For a very good guide to all sorts of dog training processes and dog behavior challenges, I use and recommend Clickertraining ...that link goes to the description of this terrific ebook you download immediately, wherever you are! -- Rosana

I enjoy connecting with other dog webmasters and bloggers on Twitter — you can find me at twitter.com/trainingdogs if you are into this enjoyable social network (not only dogs, in fact dogs are just a tiny part of it.) Recently I asked if anyone would like to submit a guest article to this blog, and SewCrazyDogLady (follow her at twitter.com/sewcrazydoglady) sent me this. It sure got me smiling. 

The Power Of No

Targ and I were out for our morning walk yesterday and witnessed a behavioral problem in the making.

We live in a very urban area and quite often see other doggerts walking in the AM. We watched some poor soul who had no idea what she was doing to her dog.

This female doggie was very vocal about seeing us and the dog that was coming up behind her. She was barking and barking and barking! So, the owner lifted up her ear flap and yelled “NO!” in her ear.

Unfortunately, this dog had already started to relieve herself so by the time that she got the message that her Mom was mad at her, she thought she was mad at her for relieving herself!

Imagine you are sitting on the couch at home and a loved one walked up to you and said in a stern voice, “No!”.

Now imagine the only tools you have to ask what the heck their problem might be, are your body language and your expression. How would you know that your loved one is mad that you changed the channel on the TV five minutes ago… or that they don’t want you sitting on that side of the couch?

The trick in correcting unwanted behavior in your doggerts is to “catch them in the act” and then give them something else to do!

Is your dog picking up things they shouldn’t be? Teach them “drop it.”

Ripping up your shoes? Trade for a high value toy that they can chew.

Barking? Find out what is triggering them and either remove it or desensitize them to it.. or better yet, put the bark on cue… teach them to bark so they only do it when you want them to.

If your dogs relieve themselves in the house, “rubbing their nose in it” does no good. None. What it does do is stress out your dog. Find out why your dog is eliminating inappropriately. Did you leave the dog home alone too long and they just couldn’t hold it anymore? Or maybe your dog was never fully housebroken? If this is a new behavior for you dog, call your vet! There may be a physical reason that this is happening.

Remember, you will catch more flies with honey… reward the correct behaviors, replace the unwanted behaviors.

Woof!

You can read more at her site,  called Fuzzy Logic, at http://blog.sacredpaws.org/

I often mention in passing the training I do with Lola (left) and LarryDog, but today I will give them their own article. LarryDog is 11 now. He seems to be getting a bit harder of hearing and dimmer of vision, but he isn’t really any slower on those occasions when he gets into a wild romp with Lola up and down our long, narrow, hily quarter-acre yard.

He has always barked a lot. While sometimes this has annoyed us, he’s been an excellent dog for warning away the bears where we lived in Colorado and now any would-be thieves where we are in Mexico. It’s been interesting to watch him let teenager Lola take over some of the barking jobs. She isn’t nearly as talkative as he is, but every now and then she goes outside through the dog door and lets out a deep “Woof!” or two. When she started this, he would run outside too and bark away. Now, he is often content to let her take care of it while he gives a few token barks from inside, then settles back down into one of his favorite spots — by me and my computer, often.

LarryDog is one bright fellow — Blue Heeler, Chow, maybe some German Shepherd or other — and he loves to learn new things even now. He likes clickers and often trains me to give him more treats than I was intending to! (But no, he isn’t fat — playing with Lola has really helped him get more active exercise.) In the past year, he’s learned quite a few things, including the trick of letting me put treats on his paws and leave them there till I say “Okay!” This was easy for him, because he waits for his meals till I give the word too.

He’s also gotten very good at “Watch me!” which I had taught him a few years ago. I kind of forgot it but he never did, and now we are using it a lot. His long stay is much more reliable than it has ever been, and we are even making progress on his cutting back on his barking when requested. I usually do this by calling him to come and sit by me, and rewarding him with petting. I think he is mellowing with age in this regard!

Lola, now 18 months, is getting more of my training attention, as she came to us less than a year ago as a rescue. She reportedly was bred by an American family in this area (Lake Chapala, near Guadalajara), and a local dog trainer and walker called her the best Rottweiler bitch he’d ever seen, in both looks and temperament. Unlike virtually all the rescue dogs around here, she has never known life on the streets. She too came to us with a good start at being trained, and like LarryDog, she’s quite biddable. This is a treat after living for ten years with a Basenji! (“You want me to do… what? I don’t think so!”)

We have a training routine with Lola. I feed the dogs their breakfast, and whoever cooks dinner feeds the dogs too. We usually do five minutes or so of training before each meal — outside or in the sunroom where she eats, while LarryDog is closed in the kitchen gobbling his meal. Okay, some days it is just a token, but other days it goes on longer. Sometimes I do training with her at other times of day too. We are still working on a reliable long down. It’s funny how dogs are — one day recently I said, “Down!” and used my usual hand signal, To my awareness nothing was any different than the gazillions of other times I had done this. But Lola looked at me as though I had just landed from Mars and she had no idea what I was. I often do things with her in different parts of the yard, but this time we were right on the front porch, our most common spot. Go figure.

I like to do sits and downs with both dogs together. Lola will keep glancing at LarryDog to be sure she should still be doing it.

There is something about these few minutes a day, day in and day out, that really makes the dog training a steady joy in our lives.

I’m curious. Besides this blog, where do YOU get your dog training information? Do you…

• Take classes
• Have private lessons
• Learn a lot yourself from teaching dog training
• Do training with friends
• Use books,ebooks, and/or DVDs
• Go to workshops like ClickerExpo or the annual APDT gathering
• Have other favorite dog training spots on the internet, be they forums, blogs, or sites
• Your own past experience
• Or what?

When I redid the look of the blog this spring, I turned on comments, so it should be easy to make one. Even if you come across this query some time after I’ve made it, I’ll be interested in your answers.

(The comments form asks for your name, email, and website if you have one. Nothing at all is done with your email address, don’t worry. I don’t even care if you give a fake one. If you have a dog website or blog, do be sure to give it, and instead of putting your actual name e.g. John Doe, it’s fine with me if you want to put what your website is about, eg Agility Training or Dog Ecoproducts as that will give you a keyword link to your site. Technically, I don’t actually know if comments are nofollow or not on this Wordpress 2.5 blog, but every link can help. Links to sites that are just trying to sell dog ebooks without any really original dog-oriented content on the site will not be accepted.)

One reason I’m asking is that as a former librarian, I do LOVE to tell you about new books, DVDs, etc. But do many people care?

When Pigs Fly! Training Success with Impossible Dogs… Control Unleashed… Learning Games… Oh Behave!… How to Run a Dog Business… These are the top sellers at Dogwise for the first half of this year. (What, this year is more than half over? How did that happen?)

When Pigs Fly! Training Success with Impossible Dogs, by Jane Killion, explains how to use clicker and Read the rest of this entry