Tag: canine obedience


First this way and Then that Way

Dog Training: How To Train Your Dog To Change Direction When Walking

After you and your dog have pretty much gotten the hang of heeling, your next step is to introduce your dog to changes of direction while heeling. You find out about the three essential turns - a right turn, an about-turn to the right, and a left turn.
 
Turning Right: To stay with you when you are making a right turn, your dog needs to speed up. And, at this stage in your training, he is not yet giving you 100 percent of his attention, and you are going to anticipate that he needs help with the right turn.
 
If you want your dog to pay attention to you, you have to pay attention to your dog. Learning to anticipate what he is going to do is the first step to successful heeling.
 
Just before you make the turn, enthusiastically say his name, make the turn, and keep moving. Using his name will cause him to look up at you and he will notice that you are changing direction, which will cause him to stay with you. Without giving him that cue, chances are that as you make the turn and go one way, he will keep going the other way.
 
About-Turn: An about-turn is a right turn times two. When you make your turn, keep your feet together so your dog can keep up. As you did for the right turn, use his name just before you make the turn to encourage him to stay with you.
 
In the event your dog has a particularly difficult time remaining at your side for the right or about-turn, you can use a treat or other object of interest to him to help guide him around. The treat is held in your right hand as you are heeling. Before you make the turn, show it to your dog by bringing the treat directly in front of his nose and using it to guide him around the turn, then give him the treat.
 
This approach has a potential drawback. Some dogs become overly stimulated when they know you have a treat in your hand. Make no mistake about it, he knows. If you see that your dog becomes difficult to control under such circumstances, you may want to eliminate use of the treat. The hassle is not worth the potential benefit.
 
Turning Left: In order to make the left turn without crowding, your dog needs to slow down as you make the turn and then resume normal speed after you made the turn. Just before you make the turn, slow down and with your left hand draw back on the leash, make the turn, and resume your normal brisk pace.
 
Find out more when you read My Dog is Learning Some New Tricks.

 

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Who’s the Alpha Dog here?

Dogs Do Not Learn By Dominance And Submission

Many people believe that dogs learn by dominance and/or submission. This is an interesting theory that appeals to our sense of logic and the way nature appears to be ordered from the point of view of the human ego. Supposedly, dogs can learn to respect another individual through dominance. This presupposes that they can perceive another being’s point of view. Humans can indeed entertain others’ points of view, yet we know that no one learns to work effectively through the dominance/submissive model.
 
No matter how much employees respect their boss or how submissive they may act around him, they expect to be paid fairly. Not enough pay and the attraction turns to resentment and a poor working attitude. Since humans reject and resist such an approach whenever they experience it, how can we expect the dog, with his more limited view, to work on this basis?
 
Not only does dominating a dog make him resistant to cooperation, but dominance has nothing to do with the smooth operation of wolf society. While it may appear that the leader is the most dominant in a pack of wolves, and that the inferiors have a profound respect for this "alpha" wolf because he is so dominant, that is a surface misreading of their lives.
 
Supposedly, this dominant individual teaches the other members of the pack what their lesser stations are, bringing order and stability into the group. However, the reason this individual is superior is because, within the group mood, he is endowed with the most uninhibited temperament and perceives order when the others sense disorder.
 
This produces an emotional balance, a self-confidence level that makes him active and direct in his behavior when the others are reactive and indirect. This confidence is then broadcast through his body language and probably through an internal chemistry revealed when he eliminates.
 
Given the pack leader’s internal balance, he will experience the least amount of stress when passing on to less familiar ground, as negatives are smaller in his sense of order. In addition, the pack leader will feel the strongest compulsion to be first on any path that leads outward to the hunt as he acts in the most straightforward manner.
 
The inferiors will depend on the pack leader’s enthusiasm to draw them across a threshold that may have a stronger inhibiting effect on them. An individual doesn’t become superior by being dominant; the leader, to feel complete, needs the group behind him. Only by guiding the hunt does one becomes a leader.
Find out more in A Firm yet Gentle Guide.

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It’s Show Time

The Joy of Attending A Live Dog Show

The atmosphere of most any dog show is that if extreme excitement and happiness, almost too exciting, especially during the early hours of the show day. Everyone arriving is wearing a smile, even if a bit forced and tense, everyone is wearing his or her best manners as well as best clothes. They are waving hello to friends they haven’t seen for almost a year as well as to those they saw just last night. Most are hurrying to find a spot to place their equipment so that they can rush to get their car parked, rush to get a ringside seat, so that they can place an article on it, and rush back to prepare their dogs for the big entrance into the ring. 
 
Meanwhile, under the handler’s tent the job of cleaning up the dogs after their journey goes on with a last-minute check on trimming, a last-minute check of the show lead, a bit more combing and brushing, with many fingers crossed and silent prayers being said. Thermos bottles of steaming hot coffee are very much in evidence, so much so that a crate top or table top will be completely covered with plastic or paper cups, some full of coffee, some emptied. 
 
On one table a dog is being sprayed with something that smells like perfume but which is actually just giving a shine to the coat. Another dog will be getting a rubdown with something that smells like alcohol. It is being used to wipe away the dust which has been attracted to the dark sleek coat. Nearby, someone is furiously throwing medicinally scented talcum powder on the snow-white coat of his charge who either is still wet from a bath or who did not get a bath and whose owner is now trying to whiten him with the powder(This powder must be completely removed before the dog is shown).
 
Almost every crate or table has a bucket or pan of water setting on it or under it or next to it, and frequently a nervous person will drop some piece of equipment into it or stumble over it and get his new suit all splashed. Every so often a dog will look longingly at a bucket of water and get tired of waiting until it is offered to him, jump down from his crate, and help himself until the owner is able to reach him and place him on the table again, where he must then be all dried off with a towel.
 
Occasionally you will hear the shouts of congratulations from a happy group gathering to look over a dog who has just made a nice win, and occasionally you will hear a warning cry go up from someone who did not carefully lock the exercise pen and from which one or two or more dogs are making their escape, or from someone whose dog has decided to take a piece out of another dog and who needs help in separating the quarreling dogs. You will hear high-pitched barks, deep, low barks, yelps, howls, growls, and all the other types of canine noises. If you look over your shoulder you are bound to see a young woman crying, either because her dog has just won or because her dog has not won either one can bring on the tears.

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