SkySoaringMagpie

The bellyband is a management tool not a training tool in my experience. There is a theory that they dislike the wet fabric/pad up against them and this stops them peeing but I haven't seen that work myself (these are dogs after all, not people). I don't really want my dogs getting about with bits of urine soaked fabric around their middles in the house anyway. Belly bands do make our life easier when our bitches are in season and the boy loses his mind - we use the kind where you put a small urinary incontinence pad in the belly band so that you don't have to keep washing it. So I would definitely suggest they get some if they can, it will help make life easier while they train. I agree with Nekhbet that they'll have to train as well. Even if the bellyband is on and the dog lifts a leg inside I would still give a verbal correction. Make sure the dog has a spot he is allowed to pee on outside and positively reinforce appropriate outside peeing. It gets back to basic house training and if it's a busy SWF and I was training it I would confine or leash it in the house so I could see what it was up to at all times in the initial stages. The people in the house should eventually get to see the overall look of a dog before he is about to lift his leg. With my entire boy I can see him do that slow saunter and it's enough for me to say "don't even think about it Mister" and he remembers the rules. Or at least he remembers that the long-haired boss is watching...

There are two organisations that are generally recognised in Australia for dog training: DELTA - http://www.deltasocietyaustralia.com.au/ NDTF - http://www.ndtf.net.au/new/index.html Anyone teaching at a club should have at least done classroom, tests and an exam (written and practical) and aspirant instructing with an experienced instructor. That's how they did it when I went through anyway. Ultimately it's going to be a personal judgement more than a judgement about qualifications. Qualifications matter, but like legal qualifications, not everyone who is qualified is a good option. Some specialise in different things, some have different experience, and some are just useless. If I were going to see a trainer, I would want to see them work a dog first. I would also want recommends from people I trust. If that the trainer had no formal quals, but had significant achievements in areas I was interested in help with, the lack of quals wouldn't bother me. Edit: Also, years of experience don't wash with me if I can't see results. It's not so much time served as distance travelled that matters, if that makes sense.

Thanks puggy puggy, the dog is a Saluki so that rules out carrying him around. Sounds like huskyheaven will be in the same position.

A friend's dog is in hospital having (literally) smashed his tibia and fibula in a running accident. It's all pinned up and caged after a 5 hour operation and the vet is hopeful of a good recovery but it will be a very long road. I want to put together a care package to send over including toys but would like some advice from people who have nursed a dog through long periods of crate rest first. Any good books or online articles that contain info on entertaining long term crated dogs? Any toys that worked really well? Anything to avoid?

A friend with Basenjis recently got a misdiagnosis of epilepsy when in fact the problem turned out to be thiamine deficiency. Agree with the others that a full bloodscreen would be a good idea.

I wouldn't characterise that as defiance because the dog is just being a dog and I've misjudged what it is capable of. I agree that it's useful to have a plan about what you're going to do - my plan pretty much boils down to "don't let them self-reward" whatever the situation is.

I have noticed that a lot of people consider them "stupid". Where did this reputation come from and what are your views on that?

I could be wrong but I got the impression that that was what Nekhbet was also suggesting? Quite possibly. Cosmolo saying "not attached" was what turned the lightbulb on in my head.

In my view the lay down and refuse to move thing is a sign you need to change classes and training approach. If the instructor did not give you techniques to use instead of dragging, find another class. Many hounds (terriers and arctic breeds) don't do well in 1 hour standard classes unless the instructor and the handler are particularly cluey. Find a class where they are happy for you to train 5 minutes on, 5 minutes off (in a crate or tied up). Classes are for teaching you things to practice at home anyway, they are not for the bulk of your training, or for showing everyone how fabulously well trained your dog is. If the instructor can't deal with your dog refusing to move, it's instructor fail, not dog fail, or your fail. A clicker is a small plastic object that makes a clicking sound that you use to mark the behaviour you want to see. It has nothing to do with the lead. A lead is a back-stop security device to stop your dog running away and/or self-rewarding. It is not a training device. For all the Beagle people reading who are struggling with training, I recommend the book "When Pigs Fly: Training Success with Impossible Dogs" by Jane Killion

As others have mentioned, dogs learn early in life what they are supposed to eliminate on. If someone buggers this up by training the wrong thing or not training at all, you end up with a problem. I would go back to toilet training 101. It's not so much about teaching her to sleep in a bed as it is about teaching her to eliminate on whatever surface you have outside that you want her to eliminate on. So. After meals, play and waking from sleep take her outside and don't go back inside until she does something. Praise her for going somewhere appropriate. Be prepared to be patient.

Nifty, thank you for this! The headcollar on but not attached is the "obvious" link I had been missing.

As I understand it, a properly fitted head collar should always be leashed to a flat collar. So in theory the dogs should already be used to having a collar on. It's "in theory" tho', because not everyone is shown how to properly fit and use a head collar.

I'm interested in hearing some success stories. Our club has agreed that from now on the goal with anti-pull devices is to explicitly treat them as a stop gap training tool. The aim is to have all owners of dogs in anti-pull gear weaned off the devices. Dogs won't be able to pass the last level of introductory classes with an anti-pull device on. I don't want this thread to be side-tracked into a head-collar war, I'm just keen to hear about techniques to wean people off them. We have never used them on our dogs, and I have always sent people to other trainers to get them fitted, so they are really not my department expertise wise.

Another thing to try is to actively use sniffs and scenting as a reward that has to be worked for and put it on cue - ie, "go sniff". So puppy can sniff, but she can't drag you over to the tree. Puppy has to give you attention first, with a loose lead. The first few times, up against hound mind, this can take a while. Wait long enough tho', and they will look, even if only to give you the "C'MON IT MIGHT BE A DEAD GALAH!!!!" look. You also decide when sniffs end, and a piece of super smelly garlic sausage can help get their attention. I have had success with just turning around and walking as well if I cue to walk again and the dog doesn't respond. I don't yank, or move quickly, I just start moving and as they're on a lead, they have to follow. My dogs are large tho' and I can't sled them. I'd be more careful with a smaller dog. If your body language is right, most dogs will follow you if you purposefully start moving but I also think it's important to give them an opportunity to respond to a cue first. With dogs who adore X, make sure that X happens on your terms. But don't try and ban X, because my experience is that a hound will find its own way if you don't provide a way. Patience and consistency takes you a long way with hounds, it might seem maddening at first, but once they realise you mean business they settle down to working the system to their advantage. I call walking around the neighborhood on a loose lead "loose lead walking". I don't ask them to heel - heeling is formal obedience work for us. It's useful to be able to call them in close if you have to share a footpath with another dog or person, but part of what exercises a dog on a walk is the exercising of their brain. Reading pee mail, training and if you allow it, meeting and greeting other dogs and people all help do this. Good luck! Edit - Huski and I must have been writing about similar things at the same time - snap!

I agree with Kavik. I would also go to a vet and ask them to do a health check and blood screen to rule out a physical or biochemical cause. Often when dogs like terriers hit the 2 year mark you start to really see the breed characteristics come out in the temperament. This often also combines with the end of companion based training and socialisation to give you an issue. The more they act up, the less socialisation they get and then you have a real problem on your hands. This is tough for people who pick an adorable puppy who suddenly grows into a toey terrier, snotty sighthound or "don't mess with me" bull breed and it's the kind of thing a good trainer can help with. However, the tail between the legs thing is not fiesty terrier. To me that sounds like something else is going on and I'd want to rule out her being in pain or hypothyroid before heading down the training path. In the meantime, I agree with Kavik, don't introduce more animals into the household until this is sorted. Apart from the risk to the new animal, you will need the time, space and calm in your environment to get your terrier back on the right path.

Agreed!! I have thought this the whole time! Even though i frequent this thread often, i still get a little suprised by what the title is and go :D show ring fag?! And then i work it out and remember how many times i've already done that Edit: If you put an acronym in caps in a subject line it is auto-corrected to put everything but the first letter in lower case.

Ooh, now I'm going to go completely off topic. Were you in the UK? It's not too uncommon there I understand because travellers and other fringe breeders breed longdogs for lamping and typically use saluki/greyhound crosses. The book "Walking Ollie" is about a saluki/greyhound cross rescue. And yeah, the writer also does not pick up poo!!! This is the author's blog where he has pictures of his dogs, the grey grizzle is a pure smooth Saluki: http://walkingollie.wordpress.com/ Sadly Ollie died last year, don't read the entry about that without a full box of tissues. It looks like he has a gorgeous new rescue lurcher tho'. :D /off topic

Makes sense. Yes - I see the point here as well. No matter how much one might worry about who will apply what and how though, shouldn't mean that a whole "methodology" should be out-lawed when in itself it may prove for some dogs to be the one thing that keeps them safe (as well as other people safe) from harm. I agree with this, I think where the friction often comes in is people's differing judgements about the extent to which harder techniques should be used on softer and/or younger dogs and softer techniques on older and/or harder dogs. Bearing in mind that hard and soft is also debatable ground. That said, I think people sometimes don't have the background to make a judgment and are assessing the technique against a wrong impression of the dog (or against "everydog" or against the profile of the dogs they see most often or their own baggage, etc etc etc). When you poke beneath the surface you often find more agreement than disagreement. I can't think of anyone here who has said a check chain on a 10 week old is a good idea for example. The tricky part is that the limitations to an application aren't always readily apparent to a casual observer.

The difficulty is that there are some methodologies that are not OK. Like teaching a dog not to dig by filling the hole with water and nearly drowning it. It's not OK because it's both inhumane, and unnecessary. I'm guessing that if someone popped up here and said "I'm planning to do this to stop my dog digging" people would post some variation on "whoa, how about you try this other thing first?" Some methods do need to be discredited and more appropriate methods taught in their place. More difficulty comes when you move further down the spectrum into the grey area and people have different views about what is humane, and what is necessary. Someone might agree for example that a e-collar is OK if the dog is going to get shot if it chases another stock animal, but not OK for your average suburban pet. These are examples by the way, not my views. What is going on there is that people are weighing up the immediate consequences if the training doesn't work combined with the possible fallout from the training. And people don't always have accurate information on which to base those assessments. I suspect much of the debate here (with a couple of exceptions) is about application as well. There is a degree of elitism that is hard to get around. I mean, you do need skill and self control to train appropriately. I saw a shocker at a show recently who had neither. Humans as a species aren't all that great at self-control or skill, and aren't that great at understanding where their weaknesses are when it comes to self-control or skill either. So people pushing for milder methods are often more concerned about the likelihood of proper application than about the technique when properly applied. You can debate this until the cows come home, ultimately it's a similar debate to the US gun debate. Some people firmly believe their fellow citizens can handle that kind of fire-power, others don't. It's a wider philosophical question than just a dog training one. So I'm probably not a group hugger. I'd try and self-assess but there's a thread in OT about the freudian slips of people self-assessing so I'd better not

I think you need to ask "what experts"? By that I mean, what do the "experts" who you think are "actively critical of him" or are "lukewarm about him" have in common? Could it be the training methodology they prescribe to that actually prevents them from acknowledging any good about him? No I don't think so, because the lukewarm ones usually acknowledge that he has his heart in the right place, his charity work, and his ability to perform the techniques he recommends. Take a look at Steve's comments in this thread. Not a ringing endorsement, but he notes some attributes. The actively critical ones will still usually note his speed, confidence and strength in the context of it being inappropriate to demonstrate some techniques to people without those attributes.

I put a similar disclaimer on my emails when giving out info to a client - this information is for the dog analysed please do not pass this on to other people. similar behaviors can be form different causes. One person goes 'oh my dog does that!' tries it and regresses the dog or doesnt fully understand what they are doing and make it worst. It's not training a trick it's dealing with a potentially dangerous situation with a stressed dog. Isn't that more responsible then 'hey go home and give it a go yourself!'. Sure, the disclaimer has a purpose on a show that is purportedly for entertainment. But the purpose is not dog training. So my question still stands, why do people leap to defend him against Cesar "bashing" but let snarking at just about any other well known trainer just slide on through? Especially as Cesar is by far the more popular and influential person. Why does he inspire people to defend him when experts are either lukewarm about him or actively critical of him?

Sure, I think one of the things about this being a pure breed forum that supports rescue - you are going to get a really wide variety of dogs and people and it helps always to be aware that just because you're experienced in one area, there's a huge variety in the dog training field and no one person is going to be able to cover the lot. People don't just have different methods, they have different goals, different standards, different criteria, different problems. I am not saying the scientific principles of dog training vary, or that breeds are mono-temperament but the experience does vary depending on the dog and the person.

When I read the above I thought you were inferring that 'smart' training doesn't include physical corrections, that physical corrections don't involve thinking it through. If that wasn't the case and you didn't mean to infer that, like I said above, I apologise for misinterpreting you. For me and my dogs that is true of physical corrections - I believe that if I have had to physically correct my dogs, I should have a good hard think about why my dog ended up in that situation. My dogs are well bred, I've raised them from puppies and they have no HA or DA issues. If you want to trial them they're a difficult breed, but to live with they are pretty easy compared to breeds that are always "on". They have dawn zoomies and dusk zoomies and craaaazy puppyhoods but much of life is spent sleeping. I do believe I should be able to manage them without physical corrections - partly my value system and partly the fact that they're not that hard house manners wise. Me not using physical corrections does not mean I do not use punishment or that I fail to enforce boundaries. I do both. But that's pretty easy stuff, you can achieve an awful lot by not letting them push you around and NILIFing them. I don't have a dog damaged by its past life or bad breeding. Perhaps if I had a really challenging dog with major HA or DA issues I would have to adjust what I do. Right now, I don't. I also do preventive pet dog training, I don't deal with hard cases - they get referred off before they even get a chance to get into my classes. For the stuff I see, physical correction isn't necessary and I think it is important to get students thinking about constructing the dog they want to see, rather than just focussing on what they don't. Human nature being what it is, people will do the latter without any help, they need a big push to do the former in my experience. Also, mea culpa, I could have phrased that better or added a qualification to make it clearer. I ranted at the OH tonight and said "can you believe someone got cranky with that post of mine!!" all outraged and OH said "well you did call them dumb". I almost shouted "I DID NOT" down the phone before realising I had lost my sense of perspective. In short, it wasn't intentional but unbiased observers agree that I didn't phrase it as well as I could have. Hope the above makes my position clearer. Edited for spellinks

I implied no such thing, I can't stop you inferring a criticism from it but I am disappointed that you have. I was talking about my breed and where I find success with my dogs and my standards for myself. I don't see how that translates to a comment on what every one else is doing, particularly as I have a breed that is super easy to shut down. My primary issue with any correction is the same issue Karen Pryor emphasises in her recent book - that is that it is reinforcing to the deliverer as well as the recipient. In addition to my considerations about my dogs and what they respond best to, I choose to avoid physical correction for my own personal reasons. I will use correction where necessary to avoid a greater evil or, when it comes to voice correction, on the occasions where I am not the trainer I could be and haven't thought about it before opening my mouth. Being an imperfect human and all. I go out of my way not to judge other DOLers and it aggravates me that even talking about my own standards and my own experience with my dogs, and not mentioning anyone else, can be read as an implied judgment. I have stayed right out of the slanging match in this thread about other people's dogs. Should I say nothing about what I do with my dogs in case people who use physical corrections might feel slighted that I choose to avoid them? What's next, I shouldn't say I walk them on a flat collar in case prong people feel slighted? Good lord, I am really not that important. To me this is just another way of shutting the more positive people down. If you have confidence in your methods, what I say about what I choose for my dogs shouldn't concern you at all.

One thing I find irritating is the expression "Cesar bashing". Trainers who ID as positive trainers cop more of a hiding than Millan does on this board - and are often subject to mis-characterisation and ridiculing of their methods. Yet I don't use the emotive expression "positive trainer bashing" because posting on the internet is not bashing - as anyone who has seen a real bashing or been on the end of one will know. No-one is "bashing" Cesar, they are just criticising his methods. And if you're a hugely popular TV star, that will happen no matter what your methods are. Even if people were going to town on the guy in a total snark-fest - and I've seen that elsewhere on the internet, not here - he has enough money and prestige from his bottled Cesar dog water, contracts with Petco etc etc to keep him warm at night. And there are a ton of better resources out there than Millan. I mean, if someone shows up here asking about a red zone dog, no-one is going to suggest they sit down and watch a series of the Dog Whisperer. They'll send them to Steve (or Erny or someone else). If someone in the breeder's forum asks how to prepare new puppy owners for their new well bred puppy, we will send them to Dunbar's website. We won't suggest they watch a series of the Dog Whisperer. So why do people react so much to criticism of an American TV personality who has "don't try this at home!" slapped all over his show's disclaimer?