Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: children, dogs that have been rehab'ed, expecations, philosophy, training, training in unusual conditions
I’m going to give you two scenarios:
Scenario 1:
Matrix is a ten-year-old shepherd cross. She lives with 2 children, ages 4 and 2. Matrix doesn’t much like the children: she growls if they get too close, and has even snapped at them for playing near her. Whenever her owners leave the room, they call her with them because she can’t be trusted.
Scenario 2:
Max is a four-year-old terrier cross. He lives with one child, age 2. He loves children, and his child loves him. They play together and adore each other. Max can be trusted with children, and has never shown any aggression toward them, no matter what’s going on.
Which of these scenarios is better?
Matrix’s parents realized they had a problem, and they called me. We taught Matrix to leave when the children walked up to her. Her owners still call her with them when they leave the room, in case a child trips and falls on her, and when friends come over to play she takes a rest in her own room, protected from the children, with her toys and her bed.
Since Max didn’t have any problem with kids, there was no reason to call a trainer. (I do know Max, as he was in training for leash manners, and I saw him around his boy. There was no doubt they loved each other.) When Max’s boy tried to give him a hug one day, Max was trapped, unable to escape, and nearly crushed by a child much larger than he was. In a panic and hurting, he snapped to get away. The boy went to the emergency room, and Max was put down.
Small dogs and dogs in pain are at great risk from children. My dog, Cash, is 110 pounds and loves kids. That said, if one of them lays on him, he’s too big (and too fit and young) to be hurt by it, and he’s big enough to get away. Most dogs don’t have that ability; most dogs are either too small or too old to escape like that. If your child is too young to understand that they need to be gentle and never hang onto a dog that’s trying to leave, then they’re probably too young to be left alone with the dog. What will your dog do when it’s trapped and hurting? Grab your dog’s leg when they’re walking and refuse to let go, or grab them around the neck and lay on them. Whatever they do, imagine if they did that while your child’s face was next to theirs, because your child was giving them a hug.
Most dogs that bite are already aggressive. Once pushed to that point, they’ll bite more easily the next time because they learn that it works. This bit of truth is wrong, though, when small children are involved. A trapped, hurting dog will bite even if they’re not aggressive. Calling your dog out of the room with you takes two extra seconds, and ensures that your child won’t hurt your dog — and can, therefore, save your dog’s life.
I would like to say this doesn’t happen often, but this winter alone I know of two dogs — friendly, sweet, child-loving dogs — who were put down after biting children who hurt them, trying to hug them. Is a hug worth your dog’s life? Please, teach your children to be gentle. Teach them to let go when the dog leaves. And until they’re old enough to remember to do so reliably, call your dog with you when you leave the room. It could mean the world to your family.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: expecations, philosophy, training, walking
One of the MOST IMPORTANT things I can tell people is that they need to walk their dogs — properly. (I haven’t posted about walking properly, but there are all sorts of articles on how to do it, with different ways of teaching you and your dog to walk together. Try Googling it!)
I’ve also hit a LOT of resistance from clients lately. I hear a lot of reasons as to why someone feels they don’t need to walk their dog, so I’m going to debunk some myths here.
1. My dog isn’t energetic.
That’s probably true. Dogs are like children; most kids I know would rather play video games than go to martial arts class. But just like children, going for a walk is better than napping. Whether or not they get out and work their muscles, they still have a need to exercise. The fact that they’re bottling energy up just means it has to go somewhere — likely toward whatever behavior we don’t want them doing, or to feed anxiety, aggression, and stress. A low energy dog still has energy, and in fact, many high energy dogs look lazy — they’re bottling that energy up. My pit bull, Lily, is a VERY HIGH ENERGY DOG. She sleeps all day. If I don’t make her get out and exercise, she looks low energy… and then she turns that energy she bottled up into anxiety and destruction. (Furniture, to be precise.)
2. My dog has a yard to play in.
Again, let’s look at kids. Are your kids more likely to sit and play video games, or go wander around in the yard by themselves? If they do head into the yard, do they get bored and come back in if no one is out there playing with them? And if you banish them to the trampoline by themselves, do they wear themselves out or do they come back in shortly, bored? All those same answers are true for dogs, too.
3. But training is going so well; the problem’s gone away.
The problem has gone away because you are exercising your dog and because you’re working on it. It takes both things to solve your problems. Like getting fit requires both exercise and eating healthy, and one doesn’t work without the other, keeping your dog emotionally fit requires boundaries and exercise. As soon as you stop exercising your dog, they take that energy and put it right back toward arguing with you.
People laughingly say that tired dogs are good dogs, but it’s true. Walking them works their body and drains off energy that MUST be put toward some use — if not walking, then arguing. Walking them also stimulates their minds so they aren’t just stagnant and bored and pondering bad ways to get attention. How do you feel at the end of the day if you’ve done nothing? Dissatisfied? Edgy? Cranky? Your dog is the same way. Now what if you’ve gotten something done? Do you feel accomplished? Tired? Satisfied? To a dog, walking is getting something done — they’ve followed their leader, seen new things, made sure the neighborhood is safe, worked as a team with the rest of their pack (you).
Even if you don’t walk correctly, walking is still important. It is the number one most important thing you can do.
So get out! Get some air! Get some sun and some exercise. Take your dog to the coffee shop, the post office, around the block, to the park. Enjoy the day… and make your best friend mentally and physically healthier!
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: cash, expecations, lily, perfection, philosophy, training
People tell me my dogs are perfect. I’m here to tell you right now: NO dogs are perfect. Except seeing eye and police dogs, and those dogs retire around 6 or 7 typically because they burn out.
So, how do you have a perfect dog? Don’t expect perfection.
Not too long ago, I took my dogs to a rodeo school where a friend of mine was going to learn to ride bulls. My dogs have seen all sorts of livestock, but not bulls — and not bucking bulls! I didn’t expect them to be perfect. I am a perfectionist, and for a while I DID expect perfection of my dogs. Then I realized some things that were very important:
1. I’m not perfect, no matter how hard I try. If I can’t be perfect, and I’m supposed to be smarter than them, how can I expect them to be perfect in an exciting, sometimes scary, always confusing world?
2. Expecting perfection means that I am constantly disappointed. I love my dogs, and I want to make sure they know it!
So, I dropped perfection. Now I look for a few things: Are they being generally well behaved? The answer is usually yes! The other thing I look for is: Are they better this week than they were last month? Once more, the answer is usually yes! This one is especially important when I’m newly training a dog with lots of problems. The truth is, that dog isn’t going to be well behaved for a while — but he can still be better behaved than he was last month!
When I took my dogs to the rodeo, I didn’t expect perfection. I expected them to be dogs, to mess up, to listen as best they could, to be pretty well behaved, to need reminders, and to be their usual loving selves.
We took our place on the grandstands. I told them to go lay down, and I poured them a bowl of water, leaving it where they could get to it. A few minutes later, someone walked by and said, “What nice dogs!” and reached to pet them.
Lily wagged, but stayed put. Cash leaped to his feet to help that hand get closer to his head. I had moved to the rail to get a better view, but I turned when I heard the person talking so I saw Cash stand up. I said, “Cash, lay down and then you can be petted.” (This is a sneaky trick, by the way: If I tell Cash he can lay down to get petted, then the person also realizes that Cash must lay down to get petted, and they wait! Otherwise, they reward him for standing up by petting him. If I tell them to wait until he lies down, they often tell me they don’t care if he jumps up, or they seem disgruntled. By correcting him, not them, the politics in the people world stay smooth!)
Cash didn’t lay down right away, but I just walked over, took his leash, and laid him down. Then I said, “Down,” told him he was good, and let the person pet him.
This happened several times, until the people walking past realized what was going on and actually started making him lay down before they petted him. If Lily didn’t get petted because she didn’t get up — better behaved dogs often get ignored, sadly! — then I made sure to pet her. Obviously, only when it’s a small group will people see what you’re doing and help enforce it, but regardless your dog will still learn!
After a while, Cash and Lily figured out they had to stay laying down. But twenty minutes passed and they got bored. Cash reached to sniff. I reminded him to stay put. Lily started skipping from sunshine to shade and back again. I reminded her to stay put (but released her after a while, so she could skip back and forth. By telling her to stay put, I reaffirmed that she had to stay. By releasing her to travel just a few feet in either direction, I was a nice person. Lily has been with me long enough to know the difference between, “Stay,” “Stay close,” and “You can be here or here [with pointing].”)
At lunch I gave them both bully sticks, which kept them occupied for another twenty minutes. In the late afternoon, when things — including them! — had calmed down, I released them and let them wander around the bleachers nearby. (Again, small group of people. Don’t do this in a crowd!) Occasionally they’d go too far and I’d call them, remind them of their boundaries. I always expected them to watch me, so that if I started to move they’d follow no matter what was going on. Twice I had to remind one of them by calling “Come on,” because they were distracted.
Were they perfect? No. But we had a great day, and the people around me were amazed at how good they were. Could I find a million and one flaws I’d like to see them be better about? Yes! But that would drive us all crazy. There were a few things I needed them to be very good about: not barking. Lily didn’t care about the bulls, but as soon as Cash started staring I corrected him and made him look away. By keeping him from even staring, I was able to keep him from getting excited and barking. I was able to communicate to him that those bulls were part of our pack, and nothing to get excited about.
I also wanted my dogs to listen — and they did. They did admirably, in fact. They were there all day, and though they needed reminders of things, they did their best. They weren’t annoying, they didn’t become unmanageable, they listened, and they tried very hard. I couldn’t ask for more.
This is how you have perfect dogs: don’t set unreasonable expectations, be proud of them for what they do well, and remember they have short attention spans. I would rather have an almost perfect dog who won’t burn out at 6 or 7 years than a perfect dog who needs to be retired young.
Perfect is overrated.
J
