Canine Rogue

01/03/2023

Virtual course with lifetime support and access to materials all about cooperative handling! This is sure to be a wonderful help, well worth the price of the course, this is a really great trainer! ❤️

Hands Off! An online program for stress-free vet care and grooming through cooperative handling.

…it’s LIVE!

Stress at the vet is the #1 reason for declining veterinary care. This brand new program will teach you how to:

1️⃣ Identify stress in your dog and how to become your dog’s advocate
2️⃣ Reduce stress in care right away
3️⃣ Train your dog to cooperate in their care, not just comply

The course includes lifetime access to online course materials, including written instructions and demo videos, as well as bi-weekly group Zoom calls to get your questions answered and see/participate in real-life training.

The end result is

🩺 Strengthening your bond by turning care into a joyful experience
🩺 Saving time performing at-home care
🩺 Resting easy knowing your dog can get the care they need to stay happy and healthy

Is this the training program you’ve been looking for? Sign up today and snag the introductory price of just $299 before it’s gone!

https://hungry-dog-training.teachable.com/p/hands-off

22/02/2023

From 4Paws University
Anecdotes are not the same as education! 👍

14/02/2023

🫠

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09/02/2023

I haven’t posted any grooms in awhile, so here’s a random selection of my babies! 🥰

01/02/2023

Wonderful examples of cooperative care in grooming!

17/01/2023

Very well said!

IT DOESN’T REALLY HURT, IT JUST…….

Whether it is a discussion about shock collars, citronella sprays, prong-collars, choke chain corrections, “bonking” a dog on the head with a rolled up towel (I mean SERIOUSLY??), throwing a shake can at a dog or forcing them into a down, I am sure you have all heard this before:

It doesn’t really hurt, it just……. (Insert: Startles, interrupts, stops the behaviour, corrects or whatever other sanitized term is used to convince others that what is being done is harmless.)

I want to answer this as simply and briefly as possible:

PUNISHMENT (ADDING SOMETHING TO STOP OR DECREASE A BEHAVIOUR) DOES NOT WORK UNLESS IT IS AVERSIVE.

There is no way around this fact. Stimuli (stuff the dog experiences) are either:

1. PLEASANT
2. AVERSIVE
3. NEUTRAL

Only a pleasant stimulus will increase behaviour.
Only an aversive stimulus will decrease behaviour.
A neutral stimulus has no effect on behaviour.

You cannot divorce a stimulus from its emotional consequences. A pleasant stimulus makes a dog feel good – so the dog will work for more of it. An aversive stimulus makes a dog feel bad, so the dog will work to avoid it. Dogs do not work to gain or avoid neutral stimuli. If a shock collar or vibrating collar or whatever, was not aversive, it would have NO effect on behaviour.

YOU CANNOT USE PUNISHMENT AND AVERSIVE TOOLS WITHOUT EMOTIONAL FALLOUT. IT IS IMPOSSIBLE.

14/01/2023

I know it’s not dog related, but this makes me laugh so very much 😂🐈

12/01/2023

😂 These kind of pictures never get old

12/01/2023

Let’s talk about stress responses! 🤣

There are three natural, instinctive reactions all animals share when they’re stressed (including dogs and US!)
1) Fight
2) Flight
3) Freeze

Fight and flight are really obvious, right? A dog either tries to run away, or it lashes out and growls and tries to bite. These tend to be the easier indicators to notice when we’re doing things like grooming so we know we need to back off and figure out ways to lower stress.

Now freeze… that one tends to be tricky for a lot of people, professionals included. So often you’ll hear people say, “Oh, look how GOOD that dog is being, just sitting there! Look how nice it is!” Then they’re inevitably surprised when the dog lashes out and bites “out of nowhere”. The signals of a freeze stress response can easily be confused with a dog who is relaxed to an untrained eye, and it’s why learning dog body language is so crucial, especially with grooming.

When you think of a freeze response, you can think of a wild rabbit hiding in the grass. It keeps itself completely still and frozen, hoping to hide. In the event it needs to bolt, however, it makes sure to keep itself in a way that it can spring up and run at a second’s notice.

This is the same thing we can see in our dogs. If a dog is relaxed, it will be very loose. If you pick up a leg, you won’t have any resistance. They’ll look around, sniff, and overall just seem calm.

A dog in a freeze response, however, will literally FEEL stiff. They will keep themselves planted down hard on the table. If you go to lift a leg, they will tightly keep their weight on it. They will have a tight, closed mouth (or a very stressful pant) and will hardly move. These dogs in this freeze response honestly make me the most nervous, and they’re the ones I really look out for. Often times, dogs in a freeze response have had their other stress signals punished out of them, and they make it so they give you less warning before they jump to a bite. These dogs take a lot of work to teach them to use their other signals again, and that you aren’t a threat.

Now… which stress reaction do we think this coyote is having right now? 😬😂