Jeff Millman lives in Chicago with his wife, two children and three dogs. He has a private dog training business called Chicago Paws as well as Watch and Train. Even though he has been training dogs professionally since 2002, he still loves dogs and loves his job.
Retrieve and Frisbee are two great training exercises to work on with your dog. As always, focus on keeping your dog engaged and interested in each session instead of getting stressed out about finishing the final behavior in one session. Have fun with it and ask questions in my Forums if you need more help.
"Settle" is simply another name for an extended down cue. However, it is often used as an “off” switch for dogs that are a bit too exuberant, mouthy, or wild. There are many strategies to get a good Settle cue.
I read an amazing article yesterday about an experiment training sea bass to respond to a tone and swim back to a certain location for feeding. At some point the signal would entice them to come back for the last time when they would be caught and harvested for food.
I just returned from Boulder, Colorado from a vacation with my wife and was blown away by the beauty and the nature. I was especially impressed with their forward-thinking Voice and Sight Control program that they implemented in 2006. There are designated trails and areas that require this level of control with dogs with very stringent requirements. Non-dog park areas in town require leashed dogs, and some trails are off-limits to dogs. Here are the requirements for the Voice and Sight Control Program.
This is another installment in my series about mistakes in working with aggressive dogs. I have tremendous success with my aggression cases and have been helping dogs overcome aggression for over 6 years. There are strategies that you can use that can make the situation worse.
I want you to avoid doing that and help your dog become more comfortable faster.
There are a lot of reasons puppies and older dogs have housetraining problems. Besides normal factors such as maturity and lack of motivation to go potty in the right location, there can be other issues that can cause a dog to have accidents. It is important to understand some of the issues to avoid focusing on the wrong reason and getting frustrated. Here are some of the issues that can contribute to housetraining problems.
If your dog barks at the doorbell, the vacuum cleaner, noises in the hallway or other events in his environment, then you should work on desensitizing him to those noises. There are many reasons why it is important to work on barking problems including neighbor complaints, repeated anxiety for your dog, and the fact that barking is often a beginning indicator of territorial aggression. You can also read my post on barking out of the window or behind a door or fence, which can lead to barrier frustration.
One of the biggest challenges with caring for a dog is providing adequate daily physical and mental exercise. If a dog loves toys, it is often much easier to find games and training strategies to keep him entertained. For those of you out there that have a dog that doesn't like toys, this is for you.
I get this question quite often, and I always ask people to clarify why they are concerned that this might be a problem. They usually tell me that they heard from someone else or saw a television show that talks about "putting dogs in their place" or making sure dogs do not become the "alpha" in the house.
Wouldn't it be great if you could just sit a dog down and say, "Welcome to the house. Let's have an arrangement. I will walk you, play with you, feed you good food and give you medical care. The only requirements are that you don't destroy my house or urinate on my rug, ok?"
