Phalanx K9 Modular Dog Training

08/04/2024

Judah showing me what’s up , working on the out with him and the handler emphasizing the “no” with correction then Juda gives up and immediately giving him the reward bite (premack principle) the dog is doing fantastic!

07/20/2024

Some of you already know the story about Finn, a working line GSD that was unethical and irresponsibly sold by a breeder and police/working K9 trainer in the CT area known as Ron Cash of ironclad K9, (disclaimer: I have met Ron in the past and reached out to him with no response to this situation with a “I am busy” excuse) he most likely decided this dog wasn’t good for his breeding stock and decided to market and sell this dog as a pet line GSD because he needed to get rid of him. He was contacted by these people and sold the dog to a couple who were extremely ignorant and later became very arrogant of the situation that was unfolding. This dog has had a lot of forced interactions and entitled to basically everything combined with zero training and socialization, Finn is. Dominant dog with a softer personality so what that means is if you entitle a dog with those traits and give that dog a correction that he or her deems unfair…you’re getting bitten. He’s 15 months old, had multiple bites and one serious( ripped someone’s cheek off) it was mostly likely due to a forced interaction, this couple tried to also keep him as a “service dog” which doesn’t work with a dog of this caliber and genetics, It was a horrible situation and it got worse as we discussed plans for the owners to surrender due to the fact he was being sued by one of the “victims”, even after we had met him for the assessment, the owner had kids petting the dog and forcing a interaction that same day and claimed he was fine with it, which I doubt with his lack of social skills and fear aggression, the owners did not see that any of this was a big deal nor did they have any remorse or responsibility. The breeder and the owners didn’t respect this animal or his space, or his genetics. Needless to say we saved Finn and he’s a fantastic working dog that’s going to make a great personal protection dog or police k9. 3 days of FSDT and he’s already tolerable and so much more relaxed, playful and even affectionate on his terms at times, which he devalues a-lot because they forced so much of unwanted attention on him treating him like a house cat or stuffed animal. Totally Unacceptable!

07/15/2024

🤙🏻

07/15/2024

So recap from this week

This is Finnegan. He is a High prey/fight drive dominance aggressive GSD with a pedigree that would honestly make most trainers get flushed and swallow in terror. Military and police k9 working lines all day. This is a pretty serious dominance aggression case that a lot of trainers in my area have either turned away in NY and CT or refused to help, getting heavy handed with this dog will earn you a 1 way ticket to the ER. Well, I don’t turn dogs away so of course I volunteered. So this 18 month old male that has bitten multiple people is being dominant with owner and others mostly due to him being entitled and to certain things in the household and they’ve all become limited resources to him. He also devalues affection because he gets way too much of it and will actually muzzle punch or bite you in the face if you bother him too much with affection and petting. The owners realized that they had a ticking time bomb on their hands. They called a GSD rescue Stephanie's Shepherds Rescue, Rehab and Training, 501C3 , Steph reached out to me because I’m only one of very few trainers in the area that will even take on a case like this and I was willing to travel with her all the way to Hartford CT area. this dog was a little outside the realm of what she typically would deal with these days, after getting all the information I realized that the breeder was extremely unethical in releasing this dog to these owners which they know they had no business having at all. Again not the owners fault but the breeder. The breeder also refused to take Finn back, when he absolutely should have because he trains in high drive police and working dogs in scent/trailing and patrol work. I pledged to do right by this dog and give him a job. He will make someone a fantastic police k9 or personal protection dog if they stick to my training guidelines only. We will be taking him in and putting him to work by giving him a good foundation when everyone else suggested the blue juice which I find very unacceptable!

07/15/2024

Always happy to make new friends and help out.

07/13/2024

Reason number 1001828393969 why I don’t do leg bites

American Bully Chief Subscribe for more training tips and information, if it’s anything you guys would like us to show or go over that’s dog related or you ...

07/12/2024

07/11/2024

These pups need a good home. Please help out the DCSPCA. willing to discount training with adopted dogs.

07/08/2024

You will never see me ever be heavy handed with a dog in protection or any type of K9 working environment. Mostly because I don’t have too.
For too long I have seen local police agencies (some that I have previously worked for) be heavy handed or down right abusive to thier dogs in training. Including sport work! There’s no reason to choke a dog off a bite, over correct a dog, or alpha role a dog. There’s no reason for it and I urge fellow law enforcement officers like myself to stand up for yourself and your dog to your supervisors in training. It’s gotta stop!
(Disclaimer: I’m not saying every department does this but any agency that claims their dogs are trained using positive reinforcement only methods is complete BS)
Mike D’Abruzzo of K9-1 can explain this much better than I can.

Police K9 dogs are one of the most abused group of dogs that should be a concern to the public and dog training industry. The acceptance of very low standar...

07/02/2024

I want to take a moment to thank all my clients for making this business possible. But first I have to address The following, it’s 100% a true story: The past two months have been the busiest and most lucrative I’ve experienced in a long time. It’s not just about the money (although we all have bills to pay). It has also been quite stressful. I’ve lost friends, faced disdain from other trainers in the area—some of whom I considered friends—for no reason other than starting a business or having a different or more methodical approach to training. Whether it be dog behavior, obedience, aggression or protection work. (Example: I want a client to understand the process or techniques in which I train a dog in its natural instinct to protect a member of a pack will not be the same as someone who trains a dog to bite a decoy on a sport field. unfortunately the sport training methods have been marketed as protection dog training)

There have been clear acts of sabotage. Clients I’ve helped were told not to contact me and were given a biased impression of me. Some trainers and a few veterinarians have spread misinformation, despite their “wisdom” and “knowledge.” These people have been unethical, used quick-fix tactics, or committed fraud by charging exorbitant fees for doing nothing or made them worse by using harsh compulsion methods. They’ve either ripped you off, told you that “you’ve ruined your dog” and they can’t help you, lied, given biased or just bad information, said “you need to put your dog down,” or called your dog “untrainable”.

Despite these futile efforts, all of you have learned that none of this is true about me, you or your dog. I only showed you the door and gave you the key to unlock it, but you proved you have the strength and mental fortitude be a confident leader. I’ve done a lot in my life, but For once I feel like I’m making a difference. Thank you for giving me that opportunity.

Cheers 🍺

06/16/2024

Happy Fathers Day from the Team and our client here, Zeus with his son Kylo doing some Phase 1 obedience training together

06/12/2024

Assessing a new client

06/10/2024

My buddy Spencer didn’t know anything outside of a sports field club, until we started doing this a few weeks ago. I’m glad he recognizes the difference in drives and play drives vs real ones. Sometimes being a. Good agitator that just gives a dog good feedback to the dog can make all the difference in the world. He’s done a fantastic job and I’m glad to be working with him.

06/10/2024

I didn’t really wanna post this but I feel like it’s important to show mistakes made in training for a reason. Spencer (Decoy) has been helping me work wrecker in protection drives and I’ve been teaching him the mechanics of actually being a protection decoy vs a sport decoy. He’s been doing fantastic and I have no complaints. Wrecker is a pretty safe dog to work with so I felt that we should have no issues (and we haven’t the last 6 times or so since we started doing this). This video I feel really shows the importance of having a good foundation in training and understanding the importance of Premack principle and good targeting can definitely avoid a serious accident in training (which we absolutely did) Wrecker also has no Ecollar or prong collar on. Just a flat collar and leash. So realistically he could’ve said “F you” and did whatever he wanted without much consequence. I even forgot the command structure because I was more focused on outing him and recalling him. I like being transparent in my training, and notice we did end it on a good note and discussed what happened to keep lines of communication open. Even if we slipped on some wet grass and the dog plowed the decoy over and messed up the command structure and almost lost a hand. Mistakes were made, but We recovered from it quickly and learned. Listen, stuff happens in training. That’s why they call it training.

06/09/2024

Assessing some new clients.

06/07/2024

i have shared this video before but i love revisiting it because, its a good example of a dogs natural instinct of protection aggression. (wolves and coyotes also posess this) watch how much of a flight/fear drive the dog has at first and then it goes from defense/fight drive fairly quickly once the owner starts being attacked. some sport trainers have told me in my early years of dog training that a dog will not protect for real without any formal training, this trainer in the video is about to learn the hard way just how false that statement is. however, when you train a dog for sport in play drives that is somewhat true for a lot of bite sports dogs because it's just a game to alot of them depending on the dog. its important to understand and know the difference between play and real. i have seen dogs that were trained using sport training techniques and most of it was just for "show" in my opinion but, these handlers really thought that thier dogs were real when they were in 100% in a play mode vs a realy fight/prey drive mode.

06/04/2024

Give me a call and set up a behavioral consultation, my goal is to help dog owners enjoy their time with their dog.

06/01/2024

Logo redesign

05/29/2024

I laughed at this a lot harder than I should have lol

05/26/2024

Working one of my clients more “seasoned” German shepherds Juda.

05/21/2024

Heres an interesting one, the best way you can possibly learn about dogs is to study thier wild counterparts (wolves and coyotes) do they act exactly the same? no thats not what im saying at all but, were talking about natural wild behaviors here. all dogs are, are domesticated wolves and a coyote is a very close sub species, they CAN interbreed. so i would consider this a fear aggression display from the coyote. the Husky seems to be a little on the assertive/dominant side but not necessarily aggressive, if anything he/she is just curious, the coyote is most likely in search of food, quite possibly around 2 years of age and recently left the pack in search of a mate to start his/her own pack. the best way to destribe fear aggression is someone who cheap shots another person when they arent looking because theyre afraid going face to face with them, so in a sense theyre trying to beat you to the punch. that would be the human version of it anyway. some dogs that are fearful will display this and its the most common form of aggression in domesticated dogs. unfortunately alot of trainers can misdiagnose and confuse this behavior with real territorial/ dominance aggression.

05/05/2024

If it ain’t raining we ain’t training