Friday, June 22, 2012

What Every Dog Should Know

I started a new Basic Manners class last night.  I always love the first night because I never know what is going to arrive.  There is always a large variety of breed, ages and owners.  All with different expectations of what they hope to get our of this class.  My job is to help them achieve ...

In my opinion the least your dog needs is to come when called, walk well on leash and allow you to catch them when you need to (of course you don't need this skill as much when they come when called :)).  The other skill your dog needs is self control, in other words not to lose their minds anytime they see _____.

Recalls (coming when called) are the easiest thing and the hardest thing to teach.  It's all about value for you as opposed to value for the environment.  Every now and then you meet a dog who just doesn't care about anything but their owner and they tend to have great recalls.  That is not the norm, the norm is everything is wonderful and your the crazy person who is always yelling.  Starting with something as simple as rewarding every time you call your dog for the next two weeks will alone make a humongous difference.

Walking on leash is in my opinion the hardest thing in the world to teach your dog.  It's like driving your car without a speedometer, nothing to slow you down.  Add that to the fact that most dogs get heavily rewarded every time they pull towards something and it is a monolithic task.  Again it's all about value just starting rewarding the dog for walking beside you and preventing the dog from walking anywhere else will go a long way into shifting the value for walking with you.  Remember it took a while to train your dog to pull this well don't expect huge changes overnight, but if you are patient you will start to see changes over time.

The last needed skill is your dog letting you catch him.  The first step never, ever scare or intimidate your dog when you have his collar, this is a sure fire way to prevent him from ever letting you catch him.  Start out on leash, grab your dogs collar and reward.  Do this a lot, usually I use their dinner so you can get a huge amount of repetitions in.  What I am looking for is when you reach for your dog he moves towards you not away.

So there you have it, these are the skills you need for a great dog.  Really it's not asking a whole lot of work on your part and it will provide you years of living with a dog who everyone want to have.

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