Meet Parker! This adorable little character has been with me a couple weeks now learning some valuable social skills and working on some general obedience. His leash work has indeed come a very long way. What began as a little tug boat is now a happy, cooperative dog that’s getting the value from the walk he needs🐾
Nicely done little guy!!
May I introduce the lovely (and slightly hyper) Bella!! Let’s take a look at her first lesson on leash walking🐾
Bruno is on his last day of training and to celebrate his amazing progress, I just wanted to show him doing his thing! This is a remarkable turnaround and he has worked extremely hard with a great, enthusiastic attitude from day 1! He’s still as energetic and playful as ever, but understands control and respects the jobs I ask him to do.
This is a brilliant walk and even when he gets a little distracted its very easy to get him back on track and keep moving. The leash is basically loose the entire time and I’m using super minimal input. I couldn’t ask for a better result🐾💙😎
Outstanding job young man!! Class dismissed!
Let’s take a quick peek at how Bruno is doing with self control:)
This is why I preach about the place command so often! This kind of dog would not have even been EXPOSED to the concept of self control without it. Now we are verging on an off leash reliable dog that can sustain long durations of sitting still while things happen around him. He’s even begun respecting smaller dogs more! He still needs some work on how to greet his play mates but that will come in time🐾
Bruno needed a ton of work walking calmly on a leash, and finally today it started to take some real shape! He’s still super sensitive to distractions but here’s a peek at how it looks now🐾
Bruno is something of a project lol 🐾
Though it has been a struggle at times to get focus from him, this exercise will help increase his attention span if done regularly. This is a super common drill I do with most every dog I train and is an easy way to demonstrate the way the slip lead and/or ecollar are used.
Beaux gives us another beautiful demonstration!
One of the more challenging commands to teach for some dog owners is a simple down command. Here’s a breakdown of how to do that properly.
Caution: it is super important to use very LIGHT pressure for this one. Being too forceful and cause injury or compromise the dog’s trust in you and the pressure language. If you have questions, reach out to me🐾
How to handle it when a dog uses their mouth on the leash or your hands with Bruno🐾
Everyone meet Bruno! This pup has energy for DAYS. I left this largely unedited save for a very few cuts. When they say “go back to basics,” this is what they mean:)
May I introduce Beaux🐾💙
As you can see, Beaux is a Frenchie. He’s got a lot of the typical traits and there are a few simple reasons for training but they all boil down to one basic thing: self control.
As usual, multiple things are happening at once here. First, we are teaching a new command (place) and using an object he’s never seen before in the process. The reason I like to use this command is because understanding requires the dog to use self control, which many struggle with mainly because they aren’t really ever asked to do it and when they are, it’s not clear what is expected.
When you teach this one the right way, you are practicing with their positive and negative markers, which increases their understanding of anything you ever ask of them and starts to open up a line of verbal communication. You’re also encouraging and rewarding focus—and Beaux really demonstrates what it looks like when focus begins to increase and they start using a little self control. This one is a clinic on those aspects as well as giving the dog time to think and solve the problem. If they engage their brain and figure it out, it’ll stick faster and last longer!
It is SOOOOO nice, every now and then, to just have a training video where you can say “THIS! It should look like THIS!”
Axel doing a killer job on Heel today💙🐾 (this dude officially owns my heart, he’s leaving in like 3 days and I’m not sure I can handle that lol)
This is Axel💙
There are a few things happening here:
1. Introducing the place command
2. Heavy use of positive and negative markers (yessss, and Nope! Respectively) so that axel can begin identifying them
3. Solely relying on the pressure/release language of the slip lead
4. Praising success and encouraging acceptance of the command (when the dog sits or lies down on place without being told—this is not required but as it happens I always acknowledge it positively to encourage calmness during this command)
5. And most importantly, I’m trying to have fun with it and stay upbeat to match Axel’s natural happy, peppy energy.
My best advice is to watch the leash carefully, note when it becomes tense or loose, and rely on that timing to be clear to the dog what you are trying to achieve. In slightly over 6 minutes, we were able to achieve full comprehension and even got some light duration out of axel when i left his sight :)
Good job little man!🐾😎💙
Willie’s Heel command is looking pretty good!! The rule is simple: stay to my left, keep my pace, stop if I stop and sit. Usually with youngsters, all I’m looking for is a loose leash walk experience. But Willie is giving us grown levels of focus here. A moving command is more challenging to a dog’s mind and because of that, the walk is an invaluable part of a great life with your dog🐾😎
Meet Willie Nelson:) this little dude has been here around a week now and getting him to accept the leash and the pressure has been a chore! It’s starting to take a little shape finally, and keep in mind we are dealing with a toddler here, so manage expectations lol
Healthy play 101!!
Note that even tho Zoey is very vocal during play, lots of growls and snarls, at no point are either of them out of control. There are several pauses, there is an even back and forth, both dogs are equally engaged in play, and you can actually see Zoey exert a little dominant pressure (listen for me to say it in the video) telling Roxy to chill it out a little.
This is healthy play. This is beautiful.
May I present, his excellency, supreme commander of the 3rd brigade and chair of the allied defense initiative, General:)
What can I say lol, there is a LOT to work with here and I don’t just mean his size. General is a great example of a big baby—literally, he’s technically still a baby lol. And nowhere is that more evident than when the leash comes out. This concept is so foreign to him that we need to go to the very basic beginnings and work from there, which will give us a great chance to get everything right the first time 🐾
I’m extremely proud of Rocco! Make no mistake, if you are a dog with separation anxiety, life is already not that much fun but going through any sort of behavioral rehabilitation is nothing to sneeze at. It’s a grueling process that is mentally and emotionally draining (for the dog and the trainer, trust me on that—I personally look at it as “I’ll carry your burden while you’re here so you can learn to carry it yourself,” so the emotional toll is significant). However!!! Rocco is on cruise control at this point and what I see in him now makes me very happy for him and his newly found peace of mind.
We aren’t out of the woods yet, but I can see some light🐾
Cisco gets some trigger time!
This is one of the daily drills I do and one of my dog moms mentioned it today so I thought I’d show them in action.
For ambient noise I have a television on with a documentary playing (WWII in color, if you haven’t seen it it’s awesome!), and we are focusing as much as possible on only using the ecollar. Just hold place for me, no big deal:)
Cisco is a real project. When I encounter a dog that is as controlled by irrational fear as much as he is, the challenge is not to fall into the same human trap of feeling sorry for him that so many others have—otherwise he wouldn’t be in this position. Instead, fully commit to helping him conquer one fear at a time. That is, after all, exactly what the root goal of his training is: how to conquer fear, how to realize just how awesome you really are.
Today’s lesson: separation anxiety with Rocco🐾
