

Aidan3
-
Posts
11,500 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Everything posted by Aidan3
-
I will use ecollars but there is almost nothing I could do with a low setting that I couldn't do with +R alone.
-
Exercising Reactive Dogs Thread
Aidan3 replied to megan_'s topic in Training / Obedience / Dog Sports
That sounds good. My old boy Django was awesome at this, there are a lot of dogs who wouldn't have been able to interact with other dogs without Django being that first step. My new dog is turning out to be similar, but in a different way. I haven't quite figured out how he will fill this role, but he's managed to bring a couple around now. If the trainer knows what they are doing, respects both dogs fully, and isn't determined to make something happen; something just might happen. It can be a good way to work. Once you get a bit of momentum, you can move things along a bit. Aside from some of the other issues I mentioned with the socialisation classes a really big one is that it doesn't teach Justice how to communicate properly with other dogs. That's so important. That's why I cringe when I hear about people correcting the most basic communication amongst dogs just because it scares them (the owner... or the trainer in some cases). My previous GSD had a lot of freedom partly because if she told a dog to back off, there was no question about it. I didn't care if it upset anyone, none of the dogs were ever upset by it and no-one was going to be hurt so long as they weren't completely socially illiterate. Of course, there are socially illiterate dogs out there, and for the safety of those dogs, I had a bomb-proof recall :laugh: -
Exercising Reactive Dogs Thread
Aidan3 replied to megan_'s topic in Training / Obedience / Dog Sports
That sounds good. My old boy Django was awesome at this, there are a lot of dogs who wouldn't have been able to interact with other dogs without Django being that first step. My new dog is turning out to be similar, but in a different way. I haven't quite figured out how he will fill this role, but he's managed to bring a couple around now. If the trainer knows what they are doing, respects both dogs fully, and isn't determined to make something happen; something just might happen. It can be a good way to work. Once you get a bit of momentum, you can move things along a bit. -
Sorry Teebs. Just try to make things as normal as you can for her, but give her plenty of chances to be with you when it's not going to cause a problem.
-
Ndtf Vs Delta Dog Training Course?
Aidan3 replied to DanRaff's topic in Training / Obedience / Dog Sports
Not talking in regards to whether you are using rewards or aversives etc, but Luke W, how long would you persevere with a method without seeing a positive change or consistent (desired) results? How long would anyone else persevere with something before deciding it wasn't working? The above just made me curious. I would question a training method that took a long time to start showing the desired outcome. Obviously the big picture things we train can take years to perfect, but we can see progress and know we are on the right track. All hypotheticals aside, in this case you should really see significant change immediately. I mean all you have to do is teach the dog to go to a mat or station, then it's just a case of building up the duration. So the dog is out from under your feet within a couple of sessions. But obviously there are more complex problems that will require a different solution. Bin raiding is one example. It's more complex, there is stuff in there (yummy stuff) and the dog may have unsupervised access to it. Although I have trained two of my own dogs to leave stuff alone unsupervised using a purely positive approach, I wouldn't necessarily expect a client to be able to do it. Then again, that sort of problem is easily managed by moving the bin or getting a more secure bin so it's probably a bad example. -
Ndtf Vs Delta Dog Training Course?
Aidan3 replied to DanRaff's topic in Training / Obedience / Dog Sports
I suppose it really depends on how the dog is affected in the long term. Either -R or +P can elicit a long-term conditioned emotional response, and in some cases it can be quite non-discriminative (e.g punish dog for counter-surfing, dog gets anxious in kitchen if there isn't a clear contingency between counter-surfing and punishment). This is really the whole point of limiting the use of aversives, we limit the risks of fall-out. -
I have a GSD with magnificent social skills who was almost certainly not socialised (being kept on a chain and all...) He's a good example for the "good genes trumps bad environment" hypothesis. Fairly exceptional, though. Good genes aren't any sort of guarantee. Although he is back-yard bred... There are a lot of factors in every dog bite. Breed is correlated, but we have clear examples with good data of why we shouldn't make the mistake of confusing correlation with causation. Where certain breeds such as the pitbull have been removed from populations, dog bites have not decreased. That alone should be enough to make a thinking person wonder. Then we have an example (Calgary, Canada) where BSL has been repealed, the pitbull population has increased, and dog bites have declined.
-
Great post, Cosmolo
-
Can I Pick Your Brains :-)
Aidan3 replied to mumof4girls's topic in Training / Obedience / Dog Sports
Good plan, mumof4girls. This is your dog and you will have to deal with any future problems for the rest of his life. There is a time and a place to put a not confident dog in close quarters with other dogs, but if it's indiscriminate (i.e just other dogs in the class, not selected ones that would be suitable) then you can do more harm than good. -
Have you used it? Does it work at all? Sorry to go OT, I'm curious to know. I can't find any evidence that citronella is aversive to a significant number of dogs.
-
I've lived with a reactive dog and trained many more and I honestly don't worry too much about this sort of thing. If someone is breaking the law, report them by all means but it's going to happen with some frequency anyway. If you don't feel that you can handle the situation or that it's unsafe for you, then turn around and walk the other way.
-
So sorry, Rozzie.
-
Fair enough then, m-sass. Personally I don't believe we should accept such dreadful legislation in this country, and history has a habit of snuffing legislation like this out eventually so I'll remain optimistic.
-
What about about the genetic factor and the difficulty managing a dog predisposed with aggression.......drop the leash with a dog like that and it will cause harm to a person or another dog/animal. I have never heard so much absolute nonesense that bad owners are the cause of aggression in all dogs.........ask some behaviourists how many human/animal aggressive dogs they work with that has nothing to do with the owners or how the dog was raised, generally the problem is that the owners don't know how to manage an aggressive dog, but give the same owners a genetically stable dog of good temperament, they would have no problems managing a dog like that. You're sounding like the rooster who believes his crow causes the sun to rise each morning. Sure, some people do argue that pitbulls are no more likely to bite than other breeds, but it's a moot point. BSL has repeatedly failed to bring about public safety improvements. Get rid of all the pitbulls and pitbull crosses, you still have a problem. Calgary has had a nett increase in their pitbull population coinciding with a an improvement in public safety outcomes. How do you explain that?
-
No, we're fighting for public safety. The BSL hypothesis has not been supported, i.e just as many children will be hurt or killed in a future with BSL as without. The argument can really be that simple. Or you could choose to look at it from a legal, ethical, or scientific perspective and argue that if we allow laws like this we are dooming ourselves to a dark future that says "your right to maintain your ignorance and foist it on the rest of us is more important than my right to an educated opinion based on evidence and enquiry". Regardless of BSL (stays or goes) this is just as important.
-
Or maybe they are just telling the truth, and banning all dogs of a certain appearance based on a correlation of dog bites with dogs who are subjectively reported to be of a certain heritage is just a really dumb idea? Seems a bit bass-ackwards to blame the vocal anti-BSL activists.
-
I read it before I replied. My reply wasn't intended as an insult if that's how you took it.
-
So, even if DNA showed they were not restricted breed, it didn't matter because someone looked at the dogs and determined they were a restricted breed. The law is a donkey of indeterminate heritage. For those of you arguing in this thread, can you just stop? You're not helping. DNA would be applicable if for instance one parent was a papered Amstaff and the other was a papered Stafford and the DNA proved that the pups were from those parents, but DNA that is offered by organisations to determine breed is the type of DNA evidence that is not admissable..........I think there are too many questions in regard to the accuracy of these tests??. The DNA would not be used to prove breed type but parentage, which I believe is just as provable in dogs as it is in humans. As I understand it, under the current legislation it won't help.
-
When cross-breeding takes place intentionally or unintentionally, there is very little chance of predicting accurately what the pups will look like. Two pups from the same litter can look substantially different.
-
The grounds for not breeding on dogs that can be intentified as restricted breeds is that simply restricted breeds and look a likes don't comply with the legislation to keep as a non restricted pet. Ok, so we're back to the legislation then. Fancy that...
-
Or it may lead to further proliferation of oodles that look explicitly nothing like pitbulls. Or perhaps, if your claim below is true, they'll move onto turning other breeds we enjoy (the ones such as GSDs, who look nothing like pitbulls) into the ones that cause the problems? Maybe so, but in the absence of evidence to support the claim, should we make efforts to eradicate them? I could think of better places where legislation could be used to eradicate unethical dog breeding.
-
This is true, but this doesn't mean they [crossbred dogs] are more likely to be aggressive either so what grounds do we have for not breeding them on that basis alone? We could come back to over-representation in bite statistics, but that is an argument that assumes that correlation implies causation, and the BSL hypothesis has not been supported so it's fallacious. Guilty until proven innocent? Shouldn't the burden of proof be upon those [bSL advocates] making the claim? Well this is part of the side issue you keep coming back to. Maybe start another thread to debate it? I agree, no-one needs them. One could argue that no-one needs purebred companion dogs either. Perhaps someone might enjoy the debate?
-
Yes, I get it m-sass. I've already told you I do. What you don't seem to understand is that this is a side-issue. We already know they were killed because they looked like pitbulls according to two council officers, that is abundantly clear. What we are discussing is why the legislation is flawed and why two dogs were killed because they looked like pitbulls, even though they were not pitbulls and their parentage was known.
-
I didn't say people can breed whatever they like whenever they like, but I see your point. The issues that we are discussing centre around BSL and the procedures legislated to enforce it in Victoria. Neither you or I know why this litter was bred so we can only speculate. If they were knowingly producing dogs likely to end up victims of BSL then you are right, but we don't know that so it remains a side issue.
-
How is it a side issue when looks determine whether or not a dog is determined a restricted breed?, looks is the "issue" if we like it or not according to the legislation and all the belly aching in the world is not going to change the cold hard facts that if you have a dog that fits the description of a restricted breed and you can't confirm breed origin, then you have a problem, so why are people breeding dogs vulnerable to falling victim of the legislation?? To begin with, these dogs were bred prior to the legislation so it's a moot point. But the main issue is that, now that Victoria has BSL, they should at least have an objective method of determining which dogs are pitbulls or pitbull crosses. If they want to be silly enough to risk public safety providing yet another test case for the BSL hypothesis they should at least ensure that they are killing pitbulls and their crosses. How many non-pitbulls is it acceptable to kill along the way? Whatever reasons people have for breeding dogs that look like pitbulls is their business. People have all sorts of reasons to breed all sorts of dogs, purebred or crossbred. That is not illegal. Obviously if you breed from stock that is unrelated to pitbulls you shouldn't have a problem. Yet we do have a problem, because the legislation is that bad.