I’ve seen lots of posts lately on Ridgeback forums about Ridgebacks needing a ”firm hand” not letting them “dominate” you etc.
As a member of a the Institute of Modern Dog Trainers I follow force free training methods. The ”alpha” dog theory was disproven a long time ago.
I have never raised my voice to Rhea or used any kind of punishment, no matter how mild to train her. She does things because she’s been taught to make conscious decisions, be confident in making them and all of the good behaviours have been reinforced. If I get an unwanted behaviour, I work out what emotion is driving it and fix it, then ask for a behaviour I want. That’s the style I use and encourage others to use. This video wasn’t planned and isn’t a routine I’ve used before. It’s just the result of good communication. No dog needs a firm hand, you just need to both speak the same language. listen to how soft my voice is. This is at dawn, when there are lots of bunnies running around and the spot we are passing is where she’d rolled in fox poo the day before 🦊🤣🤦♀️ A high distraction environment and no force, shouting or raised voices needed.
It’s not always a recall you need! Teaching an emergency stop is a great behaviour to have to call upon. #rhodesianridgeback #ridgebackofinsta #forcefreedogtraining #imdtdogtrainer ##tellingtonttouch
We are often worried about making sure we exercise our dogs enough, practice training, get focus on our walks etc but do you ever just “ take it easy” with your dog? We went for a nice stroll around the park before this and then took to the top of the hump the relax and take in our surroundings. This helps your dog learn to relax in a distracting environment. There were lots of dogs nearby running after their balls, playing with each other and full of energy. Sometimes just stopping and taking the pressure off ourselves and our dogs can help them to relax and ignore the distracting environment around them! #rhodesianridgeback #imdtdogtrainer #tellingtonttouch #ridgebacksofinstagram
I’m doing an experiment. Comment below what you observe in this video. How do you think Rhea is feeling? Tomorrow I will post the answer. You may/may not be surprised by what I say.
Emergency Stop
🐶EMERGENCY STOP 🐶
It’s not always a recall you need. Emergency stops are so helpful.
If your dog runs over to the opposite side of the road, you don’t want to call them back or them run back you.
If they are running towards you and you spot smashed glass on the floor, how handy would it be if you could stop them in their tracks?
A hand signal is a vital part of this as our voices often get lost in the environment.
How to make a toy out of a toilet roll insert.
Does your dog love to rip things up?
This is completely normal dog behaviour. Ripping things up is mimicking the process of dissecting the kill.
Suppressing this may make your dog seek opportunities to dissect elsewhere eg sofa cushions, slippers, trainers etc…
By giving them the opportunity to practice this behaviour in a way that is acceptable to you will help minimise collateral damage!
If this is something your dog enjoys then here’s a cheap and easy toy you can make 🙂 please comment with videos of your dogs enjoying this 😃
Obi’s 1st Loose Lead Walking session
Today I had a session with Obi. A 10 month old Rottweiler.
Obi came to our classes as pup but had now hit adolescence where his hormones are causing him to feel a bit more nervous, apprehensive and he has also developed some noise sensitivity as well as becoming very pully on the lead. All of these things are very common in adolescence.
Today we used a clicker as a reward marker.
What we did
✅ marked all of the good bits Obi offered, every time he looked at his owner she clicked and rewarded.
✅regularly clicked and treated when the lead was loose
✅ if Obi pulled, we stopped, waited for him to look back at owner and clicked and treated whilst moving forward
What Obi is learning is that good things happen when the lead is loose and if he pulls we stop, but if he loosens the lead off he gets to go forward.
If you notice we didn’t ask Obi to do anything. He worked it all out for himself. This means he is making conscious decisions. That’s where the learning happens! So excited to see how this progresses after this first session
What we did not do:
❌ flick the lead or pull back
❌use any form of punishment
❌shout or get frustrated
❌ lure with treats
15 Week old Cece loose lead walking
My clients are smashing their loose lead walking. I love receiving video updates like this! Loose lead walking requires patience, understanding and lots of reinforcement but it’s totally worth it when you get results like this!
No lead corrections, no force, just clear communication and reward.
Bowser 5.5month old Chow Chow Loose Lead Walking
This is Bowser. He’s a 5.5 month old Chow Chow. He’s attended our puppy classes but his owners also wanted some 121s to work on his engagement on lead. If you don’t know about Chow Chows, they are a very independent breed. They don’t crave our affection or attention in the same way our labs and Staffies do. They love to forage and will do so for long periods of time without a care in the world for their human at the end of the lead. Bowser’s owners are happy for him to get all the sniffs he likes in but it used to take them 20 minutes to get down this short path and if Bowser went anywhere near other mess or thing that could be harmful to him they couldn’t call him away. He’s also going to be a big boy so loose lead walking is paramount to prevent being dragged from sniff to sniff or down backings.
Here is a beautiful snapshot of our training walk today.
This was achieved by force free positive reinforcement.
No lead flicking
No shouting
No “showing him who’s boss”
No punishments.
Sometimes Bowser stops on the spot when he sees another dog or human. He’s not “being stubborn”, “acting up” or “being a Diva”
He’s just taking some time to make sure there’s no threat. We let him observe and then regain his focus and move on with reassurance. This builds a confident dog, not a dog that has no choice and gets dragged into situations where they feel uncomfortable.
What we have here between Bowser and his Dad is a wonderful, cooperative and trusting bond. Bowser knows his Dad won’t put him in situations where he feels uncomfortable. He’s given time to take in novel encounters.
A well trained dog is not a dog that can do a 100 tricks, it’s a dog that can carry out the basics well.
Mack practicing hand touch at 9 weeks
Week 2 of Mack’s puppy training sees him practicing hand touch. Such a beneficial behaviour with so many uses. He’s such a fast learner and his guardians are doing a wonderful job keeping up the training in between my visits ⭐️
This is the gorgeous Mack. We had our first 121 earlier this week. He’s 8 weeks old. It’s never too early to start training. This week is just focusing on settling in, toilet training, enrichment and owner focus. I did however throw a sit and recall into the mix aswell. His handler has just sent me this fantastic video of him doing a sit from a recall and finishing with eye contact! Eye contact is such an important part of getting focus from your dog. His handler has brilliant timing with her reward marker followed by the reinforcement. Mack is a clever little chap.
The ethos I go by as a dog trainer is to help owners understand how their dogs are feeling and be able to read the signs and their body language. Once you have a greater under standing of how to understand how your dog is feeling you have a much greater chance of success.
Recognising when your dog is feeling overloaded (this can be with excitement, it doesn’t just happen with nervous dogs) is vital to not setting yourself and your dog up to fail. On a walk just now, Rhea lost her ball in the river, which made her feel like she’d lost the “kill” that she likes to carry, then had some crazy zoomies after finding the scent of a squirrel. Not long after, two dogs crossed our path (I didn’t see or hear them coming) and Rhea went running towards them to play and ignored my recall. The other dogs were off lead and it was a friendly greeting, however I usually always get her back to me before she approaches the off lead dog.
As soon as this happened I put Rhea back on the lead and sprinkled some food to give her time to decompress before we move on. I think you can see from the picture she is fully decompressed 🤣. However, if I hadn’t have done this and carried on, rest assured the next time we encountered a “distraction” it would have been even more chaotic and her focus would have completely gone.
I share this (longwinded) story, only to show you the failures aswell as the successes. We all have things happen to us out on walks that are unexpected or disappointing, but understanding WHY they happened and HOW to manage the situation is what makes you continue to grow as a dog owner 😁
Hugo not reacting to traffic 🥰
This video looks simple but makes me beem with pride!
Only 5 days ago Hugo couldn’t pass any traffic without feeling dreadful about it and subsequently barking and lunging every time a car past. In addition to this he would rush to check under every car and ever driveway as he was constantly on edge.
5 days of working on focus with his owner, counter conditioning and confidence building and look at him now. That white van passing is a particularly huge win for us ! I’m so proud of Hugo and his owner. She has worked so hard with him!
We now need to work on his reactivity to humans and other dogs! Onwards and upwards!
