K&C Canine Life Skills LLC

28/06/2024

Congratulations to Rocky for graduating from Puppy Skills sessions! Rocky and his parents, Kelly and Butch worked on many puppy skills including polite greetings (four on the floor - reducing jumping, recall inside the house, recall outside the house, "Leave it" cue inside the house, ""Leave it" cue outside the house, and crate training.

Rocky, Butch, and Kelly are off to a great start with skills that will help all three of them for years to come. Kudos to all three of you for your beautiful progress and sucesses!

26/06/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Teamwork makes the dog training dream work! While dogs and humans need to be team mates; humans inside the home need to be on the same page when teaching their dog(s). I always ask people if everyone in the home is on the same page as it applies to their dog training needs. Most times the answer is yes, the family members have discussed their training needs and desired methodologies. Other times, family members are at odds with their training needs and desired training methodologies.

Too often if there is disagreement about their dog training needs that the person who contacted me tells me that the other person or people will be okay. That leaves me asking what does the other person or other people being okay look like to you? The common response is along the lines of my needs are most important, I am the head of the household, etc.

The reality of the matter is that totalitarian-like behavior is not helpful amongst humans and/or their dogs. We as humans need to be considerate of both our human and canine family members for our dog training needs to be successful. At the very least, we as humans need openly communicate our desired training needs. If disagreements, arise amongst humans, discussions need to be had by asking questions including: Why? What is the purpose? What are your needs? What are your goals that you desire to achieve? Asking these questions opens the lines of communication and allows humans to find a common ground resulting in dog training results.

This week’s wisdom is for humans to communicate and include all household members by asking questions about their dog training methodologies, goals, and results. As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

24/06/2024

Congratulations to Buddy for graduating from Canine Behavior Skills sessions! Buddy and his human Mom, Julie worked on several skills including reducing reactivity during walks, creating positive association with the vacuum, encouraging polite leash manners to reduce pulling, and encouraging polite greetings to not jump on people.

Julie asked lots of questions wanting to learn all the while putting Buddy's needs first. Buddy presentsed being a delightful, resilient boy who needed a bit of extra love, patience, and consistency.

Congratulations to Buddy and Julie for your awesome pawesome sucesses!!!!! I enjoyed working with you both!!!!

19/06/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Fear not the ‘A’ word: aggressive. I talk to many people who tell me that their dog is not aggressive. My response is: “What if your dog does struggle with aggression issues? Please know that your dog is not aggressive. Aggressive is a presentation of behaviors resulting from fear, not a label to describe your dog. He or she is a lovely boy or girl. It is okay if your dog presents aggressive behaviors. He or she is afraid of something and trying to create distance from the scary being or object.

This week's wisdom is to not fear the ‘A’ word: aggressive as it applies to your dog. Understand that your dog is afraid and needs you to be his or her protector and advocate. Please be kind when your dog is growling, barking, lunging, etc. and gently redirect or guide them away from the scary situation. The more calm and patient you are, the more you are helping your dog and other beings around him or her.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

12/06/2024

Congratulations to Daisy and Peaches for graduating from their Adult Canine Skills sessions! Daisy and Peaches worked on learning several adult canine skills including recall (come when called), leash manners, counter surfing, polite manners while people are seated on the sofa, and preventing door dashing out the front door.

12/06/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Let’s talk about crate training and confinement spaces. A common issue for many people is that their dog does not like their crate or other confinement space (examples: exercise pen, gated area). My starting point is to ask if they practiced training their dog to become acclimated to his or her crate, exercise pen, etc.? In many cases people tell me they physically placed the dog in their crate or other confinement space and walk away or leave home.

I frequently advise people that unfortunately they have unintentionally created negative association (in some cases, separation anxiety) for their dog with their crate, exercise pen, etc. The good news is that you can help your dog to enjoy their crate, exercise pen, gated area, etc. by systematically practicing acclimation in small steps. Your goal is to create positive association for your dog with his or her crate, exercise pen, gated area, etc. As we all know, positive association makes life much more pleasant for everyone.

A few helpful tips to help acclimation to confinement space to go smoothly:
• Allow yourself an extra five to ten minutes prior to needing your dog to into their crate, exercise pen, etc.
• Keep departures and arrivals neutral and low key.
• Do not use your confinement space for punishment. NOTE: Using confinement space for time out is not the same as punishment. Be sure to keep time outs neutral and low key.

This week’s wisdom is to practice creating positive association and helping your dog to become acclimated to his or her crate, exercise pen, gated space, etc. The time and effort that you apply now will help you and your dog for the foreseeable future. Happy dog, happy human, happy life!

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

06/06/2024

"Every pet needs a human who can lead. Not like a boss, but like a partner in a dance - someone who gives clear signals, rewards desirable behavior as it occurs, removes rewards for inappropriate behavior immediately, and sticks to the plan consistently until the new, good behavior is a habit."

- Dr. Sophia Yin

05/06/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Let’s talk about expectations: expectations of you and expectations of your dog. I know what you may be thinking: “There are of expectations of me?! I just want and expect my dog to listen to me!” You and your dog are a teacher-student relationship with expectations on both sides. The expectation of you is to use your high level of cognitive functioning to educate yourself and practice human impulse control while being your dog’s guardian and teammate. The expectation for your dog is for him or her to simply be present and ready to train with you.

It is quite common that humans have little to no expectations of themselves when teaching their dog new skills or resolving canine behavior concerns. We as humans need to assign ourselves expectations when teaching our dogs including:

• Set realistic goals for yourself. TIP: Be mindful of your mental, emotional, and physical abilities. Being self-aware helps to achieve more productive training sessions.

• Schedule training time. TIP: Training sessions can be as short as five to fifteen minutes making for easy scheduling and reducing frustration leading to more productive training sessions. Dogs learn best with several short training sessions rather than a few long training sessions.

• Start easy. TIP: Achieving several small goals helps you and your dog to celebrate multiple successes!

• There will be bumps along the way. TIP: Celebrate your successes and learn from your challenges. This is the fun of dog training!

• Be mindful of the Three D’s of Dog Training (Distance, Duration, and Distractions). TIP: Plan to highlight one of the Three D’s per training session.

• Be mindful of the Push, Drop, Stick method to keep your dog’s training measurable – knowing when to Push to the next level of difficulty, Drop one level to a previous step, or Stick at the current level for additional practice.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

29/05/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Dog training can be an overwhelming experience for people and their dogs. The good news is that you can teach your dog polite manners, tricks, and overcome canine behavior issues using shaping by successive approximations. Shaping by successive approximations is teaching your dog by breaking a skill or behavior into small increments and reinforcing at each incremental step until he or she has achieved the desired result.

Common examples of shaping by successive approximations include:

• Teaching the “Stay” cue playing the Bounce Back that teaches your dog to remain in position in accordance with the Three D’s of Dog Training.

• Helping your dog to reduce their overstimulated responses when they see people passing the house practicing desensitization and counterconditioning.

• Teaching your dog his or her recall cue (come when called) in accordance with the Three D’s of Dog Training.

• Crate training: encouraging your dog’s positive association with his or her crate.

• Helping your dog to reduce his or her separation anxiety encouraging resilience and positive emotional well-being when left alone practicing desensitization and counterconditioning.

Teaching your dog using shaping by successive approximations benefits both you and your canine companion that both of you are learning together! You are learning to be more observant reinforcing your dog’s small steps of success as he or she is incrementally progressing to the final result. Your dog is enjoying the process of learning as he or she is being reinforced for their steps in the right direction. Overall, teaching your dog using shaping by successive approximations reduces frustration and reduces the pressure of ‘getting it right’ on the first try.

This week’s wisdom is to make learning a positive experience for both and your dog breaking skills into small incremental steps ensuring success for everyone. The more pleasant and positive a learning experience is for you and your dog, the more you will want to continue teaching him or her and your dog will enjoy learning from you!

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

26/05/2024

I am a Certified Professional Dog Trainer with certification from an accredited organization- Certification Council of Professional Dog Trainers.

I am formally educated by CATCH Canine Trainers Academy holding the CATCH Certified Dog Trainer certification.

22/05/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Did you know that there is a paradigm shift of dog training and canine behavior modification? Modern dog training methods are shifting away from the days of the Alpha Dog and progressing to relationship building and bonding with your dog.

The Alpha Theory/Dominance Theory has been debunked. Many scientific studies have proven that punitive training methods lead to the emergence of new canine behavior issues or the exacerbation of current issues. The most damaging result of using punitive training methods is that human relationships with their dogs suffer.

This week’s wisdom is to rethink your relationship with your dog and embrace the paradigm shift by ending the battle of wills, be his or her human team mate and family member. Be proactive rather than reactive to help your dog to overcome canine behavior challenges.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

19/05/2024

A "good dog" is not the absence of behavior. All dogs are "good dogs".

Send a message to learn more

15/05/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Did you that dogs learn in stages?! Yes, dogs learn in stages as follows:

1. Acquisition - introducing a skill using prompting, luring, and shaping (no verbal cues yet)

2. Automatic - successful presentation of a skill using prompting, luring, and shaping (add verbal cue)

3. Generalization - successful presentation of a skill in various environments

4. Maintenance - successful presentation of a skill at least 90% of the time

Knowing the Four Canine Stages of Leaning can help prevent the two most common missteps:

* People immediately start verbally saying a cue (Sit, Stay, Come, etc.) without teaching the cue(s) first for the dog to learn the association between the verbal cue and the behavior.

* People get very frustrated that their dog is not listening, saying that their dog is stubborn, etc. because he or she does not respond to cues in various environments.

This week’s wisdom is to be patient as you and your dog are learning together. Understand that working through the Four Stages of Canine Learning can help you to successfully train many different skills.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

08/05/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Fun question: How do you know if your dog is enjoying something? I am posing this question for Wisdom Wednesday as many people tell me that their dog is enjoying something when he or she clearly is not.

Examples of people telling me that their dog are enjoying something are:

• A dog presenting backing away from a tug toy that is vocalizing with a low, smooth growl in combination with not releasing the toy.

• Rap music during vehicle rides that the dog is climbing into the front seat with their person seeking comfort.

• Repeatedly picking up a dog that he or she is presenting tight closed mouth, dilated eyes, agonistic pucker, turning head away from person.

The afore mentioned activities are a few recent ones that people have told me that their dog is enjoying something. Unfortunately, I am the bearer of bad news to say: “No, your dog is not enjoying himself (or herself).”

How do you know that your dog IS enjoying his or her self? A few body language indicators of a happy dog are:

o Relaxed, open mouth

o Squinty eyes

o Loose, wiggly body (may include tail wagging in circular motion)

o One or both back legs are splayed while lying down (called splooting or frog leg)

o One paw is curved in while lying down

How do you know that your dog IS NOT enjoying his or her self? A few body language indicators of an unhappy or stressed dog are:

o Tense, closed mouth

o Dilated eyes

o Tense body (may include short tail wagging movement)

o Both back legs are bended at the knees while lying down (sphinx position)

o Hypervigilant looking around

This week’s Wisdom Wednesday is to be mindful that a dog who is quiet and/or presenting passive behaviors is not always a happy boy or girl. An important caveat to keep in mind is that your dog’s body language is likely to be unclear as he or she can present mixed emotions. My advice to you is to be mindful of being observant of your dog’s body language indicators as well as the surrounding environment to put the pieces of the canine emotional puzzle together.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

06/05/2024

This is how dogs see the world with their beautiful simple thought processes. Dogs do not have the cognitive abilities that we do.

01/05/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Let’s talk about dogs and jumping. This is a common for many people and their dogs. Dogs jump on people for three primary reasons:

1. The dog is over excited to see their person or people. He or she is so overstimulated with excitement that he or she jumps up to interact with you and/or other people.

2. 2. The dog receives attention when he or she jumps on someone. Examples of attention given can be physically pushing the dog, saying cues, picking up the dog. Any response engaging with the dog is a human unintentionally reinforcing the jumping.

3. The dog is overstimulated to the point that behaviors including hu***ng and digging nails into your skin or clothing occurs. Many people mistakenly call this behavior dominance. The good news is that this thought is incorrect. The dog in this case has had aversive experiences resulting from jumping that have caused extreme overstimulation to occur.

How do you help a dog who presents jumping on you and/or other people? The first step is to understand that the goal is to encourage polite greetings rather than stop the jumping. The second step is to remain silent. I always teach people to remember that “Silence is golden.” The third step is to bring your arms in and turn away from your dog. The reason for bringing your arms in is it is an incompatible behavior that you cannot physically restrain your dog and turn away at the same time. The fourth step (if needed) is to walk away a few steps from your dog.

If you have a more extreme case for a dog who persistently follows you, jumps on you, humps you and/or digging their nails into your skin, these behaviors require canine behavior intervention to help resolve underlying emotional frustration. Please be mindful that extreme cases of jumping is your dog communicating that he or she is struggling and needs you to help.
The good news is that with 100% consistency the problem of minor to mild cases of jumping resolves itself within one to two weeks. The goal is for your dog to learn that polite manners with all four paws on the ground result in him or her receiving attention. NOTE: Extreme cases of jumping will require additional steps and time for both the human(s) and dog.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

24/04/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Did you know that you can achieve your desired dog training results using hand signals and novels sounds? Yes, it is true you can work with your dog's innate learning abilities of being more visually inclined and use novel sounds to train with other than verbal cues.

Dogs are naturally visually inclined, which makes training with hand signals more simple and productive. Dogs also respond quite well to novel sounds (tongue clicks, kissing sounds, clapping hands, etc.). Training your dog with hand signals and novel sounds is much simpler as you are working with his or her innate abilities, much simpler for training for you, and much more effective when distractions are present.

This week’s wisdom is for you to get creative with hand signals and novel sounds to achieve your dog training goals. One thing to remember is that like verbal cues, there is no set hand signal and/or novel sound for each cue. Just do what works best for you and your dog!

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

22/04/2024

Congratulations to Kodak for graduating from Canine Behavior Skills sessions! Kodak and his family needed assistance with intense reactivity at the front door and during his walks.

We practiced encouraging calm and polite manners at the front door, Engage-Disengage Game during his walks, and muzzle training. Kodak and his human Mom made significant improvements in their Canine Behavior Intervention journey.

Kudos to Kodak and his human Mom for all of their hard work and successes!

17/04/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! A worrisome issue for many people is that their dog is presenting separation anxiety. What is separation anxiety in dogs? Canine separation anxiety happens when a dog is extremely upset when they are separated from their person or people. Separation anxiety is characterized by presenting being anxious and distressed in combination with behaviors including barking, howling, pacing, destructive behaviors, escape attempts.

How can you help your dog if he or she is struggling with separation anxiety?
• Create positive association with your departure preparation activities.
• Keep departures low key to help reduce the intensity of your dog’s stress and anxiety.
• Keep arrivals low key to help prevent intensifying the level of separation anxiety.
• If possible, keep your dog contained to their own space to help preventive destructive behaviors and keeps potty accidents contained in one area. NOTE: Please do not use escape-proof crates as this only contributes to a dog’s stress and anxiety.

On the other end of the situation, separation anxiety is many times misunderstood that their dog’s behaviors including barking, potty accidents, and destruction is indicative of other emotional states or needs. Examples include:

Barking: Dogs present different barks meaning different things including trying to get your attention, something scared them, not feeling well, warning someone away.

Potty accidents: Sometimes a dog needs more frequent potty times that he or she is not ready for long duration in between.

Destruction: Sometimes a dog is bored and needs more mental stimulation in their life such as food puzzle toys and sniffing activities.

My advice when assessing for separation anxiety is to evaluate the environment for possible triggers, take your dog to his or her veterinarian for a medical exam, look for drooling, any self-harm including patches of missing fur resulting from biting or scratching. If possible, keep a log of the behaviors that you are seeing and/or hearing as putting together the pieces of your dog’s behavior puzzle can you to best help him or her.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

10/04/2024

My advice is to acknowledge growling as your dog is communicating with you that he or she is feeling uncomfortable or fearful. I advise to try not to put your dog into situations that they need to escalate to growling.

Whole Dog Journal contributor Pat Miller explains dog growling and dog language; growling is a valuable means of communication for a dog.

10/04/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! It is often said that people wish that their dogs could talk to them. The fun reality is that our dogs are talking to us, just not the same way as humans! Dogs ‘talk’ to us using body language, actions, and vocalizations.

Examples of body language indicators:

Ears out to the side of head: uncertainty.

High tail (with possible twitchy movement): alert and indicating needing to stop and evaluate the environment.

Wide sweeping tail: Happy and wanting to engage.

Lying down with back leg(s) extended: Happy, relaxed.

Examples of actions:

Lunging: Needing space from whatever or whomever the finds to be scary by decreasing the distance.

Backing away: Needing space from whatever the dog finds to be scary by increasing distance.

Freezing: Fearful and wanting the scary being to go away.

Examples of vocalizations:

High pitched barking: Happy and wanting to engage.

Growling: Fearful wanting the scary being to go away.

Deep, throaty, rapid barking: Fearful wanting the scary being to go away.

This week’s wisdom is to understand that communication is goes both ways for you to listen to your dog as much as you would like him or her to listen to you. Reciprocated communication goes a long way in the long term!

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

08/04/2024

By Ren Volpe

03/04/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Many people tell me that their dog presents aggressive behaviors "out of the blue" or goes from zero to sixty without warning. The good news is dogs rarely present aggressive behaviors without warning.

I typically share the Canine Ladder of Aggression to provide a guide of escalating body language indicators leading up to growling then snapping then a bite. Some dogs quickly escalate up the Ladder, whereas others slowly escalate up the Ladder. The reason for the variance in acceleration of presentation of aggressive behaviors is the result of a dog's emotional threshold. In simple terms, a dog who has a low emotional threshold is more likely to escalate faster up the Canine Ladder of Aggression than a dog who has a high emotional threshold.

Dogs who have a low emotional threshold are faster to become frustrated and present the presentation of aggressive behaviors. Dogs who have a high emotional threshold are slower to become frustrated and present the presentation of aggressive behaviors. Most important, is to understand that ALL dogs can be frustrated and bite, lunge, etc.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

Photo credit to Dr. Kendal Shepherd.

27/03/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Common concerns for many people are that their dog is begging while they are eating and causing disruptions while someone is attending virtual meetings. The common response is to put your dog outside.

Did you know that there are possible physical dangers and behavioral fallouts from putting your dog outside unattended? The dangers of putting your dog outside unattended include harm from being stung or bit by bugs, digging under a fence that he or she escapes, heat stroke, etc. Did you know that behavioral fallouts can occur from leaving your dog outside unattended? The behavioral fallouts that can occur include repetitive ‘rehearsing’ reactive responses (barking, lunging) can cause and/or exacerbate reactivity leading to aggression issues to emerge, another dog or a human can be being rude to your dog without you knowing causing fear and aggression issues to emerge, etc.

What is an alternate option to putting your dog outside? The most important thing is to keep your dog inside your home when you are unable to attend to your him or her to prevent harm from occurring. Confinement goes beyond putting a dog inside his or crate. Confinement can be putting your dog inside an exercise pen space, gating off a section of your home, or in a room by his or her self.

Confinement can help a dog to relax and also prevent your dog from causing damage in your home. A caveat to confinement is to be mindful that if your dog suffers from separation anxiety a different protocol including the possibility of someone being with your dog and/or medication may be necessary to help him or her to relax.

This week’s Wisdom Wednesday is to please, do not put your dog outside unattended as it is unsafe, both physically and mentally. Be kind to your dog and find alternate solutions including confinement and/or mental stimulation activities.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

22/03/2024

I invite you to reframe your thoughts from trying to change your dog to how can you help him or her.

22/03/2024

Helpful tips to get first-time dog parents onto the right path. 🤩

What first time dog guardians need to know about dog training to get better results and build their relationship with their dog.

20/03/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! Is your dog presenting behaviors that you find to be concerning? This week I encourage you to shift your mindset from desiring to suppress your dog's behaviors to asking “Why?” The first thing to do is understand that your dog’s behaviors are normal for their species. The second thing to do is to understand your dog’s behavior concerns are of concern to humans, because our species does not understand that dogs function different than us. The third thing to do is ask: "Why is my dog behaving this way?" Of course, asking “Why?” then leads us to ask additional questions including “Who,” “What,” “Where,” and “When.”

Here are a few common canine behavior concerns that you can begin to help by asking “Why?”:

* A dog presents barking at various times of day. Ask “Why?” rather than focusing on suppressing the barking. Your dog is expressing his or her emotional state wanting attention, needing to go out for potty, sad, afraid, alerting you to something that he or she finds to be alarming.

* A dog presents reacting to dogs during walks, walking past the window at home, parks, etc. Ask “Why?” rather than focusing on suppressing the behavior. Your dog is expressing that he or she is experiencing barrier frustration, fearful, stressed.

* A dog presents pulling on his or her leash during walks. Ask “Why?” rather than focusing on suppressing the behavior. Your dog is expressing barrier frustration, really wants to sniff something exciting, or anxious presenting displacement behavior to avoid something scary.

A helpful tip for you is to be inquisitive and question “Why?” is my dog presenting this behavior. Then be a detective asking follow up questions: “Who,” What,” “Where, and “When.” “Why?” is a fantastic starting point to begin your detective work and putting the pieces of the puzzle together to help your dog to overcome his or her canine behavior concerns and live a happy life.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.

13/03/2024

Wisdom Wednesday! This week’s Wisdom Wednesday is inspired by Crystal and I are taking a break for vacation. Do you feel as if you and your dog have to be ‘On’ all the time? Sometimes you and your dog both need a break to decompress a bit. Humans and dogs both need breaks from training and feeling as if the world is watching them.

Here are a few wisdom-inspired ways to give you and your dog a break:

• Go for a quiet walk letting your dog lead the way provided that it is safe for both of you to do so. Enjoy the sights and scenery!

• Enjoy quiet time outside that you and your dog simply enjoy the sights and sounds provided that the environment is not too overstimulating for your dog. Just breathe and enjoy!

• Enjoy quiet time at home watching a movie together. Enjoy your movie while your dog may love the movie so much that he or she falls asleep.

• Give your dog a mental stimulation activity to enjoy at their leisure. A bit of canine mental stimulation is always a great idea!

This week’s wisdom is for you and your dog to take a break and enjoy each other’s company. As always, take care of each other, be your dog’s teammate, and work together.