Diane’s Dogs Structured Dog Walks & Training

31/07/2024

I am ordering cots today from 4Legs4Pets if anyone need one text me and I will add it to my order.
Local Fairhope and Daphne only.

21/07/2024

Just because a dog is well trained doesn’t mean they are well behaved.
There is a lot that goes into having a well balanced, well behaved dog.
The relationship with your dog and its behavior is not solely up to the dog.
Is the dog fulfilled mentally and physically? (I do not mean by taking your dog to the dog park.)
If you have a young athletic dog, does it get enough exercise? Does it get enough rest?
Does your dog look to you for guidance?

08/07/2024

Doodles.

Bobby

04/07/2024

I work with a lot of reactive dogs, meaning they react poorly when they see other dogs or sometimes people.

When I am with a dog and am rushed by an off leash dog, my first reaction is to call out to the owner “call your dog”. I will be controlling the dog with me and will protect the dog that is with me.

I DON’T CARE IF YOUR DOG IS FRIENDLY!!!

If you do not have control of your dog it shouldn’t be off leash!
Walking back and forth to the dog park off leash is not safe.
Letting your dog out of the car without their leash on is not safe.
Please for my safety, the dogs I work with and your dogs please think about others for just a second.
If something goes badly, you will be at fault!

I don’t care if your dog is friendly.

04/07/2024

I don’t care if your dog is friendly!!!
If you don’t have control of your dog put it on a leash.

16/06/2024

Just arrived for his training. His owner stopped taking him for walks because they didn’t feel like they had any control. Keep an eye on this big guy, we will be walking by the Bay in no time.

03/06/2024

Jade hanging out with me at Fairhope Brewery, not a care in the world.❤️🐾

02/06/2024

Jade, a gem of a girl, is here to learn nice manners and leash skills. Her owners' top request is for Jade to calm down when asked.🐾❤️

04/05/2024

W

16/04/2024

This is beautiful Princess Leia.
She has a good foundation of training, she knows how to sit, down and come sometimes. She is here to learn the e-collar and how to stay seated, how to stay down when asked and how to come every time. She is young and fun, I am looking forward to getting her out and about.🐾❤️

23/02/2024

This says it all. It’s about the people not the dog.

HARRY POTTER DOG TRAINING

I feel sorry for professional dog trainers.

You see, they are hired to train a dog, but the first thing they have to tell the client is that they are not going to train the dog – they are going train the client to train the dog.

When this is said, there is always a lot of smiling and nodding by the client, but there’s no real comprehension and probably not too much acceptance either.

Even the dog trainer doubts it can really be done.

You see, people are people, and they are difficult to change. When a dog or a dog trainer shows up in a person’s life, that person already has a schedule and it probably does not include 30 minutes, twice a day, of walking the dog.

Is a dog trainer going to be able to win that kind of time and exercise commitment from his or her new client?

Probably not.

Think about how many people start with a gym membership, and how few are still going to that gym two months later. Think how many people start a diet, and how many fall off the wagon.

When a dog trainer shows up at the door of a new client, honesty may be the best policy, but telling a client “you’re fat and lazy and so is the dog, and both of you need to walk two miles a day” may not be the best way to build up a referral dog training business!

MAGIC WANDS

When people hire a dog trainer, they are not looking for a change in lifestyle or a change in values.

They are looking for a magic wand.

And why not?

We live in an age of miracle diets, miracle bras, and five minute workouts to lift and tone the body.

We have instant answers from Google, satellite mapping systems in our cars, and one-minute rice on the stove.

Surely there’s a 10-minute cure for any and every canine problem?

Come on now: What would Hermione do?

Of course in the world of Harry Potter, it was not Hermione that had a way with creatures, it was the game keeper Hagrid, who was never seen to wave a magic wand.

Instead, Hagrid’s magic was of a more down-to-earth kind. He knew that the secret to training animals, from dogs to dragons, was exercise, consistency, earned affection, and simple corrections and rewards.

THE HOUSE AS PRISON PLANET

And what do we Muggles offer up to our canine charges instead?

Tell the truth now. What really happens when we come home from work?

Too often we are both exhausted and distracted. We plop down in front of an electronic screen of some sort – a television set, a computer, or a cell phone. It’s been a mad day, and we just want to unwind between telephone calls and emails that demand a reply.

What about the dog?

He’s fine we tell ourselves.

After all, we buy it the best dog food, we spend a tidy sum on veterinary care, and the dog has a basket full of chew toys. We even put in a flap door so the dog can exit to the yard whenever it wants – no need to even ask.

But, of course, if the dog could talk, it might tell a different story!

Imagine, for a moment, that you and your dog have exchanged roles.

Instead of a dog living in your house, you are a small child that has come to live in a cave inhabited by four or five dogs. You are an only child, and the cave is attached to a small yard. You were brought to live in this cave when you were only two years old, and ever since that time you have only been able to communicate with other humans on those brief occasions when you have been allowed out on a short leash.

Now here’s a question: Would you be happy? Would you be fit? Would you know the language of humans? Would your mind be fully developed? What kind of adult would you be if you were raised in these same conditions?

Do you see the parallel? The wonder is not that some dogs are discipline problems, but that almost all of them are not as crazy as bed bugs!

When dogs deprived of exercise, socialization and instruction act out and are brought to a trainer for remedial work, their owners are almost never looking to be part of a drawn-out process that will cost a lot of money and extend over many weeks or months. Instead, the average owner is looking for an event; a quick incantation or party trick that can be repeated in two or three sessions, after which order and calm will be restored.

THE MAGIC STARTS WITH YOU

But are there really such tricks in the world of dog training?

Yes and no.

Yes, there are specific solutions for narrow and specific problems.

That said, the most important part of dog training has never been a secret any more than eating less and exercising more has been “the secret” to losing weight.

The most important part of dog training is active, consistent and focused participation by the owner in the education of his or her own dog.

The magic does not start when you hire a trainer. The magic starts:

▪️When you exercise the dog every day.

▪️When you pay close attention to your dog and communicate consistently with it through well-timed rewards and signals.

This is not to say that there aren’t tools, and that many of them aren’t great.

Every dog catalog and magazine is packed with ads offering up various types of collars, halters, and leashes. Every bookstore is packed with dog training guides promoting clickers, hand signals, e-collars, food rewards, ball rewards, scent-training, and every kind of freshly-potted canine philosophy.

But no device or method matters if the owner does not have the self-discipline to show up everyday to actively work with his or her own dog.

This is Hagrid’s secret, and it’s not one you can buy in the magic shops in Diagon Alley.

06/02/2024

Miss Darcy went home today after her two weeks of training. We had so much fun with this beautiful girl!
It is such a joy to watch dogs learn, gain confidence and become an all round well behaved dog.
I know her owners have missed her.
🐾❤️🐾

02/02/2024

👏🏼👏🏼 We support the Baldwin County Humane Society!🐾❤️🐾

25/01/2024

Windy this morning.
Darcy out for a walk looking gorgeous!❤️🐾

24/01/2024

Darcy is working on paying attention to her handler rather than other dogs. It’s just a start.❤️👍🏻🐾

23/01/2024

Darcy out for a walk this morning.🐾❤️

22/01/2024

This is Darcy. She is a young fun loving girl. You will see plenty of pictures of her while we are out and about.❤️🐾
Small dogs need training too!

31/12/2023

Thank you everyone that has let Diane’s Dogs be a part of your life in 2023. Hope you continue to have fun and new adventures with your dogs in 2024! 🐾❤️🎆
Happy New Year 🎊

30/12/2023

27/12/2023

23/12/2023

E-collars can add freedom to a dog and trust to an owner. Stop letting “feelings” hold you back from learning about the potential of the e-collar.🐾

Until a year ago, I was a trainer with a very force free approach. I didn’t believe there was a place for aversives in dog training. I didn’t have a dog that required them. Lucky me!

Until I got this chap. My very much adored kelpie, Evo. Bred to move HUGE flocks and herds of livestock out in rural Australia. A hard-headed dog, with a mega independent streak.

I worked hard with him. I’m a trainer. I laid my foundations, as I have done successfully with my other 4 dogs before him. They worked, to a point. And then, they didn’t.

I was fully prepared to give him a breed-appropriate outlet. Alongside the other work I give my dogs, I have my own sheep, meaning I can work my own dogs regularly on stock. However, my small flock of flighty sheep was far too jumpy for him to work, and he was becoming dangerous out and about in any sort of proximity to sheep.

So, you may say, just keep him on a lead! Problem solved. Well, not really.

Management can and does fail. I have heard it from countless clients. I have had it fail myself.

I also live, with sheep on my property, and surrounding it on 3 sides. Everywhere we turn, there are sheep. There’s no avoiding them.

Keep him on a lead in the garden? We have a large garden and keeping him on the lead would be unfair. He’s an incredibly active, working bred dog, who would end up spending his entire life on a lead.

We also encountered prey drive issues out and about, particularly around deer. His recall was fantastic, but once we moved, our walks were either full of deer, or sheep and he could rip a long line out of your hands to chase something particularly tempting.

So, I decided to bite the bullet and e-collar train. Controversial, particularly online.

But, the absolute best thing I ever did.

The alternative solutions I had suggested were:

Keep him on the lead - I buy good quality leads, but they have failed on me before
Move house - we’ve moved to a dream house, not an option
Avoid places with sheep etc - hard when they’re in the garden
Long line - he could still pull a long line out of reach
Train him - he was trained to a very high level and we had reached the limits via force free methods.

Management fails.

I went through the process of conditioning him properly to the e-collar. I spent ages ensuring I got it right, he understood what was expected and that he knew how to switch it off. I invested in a pricey bit of kit, and I went about it by the book.

It’s transformed his life.

He can romp around the garden, he can walk through my sheep without batting an eyelid, he can walk off lead on the hills and he can enjoy walking in the forest even when deer run out in front of us.

For him, that wasn’t ever going to be an option without it.

Nothing was more reinforcing than chasing.

And it was going to get him killed. He’d have been shot, or hit by a car, or lost. All because I wouldn’t open my mind to using different tools.

Am I suggesting every dog requires one? Absolutely not. But there are MANY cases where they save lives. It’s both saved and enriched his.

He’s happy, he lives his best life. He hikes everywhere with us, he’s well mannered and fully reliable off the lead. He knows the rules, and that’s the key.

He’s not suppressed. He can still go off and be a dog. He tears around the garden with our other dogs, he sniffs and does dog things. But he’s safe when doing it all.

I see a lot of judgement towards these tools from people owning dogs who would never require these tools. That’s great. And that’s also not a problem. But it is completely unfair to demonise the use of a tool which you haven’t taken the time to fully understand. I was 100%, without a doubt, against them before I took the time to understand how they worked and how they were used.

It’s imperative that they’re used with a trainer well versed in using them. It’s also crucial that the equipment used is good quality and not something cheap from Amazon or eBay. It’s an investment, but one that is so necessary for a lot more dogs than you might realise.

Take the time to understand others’ points of view. There is truly not a one-size-fits-all approach in dog training and my change of opinion has opened up a whole new world for all of my dogs ❤

Photo by Saffy Leyfield Photography

20/12/2023

Thank you Oscar for my Christmas present!❤️🎄❤️ I think Oscar is giving me a hint about wanting more treats.🤣🐾

13/12/2023

Keep your eyes out!

23/11/2023

Hope everyone enjoys your day and family.🐾🦃🍗

20/11/2023

It’s OK to put your dog in a kennel while you have guest over.🐾🦃