Eleanor Post & Lonely Hunters Dog Training

11/22/2023

Disco Baby! That’s the name of this amazing little poodle who boogied her way all over the field today. What a show stopper 😍❤️

08/10/2023

Baker getting some field time in during a lunch break.

This standard schnauzer is a little bit wary of new people. I find what works for him is having him check in a couple of times as we approach someone- making sure he’ll turn and face me first before we keep going forward.

I was surprised how willing he was to play tug right next to a group of new people. He was definitely looking 👀 out of the corner of his eyes, but he was in the game.

I like this guy a lot. I think the “boof”-eyness might always be there to some degree, but some dogs just gotta let a few boofs be known, yah know?

08/02/2023

You can't nip innate behaviors in the bud. You also can't nip them in the butt, which is the other thing I've been asked to help with on occasion.

Unless we can use a surgeon's scalpel to nip out a portion of the brain, the propensity towards those behaviors are going to be there if your dog is true to breed standard. Many dogs are lacking in the elements that was their original intended purpose, and nowadays that's often better, because we aren't using dogs for the same purpose as we used to - but that doesn't mean you should count on your pit bull as being like the other ones you've met that are good with other dogs.

It seems like that's just semantics, but it's important for people to understand that training doesn't eliminate a propensity towards a genetic behavior, it just teaches you how to get control of your dog in those situations. If you have that control, you can prevent your dog from getting really good at practicing things that aren't beneficial to your lifestyle.

That means you don't get to tune out after the demon has been excised. There is no exorcism. You need to become one with the demon, respect the demon and ultimately have it do your bidding (bwah hahaha). If you don't know what makes it tick, you won't be prepared, and when you're not prepared...

This is also an advertisement for the Labrador retriever, because ultimately, retrieving isn't the worst behavior to have to deal with if we're talking about innate behaviors.

01/26/2023

Demand barking

Have you raised your dog to be intolerant and easily frustrated?

How many things does your dog’s barking initiate? Attention, action (play, exercise, moving through doorways) affection?

Here are some common mistakes that people are making that lead to a dog who barks and becomes destructive when they don't get what they want.

* Not working through the frustration when the dog is a puppy/new to you.

Did you abandon the use of a crate, baby gate, xpen or tether when your dog showed agitation at being confined or left out of the action?

There are ways to work through this so your dog learns to tolerate the stress of FOMO. Being agitated about confinement is not the same as separation anxiety. Frustration is different that panic. It can be hard to tell the difference when a dog is new to you.

* Letting your dog out of the crate/car/room/house when they are vocalizing, pawing, digging or extremely pushy.

Often this is because people are concerned that the dog might need to go to the bathroom immediately etc. Try to plan around that - potty your dog right before you use some form of management like a crate. If your dog is not a puppy, does not have a UTI or some form of incontinence, this is probably not a dire emergency, especially if it has only been a couple of hours since they last went to use the facilities.

* Not understanding how much rest your dog needs

Puppies especially need a TON of sleep. They will through major tantrums when they are tired, sometimes those tantrums occur right before they are ready to fall asleep. You may remember experiencing this in your own childhood. What if you were an exhausted child and instead of just having a mandatory nap time, you were taken out to play again because your parents thought you had to burn off more energy?

Puppies who learn how to rest when they're worked up become dogs who can regulate themselves better as adults.

* Trying to avoid any amount of stress that the dog will experience

Avoiding teaching the dog to tolerate grooming, handling, having equipment put on/taken off (leashes, collars, harnesses).

Putting the puppy down immediately when it starts to squirm or whine.

Feeding the dog to make it stop barking/whining.

Exercising the dog whenever it starts becoming destructive/pushy. Make sure your dog gets exercise, but don't wait for it to become a demon before you go "Ok, now they NEED it".

There are types of stress NOT to put your puppy through - here are some examples -

Being handled, picked up, hugged by excited children, especially multiple kids at once.

Being handled, picked up, hugged by toddlers who don't have the fine motor skills to properly pet/interact with a dog, especially a sensitive dog or puppy

Taking the dog to "socials" where they are overwhelmed by dogs who are jumping all over them, chasing them, pinning them etc. vs setting up play dates with one other dog at a time.

Taking the dog to dog parks when it's timid, but also when it is a bully who smashes into other dogs.

Taking your dog on public transit when they are sound sensitive or environmentally sensitive (vibration/rocking/unstable ground/slippery surfaces) and your don't have a training plan to work on it as well as a fundamental need to do so.

Taking your dog to festivals, protests, marches, concerts or big events.

Teaching patience requires patience. Starting early means less work in the long run.

01/23/2023

When you first adopt a dog - a general guideline regardless of the dog's age.

Week one -
Where to go with your dog - House, yard (neighborhood if it is quiet).

Introduce your dog to the crate, give it food in the crate.
Give it space from your other dogs and your children (using a baby gate or the crate or just a quiet room in the house). The dog needs time to decompress and adjust, even if they seem hyper or very excited to be around your kids or other dog. Let the dog settle. Let them learn how to be chill in your home.

Dog should sleep in a crate next to your bed vs in your bed. If your dog is a very young puppy, use a “soft crate” and have it next to you on the bed if they were recently separated from their litter. After a couple of days, move the crate to the floor.

Feed half your dog's food by hand, the other half is given to them in the crate. Don't worry about obedience. Don't worry about socialization, your dog is being socialized to you and the new environment.

Give your dog regular "alone time" moments in the crate, you can start slow, like even 1 minute. Continue this for the entire time, sometimes for short times, other times a bit longer. If your dog is really freaking out, get help from a trainer.

Week 2 - Home, yard, intro to neighborhood (if your neighborhood is very busy, take the dog somewhere more relaxing, more natural environment vs urban if possible)

Keep using the crate. Short periods of supervised time with your kids/dog (like 15 mins to 30 mins at a time, or walk the dogs together on leash).

Keep feeding by hand and in the crate.

You can do the hand feeding when you're out in the world with your dog. Keep outings very simple, the dog does NOT need to be meeting other people or dogs yet, but it's good for them to be out seeing them. Notice how your dog reacts to seeing different sizes of dogs, different looking people, walking on different surfaces, hearing new sounds like the garbage truck.

Don't worry about obedience, it's not the time yet. Focus on giving your dog food (hand feeding) when 1) they seem calm 2) if they come towards you from a distraction or 3) when you call their name.

Stop worrying about socialization - let your dog get to know you first. Learn to read your dog's body language - excited, nervous, happy etc.

Week 3 - Keep doing week two stuff. Start luring the dog into "sit" and "down". Feed them close to you when they're walking on a leash to encourage loose leash walking. For the love of god, don't worry about heeling at this point.

Start having someone come to visit every day, maybe twice a day if you can. See how your dog feels about that. Let the person visiting feed the dog some treats. Not a lot of petting, no leaning over the dog, no kissing or hugging or STARING at the dog. Just let the dog explore the person and get some food from them. If your dog is way to pushy, let them get a bit of that out of their system and just hang out with your dog on a leash and feed them from your hand in proximity to the other person until your dog relaxes.

Try driving to some different locations and taking your dog out for 15 to 20 minutes and observe how they feel in new places.

Week 4 - IF your dog seems like they're feeling pretty relaxed around the family members/dog, start giving them more free time around them, let the dog drag a leash so you can intervene if they get too ramped up.

Look up "sit on the leash" exercise on youtube.

Keep using the crate, don't give the dog full run of the house just yet.

Start working on sit/down around new people, out in the world. Don't expect immediate sits/downs around distractions, just encourage the behavior and reward it.

If your dog is nervous in new situations, give it time to adjust and settle down from a bit of a distance. If your dog is a wrecking ball, do the same thing and try to give it more exercise in the yard or by going for runs with it and doing more training using it's food as a reward.

Do you go to the dog park - Hell No

Do you have a friend with a very calm dog that is not aggressive help you with socialization? Yes, but try having the dogs meet between a fence first to see how your dog is feeling about the other dog. If they act aggressively, get a trainer. If they are nervous, schedule a few more fence greetings over the next day or two to see if your dog warms up with familiarity. If they are crazy ramped up, have your friend hang out on the other side until the dogs calm down, maybe try walking together for a while first to let the energy out (you can do that with new people too if your dog is very excited or nervous about them at first).

01/11/2023

Dog training is like guiding a little paper boat as it bobs down a stream that's always pushing and pulling.

You need to always be adjusting course, helping it along, seeing what's ahead and knowing when and how to intervene.

Then you see your client open the car door and the boat comes flying out and lands in the gutter, it's already bobbing and half underwater, being carried swiftly towards a sewer grate while the captain is still organizing their wallet and car keys.

Do you let the boat crash or do you help it right away?

When you help it right away the client says "Oh, see, the boat knows you're here, so it's right on course" and when you let it crash they say "See, I knew the boat would do that. I'm glad you got a chance to see how it normally acts."

12/06/2022

I have some cute pics of Bonnie, the Doberman/Mal/Dutchie/Rottie mix. Isn't she adorable?

12/05/2022

Bonnie and her owners have been so fun to work with! Bonnie is a medium size dog, she looks like a very small doberman mix. She's social with dogs and people, has a pretty strong prey drive and she is a joy to train.

Her owners did an embark on her and look what came back! They're doing such a great job with her, and they lucked out temperament wise and got the best dog ever...she could have been a real challenge.

11/29/2022

I saw a link to an article in Psychology Today that suggested crating might not be fair to dogs because of a cruel experiment done with beagles in 1999 where "Dogs were confined to individual crates for six weeks, with no social interaction or even visual access to other dogs."

Way to compare a pampered pet being put in a cage for a few hours to doggie Guantanamo bay.

What a bunch of pap.

This emotional dart targets people who are going to worry themselves into a hole of doom and despair because they doubt their ability to make good decisions for their dog. Once again the internet is telling them they aren't a good enough pet parent.

This article won't have the slightest impact on someone who is actually cruel or neglectful to their dog.

Most dog owners I talk to are going to put their dog at more risk if they DON'T use the crate. There's implied harm and then there's the actual harm caused by thing's like dog's getting into fights when left unattended, or a dog ingesting a foreign object when no one is around to stop it.

If you can keep your sanity by giving yourself a break from constantly watching your dog, do it.

The reality is, we live with captive animals. The crate reminds us of that captivity and we don't like that because being pawrents is more appealing. We use fences and leashes and all sorts of things to control our dog's freedom. I just went camping with my dogs. Two of them slept in crates at night in the van, they had an absolute blast all day long romping and playing. For a few hours a day, when I was fishing, I crated them for their own safety. A fishing hook through the muzzle would undoubtedly be unpleasant, so I weighed the unpleasants using my system of mental checks and balances and I decided for my dog that they would prefer being caged over being snagged with a jig.

My dogs aren't very good at making decisions for their own wellbeing, so I made it for them. Did a feel a tinge of guilt because they didn't get to be loose while I was fishing? Sure. According to the article, I should see that as a red flag about my decision to confine my dog temporarily. I feel a tinge when I feed one of my dog's less food because they need to be on a diet - RED FLAG!

So many people are living with dogs with some pretty serious behavioral issues that cost them time, money and emotional turmoil. Suggesting that using a crate with the door closed for a few hours is going to damage the dog is not only untrue, is unfounded. One study of a bunch of solitary confinement beagles isn't an appropriate comparison to how the average pet owner lives with their dog.

Crating your dog for a few hours a day is not likely to cause any sort of psychological damage unless your dog is already psychologically damaged, in which case - I'm sure you need a break so that you can regain your own sanity.

Crates keep dogs out of shelters, they keep them out of the Emergency Vet and they keep them from biting the housekeeper. Dogs that are euthanized are for things like this - if a crate is a tool you can use to keep a dog in a loving home, use it.

I'm not going to list all of the common sense things about using crates responsibly. You're smart enough to pick a safe, comfortable crate for your dog. You obviously care for your dog and their well being - both mental and physical.

My four-year-old German Wirehaired Pointer and I were on our way to a pheasant hunt on a Saturday – headed out to chase the few birds left in Illinois with a couple buddies for an annual January hunt – when I lost control of the vehicle due to bad road conditions and flipped it. My truck was tot...

11/28/2022

Bagels (the Catahoula mix's) people have been some of my star students over the past few months.

Bagels was a dedicated freight train on the leash, reactive to dogs and skateboards. She also had a habit of demand barking when she didn't get what she wanted right away.

Her owners have been amazing. They made the trips from San Francisco to Santa Rosa and Berkeley to train. They did their homework and in this video you can see Bagels working across the street from a busy skate park. I will ask them if I can share some videos where they are handling her as well.

I'm giving her lots of treats here (High rate of reinforcement is just a fancy term for that) and she's taking them "enthusiastically" you might say because it's an intense workout for her to be so close to the sights and sounds of the skateboarders.

She deserves the rewards for all of the effort she's putting in to keep herself from barking and lunging. Over time, we can reduce how many treats are needed, but in this video we are working much more closely and with a lot more distractions than she is used to when she's with her owners. This phase is where we create a new association with the skateboards. Instead of lunge - look to the person who is holding the leash - get treats.

Bagels owners also were open to trying "ditch the bowl" meaning she gets all of her food on training and walks. She lost several pounds and is a lot more responsive to taking treats around distractions. Treats used to be something she would be interested in if there wasn't anything more interesting around ie dogs and skatebaords, but now that we've added a consequence for lunging AND showed her that the golden ticket lays in walking nicely on leash and offering eye contact, she makes really good decisions on her own.

Go Bagels!

11/23/2022

Not sure why Instagram still isn't sharing my posts to Facebook, but I will start cross posting. I feel like I've been neglecting poor ol' Facebook hahah

https://www.instagram.com/reel/ClT-PB_MMWf/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

09/07/2022

Perpetual disbelief about predictable outcomes is a sign that you’re suffering from tunnel vision.

If you keep treating the same injury over and over, the key is to be aware of what’s causing the injury. Having a good first aid kit won’t prevent you from being burned.

If your dog is predictably aggressive in certain situations, they will generalize that to a multitude of scenarios. It’s time to stop being surprised because something happened in a new location or with a different person.

What is the general context that elicits the aggression? Don’t get bogged down by specifics. If it’s a man in a big hat one day, it could be a lady with an umbrella the next. Being good at making associations is what is going to keep things safe.

08/27/2022

Louis getting a romp in with Stella, who is simultaneously getting in some good recall practice. Two 🐦 one stone.

08/27/2022

Louis hasn’t met many dogs, so we took the opportunity to let him meet Pearl. He’s a little ”stalky” in his approach, so we talked about ways to mitigate that at an early age and then we gave him the opportunity to interact with a dog who is reliably bombproof with pups. What will I do without you P?

08/24/2022

"Behavior isn’t minted for your consumption it exists to perpetuate survival."

Best sentence I've read pertaining to dog training in a long time.

Stay inquisitive, keep learning! I love the Village Dog type. The Formosans, Pot Lickers, street dogs and Rez dogs. Each a different flavor of clever for trainers who have cracked the code. Western dog genetics have made dogs into caricatures, the hero is so heroic he’s sacrificial, the companion so docile he’s infantilized. When we look at a dog we want to see ourselves looking back. But animals aren’t stories in a hall of mirrors, where every retelling flattens natural attributes into a standard. Behavior isn’t minted for your consumption it exists to perpetuate survival. We want to put each type into a box, the street dog is often sold as the tragic type, but f**k that, let’s amplify their problem solving ability, and the inquisitive nature of the primordial dog.

08/15/2022

I hereby ban the word "sit" from the first session.

I wonder if dogs get as annoyed with the word "sit" as I do.

Yes, your dog knows how to sit when nothing's going on, but you're bludgeoning it to death when you keep asking the dog to sit every time it gets distracted by something.

"Sit" starts to mean - there's something you want and I'm going to try to prevent you from doing it and then give up and let you do it anyway.

If it's driving me crazy, it has to be driving you crazy to some degree as well.

If your dog was incapable of sitting, how would you approach the picture differently? Would you use the leash? Would you lure your dog? Would you feed them for staying at your side instead of rushing forward?

Here's a picture of a dog offering a sit. Dogs will do this a lot, especially if you don't ask them to do it every time they want to do something else. They do this because you've taught them that "sit" often means a treat.

When the dog offers the sit, you can reward it. The dog offers it more and more, I need to ask for it less and less. If I stop rewarding the sit as much they'll likely offer the down. Then if I want, I can reward the down and the sit and have two behaviors to work with.

Ban the word "sit" from your vocabulary for a couple of days and see what happens.

08/15/2022

Slow down, you move too fast
Learn it precisely for it to last
Stumbling through the basic steps
Until you feel, it's second nature
Ba da-da da-da da-da second nature

07/22/2022

Cella's owner came to me because Cella was "pancaking" to the ground when she would see another dog. She would sometimes lunge towards a dog if it were under the right circumstances.

In our first session I observed the walk between Cella and her owner. Cella was constantly at the end of the leash pulling every which way and looking down every driveway for something to react to. It was a mix of being anxiously vigilant and hunting for prey (something I see a lot of in pit mixes without a lot of outlets for their natural drives).

First order of business was to get the walk under control and have Cella focus her energy back towards her owner to give her point to anchor onto.

In the first session we were able to walk her up to Pearl, within 3 feet and Cella was offering eye contact and relaxed body language. She saw several dogs and offered engagement with us vs fixating on the dog.

Homework was to stop figuring out which dogs she should/shouldn't meet on a walk. The answer is 0 right now. Keep is super simple, don't let her feel like she needs to make a bunch of decisions around dog interactions until she's more relaxed.

The rest was of the homework was leash handling and how to stop reinforcing pulling on the walk.

Session two and Cella has made significant improvement! Her owner said the "temperature" of the walks has gone way down and both of their jobs are much easier right now since they don't have to make a lot of decisions on whether or not to let her say hi.

The video is from session two. We saw lots of dogs in the park and Cella stayed nice and relaxed. Her ability to feel at ease within a close proximity to other dogs has changed noticeably. Look at that cutie pie!!!

07/18/2022

"Dog owners just aren't dedicated." Dedication is abundant.
Pretty much everyone who reaches out to me is a dedicated owner. Being dedicated isn't the problem for the majority of people I speak with. Dedication to a false belief (my dog needs to go to the dog park to socialize) is often the biggest obstacle to success.

"Dog owners aren't consistent" Consistency is often the part of the problem - consistent rehearsal of ineffectively applied approaches. We all have habits and reflexes that are very difficult to break. Creating a new consistency is extremely difficult. It's hard to switch gears into a new pattern of behavior.

The kind of dedication that leads to success isn't "I'm keeping this dog no matter what." It's a dedication to the process of learning and being aware of our behaviors and how they effect the desired outcome.

There is a show called Canada's Worst Handyman that could be seen as a study in human behavior. Every person in it is dedicated and they're pretty much consistent throughout the show in their approach to building and constructing things. Somehow, despite this, they don't all do well, even when given guidance and instruction. A few people show steady improvement.

Three different approaches to assembling an Ikea cabinet.

The "hands on" learner who doesn't need to follow the demonstration or read instructions.

"I'm a hands on learner" they say when offered instruction. They take a glance at the manual, but it isn't really necessary because they know what the cabinet is supposed to look like, and they are better at feeling things out than being a mindless robot.

They confidently construct the cabinet in no time. Their final product looks just like the picture on the box. There were several extra parts that weren't even necessary (those are the pieces that the people who aren't as crafty a them need to use).

Their dog farts on the cabinet and the front falls off.

No big deal, they still saved time. There is a drawer of unused pieces from various projects that gets sifted through for repairs when the front falls off.

This type of hands on learner has confidence, but they lack patience and focus. They want to show you that they can do things really well and FAST. The fact that the instructions exists is more of a challenge than an opportunity.

There is another type of hands on learner that can be very successful. They observe, they ask questions as they're going, they stop when they hit a snag and find out exactly where they go wrong. They know they have a good feel for things, but they are able to slow down and observe every step of the way. Their confidence is a great skill, but it doesn't mean they've got a big ego.

The "analytical"/ anxious learner.

If they build this cabinet, might there be another cabinet of superior quality that they should be building instead?

The analist gets instantaneous diarrhea at the sight of the instruction manual.

"How many pages is it?" they wonder as they google reviews on the cabinet after they've already purchased it. Maybe they're better off without a cabinet after all. Maybe they should hire someone to build them the cabinet...but then, can they really trust that the builder knew what they were doing?

They question each step with an anxious scrutiny that makes them dread the entire process. They jump back and forth through the manual, wanting to know what tortures await. None of the process holds any joy. Because they are so afraid of making a mistake, they don't appreciate how much they can learn from them.

The cabinet is "finished" before the door gets put on. They're exhausted from the effort. The analytical person doesn't really believe it's possible for the cabinet to ever be finished.

The curious "unskilled" learner.

This learner is looking forward to putting this cabinet together. Eventually they'd like to get into carpentry and this is a good first step.

They see the manual as daunting, but if they take it one page at a time, they'll get there. They aren't worried about what the other two cabinet makers are doing, they're focused on the task at hand.

They lay out all of the pieces and start at step one. They get a few steps in and realize they've screwed up and used some pieces that are supposed to go elsewhere. They go back a few steps and feel a sense of satisfaction at having done it properly. The process was a lot faster the second time and they recognized that they're already getting better at using the screwdriver.

Mistakes get made along the way, but they learned from each one and in the end it was actually kind of fun putting something together by hand.

I've been all 3 of these learners, and with new things I tend to revert to the first two types. When I'm really interested in something I can be the curious learner. If I'm not interested in something, but I approach it as the curious learner, I often find myself becoming fascinated by it. I'm trying to consistently practice being the curious learner.

07/16/2022

“That’s never happened before” - usually when people say that it’s because their dog has done something unpleasant. When the dog training is doing it’s job, that sentence should start applying to things you’d been hoping were a possibility!

Penny’s owners came to me to work on recall and leash pulling. They’ve been doing their homework and have seen big improvement on both fronts.

I wanted to find the perfect moment to recall Penny today. Not when she was too far gone and not before she’d started to take chase.

Observation and timing is the key to good dog training. We heard the squirrel and then we watched and waited.

Penny’s owners are using the ecollar and food rewards to reinforce recall. Adding backwards movement to the recall helped motivate Penny more to return. The level on the ecollar that was used was 13 out of 127.

Lots of practice on a long line first, getting in the reps for weeks before moving to off leash with ecollar.

Very proud of what they’ve accomplished in the last month. Penny also knows to recall on a vibrate, but we weren’t taking chances with the squirrel. A few more opportune moments like this where her owners get the timing just right and the ecollar will be an insurance policy. They won’t need to use it often, but they’ll have it in case of emergencies.

07/01/2022

Yes! Please stop fussing over every little stick and leaf.

People nanny their pups too much. Every leaf or stick isn’t going to kill them. Chewing and exploring with the mouth is normal. If you micro manage and get the pup overly concerned that you are taking things away, they start to hide. Then you have a trust problem. Pups come into your home with a sibling rivalry mentality. They have spent the last nine weeks saying “MINE”. As they develop a relationship with you it’s easy to let it become one of sibling rivalry. Instead it should be of trust and confident attachment. If your pup starts to chew something don’t just reach and take it away. Instead observe, is it actually ingesting it or just chewing. Ask yourself if you take it away will it just serve to enhance the value of the object? How you take it away is important. Safe chewing is chewing you see happen. If the pup chews with her back toward you it means it trusts you. If the pup runs off and and faces you it may think you’re about to take something away, this shows lack of trust. To develop this random chewing behavior into a useful toy drive you will need trust.