A New Day Dog Training

08/10/2024

08/10/2024

We need to be proactive owners and not reactive. Working within our dog's thresholds set them up for success.

08/01/2024

07/31/2024

I listened to Jane’s podcast this morning on the beagle puppy who isn’t cuddly with his family and is biting
( at 12 weeks old they are returning him to breeder).
I am a dog trainer of 12 years, taught puppy classes and board and trains for 12 years, as well as many other levels and CGC classes, and evaluated dogs for pet therapy work. Including puppy temperament testing.

This beagle’s story resonated with me as many students had questions about
Their dogs behavior.
The first thing we usually asked them was, "Do you know what your dog was bred to do?"
Had they read the breed standard regarding what the breed was developed to do and the breed behavior expected. ( such as a Border Collie is going to herd)

Janes response was just what I was thinking, a hound is a busy breed, not bred for cuddling, but running and sniffing.
Also, many puppies dont want to be picked up and cuddled a lot, so they struggle and bite.
I also wonder if this family had ever had
Or raised a hound breed before.
I think they expected a cuddly baby and got a velociraptor ( as a lot
of puppies are!!)
Most puppies do outgrow the velociraptor stage, which is part teething and part rowdy kid/ adolescent behavior.

Kudos to Jane for your complete thoughts on the issues the family have and the behavior of this puppy!
Loved the podcast!

07/30/2024

My daughter having some fun with our girl Promise and Hayden that is back for boarding.

*not PG music

07/19/2024

Trainers routinely watch dogs play the game of offering their best to those who demand it and offering something very different to those who don’t.

The sheer number of highly trained dogs running around pretending not to know anything is one of the greatest ruses ever pulled on permissive and/or gullible owners.

This is why your trainer can’t (or shouldn’t) make any guarantees about how the dog will behave with you—because if you won’t hold the dog accountable for what it knows and is capable of, your dog’s “memory” will be impressively brief.

Of course your trainer has to train you as much as they do the dog—or more—but once that knowledge is passed along, only one party can make the new reality… reality.

And yes, you can feel free to substitute child for dog if that helps bring more clarity to this dynamic that you’ve almost certainly seen in other contexts.
——
For seminar or shadow program dates/tickets, training courses and books, or hands-on training (Louisiana and PNW areas) please visit: www.thegooddogway.com

07/17/2024

Albert's recap with his On Leash manners!

*Everything is taught and proofed with a leash.

07/17/2024

How cute are Albert and Ghost!
Albert the Doodle is with us for an Off Leash Board and Train program, and Ghost is back for his Off Leash Program after his 2 week puppy On Leash Board and Train program earlier this year 😉

These 2 pups are doing great and working hard!

07/02/2024

The longer a dog is allowed to marinate in your soft, enabling, indulgent presence, the stronger her association with you becomes, and the taller the mountain you will have to climb to earn any believability and respect.

Training a handful of obedience commands, using tools to help create leverage, and setting limitations on acceptable behavior is actually the easy part. RE-training how your dog views you, and who you are in their world, is the toughest part of your entire journey.

Your dog’s past relation to you—what you’ve allowed repeatedly to occur, and what you’ve prioritized in your relationship (spoiling, affection, playtime, and freedom), needs to be reprogrammed. And your dog is WAY TOO SMART not to make you earn a new understanding of how your interactions affect her.

If your relationship with your dog was heavily skewed to one side—that of play time, freedom, treats, food, and a ton of affection—she saw you in the only perspective you’ve had to offer—soft, accommodating, and in need of a credible leader. This one-dimensional relationship undoubtedly fueled her stress and anxiety, as she took on the burden of Leader.

Removing unearned privileges and excessive freedoms may shift the way your dog currently views you. But a dog used to getting away with whatever she fancies will make you scratch and claw your way to believability in order to completely reverse her perception of the softy she was so habituated to taking advantage of.

Basic Obedience, rules, boundaries, and limitations are the easiest and quickest part of this whole equation. But training for respect, and for your dog to look at you through a new lens, typically takes a lot more time, and most definitely a commitment to consistency.

06/15/2024

In a world saturated with polarization and discord, we humans find ourselves desperate to connect, to be loved, and to be seen. Instead of turning to each other for adoration, we turn to the next best thing — our furry friends.

Overwhelmed and overworked, we lean heavily on our dogs to fill an emotional void that cannot be found from our human counterparts.

What’s wrong with this you ask...

Well, when our dogs personify so much more than simply being the family pet, Leadership, structure, and rules become nearly impossible to share. We see freedom, affection, and play as more vital than guidance or boundaries — forgoing the very thing that that makes our dogs most happy, balanced, and comfortable.

Our dogs need guidance and leadership as desperately as we humans feel the need to connect. So if we could put our selfishness aside for just a moment, and Lead our dogs just a bit more by prioritizing they be well mannered and respectful, then we would inevitably create the deeper connection we all so fiercely desire.

-Heather Arthur

05/05/2024

Words lose value in numbers — the more you use them, the less meaningful they become. Used excessively, they become mindless chatter, diluting their effectiveness, and ultimately escaping our attention to take them more seriously.

Dogs are no different.

Far from the depth and romance language has human to human, for dogs, words are merely sounds without meaning — that is until we attach an action to them. Dogs are much better at interpreting our emotional temperature and body language, and will relate better without long-winded conversation.

It makes perfect sense then, to use less words to improve our non-verbose communication. Repeating a command 5, 6, 7 times doesn’t make it’s meaning more clear. You will find using physical cues and body language way more effective. Try avoiding throwing out arbitrary commands and verbiage. This will allow you to be more present and in tune with your dog’s needs.

Speak less, and your dog will listen and watch you more.

You may miss your chatty conversation with your dog more than they do. But your relationship will grow in ways you wouldn’t have necessarily have thought possible.

-Heather Arthur

05/01/2024

One of the very best things an owner can get out of high quality training is a clear insight as to what their dogs are truly capable of.

Great trainers can leverage the right tools, training, and mindset to find answers that many owners would otherwise not find on their own. And even though it’s only a piece of the solution—knowing what is and isn’t possible—is an awfully important piece.

Once an owner sees what is possible, then it is up to them (with the guidance of their trainer) to become the equal of their goals and challenges with their dog. This almost always includes immense amounts of mental, emotional, and physical effort. Skills have to be learned, new ways of thinking and acting have to be developed, and lifestyle needs to be adjusted.

Of course this is a tall order. In the same way that most everyone would love to be in great shape, be financially abundant, and have great relationships with friends and family… these accomplishment all require great effort, great sacrifice, and longterm discipline and commitment.

And because we all know how us humans are wired—instant gratification with longterm costs almost always beat out delayed gratification with longterm benefits—we find most humans know precisely what’s needed, but find that cost simply too high to pay.

So when we proclaim how much we desire to transform our dogs and their behavior, it’s best, if we want to avoid appearing foolish and hypocritical, that we first examine how much of ourselves and our behavior that we’re truly willing to transform.

Said another way, don’t complain about the results you didn’t get from the actions you didn’t take. The results are waiting for you, but only come when you’ve become their equal. ❤️

04/14/2024

You’ve put your dog in a Down command. You walk into the next room for a second, get side tracked with something that needs to get done, and that sneaky little turd has his head in the laundry basket. He’s so discrete, you don’t even notice until he approaches you while licking the remnants of your favorite pair of socks from his mouth. You vaguely remember putting him in that Down 5 minutes earlier, and now realize you’ve missed your opportunity to correct him for breaking command.

Whether you’re paying attention or not, your dog always is.

Dogs aren’t deliberately trying to be bad. They are 100% self serving opportunists that shape their world to get the most pleasure our of every moment. They are always seeking the path of least resistance with an uncanny skill at sniffing it out.

Your dog will seize any opportunity to get what they want if not met with a valuable enough consequence for him to make a better choice when you’re not paying full attention.

Tiny, little, missed opportunities of correction like this will stack and compound and lead your dog to seize the moment of ease, every single chance he can get. When, BAM! You’re now dealing with a dog that is not only practicing bad habits, but he’s also learned that your “No” isn’t all that believable.

Make sure your relationship is consistently binary - rules are black and white - until you see consistent, good behavior all of the time, not just here or there. Gray - the area where allowances occur - creates confusion and will stack to create that monster that is always pushing boundaries to see what he can get away with.

04/01/2024

The human interpretation of LOVE—gobs of treats, loads of affection, lots of playtime, and unrestricted freedom—isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach to happiness.

On the contrary, this misinformed, yet easy assumption, oftentimes will create the exact opposite for the more emotionally challenged—higher stress, higher anxiety, heightened arousal, hyper-territorial, overly protective, and intensely possessive.

What’s easy (and the most rewarding to us) isn’t always what’s best.

For the rare dog that needs little instruction or accountability, you may be able to get away with your selfish indulgences. But for the majority of dogs out there, the easy for us can create a real mess of a dog when the relationship is skewed heavily to the softer side.

Dogs carrying any emotional baggage need a more personalized, counterbalanced version of LOVE—one nuanced with a balance of soft when earned, and stern when appropriate.

There is no cut and dry, one-size-fits-all approach to raising a well-behaved dog.

Each dog requires a tailor-made version that serves both the needs of the dog, as well as the needs of the human. YOUR job is to know where your dog falls on that personality spectrum, and to provide a very balanced approach to expressing your LOVE, and as a result, creating true happiness and stability.

03/15/2024

All puppies have at least two of them...

Fear periods, that is.

The 1st starts around 10-12 weeks of age, and is when your new puppy starts getting super curious of its surroundings. Her senses are developing fast, and she’s now becoming more acutely aware of her environment and everything that goes along with it.

During the 1st, your puppy may be knee-deep within this stage, and may already be exhibiting strong fear-based reactions to things she’s never seen before. This can range from mild reactions to sounds of traffic, shuffling feet, to large inanimate objects causing her to put on the brakes, tuck and hide, or even huff and puff. What’s important at this stage of development is our intervention and advocacy. Without it, what you see as comical and even silly reactions to the a garbage can, a fire hydrant, or the balloons strung to your neighbor’s mailbox, can turn into all out explosions when the next fear period takes hold.

When we neglect to INTERVENE or INTERRUPT a fear-based reaction cycle to a trigger, a dog will become conditioned to the “expectation” of fear that a trigger elicits. Suspicion can come to a head, as each an every moving or inanimate object becomes a new target.

ALLOWING fear-bases reactions means further reinforcement of them...

Which begets you stronger emotional responses as time goes on. Allowing your dog to act like a madwoman in one scenario will have her acting like one to just about any trigger. The longer a dog is allowed to practice these fear-based behaviors, the more difficult it is to break through the habitual cycle and reset.

In order to STOP the cycle, the choice to REACT negatively needs to be addressed & blocked.

This may seem completely contradictory to most, but the reality is that correcting your dog’s fear-based reaction actually helps her work through her anxiety rather than wallow within it. It is far more hurtful to allow your dog to remain in an endless cycle of stress and anxiety than it is for you stop the pattern, stop the cycle, and replace it with a healthier choice and a new feeling about what typically triggers that reaction.

Through strong leadership, where choices and reactions are molded and guided by the human in charge, a puppy will learn that the world is actually a fascinating and wonderful place to explore, and that not every snap-crackle-pop is out to get her

-Heather Arthur

03/14/2024

Had a great night with Sasha and Boujee's owners! We now have 2 reliable off leash huskys! We absolutely loved hanging out in the front yard with both girls last night!

03/08/2024

SLOW is hard, FAST is easy—for dogs that is.

One of the most often heard complaints I hear from dog owners is in their dog’s inability to shut down, turn off, and be chill, for even a minute. And of the most often misunderstood ways of achieving a place of serenity is through copious amounts of daily exercise in hopes of tiring or exhausting the overly rambunctious.

But let me ask you this... how do you think athleticism, stamina, or endurance are achieved? You’d work out, right? Pushing or sustaining your physical abilities consistently, day to day, so that you become stronger, faster, and even more resilient as time goes by. Your exercise routine becomes so addictive because of how it makes you feel, that you crave it the next day!

Adrenaline ju**ie.

Well peeps, our dogs are no different. We exercise them for what seems like hours, they crash for a minute, but then are juiced up, crazed, and still misbehaving an hour later.

While exercise is incredibly important for our pets, so is doing NOTHING AT ALL. Think about what you do to unwind at day’s end—read, watch TV, meditate, rest.

No different than us, dogs need the other side of the coin to be truly balanced—a reprieve from the go-go-go where they learn to relax and be calm.

Although your dog cannot read, or meditate, so to speak, there are several things you can instill that will reap similar benefits:

— Slow your walks down! This will work far more in your favor than a 5 mile run by working your dog’s brain versus her body—and this is where real exhaustion occurs.
— Teach your dog the Place Command. Few things will dramatically transform your dog’s behavior as duration in this command alone.
— Only offer resources or rewards when your dog is displaying calm behavior.
— Correct all over the top shenanigans. It’s your duty to teach your dog what’s acceptable or not. Mouthing, jumping, zooming, barking while indoors shouldn’t be allowed.
— YOU need to chill out as well! If you’re always on edge, anxious, stressed, and jerky, your dog will certainly pick up on your energy.

But if there is ONE THING that works above all others it is the Place Command. Place teaches independence, boundaries, impulse control, and relaxation. Whether your dog suffers from separation anxiety, over rambunctiousness, is always getting into trouble when free-roaming, paces from window to window, this command will help regulate his state of mind.

So instead of building that super athlete that needs more and more and more to get his fix, try SLOWING your dog down instead! I promise, it’s magical.

03/05/2024

Ms. Sasha!

02/29/2024

Beau was such a good boy today on his field trips!

I think someone is ready for Spring 🪷🌷🪻🌼🌺

02/29/2024

Lot's of distraction training today for Mr. Beau!

02/24/2024

If your dog abuses the freedom you’ve graciously allowed him to have, it’s time to start controlling the one resource that should be earned above all others.

Space.

You know... the stuff that surrounds you and your dog within your home;)

IT should be considered a valuable resource used to control your dog’s behavior. Freedom to explore that space should only be granted to those that know how to manage themselves within it accordingly. Given free reign without having proven capable, or having earned it, will inevitably bring you an avoidable migraine.

Restricting your dog’s freedom in order to cultivate a safer, more balanced living environment, is neither cruel or mean. Setting boundaries, and sharing consequences for breaking them within your living space, are necessary ingredients for peace and harmony.

Consumed with the desire to always make our dogs happy and comfortable, we grant them privileges that should otherwise be earned. Unintentionally reinforcing bad behavior through unearned privileges can turn the small, annoying stuff potentially dangerous down the road—where now the incessant barking turns into ankle biting.

So... If your dog habitually makes unsavory choices within your living arrangement, the last thing he should be granted is the “freedom” to explore his options. Define your rules, hold him accountable to them, pattern for healthier choices, and demand respect before considering doling out one of your most powerful resources.

-Heather Arthur

02/23/2024

Boujee having fun off leash!

02/22/2024

Better version of find Beau 🤣

02/22/2024

Where is Beau? Can you spot him?

02/21/2024

Boujee has been working in her offlesh and ecollar knowledge! From crazy, uncontrolled and nosey to calm, collected and chill 😉😎

02/20/2024

Mr. Beau chilling on place with Ms. Promise (my 7 year couch queen 🤣)