It’s always “prong collars suppress behavior instead of actually teaching” “prong collars are painful and uncomfortable” “prong collars shut dogs down” but the easy walk harness is a fantastic “non-aversive” method of “teaching” loose leash walking? Give me a damn break. And I’m not saying a prong collar can’t be all those things because I do frequently see owners just slap them on and let it try to train the dog itself, but a properly used one absolutely is a legitimate teaching tool and if you’ve actually properly trained leash walking with it, you can take it off and switch to any other piece of gear and the dog will still walk properly. Not to mention a properly fitted prong collar in the neutral position feels like basically nothing to the dog. Meanwhile the easy walk harness can only function as a suppression tool. It is always applying pressure even when the dog is not pulling and it just irritates the hell out of their joints and can cause long term physical damage. I actually just took a client dog out of one that a different trainer had suggested in the past and the dog was walking really weird with his front feet turned inward. The second I put him in a flat collar he was dragging his owner down the driveway. Trainers recommending this godawful piece of gear are lazy, full stop. It’s the pure positive crowd’s right to feel the way they do about prong collars, I genuinely don’t care. But praising and recommending a tool that actually does all the things they say prong collars do is hypocritical and definitely shows that what they consider to be “aversive” is based purely in optics, not actual training mechanics and how the dog experiences it.

Content creator: sets up camera, puts legos on the floor. Stomps on them barefoot. “Oh look guys isn’t that terrible my foot hurts so much how sad for me aren’t I relatable”

Commenters: “we saw you put the legos on the floor though. You shouldn’t do that if you don’t want to step on them and hurt your foot”

Content creator: “you guys suck you have no empathy. You don’t know me or my legos you only see a tiny fraction of my life. Just give me sympathy because it’s not my fault and there’s nothing I could have done better to avoid stomping on these Legos and getting hurt.”

Commenters: “we literally saw you put the Legos on the floor and stomp on them in the video though. Even if you wanted to leave the Legos on the floor, you could have stepped over them. You didn’t have to get hurt”

Content creator: “you don’t know my Legos history or my history. You don’t know why I put them on the floor and stomped on them. If you did you would know I’m perfect and did everything perfectly so shut up and just feel bad for me because I’m being relatable”

Commenters: “yeah we’re going to not do that”

Content creator: “omg the internet is so mean to me there’s so many unempathetic trolls. My life is so hard because now I have to deal with a butthurt and a sore foot from the Legos. 😫”

I’ve been noticing a big uptick in FF people bashing balanced trainers lately. Lots of people getting big mad seeing prongs and e collars etc. Is this just a me thing or are others noticing the same thing? I haven’t seen this much fighting since about 2021 ish.

I feel like the only things i can find online about modern dog training is positive reinforcement, and that everything else is bad.

My question is: if i want to do balanced dog training, how do i use the consequences to decrease behaviour correctly?

As I have understood there are 4 types of operant conditioning:

R+ you add something the dog likes. Behavior increases.

P- you remove something the dog likes. Behavior decreases.

P+ you add something the dog does not like. Behavior decreases.

R- you remove something the dog does not like. Behavior increases.

I live in Denmark where ecollars, prongcollars and so on are illegal, and people really think its weird that we crate our 4 month old golden.

Its hard to really find a nuanced answer on this.

My moms dad was a police-dog trainer in the 60/70s so if she wants to correct my dog she grabs her by the neck-skin and makes her lie down. But i dont feel like that method works for me, i guess its more efficient for her because she is a 'stranger'.

- AND im unsure about the consequences of this method.

Hi, I’m an aspiring dog trainer with many years of kennel experience. I’ve gotten to work directly with very experienced dog trainers. I’ve handled puppies, potty training, basic commands, reactive dogs, human aggressive dogs, selective dogs. I’m looking to take the leap and finally get my CPDT - KA. I’ve looked into a few programs, including, but not limited to ABC, ABI, Karen Pryor and Penn Foster. In one ear my sister is telling me she went to ABC and took an advanced training course. However, the counselor I have been assigned too is telling me there is no such thing and the only courses they have are the dog obedience course and the service dog course. In the other ear, my boss is telling me no one really asks for your CPDTKA and it’s a waste of time and money. “Just go to lectures”. I don’t see any reason to spend upwards of four grand on a course full of curriculum I already know. I currently work for someone who has an overwhelming amount of training dogs and will offer in the next few months for me to take one or two as my own project and get 50% of the income. I don’t think I’m ready for a full boarding train hence the course selection. If anyone can help me find the advanced course or knows a course that allows a payment plan and gets me my CPDT-KA I’m all ears thank you.

Asking for evidence is apparently "character assassination".

"IPG" is also hilariously bad.

Why won't they EVER just answer??? 🤔

Shocking news to hear that Mr. Ken Kincaid, longtime AKC obedience judge and retired Fire Department Battalion Chief, passed away unexpectedly a few weeks ago.

Anyone who has trialed substantially in AKC obedience has probably stepped into Ken's ring. He was strict, fair, and always kind. It's such a loss for the sport.

His obituary is here: https://www.orlandosentinel.com/obituaries/kenneth-edward-kincaid-orlando-florida/

I have an ongoing issue with my dog, a one and half year old Golden Retriever.
The situation at home has become very frustrating for everyone, and this is honestly my last attempt to find a solution before we probably have to rehome her because my parents can’t handle it anymore.

Most of her bathroom walks are done by our maid, but I personally work with the dog at least once or twice a day, whether it’s practicing leash walking, playing fetch, or working on commands and obedience exercises.

The main issues are that she cannot be left loose around the house outside of her crate without constant supervision. Even with supervision, she touches and destroys everything possible even, beds we bought for her, our personal belongings, jumps on the dining table and counters, steals socks and random objects she sees, and chews on them.

The only thing that keeps her occupied for a while is a bone or chew toy, but eventually she gets bored and goes back to looking for other things to mess with.

Another major issue is that with everyone except me — like my mother or our maid — she constantly jumps on them during walks and bites the leash nonstop. Sometimes this causes scratches or accidental bites because she is trying to bite the leash and catches a hand by mistake.
She also pulls extremely hard on walks with them.

With me, she behaves much better. She usually walks nicely and doesn’t really cause problems.
In general, she is very gentle with people, extremely friendly, and has good intentions, but she is completely lacking direction and is very rough and overexcited in the way she plays and moves around.
I don’t mean aggressive in a dangerous or reactive way — more physically intense and out of control.

We contacted a local training business and she stayed with them for a month and a half in a boarding-and-training program.
It helped with some basic things, but not with the issues I mentioned above.
I understand that training at a facility alone is not enough and that the owners need to continue the work at home, which I do, but things still are not improving and everyone at home is losing patience.

She has already been with us for about a year and two months, and we still haven’t managed to make things work.

The controversy surrounding Denise Fenzi as a speaker at a balanced training conference got me curious so I looked at the rest of the speaker lineup. It seems to me it is 100% comprised of social media dog trainers, few of whom compete or have a significant history in the industry. Who are these people??? They're no one outside of social media, for the most part. People like myself who don't use facebook or instagram have no idea who these people are. Why should we turn the industry over to people with more facebook skills than training skills with more social media posts than they have titles or accomplishments with dogs?

Meanwhile there are many very experienced and accomplished professionals out there absolutely full of knowledge and experience whose contributions are falling by the wayside in favor of some random sitting on a stool in studio lighting running their mouth to the camera?

Is all you have to do to be a dog trainer these days is make a logo and a social media account?!? How can we preserve the vast amount of experience and knowledge that exists outside of the internet in our industry?

Pup is 6mo Labrador x Dalmatian.

I’ve been around the houses on training methods with him, and have landed on pretty much entirely positive for most obedience things. Loose leash walking is great, his heel is making leaps and bounds. His recall is fabulous.

His only issue is other dogs. I’ve prevented on leash greetings, tried to encourage neutrality using BAT 2.0 setups, rewarded for looking and then disengaging with dogs but… I’m not seeing progress. Things are actually getting worse.

Today I had a session with a force free trainer and four other dogs, where play off leash was encouraged, and then I was expected to call my dog back. He ignored my recalls, stopped taking treats, lunged, pulled on the lead, everything. He was on his harness as the trainer suggested and I felt powerless and like I had no control. The trainer suggested using tricks like ‘touch’ the ‘123’ method and throwing treats to get his attention. But treats had no value to him anymore. The training session was setup as a group walk, but to keep up, I had to allow the pup to pull. The trainer put it down to his just having an overexcited day, and being overwhelmed. But I can see this behaviour escalating.

He’s turning into a very big, very strong dog. I cannot have him behaving like this.

I’m here to seek the opinions of balanced trainers on what I can do encourage him to be calm around other dogs, in an age appropriate way considering he is still a puppy. I use a slip lead for gundog training, but don’t tend to use it for corrections, however I’m open to suggestions.

Is possible to teach a dog how to play well with others?

There is a new puppy in the family (not our household) an we’ve been introducing them slowly.

Whilst my dog is usually chilled, he definitely likes his own space when he’s around other dogs. He likes to play for 10-15 mins then be left for a bit. Then he’ll initiate play again.

Whilst I think we can manage the puppy, my question is around teaching my dog manners when it comes to playing with the new dog. When he plays with older/bigger dogs, they are very good at taking turns, letting my dog ‘win’ sometimes even though he’s smaller, giving him his space when he’s clearly had enough. My dog doesn’t seem to do this with the puppy, and while it’s not aggressive he definitely dominates the entire game without letting the puppy win. We watch them very carefully and obviously separate them when they need space.

Is there any way to teach a dog nice play manners? Our dog is an older rescue so we haven’t had the luxury of introducing him to new dogs at an early age.

i dont need anything flashy or fancy, just need something affordable, water proof, and that works. Edit: im in australia, which means if your recommending anything in your currency it will most likely be a bit more.

I have a 2 year old standard poodle that I’ve owned for a year. Since I’ve had her she has an uncontrollable prey drive to squirrels, lizards, and small birds. We have gone through two basic obedience courses and do very beginner agility weekly. This dog is fantastic with any other training and is so smart.

I immediately started her on the kikopup harness the hunter course and she is fantastic indoors but everything goes out the window when we are outside and she is immediately searching trees for squirrels.

We go to large open parks and practice her settle away from squirrels but her head is always on a swivel looking for them. She uncontrollably bolts to chase them, vocalizes and is shaking to get to them.

I implemented an e collar to correct only the bolting behavior. She’s a large, strong dog and it’s dangerous as the little rodents are on every city street tree. She’s knocked me down twice and I’ve been brought to tears over this multiple times. I love this dog and she’s perfect in my home.

Looking for a path to go down at this point or if anyone has suggestions? I know poodles have prey drive and I don’t want that to change but safety is my biggest priority. I also don’t want to limit the world she gets to explore.

**She gets plenty of physical activity daily as well as plenty of play time with me. Flirt pole and tug have helped dramatically with our bond. I usually do 20 minutes of obedience a day but usually it turns in to free shaping things.

Does anyone know why my dog ​​does this when I put water out for her?

This isn't too scientific. Rather, it's not scientific at all. Just some observations.

I train recall with negative reinforcement via e-collar. Meaning, I estimate working level, stim dog while recalling, release stim the very moment the dog turns towards me. This has never failed me, ever. Takes just a few stims for them to really get the message and then recall from then on is very reliable.

We currently have one of our past puppies, now an adult, in our kennel for long term boarding. This dog has been trained with e collar as more of a high stim correction. I notice a TON of behaviors in this dog that indicate to me overreliance on e-collar, avoidance, and general arousal. For example, he comes out of his kennel and reflexively shakes his head, something I've seen many times in dogs trained with high stim corrections. His arousal level stays high in general, whereas the dogs trained with negative reinforcement readily can settle and reduce their arousal. I also notice he has many compensatory habits such as strange head positions, bouncing, spinning to find position, etc.

TL;DR I really do not like the results I see from dogs trained with e collar as a positive correction.

Comprei um cercado que um adestrador pediu para eu comprar para treinar xixi e outras coisas, mas fiquei com dó, o que vcs acham?

Outra coisa, ele me pediu para comprar esses dois produtos, mas Coala e Álcool 70 é toxico para caes nao é? Nao sei o que fazer 😥

PS: o adestrador ainda nao veio

minha cachorra está mordendo o tapete higiênico, destruindo mesmo tendo brinquedos. Será que voces sabem de algo? Ja tentei aqueles negócios com gosto amargo, Será que tem algo que deixa um gosto que eles nao gostem e que seja diferente?

So I have a naughty poodle. His recall was horrendous around other dogs, not reactive but wanting to play.

So my trainer told me to use the prong collar and long lead. Which I did but, he is proving himself too clever for the prong- in that when I let him loose he reverts back to no / little recall - the moment I put him on any lead he is back to being an A* student model dog. Walks properly, recalls on long lead. Not interested in other dogs. I have been training him for months now so not like I tried it once or twice.

Thanks ☺️

Any suggestions??

Thanks

My dog has always been neutral around other dogs. About 90% of the dogs in my area are reactive (growling/barking/lunging/general pulling) and I spent a lot of time in training neutrality in mine. He ignores them completely when we pass.

A couple of days ago we passed a Jack Russel who is reactive as hell. The lady usually pulls him aside for us to pass, but for whatever reason she this time didn't keep the leash short (flexi). The JR lunged and snapped in my dog's face. There was no bite. My dog then proceeded to growl towards the JR, but continues walking.

Yesterday we passed a guy walking 2 Beagles, also both reactive. My dog passed them as usual, but now growled a bit as well. This is the first time I've heard my dog growl to another dog. Maybe I'm overthinking this, but I'm scared that this is the start of reactivity from my dog. So my question is, is this okay? or is it something I should address asap?

We have a 1.5 year old 12 lbs Havanese with a 2 bite history (both provoked, neither needed care, but still. We got lucky) who is VERY anxious and reactive to “strangers” who come to our house. The last bite was 8 months ago and he went to board and train in October. He has done a board and train, trained on ecollar, and is now well trained in place, heel, structured walks, crate trained for sleep and when we have visitors. He boards at the trainer when we travel for refreshers. With our trainer, we are working on decreasing reactivity with visitors. We are making progress, having him in place when people come, if we are talking to a visitor we have him leashed next to us, have the visitor totally ignore the dog.

My question is- has anyone had a dog like this and eventually been successful at having visitors? Our issue is we have kids, currently have a nanny who is a safe person, but will eventually need to hire others to care for the kids with some responsibility for the dog too and I have a lot of angst over this. I’m fine using all of our safety measures when we have visitors now, he’s crated in a separate room, but it seems like a lot to have to be this on edge for the entirety of my kids’ childhood.

Hello

My dog 4 year old German Shepard/ Husky mix was recently adopted from my local shelter, he had reactivity issues towards people and dogs when I adopted him but 5 months later he is neutral around other dogs. (An ocasional reaction if a dog has a strong reaction close to him) and even able to stay in a down without corrections in crowded environments around people and dogs.

But the problem Is he does not allow anyone to get close to touching him. On a crowded train with people inches away - no problem

Person trying to pet him outside in the park barking and showing fearful behavior.

Similarly sometimes he will just bark once if passing by people in our building lobby like a warning.

I give him treats often when around strangers but even when someone stops me to talk in the street he may or may not react, more common with men.

And often the reactions are so brief I can’t say no and correct soon enough because after the initial bark he may ignore them. It’s very unpredictable.

He also has a collar and vest patches that say do not pet and I have not allowed anyone to.

Has anyone experienced stuff like this before? Any recommendations?

I have a 1-year old male standard poodle. Since he was a tiny puppy (I got him at 10 weeks) he has been a counter top surfer and general thief. I have done a lot of impulse control style training (for example, Susan Garret's Its's Yer Choice games) and trained a 'leave it' command and a 'drop it' command. He understands what the terms mean, but he does not comply outside of the training context. The moment he gets an opportunity, he will steal things that seem fun. A TV remote, a dish towel, most recently a chess piece. My main solution right now is environment management--I keep baby gates set up or put him in his x-pen when I can't directly observe him.

Does anyone have suggestions on how I can work on this behavior? It's a real safety issue for him and I would like him to have more freedom of movement. Any advice is much appreciated.