dog training

A Dog’s personality can change

/ susanbulanda / 2 Comments

According to a study done by William Chopik a professor at Michigan State University a dog’s life changes can influence their personality. His study has confirmed that dogs have moods and personality traits that shape how they react to situations.

The way you treat your dog and the activities that you do with your dog can influence the dog’s personality. He found that the sweet spot for training and shaping a dog’s personality is around six months of age.

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Chopik plans to continue his study to see how the environment can change a dog’s personality. For example, a dog may behave one way in a shelter and if adopted into a loving home, may react differently. A previous study by Clive Wynne, professor of psychology and head of the Canine Science Collaboratory has demonstrated that letting shelter dogs do a sleepover in foster homes goes a long way to reduce their stress.

Therefore Chopik is on the right track with his planned study about how adopting a dog out of the shelter environment may change the way the dog reacts. However, canine behaviorists know that it can take three to six months for a dog to fully adjust to a new environment.

The bottom line is that this study shows that it is important to give your dog a loving home, train your dog, and properly socialize your dog to give your dog the best possible life.

K9 Obedience Training: Teaching Pets and Working Dogs to be Reliable and Free-Thinking by Susan Bulanda

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I am very excited to announce that my latest book is now available. If you would like an autographed copy please go to my website and order one, http://www.sbulanda.com.

If you live outside of the USA the postage may cost more than the book, but if you still want a copy please email me at: sbulanda@gmail.com and I will check how much the postage will cost. The book is also available as an Ebook. Below is a summary of what is in the book. As always, if after you read the book you can email me with any questions that you may have.

K9 OBEDIENCE TRAINING COVER PRINT

Obedience is the foundation for any reliable, well-trained dog. Without obedience, working dogs are ineffective in operations and pet dogs can be annoying and possibly a danger to themselves or others.

In K9 Obedience Training, you will learn the techniques that I have developed during my career as a dog trainer and then certified animal behavior consultant. The methods outlined in my book will let your dog be free-thinking as well as obedient. I also cover the latest research about how a dog thinks, what they understand and what they are capable of solving.

What is free-thinking? This is when a dog can apply what he has been taught to situations that he has not encountered before. His training allows him to solve problems and even perform obedient disobedience. An example of obedient disobedience is when a person directs a dog to do something, but the dog knows that it is not safe to do it. For example, if you toss a ball and it drops over a ledge that is unsafe, the dog will not retrieve it even though you have told him to “fetch.” This allows the dog to make decisions. It does not undo the training that the dog has had.

In my book I cover many topics that are part of obedience but not part of the basic obedience exercises. This includes teaching your dog to allow you to groom him, handle his body parts for things such as nail clipping, brushing the coat and teeth.

The book also covers basic manners such as not jumping, bolting in and out of doors and other safety exercises.

What is also very important is the discussion about who should train the dog and the rules that you must follow to successfully train the dog. Everything is explained in detail so that you can understand the purposes behind the rules.

I also cover food and how it affects your dog’s behavior. There is so much more in this book including some fun tricks to teach your dog. And for fun, at the end of the book is a photo gallery of some of the animals that have shared my life.

Here is a list of major topics. Many of these have sub-topics as well.

Part I Training Your Dog to Think Freely

  1. What is a Free-Thinking Dog?
  2. A Positive Training Philosophy

Part II Pre-Training Basics for The Free-Thinking Dog Trainer

  1. Talking to Your Dog
  2. Questions to Ask Before You Start Training
  3. House Training and Crate Training
  4. Handling Your Dog’s Body for Grooming and Hygiene

Part III

  1. The Equipment
  2. Setting Up for Success
  3. Basic Obedience Training
  4. Advanced Obedience for Safe Work, Sport and Play
  5. Exercises for Common Behavioral Challenges
  6. Tricks

K9 Obedience Training: Teaching Pets and Working Dogs to be Reliable and Free Thinking – by Susan Bulanda

/ susanbulanda / 4 Comments

Obedience is the foundation for any reliable, well-trained dog. Without obedience, working dogs are ineffective in operations and pet dogs can be annoying and possibly a danger to themselves or others.

K9 OBEDIENCE TRAINING COVER PRINT

In K9 Obedience Training, veteran search and rescue (SAR) dog handler and trainer Susan Bulanda, M.A., C.A.B.C. (certified animal behavior consultant) shares the secrets of building an effective obedience training program. SAR dogs need “thinking” obedience: they sometimes need to exercise intelligent disobedience in the field. You can use the same training program for any working or pet dog. For trainers who demand the best obedience training for future working dogs, Susan’s techniques lay the groundwork for success.

And pet owners who want to help their dog be easy to be around will find lots of training tips and exercises too, along with straightforward advice on proper handling, grooming and teaching simple tricks.

My new book will be out by the end of June, 2019. You can order it from my web site, www.sbulanda.com  You will receive an autographed copy. Please note that the shipping cost is for the US only. If you live outside the US please email me at sbulanda@gmail.com for postal rates.  Unfortunately it often cost more to ship the book than the book cost. You can also order it on line as an ebook through Amazon or from the publisher at www.dogtrainingpress.com 

K9 Search and Rescue Troubleshooting: Practical Solutions to Common Search Dog Training Problems

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I want to share with my loyal followers that my latest book, K9 Search and Rescue Troubleshooting: Practical Solutions to Common Search Dog Problems, published by Brush Education, has won first place in the bi-annual National League of American Pen Women’s contest, in its category.

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Although this book is written primarily for SAR dogs, it can help owners and trainers of other working and sport dogs solve some of the training issues that they have. If you would like an autographed copy of my book please order it directly from my web site at http://www.sbulanda.com

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Do Dogs Prefer Food or Praise as a Reward?

/ susanbulanda / 2 Comments

In an attempt to further understand the human-animal bond, researchers investigated whether or not dogs prefer praise or food from their owners. Surprisingly most of the dogs preferred praise or praise and food equally. Two of the dogs were chow-hounds and preferred food.

While 13 subjects are not a fair sampling, especially when one considers the personality differences in breeds and even within the same breed, the study does shed some possibilities for consideration.

Most trainers, behavior consultants and handlers of working or sport dogs can tell you about individual dogs who are not food motivated. The people who try to work with these dogs have to find another way to motivate them. Fortunately, most dogs will work for both praise and food, making it easier to motivate them in training situations.

Food is still a great way to train a dog, especially when coupled with clicker training. But for those dogs who are not food motivated, a pat on the head or verbal praise is just as good. When using food, it is always best to wean the dog off of the food once he has learned the exercise and save the special treat for new exercises.

Studies such as this one are great because they open minds and possibilities for future studies. The research team in this case want to explore how dogs process and understand human language.

www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/08/160816120656.htm

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Bab’s — Praise Motivated

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Riley — Food Motivated and laughing about it!

K9 Investigation Errors: A Manual for Avoiding Mistakes

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K9 Investigation Errors: A Manual for Avoiding Mistakes, by Resi Gerritsen and Ruud Haak, Brush Education, Inc.; 256 pgs.; ISBN: 978-1-55059-672-4, $44.95

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How can you make a good book better? Resi Gerritsen and Ruud Haak who wrote K9 Fraud, have accomplished that with their updated book, K9 Investigation Errors. They cover many important points in handling dogs that are common mistakes. For example, they explain how dogs can read human gestures, even the slightest ones (the Clever Hans Effect) which can cause a false response from a dog. They review some famous cases in the United States and show how the handler or poor training misled authorities, sometimes resulting in the arrest of the wrong person.

What I especially liked was their comments that dog handlers who claim fantastic results with their dogs (typically false) influence authorities who believe them and then think that properly trained dogs who cannot perform to that level are not as good, when in fact the properly trained and handled dogs are correct.

Another interesting point that they bring out in their book is what they call failure scents. This is when a dog associates a scent with failure and by association can lead to the dog’s poor performance. This is the same as people will often associate a benign event, song, scent or even food with a bad experience and react to the memory that it triggers.

There is so much information in this book that I strongly recommend handlers of all disciplines read this book and evaluate how they can improve their dogs and their handling skills.

The book is a high quality book, as is typical of Brush Education Publications, with quality binding, pages and soft cover. It is well edited with no typo’s or other common mistakes that authors tend to make when writing. It is always a pleasure to review a Brush Education book.

The chapters are:

Scent-Identification Lineups

The Dutch Training Method for Scent Identification

Dogs’ Responsiveness to Human Gestures

Tracking Dogs in Crime Investigations

Scent Research and Tracking Experiments

Errors in Mantrailing

Human Odor and Dogs’ Scent Perception

Scent Problems and Training Problems

Preventing Investigation Errors

Welcome!

/ Karen Hendricks / 1 Comment

Thank you for visiting my new blog site!

ID-100373827Check back often (or subscribe via the button on the right) for posts to help pet owners with health, safety and training information; and to share information on dog training, behavior, and search and rescue. Additionally, I look forward to sharing:

  • Behind-the-scenes stories and excerpts from my published books
  • Safety and health tips focused on cats, dogs and parrots
  • Photos and stories about dogs I have trained through the years

Some of the questions I am asked most often revolve around dog training. Some basic tips include:

ID-10041702Remember, dogs do not speak English, therefore you must SHOW your dog what you want. Your actions speak louder than your words. All of your body language speaks to your dog. Therefore, your ATTITUDE, FACIAL EXPRESSION AND TONE OF VOICE communicate to your dog. You cannot try and tell your dog that he is not doing the right thing while you are hiding a laugh because you really think your dog’s behavior is cute or funny. Your dog will laugh right along with you. You cannot ask your dog to obey you if you hesitate in your movements. Your dog will not believe that you are the leader. On the other hand, you cannot bully your dog or physically punish him and expect your dog to respect and trust you. A good working relationship with your dog is built on trust and leadership. This is communicated to your dog by giving commands in a tone of voice that says, “I expect you to do this, no discussion.” Then move in a steady, yet gentle way to convey leadership.

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Never re-command your dog. If your dog knows what the word means, re-commanding him just teaches your dog that a) he does not have to listen to you; b)he can do it when he wants and c)you are not the leader. For every command there should be an action. Either you coax the dog into doing what you want or the dog does it. If your dog does not know the “sit” command, and you tell your dog, “Sit . . . Sit . . . SIT!”, then make the dog sit on the third sit, your dog will learn not to sit until the third command. He will think that the command is “sitsitsit.”

Most people repeat commands to their dog’s because they are being polite (according to human standards) and assume that the dog did not hear the first or second time. I can assure you that if your dog does not respond the fist time, and does not acknowledge you, he DOES HEAR you. He is just IGNORING you. Therefore, politeness to a dog translates into “My owner is wimpy, wimpy, wimpy! Why should I listen?”

So, speak clearly and in a direct manner to your dog. For every command expect or initiate an action. Do not repeat commands. Do not hesitate when you move. Show your dog that you are a leader, not a follower.