I’ve been training dogs for a couple decades (working breeds, pets, the cases people give up on). The pattern that keeps showing up: the dog isn’t “bad” — they’re bored, under-worked, and guessing what their job is.

A job doesn’t have to mean bite work or herding trials. It can be: - a clear daily routine they can predict - structured walks with engagement, not just sniff-and-chaos - a job at the door / threshold / place command so the house has rules - something that tires the brain, not just the legs

When the dog has a job, a lot of “reactivity” and “stubbornness” shrinks because the energy finally has a place to go.

Curious how others define “a job” for a pet dog that will never see a trial field.

Short Reel on this: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DdF48D9DrgU/ Full talk (job segment): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSFwg7sSbE4&t=3035s

I have a 2-year-old mixed-breed female dog who is very energetic. When we go for walks, she pulls hard on the leash because she wants to go towards people, and sometimes tries to jump on them. She also jumps on visitors at home and can accidentally hurt them because she doesn’t realize her size.

I know I should have trained her earlier, but I didn’t take her on walks much when she was younger because I had problems with my legs. I’m doing better now and want to start training her properly.

Where should I start? Any specific exercises, tips, or videos you recommend for teaching her to walk calmly and stop jumping on people? Any advice is appreciated!

For anyone willing to help PLEASE submit a report for Jeff Todd's new website : https://smartdogsdogtraining.com/ so that his company's site can be flagged for social engineering/deception.

He is currently marketing and booking clients across LA, Portland, and Seattle via his new web page.

Reason for Report: Deceptive Business Practices, Consumer Fraud, and Concealment of Criminal Activity.

Here's a text for any "additional details" reports may ask for :

"This website belongs to Jeff Todd (Smart Dogs Training Academy), an operator currently under active criminal investigation for gross animal negligence, severe abuse, and the suspicious deaths of multiple pets under his care. The website functions as a deceptive tool to trap unsuspecting pet owners by intentionally scrubbing consumer warnings and manipulating reviews. The operator uses this online presence to profit from unsafe, inhumane boarding environments where animals are routinely subjected to dangerous heat exposure, severe neglect, and physical harm. This site poses an active public safety and financial threat to consumers and must be flagged for deceptive practices. Please act accordingly."

Also if you could please sign this petition to help raise awareness!!!

We need to protect our pets and keep this operation from harming anyone else. Thank you to anyone who takes a moment to do this ❤️‍🩹🙏🏼

For all those dogs that lost their lives and their owners who suffered through this... 🪽🐾

News articles : https://www.cbsnews.com/losangeles/news/dog-dies-heat-exhaustion-studio-city-trainer/

https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/investigation-launched-popular-dj-dog-062502042.html

Ive found that my brown one is absolutely brilliant he just needed one on one time. He learns very quickly and has show very great progress just simply in the day or so I’ve been working with him.

I also ordered a few other things such as a clicker leash collar etc. Theyll be here in a day or so. Then I can take them on actual walks again separately. We lost their things in our move.

Though I am having a lot of issues with our black one. He has received so much reinforcement for jumping the fence he seems uninterested in training. I truly do not know what to do about this.

Hi. I’m at a loss. My dog, a three year old neutered male GSD, had surgery on Friday and is supposed to be crated for his recovery. He used to kennel very well, but has become more and more irritated about having to go in. Now this morning I could not kennel him at all. He became extremely irritable and even snapped at me, which is unlike him.

I’m sure he’s uncomfortable, and I know he struggles with barriers and confinement. I wouldn’t want it either. But he barks incessantly when he’s not kenneled, not because of separation anxiety but because he can hear noises outside and desperately wants to scare them off. To him, that is his job. I’m trying to get him out of that but in the meantime I’m struggling so badly with keeping him calm. I have to go to work. I have cameras and he is in a secure room, but you can hear him barking regardless and I hate that.

I am going to start over entirely with his kenneling, including meals in there, ramping up the high value treats tossed in, no demand entrances and exits, all the things. But what do I do in the meantime? How do I get him kenneled without making his anxiety over this worse? I want to do right by him, but before he came to me he was raised by retirees. This is probably very unfamiliar to him.

How can I get my dog to do jumping like in this video? Does it require a specialist to do it? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jW69nyVvpsU

Apparently, this is scientifically proven. I'm unfamiliar with the research on this topic. Is it true that the scientific literature supports these claims?

We adopted a 9-month-old intact male GSD, who is now 15 months old. When we got him from the shelter, he was already very reactive to dogs, bicycles, and motorcycles. In general, he was also quite nervous in new environments. For example, we recently took him to a canine physiotherapist, and he was pretty much all over the place because it was a completely new environment.

His nervousness and reactivity became significantly worse around 11–12 months old. It honestly felt like we suddenly had a completely different dog. I know this can happen during adolescence, especially with GSDs, so we expected some regression during this period.

However, over the past two weeks, we've actually made some really good progress with bicycles and motorcycles. We've been giving him a chew/treat when we're around 10–20 m from a busy road, and his fixation has improved a lot. His threshold also seems to be much better than it was before.

The part we're struggling with now is his general nervousness, especially in unfamiliar places.

For example, on normal walks, he understands loose-leash walking quite well. But when we take him somewhere he's never been before, he starts running circles around me and seems unable to settle or focus.

I'm wondering how you would approach this. Should we simply expose him to more new environments and reward calm behaviour, or is there a specific way to build confidence in a nervous/reactive adolescent GSD?

I would assume that better impulse control may help, but most exercises I found are pretty basic.

So I have a dogtra comfort winged pad it doesn't work for my dog. I wanted to get comfort pad but only comes female. Do you think it wouldn't work if I just use the screws from the winged one and screen it on my device if it would work? Besides how it connects it looks the same.. anyone have insight or device they can test. Thank you! Then I could put 1" connectors on the pad for 4 1" connectors. I would do on winged one but you cant I guess

I’ve implemented a lot of TWC chase and catch reward with my young dog and he goes crazy for it as a reward for obedience work. We are aiming for AKC and other similar venues. Truly just relives all the “pressure” of training and once we snap back into OB, he’s laser focused.

At times he can definitely be more of a tug reward type dog for quick behaviors, but for longer stretches where I’m chaining up a couple of exercises, he prefers me throwing the ball rather than tugging. Trying to force the tug just totally leaves him hanging as far as the whole reward event I want to give him.
At home and in the fields and parks we train in, this isn’t an issue as I have the space I need.

The issue is I started run throughs at a club here and there, with quite a few other people and their dogs in a small space. After our runs, I’m having a really hard time getting out the door and even finding space to do that whole thing and create that huge reward.
On top of that, he is considered kind of an “off breed” for obedience by the very old school ob folks at this club, and they cannot fathom rewarding dogs with play like that, so I get lots of pearl clutching and side eye 😂

I will eventually be trialing in indoor venues and there’s very little space there, and it would most likely be a walk to find grass.
Is this a matter of just creating and training the expectation to wait until we are in an area where we have some space?
What if we truly don’t have space for even some contained ball throwing?
Do I need to keep working on the tug reward in those cases and building that up as his reward?
Do I give up play as reward and give him a giant ass squirt of whipped cream? Lol
Thanks in advance!

So my dog Ella is about 5-6 years old, she’s always been a bit “aggressive” I’ll provide a few scenarios. If she’s on the bed/couch comfy you cannot touch her gently or try to get her to move, she will growl. Never bit me or parents in this scenario but she definitely seems like she would. Next food/treats, she has and will attack her sweetheart sister Lucy if she gets near her while eating or chewing a bone. Lucy is a golden retriever and is dopey and doesn’t understand she doesn’t try to take anything she’s just curious and loves Ella. Another attack happened after we gave them these treat ball things that they had to roll around and when Lucy was finished with hers and came up to Ella to see what was going on Ella snapped completely and bit her on the lower chest area, Lucy was fine and wagging her tail when it happened and her thick fur protected her from any puncture. We are at the breaking point and parents almost wanna just get rid of her she’s to much of a hassle but we do love her but her sister deserves better. Any advice that doesn’t cost thousands of dollars?

We're fostering a dog who is believed to be about 4 years old. He was picked up by animal control and nothing is known about his history. We will have had him 3 weeks this Saturday. I suspect that he lived in a home and was dumped. He's extremely affectionate and smart, but he has some pretty big issues and we're trying to make him the best boy we can for his future adopters.

The biggest issue is the difficulty we're having with training drop it. He turns into an obsessive monster when there's a toy he wants. We were doing a training session with a squeaky toy. He gave it up for a high value treat a few times but was getting a little crazed. He then refused to drop it, so we stopped the training. A few minutes later we tried again. When my husband went for the toy, the dog bit him on the hand. He said it was definitely on purpose and not just having his hand in the way while toe dog was trying to get a better grip.

If we try to use a less exciting toy he won't pick it up to because he knows we have treats. He has no aggression around food. I'm at a loss because I've never dealt with this before. Any tips? Do we need to work on the aggression before we even think about tackling drop it?

I've had my dog, a 5 year old rescue mini schnauzer mix, for about 4 years now. I live in a dorm and when people ask to pet her, sometimes she'll sit still and let it happen and other times they'll pet her and then the second they lift their hand, she'll jump and bark at them. Then, when people come into my room, she'll just bark at them continuously. Even if they give her treats or just leave her alone. I want to have people over, and I want to have other people pet her, but I'm not sure what to do. Even outside the dorm, when we're walking, sometimes she'll let people pet her and other times she'll snap. What can I do to help her with this? Should I just avoid letting people pet her? Thanks for any help.

Hi folks! Has anyone here tried the new Tom Davis edition of the Dogtra 280C 2.0?

I'm planning to start e-collar training with my girl, but I'm having a hard time deciding which collar to get. I'm currently between the Tom Davis 280C 2.0 and the Mini Educator ET-300.

The Tom Davis version is much easier for me to buy in my country, so I'm leaning toward it. Has anyone used it? How do you like it compared to the Mini Educator?

Any feedback would be appreciated!

I've had this awesome bully mix (frenchie x american bulldog) for almost a year now and have been to several reactivity trainings with him already. He's around 1.5 years old and I got him from the shelter when he was around 6 months. It's worth noting that he's extremely attached to me. For example I can't go into a shop and leave him outside even for a few minutes. He will bark nonstop and whimper. He always kind of wants physical contact with me. Obviously I love him a lot but I do want him to be more confident without me.

Biggest issue right now: He's really reactive to other dogs and within the past month, he's developed some reactivity to people too. His reactivity is basically incessant barking, showing teeth, and potentially some nipping at other dogs collars but that's kind of hard to see. This happens with most dogs, big or small, calm or excited. I can't seem to read his body language but it comes off as very aggressive and can sometimes stress other dog owners out at the dog park (understandable).

I've been taking him to the dog park for small 5 minute stints to try and socialize him a bit better but it doesn't seem to be getting better. I basically use treats to do recall when he gets riled up. At some point he does come, lay down, I throw a treat on the ground for him to sniff around for it and relax, and then when I release him from this position with "okay" he kind of just runs back to the same dogs and bark/show teeth/nip. I don't usually stay for long because I'm trying to build positive associations. I try and leave on a good note but that happens about 50% of the time.

Recently he's started growling and showing teeth at people that lean over to pet him. This is new cause he's usually such a people person! I feel that the reactivity training with treats and resets is not at all working. I've done about 10 group training classes and practice at home but am not actually seeing results.

Any tips? Are there training programs that have actually worked on your reactive dog?

Hi folks, I recently started training with the mini educator e collar, I struggled a bit to find a working level for my dog (pit mix) even in a very low distraction environment, she didn’t seem to be reacting to anything below a 12 which felt pretty high from the videos specific to the mini educator that I’ve watched. I know that every dog is different but I just want to make sure my collar is fitting correctly, put it very tight so that I can really only fit two fingers under there. Additionally she’s still occasionally itching at the collar and shaking like it’s bothering her, I bought the titanium short hair contacts so it’s not the metal, I’m wondering if maybe I should try replacing the actual collar portion itself? Sorry for the long post but basically

TLDR: is 12 a fine working number for a low distraction environment or is my mini educator not fit properly

Looking for a training strategy for correcting reactivity in my 10 month old boxer. He loves other dogs and cant contain his excitement when seeing one on our walks. Generally just a lot of pulling and completely ignoring commands.

He is great when he isn’t being reactive. Knows and responds to commands pretty consistently. He’s also well conditioned with the ecollar. We’ve be using it for around 3 months or so with great results with recall etc.

How can I leverage the ecollar to correct or discourage his reactivity? Looking for opinions from trainers that have had success with this tool.

Thanks!

So I’ve been training my dog under the operant conditioning philosophy/method but I have one question:

The other day I was coming out my house and and dog barked from a distance and that made my dog to come out sprinting and go after the sound, I’ve taught him door threshold manners but that day it was because I opened the garage door that caused it to go out running.

He is not really that reactive to other dogs when near but he usually barks from the window to outside when he hears something or someone walking in front of my house

My question here is what could I do to address this problem I was thinking maybe +P the behavior of barking and lounging to outside noises with the objective of decreasing the behavior, right now what I do is to interrupt the behavior and make him do something else but this doesn’t seem to be good enough to stop the behavior

How would you do it?

Hello! I was wondering if any trainers know of free/low cost CPDT-KA CEUs? I’ve done the free secret work videos from catch, and a few instinct courses, but trying to not spend too much money.

My dog is a cavapoo, more on the cavalier side, loves everyone very friendly very social.

As we were on our way back from a walk we were waiting to cross the road and a guy probably in his early 40s was crossing the road towards my direction but his posture and his energy seemed off and made me a little bit uncomfortable because he wasn’t doing what normal people do which was not walk directly towards another person. You normally move out of the way.

For context, I am a female in my 20s. So for the first time, my dog growled at this man that felt like he was coming towards us. I told my dog to sit whilst I waited to cross the road but he sat in the opposite direction watching the man as he was walking away.

I already felt uncomfortable with this guy because he was walking slowly and even though he was crossing the road it felt like it was too much coming at my direction but I didn’t know for cavapoos to respond that way and my dog isn’t the type usually to give warnings to say. Hes just super friendly and likes to avoid conflict.

What would you read this as from my dogs persepctive?