David Kaye's Kaye-Nine Training School

12/17/2024

Frankie is a six month old extreme PTSD fear based non-aggressive Great Dane that was never socialized and kept in a small enclosure. When we started yesterday he was completely dysfunctional and we could not get him out of his jeep. And when we did finally get him out he was screeching and crying in fear. Was one of the saddest cases I’ve ever seen. Today we can get him out of the Jeep and we can walk him loose on the leash. All we’re trying to do is sensitize and countercondition his fear by teaching him to release leash pressure on a martingale and by getting him around other dogs. The only positive reinforcement we have to use is our reassurance to make him feel safe. This is remarkable progress after one exposure to our pack. Small steps, Incremental gains, that’s all we’re looking for at this stage. We call this progress. Go Frankie! 

12/13/2024

This is Young Vincent Bernese Mountain dog mixed with a little bit of Great Pyrenees. He is fear based, sensitive, insecure and it’s wired into him. We need to desensitize and counter condition it. While he does have a food drive it is easily superseded by his fear rendering it less relevant. This doesn’t mean we can’t train him. It Just means we have to use a leash and martingale with the food. Every dog is different. Go Vincent! 

12/13/2024

This is 20 week old Emmie Golden. Don’t be fooled by her soft and sensitive side. She’s a full Drive, full energy Golden that jumps incessantly, mouths your hands and has a voracious food drive. We are able to lure and mold with food very quickly and easily. Her progress is instant. Not all dogs can do this. Fear. sensitivity and insecurity will often times supersede the food drive rendering it less relevant. Not with Emmie!  We need to stop her jumping and mouthing and channel her drive and energy into performance. What a great start. This will be a high-performance girl. Go Emmie!

12/11/2024

The second dog is Dewey Ridgeback. He also has extensive fear but the big difference with this dog is that his food drive is voracious and this makes it much easier to work with him. After five days of training, we are on our second day of remote and he looks much better. It’s important not to rush when desensitizing and counterconditioning fear. Go Dewey!

12/11/2024

Two different fear based dogs that we are training this week. First is Kennedy Mini Goldendoodle. Her fear is extensive and wired into the dog. We started five days ago by desensitizing encounter conditioning. She had no food drive. Only now can we work her through her fear. This is nice progress. Go Kennedy!

12/08/2024

12/08/2024

Can you believe they wanted to euthanize this young man? His progress has been fast and furious. Turns out he was just another misunderstood, frustrated, fear based, high drive dog. Dunkin has made outstanding progress. This is all off leash with food only positive reinforcement. But we’re not out of the woods yet. While we have successfully re-trained the owners, all we have to do now is reconnect them on the other side with different tools, training and philosophy. This is not a cure. It’s a way to fulfill and manage his drive. We will most likely need to add remote, but we’re going to see where the owners re-connect with him first. His home environment will have to be counterconditioned. All the same triggers will exist. We will just be implementing different rules, boundaries and limits in exchange for the value instead of giving the value away for free. We will no longer allow the dog to guard. Go Dunkin!

12/05/2024

This is extreme fear work with a Southern Blend Herding Mix that bites people, dogs and transfer bites his owner. It was recommended by the local veterinarian, animal control officer and K9 handler to euthanize this dog. Why then are we successful with Dunkin right out of the box? Because we understand his psychology and we did not do his initial evaluation on his home turf where he is overconfident, guards, and has a bad relationship with his owner. Instead, we start on neutral ground. We then take the time to learn the psychology of the dog, the psychology of the owner and the psychology of their relationship first. We then use the proper value to train the dog in exchange for performance. The results were instant in this case. We cannot fix them all, but we can recognize pretty quickly if we can help or not. This is a dog and a relationship that we can help. Go Dunkin!

11/17/2024

Unwinding more extreme non-aggressive fear in a four-year-old German Shepherd. If Gracie is non-aggressive why is she dog aggressive when with her owner? Because her owner became afraid to be around dogs due to aggression and started the steep decline by under fulfilling her natural drive. Then she let the fear over attach to her without clear rules boundaries or limits That’s when he dog started to guard her. This is very predictable. Here we unwind it all with one exposure. We can help both the dog and her owner. Go Gracie!

11/17/2024

More fear work. Tilley rescue has extreme dog aggressive when with her owner yet after just one day she is fully adjusted and acclimated with our pack. We’ve said it before, and we will say it again and again. This is not a dog issue! It’s a relationship issue. The owner inadvertently taught her dog that her dog’s job is to guard her. This happens when the owner transfers her fear directly to the dog with poor leash/ communication skills. We will have to retrain the owner. Go Tilley!

11/14/2024

11/05/2024

This is far too frequent. An owner pays a fortune (over $6000) to have a German Shepherd dog trained. The trainer half trains the dog and never trains the owner. What do you get with a half trained German Shepherd and an untrained owner? You get absolutely nothing from the dog. This starts your decline. The dog starts getting reactive on walks because he’s under fulfilled and the owner has poor leash/remote skills exacerbating the problem and accelerating the decline. Six weeks later? it’s like the dog was never trained. That’s what we have here. But this dog‘s temperament is magnificent! Good thing for the owner. We have to stop the decline, flood his Prey Drive and retrain the owner how to use the remote more effectively to be successful here. Go Bode! 

10/26/2024

Mango’s first trip in public to the Mill Shops. We’ve desensitized. We’ve counter conditioned. We’ve built his confidence and reduced his sensitivity. It’s not a cure. It’s a way to fulfill and manage his drive. Go mango!

10/24/2024

Advanced fear work with an unbalanced, insecure, low self-esteem Saint Bernard rescue that is already over-attached and lunging. Her progress is instant by simply separating her from the owner, fulfilling her drive and giving her some direction. Go Maeve!! 

10/20/2024

It does not take long to counter-condition and desensitize a fundamentally sound German Shepherd that has simply gone a stray due to lack of leadership. 10 month old Mango GSD is just that. Fundamentally sound, kind, loving, eager to please and non-aggressive. He became fearful, reactive and aggressive not from any fundamental flaw in his breeding, but rather from a poor relationship with his owners, a lack of socialization and an over-stimulating home environment instead. Some of the highest distraction we can work a dog under is an over-attached dog that hasn’t seen its love object owners for almost a week. Mango is ready for the challenge and after just five days he passes with flying colors. This is a different dog. We are successfully changing his psychology. Now for the owners. Go Mango!

10/19/2024

Mango German Shepherd’s progress has been outstanding! This shows that even a good dog can turn bad without the right guidance, fulfillment and direction. Mango was a mess when he arrived 4 days ago. Fear-based, insecure, reactive, over-attached and guarding. We separated him. We gained his trust. We fulfilled him. Now we can train him. Go Mango!

10/19/2024

While Konig Sable German Shepherd is non-aggressive, he still possesses working drive that must be well managed and maintained. He recently jumped his fence and went after a neighborhood dog. This is a sure sign of building frustration and decline. “He never did that before!” they said. If I got a dime for every time I’ve heard that. “He never did that before” is code for a dog in decline. How fast and how far depends on the individual dog. The higher the drive, the faster the decline. It doesn’t matter how well the dog is trained on leash or how well you can communicate if when the leash is taken off the dog’s impulses are allowed to take over. Needless to say Konig is back for off-leash training. We will reevaluate him and then add remote. Go Konig!