Where problem dogs are no problem

Friday, December 21, 2012

Prong or Positive Reinforcement?

I had a client come for class last night who mentioned that she had taken her dog to daycare and the daycare owner put a prong collar on her dog to train it.  First of all, her dog is a Doberman puppy.  Prong collars don't belong on puppies.  Secondly, I use positive reinforcement with her dog and now someone else is using compulsive training methods. I believe this will be confusing to the dog.  I'm not sure why the daycare person took it upon herself to train the dog.  I serve three functions here--daycare, boarding and training.  When a dog comes to board here and jumps on me, the owner says I shouldn't let them do that and I should know better because I am a trainer.  I remind them they have not hired me as a trainer but are simply bringing the dog here to board--training is extra.  The same with daycare, the dog is here to be loved and to be socialized with other dogs, I have not been hired to train the dog but to babysit the dog.  Yes, I do correct the dog is it has bad manners but that is all.  Again, training is extra.  I have clients who bring their dogs here to board who go to trainers that have different philosophies than I do and I do not push my training methods on them.  Now on the the prong collar issue.  If a dog is trained from the time it is brought home as a puppy, the training will be much easier as the correct behavior will be the only thing the dog knows.  Unfortunately, most people wait until there is a problem, the biggest being pulling on the leash.  I have been very successful teach all types of dogs, from a Peekapoo to a Great Dane, to not pull on the leash, all without a prong collar.  Having a dog walk next to you is nothing more than a habit for the dog.  It will take time to establish this habit but I promise it can be done.  If you want a quick fix, the prong collar will work.  It will also work to make your dog fear you and become aggressive.  I believe that trainers who resort to prong collars as a first line of defense are trainers who are not creative in learning different methods to train the dogs.  I want my dog to walk by my side because she loves me and wants to, not because she might have physical pain if she doesn't stay close enough.  Emma is my service dog, she is a Landseer Newfoundland.  I got her when she was 6 months old and started training her right away.  She started formal classes at 3 months old.  Emma was trained on a buckle collar, not even a training collar.  She is CGC, TDI and PAT and has 2 legs toward her CD title.  So if you want a stable, well balanced dog, please take the time and do the training and don't look for a quick fix.

Saturday, December 1, 2012

This week's outing

Today we went to PetSmart again.  Apollo does fine in all other stores.  He just has a problem when he sees other dogs.  And today it seemed like it was only small dogs--a pug, a dachshund.  The golden retriever he didn't back at.  So we worked and worked.  Stop barking at the dog, sit and watch me and get a treat.  Over and over.  A couple of times, Apollo actually sat and looked at me instead of barking at the other dog.  Hooray, we are making some real good progress.  He gives me an automatic sit every time I stop walking in the store and will sometimes automatically drop into a down.