What the Pup

08/26/2024

A very Happy National Dog day💙🩷💚

08/05/2024

Having a great time training Mochi to stay on her climb/place. It's been a lot fun. Even though she's very hot, she's still working hard to focus

04/29/2023

Plant guide from Home Depot for dog owners!

05/21/2022

Bees are critical to our planet! Highland Canine Connect is training a bee detection dog to help locate and provide info on these essential pollinators.

03/10/2022

A picture is worth 1000 words

I can’t keep my dog because….
We just don’t have time for them.
We have to move.
We just had a new baby.
We don’t have a big enough home.
The kids don’t help anymore.
The kids are allergic.
The dog is too hyper.
The dog is too lazy.
The dog is having trouble housetraining.
The dog got too big.
The dog escapes out of our yard.

EXCUSES. All of them. If your pet means enough to you, you will find a way.
if the Ukrainians can do it, so can you.

Pray for the people and animals in the Ukraine.
🇺🇦🐾🌻

08/14/2021

Sierra💜 and Poodie ❤️

07/08/2021

06/22/2021

06/22/2021

06/19/2021

Wow 🥰

“We wish the woman involved all the best in her recovery,” the agency said.

06/17/2021

Read about the experiences of service dog owners in our 2021 Service Dog Accessibility Survey.

06/07/2021

This is so well so

To bring everyone up to speed, there is a toxic, social war going on between the Pure Positive/Force Free movement and Balanced Training. One of these bodies is massively funded and out to dictate how you train your dog. But don’t get fooled by the pretty language and perfectly-placed buzz words..

“Animals have never learned through punishment or consequences”
“Don’t train with pain”
“Reward what you like, ignore what you don’t”
“Dominance and force in dog training creates stress and fear”
“This dog just needs medication”

I’ll be honest, “Positive-only” sounds pretty great on paper, but practically? Not so much.

News flash: “Purely Positive” anything doesn’t exist. Life, parenting, career, school, nature, it all has consequences and it all has pressure. And if you want to talk about the quadrants of consequences, There’s FOUR. Yep, PP/FF peeps pick and choose which quadrants they want to train with. Balanced trainers use what works. We implement a holistic approach.

Rewards = information
Punishment = information

Information and communication are how dogs (and humans) learn. Punishment is NOT abuse.

If I’ve lost you in all of this chaos, allow me to break it down: Rewarding a behavior will encourage repeating, punishing a behavior will deter. These PP/FF folks are trying to change that.

The ban on these tools is coming. The ability to train how you want is being argued. The ability to use certain tools is being argued. The ability to say “no” to your dog is being argued.

So this post is to raise awareness as to what’s going on out there. I’m sharing my thoughts and stories because spreading the truth, sharing content and success is how I bring value to this community. My clients and followers are my motivation. I believe in these tools because I’ve seen them work, time and time again. Believe me, we were there one day. Stuck, stressed and struggling feeling like everything we tried with our dog wasn’t working. Trainers had failed us and it was incredibly crippling.

These tools and training methods have saved my dogs lives along with so many others, and I don’t want that to be taken from us. This current debate has really taken away from the dogs (and the training). Have we forgotten our mission? To help dogs, to clear shelters and empower owners to succeed.

Myself and all other balanced trainers have to deal with the constant hate, negativity and criticism from the PP/FF body. “Death before discomfort” is especially unsettling to me, and this idea is the reason so many dogs are being killed for no reason.

It’s time we stand up and share our success. Our rights are being stripped and our dogs are suffering.

P.S. Any hate or bashing will not be deleted, rather exposed. So watch your words :)