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"...in a healthy dog-owner relationship, praise
is virtually an automatic reaction, an attitude toward
the dog.
The most common mistake is to consider praise simply
a reward." ~The Monks of New Skete
| Puppy | Obedience | Schutzhund |
| German Showing | American Showing | Pet |
Puppy Socialization
Starting one week after you get your puppy (age 8 or 9 weeks), get him out one day a week to a new situation he has never seen before. This takes some planning, but is worth the effort.
8 Weeks: A walk (off leash) in a meadow or pasture with medium tall grass. Keep him with you by voice. Encourage him to climb over a little mound of dirt or a log. Praise his efforts to do something he has never done before. Walk just fast enough that he has to strain very slightly to keep up with you. At this age his desire to stay with you is very keen. Capitalize on that. The walk should take no more than 20 minutes.
9 Weeks: Another walk, this time in the woods. He is in taller grass and weeds. He must occasionally climb over small logs (Just big enough to be a challenge). He goes up the hill, down the hill, over the rocks, maybe down a small bank. The perfect setup is where he goes across a small creek. He gets wet up to the chest. He scrambles up the bank to follow you. He goes through a thick carpet of leaves that crunch when he walks. Encourage him all the way. Praise him for meeting the challenge. The walk takes about 20 minutes.
10 Weeks: The same as age 9 weeks but a bit more difficult. Occasionally hide momentarily from him when he is distracted in the woods. Watch him. Does he notice you are missing? If he does, and starts to look for you, suddenly appear and praise profusely. If he doesn't look for you, toss a pebble to make him notice you are missing. Then call him from your hiding place. When he starts to look for you, appear and praise him. This will teach him, as it is repeated time and time again, to watch you when you are out in the woods, instead of you having to constantly be watching where he is. This makes him take that responsibility of staying with you. Play this game over and over through many weeks until you cannot hide from him because he is always watching. This only works when started young.
11 Weeks: Take him swimming. You hold him and wade out to knee deep water. Point him toward shore and *gently* let him go. Be sure he gets his head up and he heads for shore. Have someone on shore encouraging him in a positive way. Another way to approach this is to entice him into the water by going in yourself and encouraging him to follow. Do not throw him in! When you are through get him out and dry him off and go home. Don't let him get chilled.
12 Weeks: Take a trip to the farm. Let him see cows, horses, chickens and whatever else you can find. This time you can keep him on leash. Make sure he is safe from the animals and let him get close enough to sniff. This outing can take 20 or more minutes. You have a positive attitude about all this. Be nonchalant about it all, as if this is what every 12 week old pup does.
13 Weeks: Take him on leash to town. Walk him on a main street with medium to light foot traffic. He sees and hears cars, trucks and heavy street traffic. He passes by many people walking bicycles, delivery men with hand trucks, etc. This should be a short outing about 10 minutes. Praise him lavishly for positive behavior. Be nonchalant and very encouraging. When you get back to the car, lay on the praise for his remarkable feats of courage.
14 Weeks: A trip to the beach or some other special place he has never been. Perhaps a trip to the local grade school front lawn when all the children are pouring out. Let the kids stop and pet him. Let him see and be in the crowd.
15 Weeks: Another trip to town.
16 Weeks: Your pup's major learning age of his entire life is now over. Hopefully you have given him a very wide range of experiences. If you have done all this faithfully you will have taught him the most important thing of all to learn and it will stay with him the rest of his life, enabling him to continue to learn throughout his lifetime.
17 to 21 Weeks: This is a bad time to subject your pup to stress, such as plane trips, a stay at the vets, boarding kennel or any threatening situation. Many pups act very fearful at this age. This should be a quiet time in their lives.
I wish I could claim these ideas as my own, but I can't. The information was signed "author unknown" and I got them from my friends at Adelhertz Kennels.
"Rambunctious, rumbustious, delinquent dogs become angelic when sitting."
~Dr. Ian Dunbar
If you don't give your dog a job, he will become self-employed.
Crate Training
Here is a link for the least expensive crates that I have found. I use them for my dogs.
http://www.conceptsforpets.com
What to look for when lining up obedience training for your dog.
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Group training is an inexpensive way to teach the basics. This is the foundation for a dog's learning. Many dogs go beyond this to work with agility trials, advanced training skills, Canine Good Citizenship (CGC), therapy dogs and other titles.
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One-on-one or private lessons teaches in isolation and does not allow for the dog to be socialized. We would recommend this only if you're dealing with specific associated behaviors.
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Socialization is the major advantage as the dog must get use to the idea of having other dogs around. They must be exposed and learn to ignore major distractions in a controlled environment. You will learn the skills of how to walk the dog down the street and pass others.
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Do more then just call if you are unfamiliar with the school.
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Plan to attend a class or two before hand or enrolling. The first class is pretty wild. The last class is amazing what the dogs and owners learn over a period of time.
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Look for training styles, abilities and people skills. How do they handle difficult dogs? How do they handle shy dogs? How do they handle fearful dogs? What are their attitudes towards boxers? towards rescued dogs?
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Watch out for trainers who promise or guarantee results.
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Look for humane training methods that use gentle, effective handling skills, not harsh or abusive methods which are unnecessary and often counterproductive and may even be harmful to the dog.
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Look for trainers who have ethics, before profits. Is the trainer understanding? Out for the welfare and quality of the dog? What are the class sizes like? Can they offer you references?
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Look for trainers that have a sense of humor. If it's not fun for both you and the dog, you maybe working to hard. If you're not excited about training your dog, your dog is not going to be excited about learning new things.
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Think of hiring a trainer for obedience school, just like you would if you were looking for a babysitters, day care for a child or educational schooling programs.
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Sometimes to get the best quality you may have to look beyond the front door steps of your communities.
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Talk to your vet for referrals, look at local animal shelters (most understand family pets), call state and local humane societies, check with local adult education programs (many offer basic obedience) and you can also post to various dog listserves.
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Look for trainers that use praise, motivation, reward (food/toy) and use consistency.
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Once you have established this communication system with your dog, continued to use them in your daily routines for the betterment of the dog. They will come to love you for their proud work and they will be a more enjoyable family member.
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They look to you for your leadership and guidance more then ever.
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A trained dog is a happy dog and a happy dog has an enjoyable life to live :o)
Written by my friend, Janice Dobson
Dog owners today have many activities to choose from if they want to work with their dogs: agility, obedience, tracking, schutzhund, ringsport, herding, flyball, search and rescue, conformation, therapy work, the list goes on and on. I will eventually be adding to this page a variety of information and links on each of these sports/activities.