, resilience, flexibility and how to listen to them, their wants, desires … emotions.

They can teach us just as much as we teach them.

The experience of training your dog truly is a two-way street and an individual experience.

Do you think that they have expectations of what they want their life to be, and are pushed in to making difficult decisions because somebody else has made an unexpected change in their life that they couldn’t control?

Maybe worth a thought.

And on that note, welcome to Spring!

ARE HOMELESS PEOPLE’S DOGS NATURALLY WELL-BEHAVED?

It has always amazed me how the majority of dogs owned by homeless people are so obedient.

They follow their owners around from place to place, almost never on-leash, never run away or exhibit any kind of reactivity towards people or other dogs and can lay in place for hours on end in a range of environments.

So how does it appear that the majority of the dogs belonging to homeless people are well-trained?

Have they all been going to dog training classes week on week, or is it just that this type of behaviour is typical of the breeds of dogs that homeless people choose?

I would say “No” in both of these cases.

What would be your take then, on how the obedience level of these dogs can easily put our efforts to shame, despite all of the training we put in week in, week out?

Here’s my take….

I think there are a few major points to consider:

1. Homeless people don’t tend to work and because of this they spend a lot of their time together with their dog.
2. It is likely that their dog is their world and keeps them going day on day, emotionally.
3. It is also likely that food would be more scarce than it is for our dogs, where it’s virtually on-tap!
4. The dog is always out in the real-world, exposed to everything and learns to get environmentally aware.

So if they haven’t done any planned training with their dog, how come it doesn’t run away and instead sticks to its owner like glue and does as it’s told almost faultlessly?

Why doesn’t it search out a better life with a more affluent owner?

I believe that it’s all about the relationship, the bond, between dog and owner.

Of course, this won’t be the case in 100% of situations, but on the whole both dog and owner come to know each other perfectly, share a space, share their daily experiences, share a bed to keep each other warm and share each and every meal.

As I have said all along – “Dog Training is All About Relationship” – the relationship that you spend time building between you and your canine companion.

When you have that bond between you and them, you both truly become inseparable and training becomes something so much more than a list of commands that you reel off when needed.

With that deep relationship, a dog truly is, “A Man’s Best Friend” – and a woman’s too, of course!

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HOW’S YOUR TRAINING PLAN TURNING OUT?

In Issue 7 of DOT News we discussed making a training plan for your training activities, to keep you on-track for 2024.

How’s it going?

Did you make one and if you did, are you keeping to it?

The reason I ask is because towards the end of February is the time where people tend to give up on their New Year Resolutions.

OK, we didn’t set resolutions for our dog training activities, but are we keeping to the plan we made at the back end of last year, if indeed we made one?

Personally, I seem to have been a bit lapse in getting going and doing the training that I have supposed to be doing with my little guy.

Now, I can give a whole heap of reasons about the weather, food for training, places to train, time, training other people’s dogs, time, time and more time…. and of course unexpected situations which I hinted at earlier.

But they are all excuses!

Yes, yes, we can say they are valid reasons and to us they are, but really there is nothing stopping us from adhering to our plans other than we choose not to.

So what can we do about it, what can I do?

Well simple really, let’s just carry on with what we are supposed to be doing with our training. Come hell or high water, we are going to do it.

Even if it’s just for 5 minutes a day!!

But do it we will.

We owe it to ourselves and we owe it to our little furry companions. Why would we ever want to let them down?

Why not share your experience & training plan with us?

Let’s get to it!

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OUR TAKE: BALANCED TRAINING METHODS

Everyone has an opinion these days, that’s for sure.

Personally, I don’t try to force mine upon anybody and am happy to let others get on with their lives as they see fit.

Similarly, I don’t go out to discredit other dog trainers’ methods. After all, we are all doing the same job helping dogs and their owners after all (or should be) and there’s apparently more than one way to skin a cat – what a dreadful thought!

Here at DOT Academy we use balanced training methods. But what does this mean?

Balanced training methods basically mean using what works. Being flexible in our approach and using the dog training tools available to us, we are able to instil behaviour change in dogs through training methods that help the dog to learn in a fair and positive way.

All training should be a positive experience.

Seeing as learning, for us all, is a practice of consequences, then we expect every one of our actions to have a consequence – whether good or bad.

As a child we may have exhibited a behaviour that was inappropriate and as a consequence we were told off in some manner, by our parent.

We learned something from that experience.

Maybe we have done something in our lives that has had the consequence of people thanking us, congratulating us and rewarding us with gifts.

Perhaps we also done a bit of self-training and stood on the prickly end of a garden rake lying on the grass and got a surprise whack, as the handle magically rose up sharply and smacked us in the head!

The point is that everything we do has a consequence and this is the same for our dogs too.

“Force-Free” or “Positive Training” in my mind isn’t very realistic and truth be told, not very truthful either.

To be a force-free trainer means that you don’t force a dog to do something.

With that in mind, we need to speak about the use of a leash in these circumstances, as the use of a leash to stop the dog running away, stop it going somewhere we don’t want it to go, preventing it from running towards other dogs, etc., is not – in my mind – a force-free training method.

You are forcing the dog to do something that you want it to do.

Positive-Only training methods, focused solely on reward-based training methodologies, are all well and good when working with puppies and dogs in an isolated environment. But when you go out into the real-world and adolescence kicks in, then good luck with keeping things 100% positive!

Similarly, undertaking behaviour modification training requires corrections to be employed in order for the dog to learn.

However, whether a balanced trainer or a positive one, we can all agree on one thing…

“Training should be a positive experience…”

Dog training needs to be fair.

Corrections need to be fair and communicated in such a way that sees the dog perform that behaviour less and less, over time.

Praise & rewards need to be given in appropriate amounts and in the appropriate manner, as to show an increase in the behaviour we are looking to encourage, so that over time the dog performs that behaviour more frequently.

If we apply the same correction/punishment continually but the behaviour doesn’t decrease, then this is a punitive form of punishment which is unfair on the dog and potentially damaging to the relationship between the dog and the handler.

For DOT Academy, we generally use flat collars, long lines, slip-leashes, check chains and martingale collars for our training.

They work and are fair if used correctly.

Most of the time we don’t need to use them as we focus on building a solid relationship with our dogs.

When we do need to apply a correction, it’s done in a fair manner and often coupled with praise and a reward for the behaviour that immediately follows.

We see our methods as fair, capable of achieving behaviour change fairly quickly and effectively in training a plethora of companion dogs.

Let’s face it. How many times have you seen a dog being walked where it’s almost choking itself to death as it’s pulling so hard on the leash?

And that’s acceptable? Really?

How much damage will that dog do walking like that it’s entire life? A fair bit I would guess.

Better to teach it to walk on a loose leash as quickly as possible to save it from further damage. This could be achieved in a just a few days, if not shorter, using balanced training methods.

Anyway, each to our own.

As long as we have the best intentions and we are helping dogs to lead a better life and we’re not setting out to abuse them and instead focusing on building that all important relationship, then that’s what really matters – isn’t it?

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PROCRASTINATION AND AN AGING DOG

We all put things off.

We put off going places, calling people, studying for something, learning something, dancing, singing,, spending quality time with those we love.

Spending quality time with our beloved four-legged companion.

Their lives are so short – very short indeed.

Compared to ours.

It’s on my mind almost daily as I am certainly one to procrastinate over things, to some extent or other and not because of simple little things.

I procrastinate because I don’t feel good enough.

Imposter syndrome some would suggest and I would agree, but instead of stopping me from doing something, it just slows me down … sometimes a lot! As I focus on pushing through those annoying feelings of inadequacy.

But what’s the damage of our procrastination on the lives of our dogs?

Did we train them sufficiently, giving them the skills to navigate our complex human world with confidence?

Did we get their obedience levels up to scratch so that we could just ask them to do something and they would immediately oblige, rather than have us nagging at them minute after minute to not pull, wait, come and sit, sit, SIT?

Did we do the fun things that we promised them we would do – agility, competition and fly-ball?

Did we have fun with them playing on the beach, in the woods, in the river and in the sea on a frequent basis?

Did we include them as much as we could in our every day lives?

Or…

Did we leave them at home a lot of the time and expect them to wait patiently for our return, as we excluded them from a large part of our lives?

Time ticks away, more so for our beloved dogs.

Why not take some time to look them in the eye, as you sit there with them and remember all the things that you promised them you would do with them when they first came into your life.

Ask yourself, what is the lasting effect – the true cost – of your procrastination on your dependable, loveable companion?

Food for thought.

And on that happy note….

Another month and another newsletter over so very quickly!

Until next time…

Happy Training!

Just Do It! ~ (Nike)

– Stuart