Dog Whisperer

[cinderbird]

Just want to say - clicker training, if done properly does NOT require a clicker to mark the behavior the rest of the animal's life. My dog was clicker trained, and always gets compliments on how well she's trained.

Part of proofing the behavior is phasing out the clicker.

We also crate trained her from the moment that we brought her home, which I believe is a MUST for a positive relationship with your puppy. If you don't set them up for failure when you aren't home, then you're not going to come home to various items torn up, or pee and poop around the house.

She "graduated" from her crate at about 1.5-2 years old, with short sessions out of the crate while we were gone. She now no longer has her crate, but when it's pulled out for visiting dogs (Canine Assistants) she still enjoys going in it and napping in it.

We also were there to re-direct her when she was out of her crate and grabbing something as a toy that wasn't a toy (a shoe for instance) that we removed from her and gave her an appropriate toy instead.

And we set up clear rules for her, most of it was just intuitive to us. We knew what we considered acceptable behavior and didn't allow any less.

This is a dog that has never had any physical punishment or corrections.

Exactly. Most dogs are very eager to please. They don't destroy things or eliminate in inappropriate places to "get back" at their owners, they do it because they don't know any better or they aren't given a proper outlet. There are a lot of people who expect puppies to be perfectly trained right out of the womb and just don't get it when they dont behave perfectly, or are willing to hit their dogs.

i trained my CATS. They both sit before getting their food, allow their claws to be trimmed by a single person in a single session, allow me to clean their ears or teeth (teeth are a little more of an issue, but they put up with it well), i can touch them wherever i want to examine them if i need to or if a vet needs to, etc. and they are cats, they don't respond the same way dogs do.

When my boyfriend and i get a dog or dogs, they will be better trained than most peoples children because i won't accept anything less and we are more than willing to work with the animals to get them to that point. it will make us a happier, healthier pet home for it.

Going back to the topic, i DONT agree with Caesar's training methods. They are old and outdated. There are much better (in my opinion) methods of training dogs that don't involve alpha rolling or that kind of aggressive dominance. Making an animal fear you is a recipe for disaster. Fear causes a lot of terrible behaviors and reactions, positive reinforcement, clicker training, crate training, etc are more appropriate ways of training dogs.