S.V. Namibia

21/05/2024

Mark your calendars! Two Championship Dog Shows are hitting Windhoek!

21/05/2024

🐾🏆 Get ready for the Hochland & Windhoek Dog Clubs’ Championship Shows! 📅

Join us on Saturday, 27th July 2024, at the GSD Club Grounds, Frankie Fredericks Drive, Olympia, Windhoek.

Don't miss out—entries close at midnight on Tuesday, 23rd July 2024! 🐶✨

21/05/2024

🐾✨ Say goodbye to hassle and hello to convenience! 🌟

Register now at www.showassist.co.za to enter your furry friends for the 2 Championship shows in Windhoek on 27 July 2024.

Track results effortlessly and enjoy the efficiency of our new innovative system. All entries for this year's shows must be done via the website. 🐶🏆

18/04/2024

Training will be offered on an ongoing basis starting this Saturday.

Not sure what "showing" is all about, come and find out!

11/03/2024

Our first open show for 2024 is approaching fast!

06/03/2024

29/01/2024

Important Notice - AGM 2024

27/01/2024

First fun show of the year done and dusted. There will surely be many more this year! Thank you for the great support we received from our members aswell as our sponsors! Namely: Hill's , NamibianPet, Gernot Rust, Anette Starke, Florian Dillmann, Gerlind Haukambe, Anuschka Coehlo, Jackie van der Merwe, Erika Neumann, Lloyd Londt, Marianne McKenzie and many more. The SVN Club highly appreciates all your efforts and time spent!

26/10/2023

26/05/2023

Windhoek Dog Club Championship Show hosted by Hochland Dog Club

13/10/2022

The moment you have all been waiting for!

12/12/2021

When people get a new dog, everyone talks about puppyhood, the does and don’ts, how to deal with specific puppy issues. People will prepare themselves for the first few challenging months with a puppy.

The mess, chaos and sleepless nights are generally overshadowed by the cute fluffy cuddles and the expectation that it won’t last for too long. Your eager little puppy will start to master toilet training, sleeping through the night, basic skills and even recall, but then adolescence hits.

For some it hits like a bus, but very few people talk about adolescence.

Adolescence is a really hard and trying time for both dog and owner. For owners, it can be really frustrating, as your puppy that was making loads of progress can suddenly stop, and even regress in some areas. Some of the behaviours that were adorable as a tiny puppy, become annoying and rude by a dog who is a lot bigger. With the largest number of dogs being placed into rescue during adolescence.

From roughly 5-6 months until around 18-24 months, your puppy is no longer a puppy, but rather a teenager. This can look very different in different dogs. Some may become more anxious, or fearful, some more reactive to things, others over confident, and for some lucky owners their dog will remain easy going and steady.

For the dog, adolescence is a really difficult period to navigate through, there are so many changes with hormones, genetic drives, even the brain structure and a second fear period, all happening simultaneously.

Hormones play a bit part into the development and sexual maturity of a dog. For female this may be a season and potential subsequent phantom pregnancy, this may result in dramatic behaviour changes. For males, they have the highest level of testosterone in their body, than at any other time in their life, even adulthood, and you may find your adolescent male starts to become more aggressive particularly toward other entire male dogs.

You may find that certain innate behaviours get “switched on” and become more easily triggered. So with Collies you may find that your dog starts to herd more things, and becomes more reactive to things.

Your dogs behaviour may also change, there are a number of behaviours associated with adolescence such as:
- Increased independence, some may label this stubbornness.
- Decreased responsiveness to trained cues
- Increased impulsivity
- Increase in energy
- Gender specific behaviours (i.e scent marking)
- Exacerbation of existing patterns (i.e Destructive behaviour, reactivity, fear based behaviours, excessive barking, compulsive behaviours etc)

During adolescence the brain structure changes and develops into a mature brain. New neural pathways are made, and others are lost, even ones that you use regularly, infuriatingly. Your dog may become more reactive, the reason for this is that the inhibitory neurons of the amygdala don’t fully mature until the end of adolescence, these help to dampen down emotional responses. You may find that they become more sensitive to things, and remember negative things more than previously, this is because extinction memory is impaired during this period, which means your dog is more likely to create fear memories due to a bad experience. The training you do with your dog may feel like you’re taking one step forward, but two steps back, this is because there is a decrease in the communication between the frontal cortex and amygdala, this is a key component for skills training.

It is important to try have patience and compassion, for both your dog and yourselves, as you guide and support your dog through this sensitive developmental period.

29/01/2021

Puppies having fun at Puppy class:)

17/01/2021

Over 160mm have fallen so far at the club, our lawn is looking great and ready for many training classes to come! Looking forward to seeing everyone back at training next week🐶

28/06/2020

Socialization... it's probably not what you think it is.

Dogs go through a critical period of development that lasts roughly from 3 weeks-16 weeks of age. In this time, they're forming ideas and opinions about the world around them; good and bad. They're developing social bonds, and learning how their behaviour impacts other living creatures.

A dog that has a quality socialization program is one that will reach its fullest genetic potential.

Socialization is about giving them the tools and outlook on life to navigate through our society with minimal stress to themselves and others... now to my point.

If your entire plan for socializing your puppy is taking it to puppy classes, puppy play parties or the dog beach, you are GOING to have problems. Unfortunately, the idea that puppy-puppy or puppy-dog interactions constitute 'socialization' has been continually force fed to well-meaning, but misinformed pet professionals.

Either two things will come of such a plan...

1. Your puppy meets the wrong dog and has a bad experience. Bad experiences are just as bad as no experiences. A bad experience during the critical period can result in lasting negative impressions and behavioural problems; namely, fear and aggression.
2. Your dog has a positive experience. And that positive experience creates a positive value for other dogs. And their positive value out-competes the puppy's value in you. Doesn't sound that bad?

As it stands, the second problem is waaaay more common than the first. Right now, the issues associated with an extreme positive value in other dogs is taking up probably 70-80% of my workload. What issues are they, you ask?

- Inconsistent Recalls
- Poor Leash Walking Skills
- Reactivity (sometimes eventuating into aggression)
- What many refer to as 'selective deafness'; *Fido is perfect when it's just us, but as soon as he sees another dog...*

Just to name a few. And the thing is, most owners see all that 👆 as the problem. When in fact, it's just the various symptoms of the real problem; a poorly structured socialization program that's resulted in their dogs developing a TONNE of value in other dogs, and comparatively little in them. The owner. The one that feeds, walks, plays and loves them.

And the thing is, it's not the owner's fault. It's my own industry's. Other trainers. Well-known, well-read sciency-folk. And I don't know why other people aren't seeing the correlation. I very rarely see behavioural cases that stem from a LACK of experience, but that overwhelming stem from an extremely skewed socialization picture.

I'm sure the word 'socialization' is the problem too. It implies *social* experiences and interactions. When really we can broadly divide 'socialization' into social and environmental experiences. And of the 'social' experiences, MOST should entail NO direct interaction.

While a lot is missing from most owner's socialization programs, that's probably the biggest thing; they've never given value to themselves, particularly in the presence of other dogs. A huge part of what I do with my personal dogs is to take them around other controlled dogs, and pay them for looking at me. In their head, they're learning that other dogs are good (socialization), and that when they're around, I'm going to pay them really good stuff. Here, I'm giving myself value. I'm building the puppy's engagement in me.

Thus, what often becomes a distraction and a constant thorn in the side of obedience and manners, now becomes a cue to focus on me.

The graph below is an example of a (not very detailed) socialization plan. The exact percentages will differ between puppies a great deal, but the main point to note is that MEETING OTHER DOGS and MEETING PEOPLE constitute a tiny fraction of the whole shebang. And that ratio will stay relatively consistent across the board.

I'm not offering nor recommending any puppy classes anymore, with the exception of . I'm now offering private lesson programs which I've found to be infinitely more successful in preparing puppies for life. If you're after a class environment, I'd also recommend you check out . And for online training purposes (for my remote followers) check out by

27/06/2020

Clean up Day in full swing. Thank you to all our eager helpers!

19/06/2020

The compassion and empathy of a dog knows no bounds. It comes quite naturally to them as they’re the type of animal who will happily go out of their way to help other animals in need. When Sarge’s owner, Cheryl, brought a little orphaned fawn home, the dog was quick to intervene.

05/06/2020

We are excited to announce that all our classes are open for training again🐕
Please note that all persons entering the premises have to adhere to the health and safety measures currently in place under the Covid 19 Lockdown Level 3 regulations.

27/05/2020

"Dogs don't understand don't, because don't is a concept. Dogs understand DO. They understand behaviours. Create a behaviour that you DO want, so that your dog can be right and you're setting him up for reinforcement. This makes for a much better relationship for you and your dog, and for anybody else who comes in contact with your dog."

22/05/2020

Something to think about when you are choosing the right breed for you and when you are training a dog. Choose wisely and train wisely 🐶

23/03/2020

20/01/2020