Woof Social Club US

31/08/2021

Punishment is scientifically tested and it works.

By punishment, I mean anything which makes a behaviour less likely to happen again. Punishment is not only against my values but has lots of side effects in training.
Having a dog who pulls at the lead is very annoying, I know. So, let's say, you decided to use a head collar to stop your dog from doing that. Innocently, you buy the equipment believing the dog won't feel any discomfort or pain. This just, magically, stop your dog from pulling.
As soon as you go on the streets, your dog sees another dog and gets super excited, pull in the lead and the dog feels a pain in the neck and his head turns away by itself. Very odd! Your dog doesn't understand, get confused, come back to your side and keep walking towards the park. You think "Wow, this really works".
Around the main road, your dog sees another dog, he tries to walk faster to reach the other dog and feels that pain in the neck again. "What's happening today? I don't understand. «Frustrated, your dog comes back to your side.» By the 34th time your dog sees another dog and feel the pain in the neck, he's 100% sure!
This is how it's born reactivity! Amazing stuff. Now, human not only has a loose leash walking problem to solve but lunging, barking and biting issues as well. The human will say «Last week my dog was ok and suddenly he became aggressive for no reason».
Just because it works doesn't mean you should use it. All the things you need to teach your dog can taught with positive reinforcement, which has no side effect, apart from having a happy and obedient dog.
Which habit would you like to change in your dog?

31/08/2021

Being ignored by your own dog, worse feeling!

When I first started training recall with my dog and couldn’t get his attention, it was so frustrating! “You know this”, I kept telling myself. Have you ever felt like your training isn’t working? When we feel like this we don’t see things clearly. We tend to get stuck at those stories we tell to ourselves.
The most difficult (and essential!) part at this stage is to change the strategy completely.
If something isn’t working, why to keep making the same mistake? The best thing to do is change your ways! A couple of years ago when I started training recall with Marvin, he used to ignore me to play with all the other dogs in the park. But something changed. I rearranged my training, I changed my set up, I created motivation and ta-da! All of the sudden, I was the most important topic in his agenda. He would disengage from anything and anyone to come when called. I could see, he was doing so much effort to attend to all my calls.
If you’re struggling with recall, my recommendation is to change your training. Everyone thinks that recall is all about calling the dog and handing treats. Actually, it’s much more sophisticated than that. I passionate about using science based methods to understand the dog’s behaviour and create a training that works for you and your dog.
If you want to learn more about how use science to make your dog to have a reliable recall, go to the link on bio and sing up for the free class “How to train your dog to do pawsome recall?”.

31/08/2021

The dogs' eyes are always on the prize while training. You know their real motivation.

Dogs don't do anything because they love you and deffo they don't do it to please you. They do it for the reward, the consequence. Treats are the reason they learn something new, but also it's what maintains the behaviour strong.
If you reward every single time you ask for something, the cue will be powerful, reliable and rewarding itself. You'll have to train long enough and often enough to have this effect, but it'll pay off, I promise.
Doing this, they will have a reflex for each cue. No dog should think if he/she will come back to you or not. They should enthusiastically run towards you. However, this only will happen when they have a strong connection in the brain between the cue and the movement. Until you get there, your dog will do only for the treats. The treats are essential to creating these rock-solid responses.
In this photo, there’s Marvin and the pile of fur I brushed off him. When I started cooperative care, he used to allow me to do it but not being very keen on it. I used to feel impressed with the amount of treat I had to use and how short was the duration he allowed me to do it. On this day, we had friends at home and to calm him down, I was brushing him. It became a rewarding experience itself.
Now I want to know about your training. Which cues you're having trouble to maintain or teach? I love hearing what you have difficulties with, this way I can help you more.

31/08/2021

Bad recall is the most dangerous lack of training.

We need to train the dogs to live our life style and follow our rules, right? To have fun in the park and to exercise your dog properly your dog needs to be off lead. The fact we need to allow them to run free give us a big responsibility: train recall.
Allowing them off lead before the recall is 100% is extremely reckless and can end badly.
So many dogs get lost and have accidents because of poor recall. Even when they are not off lead things can go wrong and a disaster can happen, like in Zowie's example. I know and train her to be more confident for a couple of years now. Her parents are the best guardians, super responsible and caring. But in an unlucky day she got spooked, slip away from the harness, got hit by a car and ran desperate home. She got traumatised by the experience and until now we work on confidence building in the outside world. If they only had a rock-solid recall, they could have able to catch her attention and have avoid this traumatic event.
This is why I feel so strongly about recall. It has no must applicability! it can save you from so many stressful situation. I believe it should be the number 1 priority in training when you get a dog.
If you just got a dog, puppy or rescue make this your priority! And if your dog is a bit hit in miss in recall training, let's make this reliable so you can ensure your dog's safety and have control over the situation.

31/08/2021

Expert - Pat Grechi part 2

31/08/2021

Hey Guys, I’m Pat Grechi! ✋I’m the experts of Woof Social Club!
I am the person to help guide you in the dog training world.
I believe in fear-free dog training and only use positive reinforcement methods.
I am originally from Brazil, but now live in London with my English partner and have helped more than 600 dog guardians to live easier and happy lives with their furry friends in both countries.
Aside from practical experience, I also have wide-ranging knowledge of behaviour modification with diplomas from the courses 'Learning, Motivation and Reinforcement' (IMDT) and 'Living and Learning with Animals' (Behavious+works, Susan Friedman).
As well as certificates from the following IMDTB courses:
☑️Positive reinforcement
☑️Canine aggression and Rehab
☑️Impulsive control
☑️Behavioural Consultations
☑️Separation anxiety
☑️Resource guarding
☑️Dog to human aggression
☑️Abnormal repetitive behavior

31/08/2021