Dog Training: The Issues

First, I'm going to cover my dogs' issues and the issues on which I worked with Victoria.

Leash Behavior - Probably the most frustrating issue. When on leash, my dogs go berserk when they see another dog. It doesn't matter what kind of dog, big or small, they bark at them all! They also lunge at the other dog and Riley tends to nip at Finlay (redirection of her aggression). Not only is this embarrassing, it's not healthy for the dogs. Note - This behavior is worse in our neighborhood, but does still happen to a lesser extent in parks and other "neutral" locations (territorial behavior for sure).

Barking - Excessive Barking (Ha, right when I typed that, Finlay barked!) - The dogs bark whenever they see a critter out in the yard (bird, squirrel, lizard, etc...), Riley barks when she sees a dog or cat on TV, and Finlay just barks for no reason (boredom?).

Manners - We have had some disputes with my family over my dogs' manners. Namely, Finlay stealing food off coffee tables or Riley jumping up in someone's lap at the dinner table. There are also issues with Riley getting into your lap and demanding attention.

Walking - The dogs also need help heeling on the leash.

For the most part, we worked on the above issues, mostly focusing on the leash/walking and manners. All in all, I think some of the training will help with other issues as well, because we are reminding ourselves that we need to teach the dogs what behavior we like. I've ordered a copy of Victoria's book from www.amazon.com and when it arrives, I will use it as a supplement to the training she provided to me.

Back to the Basics

I was very fortunate to get to spend some time with Victoria Stillwell from Animal Planet's, "It's Me or the Dog" last week. Victoria came by to help me with my wild terriers, Finlay and Riley. Now, I've talked about them before and you know they are my muses for Hound and Thistle and you know how I love them. It is clear that we didn't do the best job training them and we have some issues that need to be addressed, so I'm going to blog about our progress which will help me stay committed to the training.

Victoria could not have been nicer and did not judge me for the way my dogs are. That meant so much to me because I do realize that I didn't do the best job...it's the old, "give them an inch and they'll take a mile." Now, my husband and I have tried various training methods and have not been successful thus far. After meeting with Victoria, I can see why - we hadn't tried her methods which are purely based on positive reinforcement. Now I want to note that we did not use forceful methods before, but we tried the "choke chain" (which in itself has a horrible name), tried a citronella collar (we never wanted to use a shock collar) and tried to show our dogs that we were the leaders...None of which worked.

Victoria explained to me that our goal is to show our dogs the appropriate way to behave in the human world. After all, they are animals and we can't expect them to "guess" what we want and they do what comes naturally. She told me that what I needed to do was to reward the dogs when they were doing what I wanted them to do. Sounds simple, right? Yeah, I thought, "Why couldn't I have figured this out myself!" I was too busy telling my dogs, "no" instead of showing them the behavior I wanted and rewarding it when I got it. With this new knowledge, we started our training session.

Please keep in mind that what I write on here is my interpretation of what Victoria taught me and I would ask you to refer to her book for specifics from her (you can purchase her book, "It's Me or the Dog: How to Have the Perfect Pet" at www.amazon.com) . I would not want to lead anyone astray or misinterpret her training, because I am not a trainer and she is such a fabulous trainer! In my next post, I will discuss my dogs' issues and the training methods I was taught. Then I will update you on my day to day training which will be short posts about our progress along with what I learn from Victoria's book.

Stay tuned!