A protection dog sport which includes tracking and obedience
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Send us a textWe truly enjoyed interviewing Tony. There will likely be a second episode. After listening to this one we know you'll see why we need to have him on again. Lots of subjects were covered in a slightly longer episode than normal. Tony Pallotta started training dogs in 1993, with over 25 years of experience thus far, his knowledge and experience has made him a leader within his industry. Like most it is not uncommon he started out in obedience training and found within him the passion and desire to learn, absorb and to become more competent and proficient within. It was with that mindset and goal he began to study and train in the sport of Schutzhund. Once he became proficient in Schutzhund as a successful handler and decoy. He realized early on that he felt there were some key components missing that caused him to raise some questions about what was being achieved and what was being taught to believe in. Subsequently he continued on with his desire to study and research and he began to prepare dogs for protection sports. This tested the handler's skills as well as the dog's skills to work in un-patterned programs. This is known as a real street type application in personal protection for both K9 and Handler. This experience allowed the furthering of comprehension and knowledge base by competing in protection venues such as, K9 Pro Sport's, Sundog Protection Pro Series and Iron dog.His desire to understand and specialize within the field took him to Italy. While in Italy working with Renzo Zolli and his community of training partners reaching into Austria and abroad, there a re-affirmation of skill set and advancement occurred. The realization that there was so much more to learn he continued on his travels to study disciplines and to further acquire a knowledge of skills and excellence, it was then that he landed in the Netherlands and began working with Erik Huft in the KNPV program. This was an unanticipated, eye opening experience for Tony and a catapult into a whole new style of training in the world of working dogs. At that time little was known about the Royal Dutch Police Dog Association Program outside of the Netherlands. Many of the world's Elite Military and police K9's have come from this program and it was with great honor for Tony to have been given the opportunity to work and study with such high caliber trainer's.https://workingk9.ca/workingk9-trainer.htmlWe are pleased to announce that Vested Interest in K9's has become our newest sponsor. Vested Interest in K9s, Inc. is a 501c(3) non-profit whose mission is to provide bullet and stab-protective vests and other assistance to dogs. Check it out www.vik9s.org. Please welcome Ray Allen Manufacturing as a sponsor to the podcast. Go to the most trusted name in industry for all of your k9 related equipment. For a 10% discount use the RAMWDDP10 discount code.Welcome our sponsor Gold Coast K9. Gold Coast K9 trains and deploys hand-selected service dogs for personal and family protection, police agencies, and school districts. Their training programs rank among the best and most trusted in the world. Follow Gold Coast k9 on all social media platforms. For 10% off merchandise use the GCK910 discount code on their website www.goldcoastk9.comHLTK9 Conference continues to be a supporter of the WDDP. They are gearing up for the next conference in Myrtle Beach SC. Plan ahead, the 2025 conference will be April 1,2,3, 2025. Register today at www.htlk9.com. Welcome out newest sponsor NCK9LLC. Located in Four Oaks NC, just east of Raleigh NC. Jim O'Brien and staff offer a variety of K9 services. Contact them at Phone : 919-353-7149 Email: jobrien@nck9.us
Send Julie a text!!Shannon Walker is an esteemed canine expert, renowned dog trainer, and the CEO and founder of Northwest Battle Buddies -- a non-profit organization dedicated to providing service dogs to combat veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). These precisely-trained dogs (and their precisely-trained humans!) provide veterans a way forward, when they may not have seen one. The service dogs allow vets to live in a way that civilians often take for granted -- whether it's taking your 5 year old daughter to the park or grabbing some milk in the grocery store. These parts of life that seem so basic to others might often seem paralyzing an incredibly difficult for vets with PTSD.Shannon shares why it is critical for a veterans to have service dogs, which she considers service equipment. Veterans with PTSD have a shockingly high suicide rate after returning home to civilian life.After gifting more than 250 dogs to veterans (that would cost $25,000 per dog), they have not lost a single vet to suicide. These highly trained animals are very carefully matched with their owners based on their needs, including: if the vet has a family, if they are working, if they have any disabilities, and more. Shannon has been in this field for nearly three decades and established Mans Best Friend – Dog Training in 1997, where she continues to make a positive impact in the lives of both dogs and their owners. She originally trained using the Schutzhund methodology, a European canine sport that evaluates a dog's tracking, obedience, and protection abilities. Shannon Walker - GuestShannon's LinkedInNorthwest Battle Buddies IG accountNorthwest Battle Buddies websiteJulie Berman - Podcast Host & ProducerJulie Berman's LinkedIn Profile@womencooljobs (Instagram)www.womenwithcooljobs.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I absolutely LOVE being the host and producer of "Women with Cool Jobs", where I interview women who have unique, trailblazing, and innovative careers. It has been such a blessing to share stories of incredible, inspiring women since I started in 2020. If you have benefitted from this work, or simply appreciate that I do it, please consider buying me a $5 coffee. ☕️ https://www.buymeacoffee.com/julieberman Thank you so much for supporting me -- whether by sharing an episode with a friend, attending a LIVE WWCJ event in Phoenix, connecting with me on Instagram @womencooljobs or LinkedIn, sending me a note on my website (www.womenwithcooljobs.com), or by buying me a coffee! It all means so much.
Visit us at shapedbydog.com The science of Matching Law is vital for everyone with a dog to understand for dog training and daily life so you can get consistent behavior without needing to use punishment. It's something we can all use to our advantage as positive reinforcement based trainers! Knowing about Matching Law and its relationship to reinforcement value and your dog's natural drives will help you get great behaviors and give you a strategy to turn not-so-great behavior around. In this episode you'll hear: • What Matching Law is and how it impacts your dog's behavior. • About reinforcement value and recency. • How different parts of the predatory cycle influence a dog's behavior. • Real-world examples of how reinforcement works. • Insights into training protection dogs and for bitey sports without punishment (training the out - with reference to my friend Matt Folsom of Modern Malinois). • The importance of understanding your dog's natural drives. • Practical tips to use Matching Law to your advantage. • About Matching Law in day to day life and dog behavior. • How to use your dog's favorite reinforcements to your advantage. Resources: 1. Podcast Episode 144: Teach Your Dog To Listen No Matter What… Even If You Think They Are Stubborn - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/144/ 2. Podcast Episode 196: Why Mastering Reinforcement Is The Linchpin To Reinforcement Based Dog Training - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/196/ 3. Podcast Episode 24: Distraction Intensity Index: Help For Dogs Who Chase Chipmunks, Bicycles, And Neighbor's Cats - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/24/ 4. Podcast Episode 232: Canine Predatory Motor Sequence: Understand Your Dog's Prey Drive To Enrich Your Life Together - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/232/ 5. YouTube Video: DIY Puppy Bombs: Easy & Affordable Enrichment Toy for Puppies - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBveJe2C2dA 6. Podcast Episode 265: Dog Training Community And Controversy: Can We Draw From Our Positive Reinforcement Values? - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/265/ 7. Podcast Episode 102: Transitioning Your Dog Training: From All That Is Wrong To That Which Is Right - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/102/ 8. The Modern Malinois YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/@modernmalinois 9. Podcast Episode 6: The Art of Manipulation - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/6/ 10. Podcast Episode 205: The Hidden World Of Reinforcement For Dogs And Why You Need To Know - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/205/ 11. Podcast Episode 59: Why Your Treats Aren't Working for Your Dog - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/59/ 12. Podcast Episode 11: The Power of Permission in Dog Training - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/11/ 13. Watch this Episode of Shaped by Dog on YouTube - https://youtu.be/qZSCQFapIww
It's always great to have Avi over and just talk. We never know where the conversation is gonna go and those are my favorite chats. I don't like scripted questions, I believe they make for phony interviews. Now-a-days everyone has a podcast, so I decided to back off on mine. My goal is to only share interesting conversations with people, the kind of conversations I'd like to listen to.. not just a talk to talk. We talked about his dog ORKAN, training, competing and his new endeavor in dog training equipment including the AC STICK. I think you'll like this chat, Avi is a favorite guest because I think our conversations are raw and real. I'm providing links to Avi's socials below as well as the AC STICK he mentions... https://acstick.com Facebook- https://www.facebook.com/avi.cohen.100483 Instagram @avicohenrad
In this episode I have the honor to have Shannon Walker on as a special guest! Shannon is the founder and CEO of Northwest Battle Buddies. Northwest battle buddies is a nonprofit dedicated to providing professionally trained service dogs to combat Veterans battling PTSD, at no cost to the Veteran. With a professional dog training career spanning nearly three decades, Shannon is renowned for her profound dedication and tireless service to our nation's heroes. Born in Pendleton, Oregon, Shannon's lifelong passion for dogs and training propelled her into the world of Schutzhund—a European canine sport renowned for testing a dog's tracking, obedience, and protection skills. Training under the tutelage of 1988 world Schutzhund champion Gene England, Shannon acquired extensive experience and knowledge in this specialized training method. Her diligence led to a decade-long competitive career at local, regional, national, and international levels, culminating in her winning the 2003 European Championship in Diest, Belgium. Shannon's dedication to canine development is exemplified by her successful establishment of Man's Best Friend Boarding and Training Kennel in Battle Ground, Washington, in 1997. Over the years, Shannon and her team have trained thousands of dogs, addressed various behavioral issues, and provided solutions for both family pets and service dogs. In 2011, Shannon was approached by a U.S. Veteran of the Iraq conflict who sought her assistance with his service dog. Deeply moved by the transformative impact of the service dog on this Veteran's life, Shannon was inspired to found Northwest Battle Buddies in 2012. To date, NWBB has partnered hundreds of professionally trained dogs with Veterans from all branches of the U.S. military, with Shannon overseeing the extensive training and care of all dogs and handler instruction provided to each Veteran. Shannon's contact information https://northwestbattlebuddies.org/ https://www.facebook.com/NorthwestBattleBuddies/ https://www.instagram.com/northwestbattlebuddies/ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-T7QmOqo20RIRvzhe9ZEmQ Sponsor Sponsor CalmiGo Enter the code BHIPODCAST for $30 off the device. calmigo.com?fid=614&utm_source=affiliatly&utm_medium=influencer&utm_campaign=Jacob_Minnig-614&utm_content=facebook-ig&utm_term=BHIPODCAST&source=affiliatly&placement=facebook-ig&medium=influencer&aff_id=614&aff_name=Jacob_Minnig&coupon_code=BHIPODCAST
Nach der neusten respektlosen Schmährede von Markus Söder in Richtung der Grünen meint WDR 2 Kabarettist Wilfried Schmickler: So tief ist der politische Anstand selten gesunken. Und dieser miese Umgang mit Menschen bleibt nicht bloß im Festzelt. Von Wilfried Schmickler.
Belgian Malinois are an amazing breed and if you want to learn as much as you can about them, check out this podcast with Peter and Connie Scherk. Peter is a 3X World Champion, FCI / FMBB Champion and his wife Connie also a fierce competitor. But beyond that, they are truly dog LOVERS as you'll see in this podcast. They are among the very top authorities when it comes to the Belgian Malinois. In this podcast we focus a lot on malinois puppies, breeding, selecting and training them for protection sports such as IGP / IPO / Schutzhund. This is a great chat with so much information about malinois puppies, that anyone who either has a malinois or is interested in getting one, should listen. Truly one of my favorite podcasts on the topic. We talk about training the puppies in the right steps to be solid sport protection dogs, the how's and why's.... We talk about how they select world champion dogs and their passion for the sport and breed. Learn more about Connie and Peter here: website: https://cpscherk.de video training: https://dogsport-online.com/all-online-courses/ k9 and sports: https://k9-and-sports.com/en/ Check my complete online dog training resources here: https://robertcabral.com My online course for dog trainers: http://shelterdogtraining.com #malinois #malinoispuppy #ipo
Training Without Conflict® Podcast Episode Thirty-Six: Vadim PlotskerIn this episode, I interviewed dog sport competitor, IGP judge, member of the WUSV board of directors, and current United Schutzhund Club of America President, Vadim Plotsker. I have been wanting to have this conversation for a long time as Vadim has a very unique perspective on the sport of Schutzhund and the German Shepherd dog. During the conversation we were able to discuss the current state of Schutzhund not only in America, but worldwide. I was able to find some answers regarding rule changes and the path required for them to become rules in the FCI standard.We were also able to discuss some of the issues facing the sport of IGP worldwide and potential solutions to those issues. I learned a ton from this discussion and I am sure you will as well!Ivan Balabanov is a 2-time World Champion dog trainer, Ot Vitosha Malinois breeder, trainer of Premier Protection Dogs and founder of the revolutionary Training Without Conflict® dog training system.For more information about Ivan Balabanov and information on how to train your dog using the Training Without Conflict® system, check out: https://trainingwithoutconflict.comhttps://malinois.comhttps://premierprotectiondogs.com
Decoys, in particular, are the unsung heroes in sports like, PSA, Schutzhund, French Ring, or Mondioring, where they engage dogs in exercises that could potentially lead to injury. These skilled individuals don't just wear a bite suit and endure the physicality of a dog's engagement; they are artists of canine communication, understanding the subtle language of dogs to a degree that allows them to anticipate and react in ways that protect both the animal and themselves, ensuring a safe training experience. Their role is not merely about being a target; it's about being a partner in the dog's safe training journey. They help in honing a dog's skills, ensuring that the dog's natural drives are channelled in a safe and constructive manner. This requires a deep understanding of canine behaviour, impeccable timing, and a profound respect for the animals they work with, all contributing to a safe training environment. Trainers, on the other hand, are the strategists behind this intricate dance, with a focus on safety. Their knowledge in animal behaviour, training methodologies, and injury prevention is critical. They design training programs that challenge the dogs yet keep them within the bounds of safety. Their ability to read a dog's physical and mental limits is essential in maintaining a safe training regime and preventing overtraining and stress, which can lead to injuries. Together, decoys and trainers create a synergy that allows our dogs to engage in these sports with vigour and enthusiasm, while significantly reducing the risk of harm. Their skill and knowledge are the bedrock upon which the safety of our beloved canine athletes rests. As we cheer for the impressive performances of our dogs, let's also take a moment to appreciate these dedicated professionals who make it all possible, ensuring a safe and enjoyable experience for all involved. Further details looking for great dog trainers and supporters of the canine paradigm? Below is a vast array of people and business's who stand by us, donate to our running costs and do great things for the canine community. Glenn runs and has almost everything canine related at, Canine Evolution or Pet Resorts Australia Pat has a full range of coaching and dog training services at Operant Canine You can support our show and get extra content right here on our Patreon page. Everything goes into keeping the show running and we love all the wonderful people who are part of that community. If you're not sure how, just ask us. You can get our full range of our Merch at our Teespring store here You can help us by spreading the word amongst the canine community or even suggesting a special guest to interview. If you need to find out how to listen to our podcast, go here We have a YOUTUBE channel that you can subscribe to now If you enjoyed the podcast, please review us on Itunes, spotify and any other podcast directory Details on joining the IACP can be found here. If you're not in it you should be! Understand? Check out Dogs Playing for Life! A rescue process changing dogs lives across the USA For more details on how to help our friends at Peggy's Promise, you can find all the details on how to do that on their website. They are our rescue charity of choice. Support our supporters Narelle Cooke's raw feeding guide for dogs here. Narelle has her own podcast on all podcast directories called Natural Health for people and pets. Check it out in person. Looking for the best, human grade supplement range for your dogs? Check out Canine Ceuticals. Now available in the USA. SHOW SPONSOR Jason Firmin Einzweck Dog quip SHOW SPONSOR The motorcycle dog kennel by Rowdy Hound SHOW SPONSOR Professional dog training services DanKroft K9 SHOW SPONSOR Daycare and training from the heart dog training SHOW SPONSOR Dog training all styles in Adelaide Dog Club SA SHOW SPONSOR Our beloved friend and regular contributor,
Ever wondered what it takes to go from a nine-to-five grind to following your passion full-time? As we chat with Oscar Mora, dog trainer and owner of Elevated Canine Academy, we uncover the fascinating journey that led him from the aerospace manufacturing to a life filled with sport and pet dog training. Oscar introduces us to the protection sports of Schutzhund and Mondioring, shares the pleasure he finds in being more present with his family life, and gives us an inside scoop on current and past trends of professional dog training. This episode isn't just about Oscar's story - we also dive headfirst into thought-provoking topics like the impact of breed and genetics on a dog's behavior, and the controversial effects of different training methods on dogs. Oscar helps us debunk some myths about bite work and shares his insights about selecting puppies based on confidence and drive. We emphasize responsible dog ownership and the importance of understanding a pet's breed before welcoming them into your home.In the final part of our discussion, we delve into the nuances of dog training, addressing contentious issues like effective correction techniques and the often misleading portrayal of dog training on social media. We also explore the importance of teaching dogs an 'off switch,' and share our own experiences and techniques.. Tune in for an enlightening conversation that not only gives you a unique perspective into the world of dog training but also equips you with practical tips to navigate it.
In this video, Ed Frawley shares a question from the Ask Cindy database. Today's question is about an owner who has a 14 week old German Shepherd that they are raising to become a Schutzhund competition dog. The owner wants to know is it important for you dog to socialize with other dogs. | Links mentioned: Whelping Puppies https://leerburg.com/118.htm | How To Artificially Inseminate Your Dog https://leerburg.com/127.htm | How To Tattoo Your Puppy https://leerburg.com/411.htm | Your Puppy 8 Weeks To 12 Months https://leerburg.com/120.htm
In this video, Ed Frawley shares a question from the Ask Cindy database. Today's question is about an owner who has a 14-week-old German Shepherd that they are raising to become a Schutzhund competition dog. The owner wants to know is it important for you dog to socialize with other dogs. | Links mentioned: Raising Your Puppy With Michael Ellis https://leerburg.com/ellispuppydvd.htm | Your Puppy 8 Weeks To 12 Months https://leerburg.com/120.htm | Intermediate Dog Obedience https://leerburg.com/302b.php | The Power Of Training Dogs With Markers https://leerburg.com/219.htm | The Power Of Training Dogs With Your Food https://leerburg.com/221.htm | Basic Dog Obedience https://leerburg.com/302.htm | The Power of Playing Tug With Your Dog https://leerburg.com/221.htm
K-9 Detector Dog Training This course has been a 10-year work in progress. Kevin Sheldahl is a retired Deputy Sheriff who worked as a K9 handler for his entire career. He is an internationally recognized police dog judge along with being a judge in the sport of Schutzhund dog. Kevin is also registered expert witness in federal and state courts on public safety K9 cases. Kevin’s company (K-9Services.com) trains and certifies public safety officers. His students get certified as bomb dog, narcotic dog, cadaver dog, and wildlife detector dog handlers. His in-person courses are six weeks long. To date, he has run 69 of these six-week courses with an average course having 10 to 15 new dog handlers. Through these courses alone, Kevin has trained over 700 K-9 Teams from start to deployment ready. Thru his seminars and workshops, Kevin has guided thousands of handlers in their careers from start to being ready for deployment. Kevin has also taught in Germany, Colombia, Mexico, Malta, Canada, and all over the United States. This work has given him the experience to see many teams and expand his knowledge of the unique subset of dogs in the role of working police service dogs. There are very few instructors in this country that have Kevins experience, not only as a dog handler but as an instructor who has years of experience teaching new dog handlers..
Bri Rabine is a fellow dog trainer here in upstate NY that I am so thankful to have on this episode as we dive into her story of how she got each of her three dogs and spent time discovering what suited them best. We also head into the world of dog sports and share a few you might be interested in competing in, GRC, Schutzhund and more! Listen in to hear what it's like owning dogs as a trainer and explore the world of dog sports! FURTHER DETAILSConnect with Bri: Instagram @bri_andthedogs, www.paws4obedience.com or email bri.nck9c@gmail.com Looking for other great supporters of the My K9 Coach Podcast? Join the community of dog owners, lovers, trainers and industry professionals in the My K9 Coach Podcast Facebook Group. K9 Coach Dana has a full range of coaching, courses and dog training services over at www.myk9coach.com where you can also subscribe to get dog training emails in your inbox! For even more cool dog stuff in your life, you can follow her on Instagram and Facebook @K9CoachDana If you enjoyed the podcast, please review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and any other podcast platform. You can further help support the show by spreading the word amongst your friends. CREDITSMusic - It's Going Down - Instrumental Version, Song by SOURWAH feat. Maya Miko, Courtesy of https://artlist.io/song/97883/it's-going-down---instrumental-version
Training Without Conflict® Episode Thirty: Omar Von MullerIn this episode, I had the pleasure to catch up and have a nice conversation with a long time friend, and trick dog master, Omar Von Muller.It is highly likely you have seen one of Omar's tricks in a viral video in the past or in a major Hollywood production. As a teenager, Omar trained dogs for friends and family. Omar also spent time training police dogs for the Miami Dade Police Department, as well as competing in Schutzhund and French Ring.In 1993, Omar moved from Miami to Los Angeles where he began to train dogs for celebrities, and the motion picture industry. Some of his movie credits include, The Italian Job, Four Brothers, Jackass 3D, and Water for Elephants.The highest honor of Omar's career is his dog Uggie being involved in the Academy Award winning film, The Artist. Uggie received many awards for this role worldwide and eventually became the first dog to have his paw prints immortalized on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Currently, Omar continues to train dogs for Hollywood films, but has also created an online learning platform for students to learn how to teach tricks to their personal dogs. For more information about Omar, check out: https://www.trainingwithomar.com/Ivan Balabanov is a 2-time World Champion dog trainer, Ot Vitosha Malinois breeder, trainer of Premier Protection Dogs and founder of the revolutionary Training Without Conflict® dog training system.For more information about Ivan Balabanov and information on how to train your dog using the Training Without Conflict® system, check out: https://trainingwithoutconflict.comhttps://malinois.comhttps://premierprotectiondogs.com
Training Without Conflict® Podcast Episode Twenty-Nine: Edgar ScherklThis episode was a long time in the making. I was finally able to sit down with Edgar Scherkl to talk about Belgian Malinois, the history of Schutzhund, the German Korung, judging in competition, and the current situation in the IGP world community. The podcast is available now on YouTube, Apple Music, Spotify, and all other major podcast platforms!I'm certain that if you have been around Schutzhund (IGP) long enough, you are already highly aware of Edgar Scherkl.For those of you that don't know who he is, let me summarize his insane accomplishments:• Edgar has won 20 Championships with a few different dogs. • He has won the FCI World Championship 2 times and the FMBB World Championship 2 times as well!• Edgar is also a World Level judge and has judged many national events in Germany, as well as the FMBB World Championship 3 times, one of which being the Judge supervisor.• As a helper, Edgar did the helper work at the 2000 FMBB where my dog Django and I won Vice World Champions. He has been a helper several times at national championships in Germany as well.• Edgar is the current president of the German Malinois Club (DMC), he is a current FMBB board member and also a previous board member of the FCI Working Commission.I have known Edgar for over 20 years so we had a lot to talk about! The conversation took us back in time to many great moments in our past, and we also talked about the future of IGP and dog breeding.Enjoy the conversation and don't forget to support my channel by subscribing and sharing.Ivan Balabanov is a 2-time World Champion dog trainer, Ot Vitosha Malinois breeder, trainer of Premier Protection Dogs and founder of the revolutionary Training Without Conflict® dog training system.For more information about Ivan Balabanov and information on how to train your dog using the Training Without Conflict® system, check out: https://trainingwithoutconflict.comhttps://malinois.comhttps://premierprotectiondogs.com
This podcast will probably blow up the internet and ruffle many feathers. I had no idea where this conversation would go, in fact I wasn't even sure if we were gonna do a podcast. Larry was in town getting ready for a seminar, so I took him to a favorite beach spot to have a beer and some fish tacos. Then we thought, what the heck, let's talk! Our conversations are always like minded, entertaining and meaningful. I'm blessed to count this guy as a very close friend, comrade, fellow dog trainer and more! We often laugh at the same stuff, get frustrated at the same issues and always value each other. I can honestly say I feel like I've known him for so long, even though it's only bee a few years. We connected through a mutual respect in dog training and then found out we grew up a few miles from one another in New Jersey. We both moved to the south at one point and we both have the same humor. We also share a true respect and passion for dogs. This chat delves into so many topics, O'd be remiss to try and list them all here, but some are: ecollar bans, purely positive training, rescue dogs, dog trainer certification, ethics in training, haters and SOOOO much more. NO matter what you're looking for, you will either LOVE or HATE this podcast, I hope you'll make it all the way through, because it takes a sudden turn right around the 1 HOUR mark! If you want to learn more about Larry, check out his Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/larry.krohn.9 as well as his Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@UCortXxJdZYbHCrOa3nddr6g ************************* Check out my online dog training resources for dog trainers and owners: https://robertcabral.com If you've ever considered learning to become a dog trainer, my online course can help: http://shelterdogtraining.com
Training Without Conflict® Podcast Episode Twenty-Seven: Debbie Zappia Part TwoIn this episode, Ivan interviews the first returning guest of the TWC Podcast, Debbie Zappia.This episode features a deep dive into the sport of American Schutzhund. Ivan asks all the pertinent question to fully understand the inner workings of this burgeoning sport!Debbie has had a long, storied history in the sport of Schutzhund, highlighted by her incredible accomplishment of winning the 2015 WUSV World Championship with her dog Iron Von Den Wölfen, becoming the first American AND the first American woman to win the WUSV World Championship. Aside from her World Championship, she has been on the podium countless times with multiple dogs throughout her 30-plus years involved in dog sport. In 2019, she founded American Schutzhund with the intention to preserve the integrity of the historic sport of Schutzhund and also to continue the tradition of a proving ground for selection of some of the world's top working dogs. As always, if you enjoy this podcast, please like, comment, and share with your dog friends
Today I sit down with the god father of detection Randy Hare!Randy Hare is living his lifelong dream of working with animals and people. Experience and talent in dog training have landed him spots on regional television, in various K-9 Magazine articles, and on national television. In 1987 he appeared on “Late Night with David Letterman” to perform a complicated trick he had taught his (then) six-year-old German Shepherd. Randy's real start, in the late 1970's, was training hunting dogs. Then, in the early 1980's he attended a Professional Dog Trainers School where he gained a solid foundation in training dogs for Obedience, Protection, Police Dog Training, and Tracking. By invitation Randy returned to the school as an instructor for one semester, helping train other dog trainers.While Randy continued to further his education into dog training, the school was his first professional experience with training dogs. In 1984 Randy opened his first training center in Monroe, Louisiana where he trained Obedience, Protection, Police Dogs, and Narcotics Detection Dogs. His very first police dog, trained for the Monroe City Marshall's Office, finished 15th in the nation from a field of 140 dogs at the United States Police Canine Association (USPCA) National Police Dog Trials in Detroit, Michigan. This accomplishment earned him an award from the Ohio Dog Training School, the first award of this kind to be given by the group. Then, after training hundreds of dogs, Randy became interested in police dogs and law enforcement. In police dog training he experienced his work in action: real criminal apprehension, real tracking, real detection work, real handler protection, and, last but not least, real obedience.While still training dogs for private citizens, Randy trained and competed against other handlers and trainers with his personally trained police dogs while also competing successfully in Schutzhund competitions. In his first National Police Dog Trial, Randy finished 7th out of 150 top dogs in that year's national event held in St. Cloud, Minnesota. This began a 5-year span of over 30 competitions where Randy won or finished in the top percentile in 96% of the competitions: those competitions were Police Dog Trials, Schutzhund Trials, and Narcotics Detection Dog Trials and involved four different self-trained dogs.Randy says he now has a gift for learning from everyone he meets and from every dog he trains.“I went through a period early on when I thought I knew everything. I really grew as a trainer and a person when I faced the fact that you never stop learning and you never know it all. Thanks to a close and dear friend of mine, Walter “Buzzy” Tomlinson, for finally making me understand that. I believe the dogs that I have trained have probably taught me more than I have taught them.”During Randy's twelve years in Law Enforcement, Randy attended every major seminar (within reach) conducted by world-class trainers from the United States and Europe. He learned what each trainer had to offer, combined the best of their styles and techniques with his own, and now shares his training method. Each dog he trains benefits from his experience and knowledge. Few trainers can match his EXPERIENCE, TALENT, and LOVE for training dogs, as shown by his “Recognition and Achievements” through national police K-9 organizations such as the National Police Canine Association and the United States Police Canine Association where he served as a judge for both organizations. Randy is now the proud owner of the Alpha Canine Training Center and the Randy Hare School for Dog Trainers.In 2004 Canine Training Solutions produced a DVD series demonstrating Randy's innovative and effective "On Target" way to train Detection
Training Without Conflict® Podcast Episode Twenty-Six: Debbie ZapiaIn this episode, Ivan interviews the founder of American Schutzhund, Debbie Zappia.Debbie has had a long, storied history in the sport of Schutzhund, highlighted by her incredible accomplishment of winning the 2015 WUSV World Championship with her dog Iron Von Den Wölfen, becoming the first American AND the first woman to win the WUSV World Championship. Aside from her World Championship, she has been on the podium countless times with multiple dogs throughout her 30-plus years involved in dog sport. In 2019, she founded American Schutzhund with the intention to preserve the integrity of the historic sport of Schutzhund and also to continue the tradition of a proving ground for selection of some of the world's top working dogs. This episode is full of great stories from past competitions, discussion about breeding and selection, training preferences, and many other awesome topics that will entertain anyone interested in dog sports. As always, if you enjoy this podcast, please like, comment, and share with your dog friends
Sue has over twenty five years experience training and handling dogs, both her own and those of her clients. Sue has also been teaching dog obedience lessons since 1993. Sue has participated in a variety of dog sports including obedience, tracking, retrieving, Schutzhund and agility with her own dogs and those of her clients. Sue shares her life with her young German Shepherd Hawks Hunt's Sphingidae RN, ATD 2K9, “Hawkeye”. Hawkeye and Sue are training in tricks, obedience, nosework, tracking and rally, and have been enjoying their first trips into the competition ring. Alongside of his friend Zero, Hawkeye stars as the Professor, amusing his friends on the Tiktok Pigpen and the Professor. Outside of the dog training world, Sue is an avid outdoorsman, participating in camping, hunting and canoeing, and she is also an enthusiastic equestrian athlete. Sue enjoys riding her gelding Kahless, and learning the finer points of dressage. Sue founded Dogs in the Park when she was a student at the University of Guelph, and she co-owns it now with her husband John. Sue is particularly interested in the rehabilitation of aggressive dogs and the resolution of behavioural problems with dogs in family homes. In 2003, Sue passed the Certificate of Pet Dog Training and in the fall of 2004, she was accepted into the International Association of Animal Behaviour Consultants as a clinical member. More recently, Sue wrote and passed the Certificate of Behaviour Consulting Canine, Knowledge Assessed. Sue is a well respected speaker, both online and in person and has delivered programming in Canada, the USA, the United Kingdom and Ireland. Sue has delivered webinars, seminars and lectures on Applied Behaviour Analysis, Resolving Behaviour Problems and Working with Clients. For more information about Sue's credentials, please visit www.ccpdt.org and www.iaabc.org. Legal Disclaimer: This podcast is intended for educational purposes only and does not constitute advice or professional services by either the host nor any of the guests. www.dogsinthepark.ca www.losinglulu.com About the Host: If you want to work with me, Susan Light, you can find me at: www.doggydojopodcast.com The music was written by Mac Light, you can find him at: www.maclightsongwriter.com If you like the show, please Subscribe, Rate, Review, and Share to help others find the show! I'll see you in two weeks with a brand new episode of the Doggy Dojo!
On this episode, Dennis sits down with Founder of Hellak9's, Sharod Johnson. About Hellak9's: Sharod Johnson and Tara Khatchi founded HellaK9s as a young couple offering group classes in public parks and dog sitting in their home in Chula Vista, California. While Tara took care of the dogs, Sharod worked as an apprenticing Schutzhund helper, and dog trainer, in addition to being active duty. They simultaneously ran a Belgian Malinois rescue where they integrated group classes with volunteers who stepped up to handle the dogs. It wasn't long before they grew notoriety and needed to move to a larger property in Alpine, California; this is where HellaK9s San Diego continues to operate today. The ranch-like property provides 200-acres of privacy to exercise and train dogs with their growing staff. After a successful 2 years in Alpine, Tara and Sharod decided it was time to head back east. Sharod and Tara started their second location, HellaK9s Stafford, in Stafford, VA. This is HellaK9s first storefront and new Headquarters. With the help of a few aspiring trainers, two additional East Coast locations have opened; Virginia Beach, where Sharod finished his Naval career, and New Jersey. Most recently, Sharod began hosting seminars in Anchorage, Alaska for the PSA club, Rheaper K9. This started a great partnership with the owners of 907 Hell Hounds, Kaylynn and Jesse Deans, resulting in the merger and creation of HellaK9s' 5th location, HellaK9s Alaska. HellaK9s' growth has been on the demand of an emergent pet industry needing trainers with a logical approach to conditioning and the insatiable hunger of new handlers stepping into the working dog world. HellaK9s has rapidly grown from 15 to 32 employees in 2022. What makes HellaK9s unique is we don't solely train pet dogs. We also train rescue dogs, military working dogs, Police K9s, and sport dogs. In 2020, HellaK9s started performing workshops, and seminars, as well as participating in joint training exercises with agencies like the San Diego Sheriff's Department, Manassas PD, Langley and Keesler AFB K9 units, and Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek K9. HellaK9s' goal is to better the dog community by providing dog owners access to training that goes deeper than the behavior level but dives into the emotional state of the dog. Today, Dennis and Sharod discuss the story of how Sharod started Hellak9's, his military career in the NAVY and how he transitioned into the K9 training business, the type of dogs they train and the specialty training that Hellak9's provides. Find more info on HellaK9's here: https://www.hellak9s.com/ If you like what you are hearing and want to stay in the loop with the latest in Street Cop Training, please follow our Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/StreetCopTraining Don't forget to subscribe and rate the podcast, it truly helps! Sign up for classes here: https://streetcoptraining.com/course-list/Follow our podcast here: https://streetcoptraining.com/street-cop-podcast/ or https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/street-cop-podcast/id1538474515
In this episode, we navigate through the difficult topic of behavioral euthanasia in aggression cases. Our expert guests Trish McMillan and Sue Alexander share their expertise in animal behavior, sheltering, and the incredible support group they co-founded, Losing Lulu. We also explore the caregiver burden, the impact it can have on a family, and how to deal with criticism from those who do not understand the situation.The Aggression in Dogs ConferenceThe Aggression in Dogs Master CourseThe Bitey End of the Dog Bonus EpisodesAbout Sue:Sue has over 25 years experience training and handling dogs, both her own and those of her clients. Sue has been teaching dog obedience lessons since 1993. She has participated in a wide variety of dog sports including obedience, tracking, retrieving, Schutzhund, nose work, and agility with her own dogs and those of her clients. In the past year, Hawkeye has joined Sue as her most recent canine partner. Outside of the dog training world, Sue is an avid outdoorsman, participating in camping, hunting, fishing, and canoeing and she is also an enthusiastic equestrian athlete. Sue enjoys riding her gelding, Kahless, and learning the finer points of dressage. Sue founded Dogs in the Park and she was a student at the University of Guelph, and she co-owns that with her husband John. Sue is particularly interested in the rehabilitation of aggressive dogs and the resolution of behavioural problems with dogs in family homes. In 2003, Sue passed the Certificate of Professional Dog Training and in the fall of 2004, she was accepted into the International Association of Animal Behaviour Consultants as a clinical member. More recently she passed the Certificate of Behaviour Consulting Canine, Knowledge Assessed. Sue is a well respected speaker, both on line and in person and has delivered programming in Canada, the USA, the United Kingdom and Ireland. Sue has delivered webinars, seminars and lectures on Applied Behaviour Analysis, Resolving Behaviour Problems and Working with Clients. https://www.dogsinthepark.ca/About Trish:Trish McMillan is an internationally-known speaker on the topics of animal behavior and sheltering. She holds a master of science degree in animal behavior, and is a certified professional dog trainer. Trish first walked into a shelter in the mid 90's and has been hooked on shelter behavior ever since. She worked for the ASPCA for nearly eight years, first as director of animal behavior at their NYC shelter, and then with the field team, helping assess and rehabilitate dogs from cruelty cases, dogfighting and hoarding situations.Trish owns McMillan Animal Behavior in North Carolina, where she lives in a tiny house on her farm, Pibble Hill. Trish currently shares her life with many animals of five species. Trish's professional work includes training and behavior modification work with dogs, cats, and horses. She speaks and consults nationally and internationally on animal sheltering issues, dog, cat, and horse behavior, dog aggression, and defensive handling. She also runs a popular online shelter dog behavior mentorship and other courses through the Shelter Behavior Hub, and is one of the founders of the behavioral euthanasia grief support group, “Losing Lulu.”Support the show
This discussion is sure to ruffle some feathers as Michael, Bart and I discuss everything that is going on in dog training, but everyone is afraid to talk about. This includes the radical shift in dog training language and methodologies and how that will affect dogs. The bans on training tools that are being attempted here in the USA and the ones that have taken place in many European countries and what that means for the future of dog training. We discuss the use of the ecollar and the stigma that surrounds it as well. As we see people trying to ban tools and dog sports, we should understand that this will inevitably mean an end to dogs as we know them and owning dogs as pets. A very sad state of events for anyone who loves dogs. I've known Bart for over 12 years and we've shared some great conversations about dog training and technology over the years. I hope you'll enjoy this chat. It's a no holds barred, gloves off conversation about our passion for dog training. T o learn more about Michael and Bart, follow these links: https://www.nepopotraining.com https://www.martinsystem.com Check my online dog training resources here: https://robertcabral.com
Jerry Bradshaw joins us on HFA to discuss Variable Reinforcement Schedules in detection dog training. Jerry has over 30 years' experience in training detection, patrol, and tracking dogs for law enforcement agencies and militaries both domestically and internationally. In addition to professionally training working dogs, Jerry has also won national titles with his personal dogs in the competitive protection sports of Schutzhund and Protection Sports Association (PSA). Jerry currently serves as the Director and President of Tarheel Canine Training in North Carolina which provides trained patrol and detection dogs to LE agencies across the country. Variable Reinforcement is a topic rarely discussed in SAR circles, but it has been a staple of detection K-9 training for many years. By varying when and how you reward your dog during training you can add the "Maybe" question to your dog's behavior which can increase the intensity and reliability of the behavior. If you have not implemented Variable Reinforcement into your training, you definitely want to hear Jerry explain the benefits of this training methodology. References mentioned during the episode: Jerry's webinar series on detection: Detection Webinar Link Tarheel Canine: Website Link Slideshare: Powerpoint Link Controlled Aggression: Podcast Link
When it comes to dogs participating in bite sports, developing their grip strength and technique is a crucial aspect of their training. Proper grip development through good techniques in tug and rag work can help improve a dog's performance, prevent injuries, and increase their confidence and drive. In bite sports, such as PSA, Schutzhund, IPO, and French Ring, dogs are trained to bite and hold onto various objects, including sleeves, bite suits, and hidden sleeves. To prepare them for these tasks, trainers use tug and rag work to help develop their grip strength, proper bite technique, and overall confidence. It's important to use appropriate equipment when engaging in tug and rag work with a dog training for bite sports. Specifically designed bite tugs and rag toys that mimic the texture and feel of the equipment used in bite sports should be used. This helps the dog learn how to properly grip and hold onto the equipment, while also protecting their teeth from damage. Proper technique during tug and rag work is also essential for developing a dog's grip strength and technique. Trainers should let the dog win and avoid forcefully taking the toy away, as this can create negative associations with biting and decrease the dog's drive. Varying the types of games and toys used in training can also help develop a well-rounded grip. This recent episode got some great feedback about development too Further details looking for great dog trainers and supporters of the canine paradigm? Below is a vast array of people and business's who stand by us, donate to our running costs and do great things for the canine community. Glenn runs and has almost everything canine related at, Canine Evolution or Pet Resorts Australia Pat has a full range of coaching and dog training services at Operant Canine You can support our show and get extra content right here on our Patreon page. Everything goes into keeping the show running and we love all the wonderful people who are part of that community. If you're not sure how, just ask us. You can get our full range of our Merch at our Teespring store here You can help us by spreading the word amongst the canine community or even suggesting a special guest to interview. If you need to find out how to listen to our podcast, go here We have a YOUTUBE channel that you can subscribe to now If you enjoyed the podcast, please review us on Itunes, spotify and any other podcast directory Details on joining the IACP can be found here. If you're not in it you should be! Understand? Check out Dogs Playing for Life! A rescue process changing dogs lives across the USA For more details on how to help our friends at Peggy's Promise, you can find all the details on how to do that on their website. They are our rescue charity of choice. Support our supporters Narelle Cooke's raw feeding guide for dogs here. Narelle has her own podcast on all podcast directories called Natural Health for people and pets. Check it out in person. Looking for the best, human grade supplement range for your dogs? Check out Canine Ceuticals. You can also see her on Pooches at play with Lara Shannon SHOW SPONSOR Jason Firmin Einzweck Dog quip SHOW SPONSOR The motorcycle dog kennel by Rowdy Hound SHOW SPONSOR Professional dog training services DanKroft K9 SHOW SPONSOR Daycare and training from the heart dog training SHOW SPONSOR Dog training all styles in Adelaide Dog Club SA SHOW SPONSOR Our beloved friend and regular contributor, Birdy O'Sheedy can be found at birdyosheedy.com and you can see her baby puppy on her instagram HUGE thanks to all our contributing artists. Please support their works Jane StuartAvery KellerZoie Neidy
This is one of my favorite episodes! DOGS! We all love our dogs. Marc Guerrieri, owner of Canine Resolutions in Waterford MI, talks about training dogs using “Training Without Conflict!”, a philosophy that he studied under his mentor and highly regarded dog trainer, Ivan Balabanov. Listen to how Marc started dog training at 19, competed in a sport called Schutzhund, and the rewards of training rescue dogs successfully so they can stay with their families. You will hear in this episode his love for dogs and his passion for his industry .
Visit us at shapedbydog.com Somebody has likely told you that not all dogs can be trained the same way and that different methods are needed for different dogs. Is there truth behind this? I'm covering how different dogs might need different training approaches, but the word philosophy should replace method. Plus, I'm sharing why the dog training philosophy I choose aligns with my heart and an invitation to everyone to consider trying something different. In the episode you'll hear: • How any dog can be trained using kindness, clarity and choice-based games. • Why my philosophy doesn't involve the use of positive punishment. • That the expectations of ourselves should be higher than those we put on our dogs. • The difference between dog training philosophies and dog training techniques. • How my training approach will differ for dogs as individuals. • About the dark history of dog training and its slow evolution. • How my training method was mocked decades ago but is now widely adopted. • My invitation to open-minded dog trainers who use positive punishment. • How confirmation bias subtly influences our worldviews. • Why I choose to train with kindness, choice, clarity, and positive reinforcement. • Different ways I change my training technique based on what a dog needs. Resources 1. Podcast Episode 150: Adding Mindset To Your Dog Training Tools: Who Do You Become? - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/150/ 2. Podcast Episode 146: Balanced Dog Training: Does It Really Exist? - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/146/ 3. Podcast Episode 33: How Do I Stop My Dog Counter Surfing?! - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/33/ 4. Podcast Episode 189: All The Things That Influence Your Dog's Behavior And What Behavior Tells You - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/189/ 5. Podcast Episode 176: Why Your Dog's Emotions Are A Critical Element Of Dog Training - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/176/ 6. Podcast Episode 46: Is Your Dog Trying to Dominate You and What You Can Do About It - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/46/ 7. Podcast Episode 187: When To Listen To Your Heart In Dog Training - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/187/ 8. Podcast Episode 175: Food Luring VS Shaping In Dog Training: How Science Changed How I Teach Dogs - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/175/ 9. Podcast Episode 8: Get Your Dog in the Belief Loop of Awesome - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/8/ 10. YouTube Playlist: Susan Garrett's Dog Training Philosophy and Training Processes - https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLphRRSxcMHy2An5_3KqDPqFVV6J6dYsYx 11. Watch this Episode of Shaped by Dog on YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xH1JqN34Sr0&feature=youtu.be
Training Without Conflict® Podcast Episode Thirteen: Dr. Helmut RaiserRecently, Ivan spent sometime with Helmut Raiser and naturally they decided that they had to do a podcast. For those familiar with Schutzhund ( todays IGP) Helmut needs no introduction. For those who have not heard of him, he is one of the most influential trainers that popularized the Schutzhund in Germany and most of Europe in the 80's. They had a very interesting conversation, at times diving deep into dog training, German Shepherds, dog politics and welfare, decoy work and more.I hope you will enjoy listening as much as they enjoyed the conversation.Dr. Helmut Raiser is a dog man with an epic history in dog training and dog sport. Helmut has been winning championships in the sport of Schutzhund since the late 70's and still continues to win and podium at competitions in the current day. A peek at his working dog shows you a master of his craft with countless V (excellent) scores in all three phases of the sport.Aside from his competition success, he also created RSV2000, a highly successful division of IGP dogsport. Any written biography of Dr. Helmut Raiser would not do him justice so it is highly recommended to listen to this podcast to learn as much as you can from this dog training master!For more information about Dr. Helmut Raiser and RSV2000, check out: https://www.rsvglobal.live/Ivan Balabanov is a 2-time World Champion dog trainer, Ot Vitosha Malinois breeder, trainer of Premier Protection Dogs and founder of the revolutionary Training Without Conflict® dog training system.For more information about Ivan Balabanov and information on how to train your dog using the Training Without Conflict® system, check out: https://trainingwithoutconflict.comhttps://malinois.comhttps://premierprotectiondogs.comPlease like, comment, and share with your dog friends!
Tierisch menschlich - Der Podcast mit Hundeprofi Martin Rütter und Katharina Adick
Ein Video zeigt ein zweijähriges Kind, das von einem Hund attackiert wird und sorgt verständlicherweise für Empörung. Aber nicht so sehr wie der Brotbelag des Hundeprofis! „Was will diese Hure für Geld noch alles tun?“, um nur einen Kommentar zu zitieren. Zum Beispiel eine Podcastfolge aufnehmen, in der es auch um das Produkt „Illusion“ geht - das Halsband zur Verdeckung tierschutzwidriger Trainingsmittel. Außerdem: Salat und Schnaps - warum denn nicht? Im Rasseportrait: Der Yorkshire Terrier. +++ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Today, we continue our conversation with competitive tracking extraordinaire Emily Lawrence!When it comes down to it, “tracking is the great equalizer.” Emily teaches us that the key to building skill and confidence in our dog is going to be a slow, baby-step process for trackers of any level.She reminds us that frustrating training sessions are all part of the package. It's okay that our dog struggles because the point of training is to encourage them to push their boundaries. That said, we need to make sure we end all of our sessions on a good note, to make sure that our dog walks away happy about what they did.Emily invites competitive trackers to enjoy the journey, to stop trying to micromanage your dog, and to try to have just a little more fun:“Trust your training and let your dog use their superpowers.”Key Topics:How to make IGP tracking work for you and your dog (01:00)Knowing exactly where your footprint is (06:19)Why Emily doesn't care about wind direction (12:40)Introducing articles (16:29)Building your dog's endurance (21:26)Being the only Border Collie at her last tracking competition (26:20)Training a Border Collie versus a Pitbull versus a German Shepherd (33:48)Teaching corners without using corrections (35:50)Episode takeaways (38:10)How to connect with Emily (42:00)Resources:Emily on InstagramEmily on Facebook (to access BIGFOOT DOG TRAINING)Bigfoot Dog Training Website (currently under construction)We want to hear from you:Check out the K9 Detection Collaborative FB page and comment on the episode post!K9Sensus Foundation can be found on Facebook and Instagram. We have a Trainer's Group on Facebook!Scentsabilities Nosework is also on Facebook. Here is a Facebook group you should join!Crystal Wing K9 Coach can be found here!You can follow us for notifications of upcoming episodes, find us at k9detectioncollaborative.com to enjoy the freebies and tell your friends so you can keep the conversations going.Jingle by: www.mavericksings.com Instagram: @mavericktasticAudio editing & other podcast services by: www.thepodcastman.com Instagram: @the_podcast_man
Today, Stacy, Robin, and Crystal sit down with competitive tracking extraordinaire Emily Lawrence!Having gotten her start in the sport in 1989 at the tender age of 11, Emily has had many years to hone her craft. Listen in as she shares her training strategies, with a particular focus on the unique challenges in training her Border Collie compared to your traditional German Shepherd.She discusses the ins and outs of Schutzhund-style tracking, comparing it to other forms of tracking such as search-and-rescue.“There are three basic phases to this sport: tracking, obedience, and bite work. In order to be successful in this sport, you have to be good at all three phases.”Emily explains that we often don't give enough credit to our dogs when it comes to conquering the challenges we set up for them. To her, one of our main responsibilities as trainers is to instill within our dogs the confidence to be able to solve problems.Key Topics:How Emily got into the sport and her approach to tracking and agility (01:30)Training a Border Collie versus a German Shepherd (06:41)About Schutzhund-style tracking (10:14)Terrain changes (14:58)Giving your dog enough credit to find the track (18:03)Ensuring that you place food in footsteps instead of near footsteps (20:59)Resources:Emily on InstagramEmily on Facebook (to access BIGFOOT DOG TRAINING)Bigfoot Dog Training Website (currently under construction)We want to hear from you:Check out the K9 Detection Collaborative FB page and comment on the episode post!K9Sensus Foundation can be found on Facebook and Instagram. We have a Trainer's Group on Facebook!Scentsabilities Nosework is also on Facebook. Here is a Facebook group you should join!Crystal Wing K9 Coach can be found here!You can follow us for notifications of upcoming episodes, find us at k9detectioncollaborative.com to enjoy the freebies and tell your friends so you can keep the conversations going.Jingle by: www.mavericksings.com Instagram: @mavericktasticAudio editing & other podcast services by: www.thepodcastman.com Instagram: @the_podcast_man
Kim & Laney have Collette on the show to talk about her experience coming to Schutzhund later in life, importing a special male dog and working through higher level competition with him. Collette is a candid individual who shares about her lessons learned, being a mom with a career in dogsport, and more.
If you want to know about German Shepherds, you want to talk to an expert. In Germany this is called a Körmeister. This person is an authority on breeding. Johannes Grewe is a Körmeister and Avi and I ask some tough questions on the topic of showline and working line German Shepherds. The questions of what makes for a good German Shepherd and what dogs should we be breeding is always at the top of everyone's list. Talking with Johannes is talking to one of the foremost experts on the breed. Johannes has bred, trained, judged and lived with German Shepherds for most of his life. Avi and I get down to the serious issues. It's a long podcast but we cover a lot of topics including the evolution of the angulated German Shepherd, the sports of IPO, IGP, Schutzhund... and so much more. ********** If you'd like to learn more about becoming a dog trainer, check out my 25+ hour online Dog Training Course "Shelter Dog Training": https://robertcabral.com/shelter-dog-training My dog training membership site for every dog owner: https://robertcabral.com ************ Overall, this is one of the most informative videos you will ever see on the topic of working line and showline German Shepherds. Whether you LOVE the breed, are interested in buying a puppy or just want some really great information, this will be a valuable podcast for any lover of German Shepherds. Johannes Grewe's resume is simply amazing... 1964 Member of the SV and OG Dorsten 23 1969 President OG Dorsten 23 1970 Kennel Name "von den weissen Bergen" 1970 Graduated State Police Canine School 1972 Graduated as SV Youth Dog Evaluator 1974 SV Leistungsrichter License 1977 Founded OG Wulfen 1977 Stephanitz Urkunde by Dr. Runawael 1978 SV Forderabzeichen by Dr. Rummel 1981 Immigration to the USA 1981 Member of Schutzhund USA 1981 Resignation as SV Leistungsrichter 1983 WUSV European Champion Ship Belgium 1984 WUSV European Champion Ship Italy 1985 WUSV European Champion Ship Hungary 1986 North American Schutzhund Champion Ship 1987 Founded Sunland Schutzhund Club 1988 WUSV World Championship Germany 1990 Kennel Name "vom Sunland" 1993 Chairperson Regional SchH Championship 1993 Chairperson USA Siegershow 1993 Breeding Award "Born in the USA" 1995 Breeding Award "Born in the USA" 1995 Chairperson Regional Conformation Show 1995 Regional Breedwarden 1996 Breeding Award "Born in the USA" 1997 Chairperson USA Siegershow Served for 6 years at Board of USCA 1997 Appointed as first show judge for USCA Appointed in 2002 as IPO Judge for USCA Appointed as Koermeister for USCA Trial Chairman and director for the 2008 WUSV World Championship Event in Cincinnati Check out Johannes Grewe on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/johannes.grewe.39
Laney and Kim speak with Alexis Roy, who is Sister's breeder. Alexis has spent more than a decade in Schutzhund and has grown a deeply beloved breeding program surrounding her first female Carma.
Laney & Kim catch up after some weeks of summer training & grinding.
Laney & Kim recount their experiences at Helper Camp 2022, an event put on to grow Schutzhund helpers in the United States.
Peter Scherk is an international renown IPO / IGP / Schutzhund competitor, trainer and WORLD CHAMPION 3 X, an unheard of feat. In this podcast I sit down with Peter & Connie Scherk and talk about their training, competitions, their outlook and training philosophy and how they have become so successful with the Belgian Malinois. This is one of the best podcasts for anyone who is interested in learning about IGP, training malinois, competing and understanding what it takes to be a wold champion. From their small, humble yet incredibly successful Team Heuwinkl, we delve into his training philosophy which he teaches in his new Book Successful Together / Gemeinsam Erfolgreich, a book I highly recommend. Check out this interview, then visit Peter and Connie at their site: https://cpscherk.de YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCooSWHqB3luvIbrIYmPUmKg Instagram: @cp_scherk Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ConniePeterScherk I think you will love this interview. Sorry the audio is a little spotty in places, but the value of the content is immense! This is what happens when you deal with international conversations!
Your Working Dog Radio hosts, Eric @vanessk9 & Ted @ted_summers, sit down with retired FBI Special Agent and all around K9 badass, Sonja Nordstrom. Nordstrom served in the FBI as a Special Agent for over two decades. In addition to hunting bad guys, Nordstrom joined a volunteer K9 SAR team and progressed through the ranks as a handler, trainer, and evaluator. She has also earned her Detector Dog Trainer's Certification from VLK, and has provided Detection K9 training to LE, Professional, and Volunteer K9 teams and lectures hundreds of LE regarding the use of K9s in homicide investigations. Through the years, Sonja has completed thousands of hours of training under nationally recognized LE, SAR, and sport K9 trainers and experts, was Secretary of the Los Angeles County Police Canine Association, attained local and national level search dog certifications, and has trained and competed in the K9 sports of Schutzhund, Mondioring, and French Ring. While stationed in Los Angeles, Nordstrom deployed with her Human Remains Detection K9s for the FBI Evidence Response Team (ERT) and CARDA (California Rescue Dog Association) throughout California, the Western United States, Mexico, the Middle East, and to the Pentagon after 9/11. Nordstrom is currently fielding with her fifth HRD K9, is the lead trainer and President of a volunteer K9 SAR Team in Utah, and has completed hundreds of field missions including several deployments to Europe to assist in locating WWII MIAs. In 2014, after retiring from the FBI, Nordstrom opened Sonja's Dog Training, LLC, providing training for pet dogs and also specialized training in detection and scent work for LE, SAR, and pet dog handlers. She is also a UKC Nosework and AKC Scentwork Judge. Most recently, Nordstrom has formed American Tactical Aggregate K-9 in collaboration with Steve "Zane" Stoops and several other top tier LE and Military CAD Trainers and Handlers. Nordstrom is also a host of the podcast K9 Top Tales, which features stories of K9 warriors, crime fighters, protectors, and rescuers as told by their Law Enforcement, Military, and Search & Rescue Handlers and Partners. Nordstrom has been a regular badass in her career, and after the badge. If you're looking for some inspiration, some training tips, go to see what she's up to now, be sure to follow her podcast: K9 Top Tales https://anchor.fm/k9-top-tales IG @ k9_top_tales https://www.instagram.com/k9_top_tales FB @k9toptales https://www.facebook.com/k9toptales American Tactical Aggregate K-9 with Steve Stoops: website: atak9.com IG @ata.k9 https://www.instagram.com/ata.k9 FB @aggregatek9 https://www.facebook.com/aggregatek9
Seminar recap from the last couple weeks of so. Much. Training. Digging in hard like ouch. Episode photo by Abi Max Photography on FB & IG.
S.O.S. (Stories of Service) - Ordinary people who do extraordinary work
I am so excited to host my dear friend Kari Mendoza, who I have known for more than 12 years. We met when I was stationed in Hawaii back when she first founded a company dedicated to moving pets safely! She is going to shed light on so many topics, including why shipping pets in cargo is safe and the misinformation on the dangers of shipping snub-nosed animals. She is also a fierce advocate for easing the process of pet shipping, something so many families struggle with!She is the CEO/Founder of Island Pet Movers/Paws Up Pet Transport. Island Pet Movers was created by Kari after she watched her best friend struggle through the process of preparing her dog to transfer to Hawaii while her husband was deployed to Iraq. As a prior land development project manager, Kari knew that the process of working with government agencies can be challenging and sometimes confusing and that she could make the process easy and stress-free for her clients. In 2009 Kari put her newly acquired MBA skills to work, and after many hours of logo and website design, with a business license in hand, Island Pet Movers was created and each year they help thousands of pets move to and from Hawaii and the Pacific easy and stress-free.Kari has been a very active competitor and trainer in Schutzhund, an international dog sport, since 2003, serving as her club president and the Assistant Regional Director for the West Coast, which includes Hawaii. This allowed her to travel extensively with working dogs throughout the United States, and on many occasions escorted dogs between the United States and EuropeKari is a U.S. Navy veteran and her dad was enlisted in the Army. Growing up as an Army child had many challenges, most memorable was moving from a new home to a new home every 2-to 3 years. While schools and friends changed every few years, her parents made sure that her pets were the one constant that stayed with her move after move. This intimate knowledge of military life and relocating with pets brings a unique and heartfelt opinion to any table in relation to pet relocation around the world. Kari's relentless drive for success in business, love of dog training, and attention to animal behaviors coupled with her intimate knowledge of the pet shipping industry help her to lead a successful team of pet relocation specialists serving families all across the globe.Kari is also a licensed US Customs Broker, specializing in customs clearance for pets traveling back to the USA as cargo. Since 2009, her company has moved over 40,000 pets.Find her company here: https://islandpetmovers.com/
Der Hund als Bewacher für Haus und Hof: Den Job machen sie schon seit tausenden von Jahren. Doch was mache ich, wenn der Beschützer-Instinkt meines Hundes überhandnimmt? Was ist artgerecht und welches Beschützerverhalten ist normal? Insbesondere Hundesportarten wie der Schutzhundesport werden heiß diskutiert. Was Welpentrainer André Vogt darüber denkt und wie richtiger Schutzhundesport funktioniert, die Antwort kriegt ihr heute in der neuen Podcastfolge: „Schutz für alle?! – Wenn der Hund zum Bewacher wird.“ Kuba lebt mittlerweile seit einem Jahr bei Welpentrainer André Vogt, er hat sich bewusst für einen Malinois aus dem Tierschutz entschieden. Malinois werden häufig als Schutzhunde eingesetzt. Doch ist Kuba eigentlich auch ein Schutzhund oder eher die totale Schmusebacke? Influencer Florian Buchholz und seine französische Bulldogge Carlos, sind ein tolles Team – doch wie viel Schutzhund steckt eigentlich in Carlos? Als Gast unterstützt in der aktuellen Podcastfolge: Daniel Jannett. Wenn sich jemand zum Thema Schutzhund auskennt, dann er. Er bildet seit Jahrzehnten Schutzhunde aus und weiß als aktiver Leistungsrichter im Schutzhundesport bestens zu dem Thema Bescheid. Du möchtest mehr über unsere Werbepartner erfahren? Hier findest du alle Infos & Rabatte: https://linktr.ee/DerWelpentrainer
Season 4 Episode 63 Power of Communication" with Michael Ellis Michael Ellis really does not need much of an introduction. Michael is an internationally renowned dog trainer and teacher with 30 years of experience in the competitive dog sports. He has taught extensively to a very diverse group of trainers, from competitive sport trainers, police departments, and the US military, to search and rescue groups, service dog agencies, and pet dog trainers. Michael's clear, concise, and patient style has made him one of the most popular coaches of trainers in the country. He has given over 300 seminars in the United States, Canada, and South America, that's well over a thousand days of lecture and practical work in the last eight years alone, and as a result, has been one of the driving forces in popularizing reward based training systems for the protection sports. Michael has competed in and done decoy/helper work for several national level competitions, both in Schutzhund and ringsport. He was also one of the first Mondioring decoys certified in the US. He has coached national champions in several disciplines, and many national and international competitors, but he is perhaps most proud of the hundreds of club level and beginning trainers that he has helped to improve their communication and physical skills. He was a past president of the American Working Malinois Association and a former board member of the US Mondioring Association. www.michaelellisschool.com Show Sponsors: Also Check out our NEW FORD K9 YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/c/CameronFordK9 Honest Pet Company: Are you looking for quality training toys and food rewards. Do you want to help give back to the working dog community. Purchase and and support Honest Pet Company and the non profits they give back to. Go visit www.honestpets.co Leash and Harness Coffee: Made by Handlers for Handlers and in support of handlers and K9 Units. Leash and Harness coffee gives back to K9 Units with proceeds from the sales of the coffee use this discount code to get 10% off your coffee order FORD K9 www.leashandharnesscoffee.com SciK9: Home of the TADD and all your cleaning materials for Detection work. www.scik9.com Getxent: Getxent tubes for odor absorption www.getxent.com HITS K9 Conference: In Orlando August 16,17 and 18. go to www.hitsk9.net Ford K9 LLC: Are you needing a Detection Dog Handler and Trainer School... maybe looking at one of the Ford K9 Seminars go towww.fordk9.com
In this episode, we spent time learning about Protection Sports with Shade Whitesel. An excellent trainer and avid participant in Schutzhund and AKC obedience, Shade has been dabbling in dog training since she was a young girl, and worked many jobs to gain experience in the field, including as a kennel manager, a veterinary technician, and groomer, as well as taking continuing education courses. In 1994, Shade moved to a full time dog training career, teaching handlers how to play with their dogs, and teaches humans how to teach their dogs to live in our world, as well as problem solving behavior of all kinds, including aggression. Shade has utilized a variety of training tools over the course of her career, but now is primarily positive reinforcement based, and does not find it necessary to use any pressure or correction based tools to achieve life manners, behavior modification or sport (AKC or Schutzhund) behaviors. She specializes in high drive dogs, and loves to teach their handlers how to channel prey drive and arousal issues into reinforcement that the handler controls, along with teaching the dogs how to be calm and not adrenalized 24-7. She has achieved many titles on multiple dogs over the years, and has an impressive record in both IPO and obedience. Shade offers private training, seminars across the country, and is also a regular instructor with Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. You can find more about Shade by visiting her website here: Shade Whitesel Dog Training | Seattle WA (shadesdogtraining.net) Like this episode? Don't forget to rate, review and subscribe so you never miss a future episode! You never know what we'll be learning about next.
Sandra King joins Laney and Kim to discuss growing up in the world of Schutzhund in Germany. Sandra was surrounded by the sport and struggled profoundly with the use of aversives. She shares her candid perspective on this experience while also asking tough questions about the future of dog sport. Edit: small correction that per USCA rules there is no requirement for dog to keep eyes on handler during long down.
Laney and Kim talk about animal husbandry particularly as it relates to sport dog handlers / owners. They go down some pet dog rabbit holes but try to tackle the cultural questions in Schutzhund as well.
Kim and Laney speak with Cassie, who took second in the 2021 USCA Nationals with Nemesis von Hanrahaus. Cassie shares her story in Schutzhund, as a competitive softball player in her youth, and now as a talented & driven breeder / dog sport competitor. Cassie is an example of the sort of person we want to encourage. Deeply motivated, intensely curious, looking to the next 50 years of the sport.
This is an awesome episode that addresses the genetics of dogs, particularly the German Shepherd. Avi and I review interviews we received from these experts: Pierre Wahlström Steve Stoops Johannes Grewe I think you'll gain tremendous insight from each of these interviews and as always, its a great discussion and fun time with Avi Cohen on the show!
Amanda joins Laney and Kim for a far-reaching discussion. She shares stories from her career, thoughts on effective training, and the sport of Schutzhund as a whole. Amanda is a close friend of the show as Kim's mentor and beloved guest of Kontrolled Chaos Working Dog Club.
Please enjoy this episode with SHANNON KRIEGER, a person who has served the United States with dedication, sacrifice, and honor. From 1999 - 2012, Shannon Krieger was a working K9 handler and trainer for Special Operations Forces (SOF) and a K9 program that would become one of the best practical military initiatives in the last century. That initiative was the Combat Assault Dog (CAD) program in USSOCOM. In 1993, Shannon started at the 1st Battalion 75th Ranger Regiment where he became a Rifle Squad Leader. In 1998, he became a member of a Tier One Unit within the US Army. Shortly following 9/11, Shannon was a member of the Assault team when the US launched a Direct-Action retaliatory strike against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. During follow-on operations, Shannon was injured in a helicopter crash that permanently changed his life and career path but which ultimately led him to a primary position to continue to build the CAD program. As a dog handler, trainer and program manager, Shannon travelled the world in search of the best training and canines for the SOF mission, pulling the best training techniques from KNPV, Schutzhund and Ring Sports and melding them into practical techniques that are combat proven. For more information about ATAK-9 cadre of exceptional instructors/consultants, workshops and full courses, follow these links: Email: atak9.team@gmail.com >> Website: www.atak9.com >> ATAK-9 apparel: www.atak-9.myspreadshop.com/all >> FB: www.facebook.com/AggregateK9 >> IG: www.instagram.com/ata.k9 >> YouTube: ATAK-9 If you enjoyed this podcast, please drop us a kind review! Also, please check out these links for more info from your K9 Top Tales host: Heimdallr K9 Services - Personal Family Executive K9s - heimdallrk9.com Sonja's Dog Training - Behavior, Scentwork, and Detection K9 Training - sonjasdogtraining.com --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/k9-top-tales/support
Avi's BACK.... back on the show and back from Europe after spending much time searching for his new German Shepherd puppy. In this episode we talk about the search, meeting the puppy, what he was looking for and why. This is a dog that Avi will compete with and his search was exciting and fun. We talk all about it in this podcast. You'll laugh at the stories and our shared friendship. Check my site https://robertcabral.com my youtube channel for the videos of all my podcasts and more: https://youtube.com/robertcabraldogs Thanks for subscribing!
This Episode we speak with Mike Suttle of Logan Haus Kennels... Mike is a well know breeder and trainer. Mike has well proven breedings of Malinois and Dutch Shepherds as well as Labradors. I personally have had 2 dogs from Logan Haus (1 Malinois and 1 Labrador) both have been outstanding dogs. *Episode Warning, Mike is on a cell phone during this interview and at times has spotty signal, he cuts out from time to time but you can still follow what he is saying and speaking about. Logan Haus Kennels is owned by Mike Suttle. Mike has been training and raising working dogs for over 30 years. He began with the first working sled dog kennel in West Virginia where he trained Siberian Huskies and Alaskan Malamutes. At age13, he titled his first dog in obedience. Growing up on a cattle farm, he learned how to train herding dogs for livestock. Throughout his high school years, he worked as a veterinary assistant. He then spent 8 years in the United States Marine Corps where he was first introduced to the military working dog program. For the last 20 years, he has dedicated his efforts solely on working military and police dogs. He has attended over 50 military and police dog seminars and has spent thousands of hours training with the best police dog trainers throughout the world. As a breeder Mike has produced puppies that have been used in USAR, Police, SWAT, US Customs, US Border Patrol, DOD, as well as International Police, Security, Customs, and Special Operations. Logan Haus Kennels has bred, raised and prepared more puppies from birth to being selected and used for Tier 1 SOCOM positions than any other kennel in the United States. Mike has earned titles in Schutzhund, SDA, and AKC and has trained many police service dogs. Mike has also worked as the co-owner of Signature K9 for 5 years where he developed many new pieces of training equipment and spent hundreds of hours working in the field with military working dog handlers and police K-9 handlers to discuss training and equipment issues. In 2013 Mike started a Canine Trainers School and has helped professional trainers from several countries to better understand dog training in the areas of shaping behaviors, bite development, and odor detection. Together with input and feedback from other trainers, Mike developed a very effective system to start and imprint puppies as young as 5 weeks old in detection work, this system is being adopted by many programs all over the World who are recognizing the benefits of starting with puppies and teaching them the skills they need as they develop into detector dogs. Mike has recently completed a 3 year rotation as an Explosives Detection K-9 handler and consultant in Afghanistan on a security contract. Logan Haus Kennels was included in a feature about elite Special Operations canines on CBS 60 Minutes. Follow the links below to watch the full segment and 60 Minutes Overtime: Ford K9 LLC FORD K9: www.Fordk9.com LOOKING FOR YOUR NEXT DOG? Contact us here at Ford K9 to purchase your next fully trained Detection Dog. Now you can also pick one of our raised puppy to detection dogs. Email info@fordk9.com Ford K9 MOBILE CLASSROOM - We come to YOU. Any one of our classes and seminars can come to you and your area. Contact us today to schedule. FORD K9 in LAS VEGAS: Attend any one of our classes or seminars. Ford K9 now offers the new CSDT (Certified Sport Detection Dog Trainer) classes. We offer Level 1 and Level 2.Becoming a CSDT will help you develop as a trainer and become more familiar and efficient as a trainer working with all types of dogs and handlers wanting to join in the great sport of scent detection. Do you want to become a professional handler in Conservation or SAR or other Detection disciplines? Ford K9 also offers CPDT (Canine Police/Professional Detection Dog Training School ) Levels 1, 2, and Master Trainer. This is for Handlers and Trainers or those working professional detection dogs such as Explosive, Firearm, Narcotic and Electronic Media / Cell Phone Detection, Conservation, SAR / Human Remains, Currency and more. SHOW YOUR SUPPORT for K9s TALKING SCENTS PODCAST you now have all kinds of gear for you guys from Shirts, Hats, Mugs and more just got to www.fordk9.com and click on the ONLINE STORE
If you haven't heard of Oscar Mora, you'll wanna listen to this podcast. Oscar has been in the game just over 10 years but is making some waves. He's a very skilled. decoy, handler and trainer. He was the Southwest Regional IGP Champion for 2 years and runs Elevated Canine Academy. He's a good guy and a trainer that I like and admire. See what makes him tick in this personal chat!
Recently I got the opportunity to sit down with Vadim Plotsker, the current president of the USCA, United Schutzhund Clubs of America. This is the organization that is at the helm of German Shepherds in the USA. What an amazing conversation and some interesting facts that you will want to know about if you love German Shepherds. Like why is the fight between kennel clubs and orgs like USCA, WUSV, FCI, etc so important for the German Shepherd? What has USCA done to improve the breed? What is the future of USCA, Schutzhund, working dog sports and more?
What makes the Belgian Malinois so great at sports? Danny Craig understands Malinois from a unique perspective; he has bred, competed, titled and championed many Belgian Malinois over the years. He truly understands the dog and its needs.. and he really LOVES Dogs!
You can't get a better perspective on IPO / IGP / Schutzhund than from Frank Phillips. He's a top level judge for the sport as well as a top level competitor on a world level. He's stood on the international podium on several occasions and judged countless trials. He knows the sport inside and out and brings almost 30 years of experience. This is one of my all-time favorite podcasts and it will be for you too!
Avi Cohen has competed at national and international levels in Schutzhund / IPO/ IGP. He is among the very best in the world and in our chat we talk about the dogs, the training, the mindset it takes to get to this level. The differences in training and competition over the past 30+ years and more. A fun, lively and very educational chat with a great guy!
Balanced Training with Doug DeaconSV/CAN Judge Doug Deacon was a founding member of the German Shepherd Schutzhund Club of Canada, which was formed in 1979. He received his SV judge's license in 1983 and since then he has developed a reputation throughout Canada and the United States for maintaining high standards for working dogs. He has judged the Canadian National Schutzhund Championships on several occasions, the USA Nationals protection phase and the North American Championship twice. He has also judged many Regional Championships and numerous local trials in Canada, United States and the South America Championship. Doug was the tracking judge for the 1998 WUSV Championship held in Boston, MA., USA. He also judged the obedience portion of the WUSV Championship in Italy in 2003 and again in 2006 in Denmark. Doug did judge at the WUSV Championship in Kiev, Ukraine in 2011. As a dog trainer and handler, Doug won the 1980 USA Sch H - 3 National Championship in Denver, CO; the 1981 North American Championship and the 1982 FH Championship. He served on the Canadian team to the WUSV World Championship in 1985 and 1990 and then captain of Team Canada in 2004 and 2009. In 2004 Doug and his dog Artos von Farbridge obtained the highest Sch H - 3 score in Canada with a 290 and had the highest average score of 286. He has participated in numerous Championships as a tracklayer and/or helper. Doug trains with the Delta Schutzhund Club in Delta, British Columbia. He has served as Vice President and as a director of the German Shepherd Schutzhund Club of Canada and was the National Training Director. Doug was a police K-9 officer who developed the Minimal Force Canine program for six Police Departments in his area. This Police Dog Training Program used Schutzhund as its foundation. The success of this Police Training Program has put a demand on his time. He has conducted seminars for several different Police Services including Calgary, Edmonton, Saskatoon, Washington State K-9 Association, Minnesota K-9 and many more.September 2006 Doug retired from policing. He spent 8 years with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and 23 years with the New Westminster Police Service
Merry Christmas, listeners, I'm so glad you're here! Today's BONUS episode is my Christmas gift to you! Today, we're going to broaden the umbrella of our topic just a bit to discuss dog sports. Competitive dog sports enjoy a huge following today, and even though dogs who compete in these sports do not necessarily qualify as working dogs, they and their handlers still put a lot of work and dedication into their craft, and I thought that they should be given some attention within the scope of this project. In the first episode, we went in depth about ring sports with dog handlers Kirsty and Allison, and I encourage you listen to that one as well. In this episode, you'll get to hear from Lise Strum, dog trainer and owner of Agape Ranch Dog Sports, located in Southern California. Lise discusses dock diving, flyball, agility, frisbee, carting, and Schutzhund, but this list only scratches the surface of all the dog sports that exist. If you and your dog compete in sports together, or if you are interested in branching out into dog sports, this episode is for you! Lise also talks about ways that she is able to give back to the community through her business and her dogs, to organizations such as The Ddamien Project and Raising Hope Dogs. I hope you enjoy it! Get in touch with Lise on Facebook or Instagram @agaperanchdogsports. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider subscribing to it, rating it, leaving a positive review, and sharing with people you know who are interested in the topic. This show exists in support of its sister photography project on the same topic and of the same name. You can learn more about that by visiting www.herobeside.me. I'd love to hear your feedback, questions, recommendations and ideas concerning this podcast. Please reach out at hello@herobeside.me or on Instagram @herobesideme. Thanks for listening! Be sure to give the furry hero beside you some extra love today.
https://taylormadeworkingdogs.com/https://www.facebook.com/tmdogs/https://www.instagram.com/taylormadeworkingdogs/?hl=enhttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRt04cEzNAL__CkA9X2Nm_Info@tmwdogs.com UC Davis Study we cited in the episode.https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0055937&fbclid=IwAR0K7ELM5ZCzuZMz1567cpTY0ML5nOcvYIM_U9qmoXlkPDWzobQrKxY2JukArticle Citing Other studies we discussed in the episode.https://dogsfirst.ie/health-issues/dog-neutering/?fbclid=IwAR3fljDbt38Y6-yHz5buN5gBpeGgeGC6bpGZKK64YmVe6XYAFuu7rGxSq5A
Sonja's accomplishments with dogs and training credentials achieved during the last 25 years are unmatched. In 2014, Sonja retired from the FBI after 23 years of service as a Special Agent and opened Sonja's Dog Training. While serving with the FBI, Sonja completed thousands of hours of training under nationally recognized trainers, competed in the protection sports of Schutzhund, Mondioring, and French Ring, attained local and national level search dog certifications, completed 100's of field missions with her K9s for the FBI and others, and has trained and worked with 100's of dogs of all ages and types. For approximately 10 years, while stationed in Los Angeles, Sonja deployed with her K9s for the FBI Evidence Response Team (ERT) and CARDA (California Rescue Dog Association) throughout California, the Western United States, Mexico, the Middle East, and to the Pentagon after 9/11. Sonja also teaches the dog sports of Nosework/Scentwork and is a UKC Nosework and AKC Scentwork Judge. You can contact her and visit her website at www.sonjasdogtraining.com You can also listen to her podcast K9 Top Tales at https://anchor.fm/k9-top-tales SHOW SPONSORS: FORD K9 LLC. www.fordk9.com Attend any one of our classes or seminars. Ford K9 now offers the new CSDT (Certified Sport Detection Dog Trainer) classes. We offer Level 1 and Level 2. Becoming a CSDT will help you develop as a trainer and become more familiar and efficient as a trainer working with all types of dogs and handlers wanting to join in the great sport of scent detection. Ford K9 also offers Handler and Trainer courses for those working professional detection dogs such as Explosive, Firearm, Narcotic, Mass Media and Cell Phone Detection. We are offering Seminars of Cognition for Handlers and Trainers in SAR/HRD as well as Wildlife Conservation K9 Teams. Contact us for more information at www.fordk9.com SHOW YOUR SUPPORT for K9s TALKING SCENTS PODCAST you now have all kinds of gear for you guys from Shirts, Hats, Mugs and more just got to www.fordk9.com and click on the ONLINE STORE
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In this episode, TMWD introduces the hosts, Kris Taylor, Rodney Daniel, and Ian Sachs. We go over our respective histories in the dog and pet industry, and touch on how we came to work together. We also deep dive into the history of forming Taylor Made Working Dogs in order to help establish why we are in a position to help you and your dog(s)!
Call it Schutzhund, IPO, IGP or whatever... it's the German Protection dog sport that probably started it all. Special guest Oscar Mora south west regional champion 2 years in a row talks about his passion and drive for the sport and all dogs in general.
In this episode, Jerry Bradshaw and Debbie Zappia discuss: Debbie’s story and how she got into the sport world. The evolution of Schutzhund and how it is expressed in IPG. The conception of American Schutzhund and breed testing. The relationship between American Schutzhund and PSA. Key Takeaways: Political pressure has changed the way that dog sports have changed over the years. There will be over 40 exercises for each club to choose from and the results will be recorded for each dog for breed test purposes. There will be updates to American Schutzhund from IPO or original Schutzhund to keep the skills relevant and important. Without good judges you don’t have a sport – not a sport that is equal to all. American Schutzhund is completely inclusive – you can be in other types of clubs and organizations as well as American Schutzhund. "We don’t know if we’re going to be successful or not, we may fail. What we do know is this: we’re not sitting around complaining, we’re actually trying to do something. We’re working hard, we’re trying to put an organization together that’s going to make our vision a reality. What we can promise, is we’re going to continue to fight for the betterment of all of our respective breeds." — Debbie Zappia Contact Debbie: Facebook: American Schutzhund Email: DZappia300@aol.com Get Jerry's book Controlled Aggression on Amazon.com Contact Jerry: Website: controlledaggressionpodcast.com Tarheel Canine Training: www.tarheelcanine.com Youtube: tarheelcanine Twitter: @tarheelcanine Instagram: @tarheelk9 Facebook: TarheelCanineTraining Protection Sports Website: psak9.org Patreon: patreon.com/controlledaggression Train Hard, train smart, be safe. Show notes by Podcastologist Chelsea Taylor-Sturkie Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You're the expert. Your podcast will prove it.
Wer Hunde liebt, schließt in der Regel sowohl kleinere als auch größere Exemplare ins Herz. Nichtsdestotrotz haben manche Menschen, bestimmte Rassen bzw. Tiere besonders gern, sei es aufgrund des spezifischen Wesens oder ihres Aussehens. Kampfhunde etwa werden gerne gehalten, um Hof oder Haus zu beschützen und eventuelle Einbrecher abzuwehren. Doch sind Kampfhunde wirklich immer gefährlich und gegen jeden aggressiv?
Summary: Lucy was involved in search and rescue for over 15 years, training numerous personal dogs for wilderness search and rescue, as well as land and water human remains detection. She has deployed for hundreds of missing person cases in both urban and remote wilderness locations. She has also provided training to hundreds of search and rescue dog handlers and their canines. Lucy also worked for 10 years as a full-time police sergeant and police canine handler and handled multiple dual-purpose patrol/narcotics canines for her police department. Lucy raised and trained all of her police and SAR dogs from puppies. Lucy was a state certified police canine training instructor and served as a field training officer for her department. In 2013, Lucy took a full-time position as an instructor and trainer for the Randy Hare School for Dog Trainers, teaching detection trainer schools and working dog training classes to law enforcement, military, and professional dog trainers. In 2017, Lucy relocated to Mebane, North Carolina, where she continues to offer high-level training and instruction to police, search and rescue, work and sport dog handlers. In addition to training dogs for police and search and rescue, Lucy competes in a variety of sports with her own dogs as well. Her now retired patrol/narcotics detection partner, Steel, has the distinction of having achieved an AKC Tracking Championship as well as an IPO TR1 title, in addition to having been a certified police tracking dog. Lucy has achieved titles on her dogs in obedience, tracking, and Schutzhund. She is also a National Association of Canine Nose Work Judge. Lucy is also currently the service dog trainer for the American Humane's Pups to Patriots Program. This program trains dogs to be service dogs and pairs them with veterans coping with post-traumatic stress and traumatic brain injury. And she says that’s the bulk of her work these days. Links: Leave FDSA A Voicemail! We're collecting questions for our annual anniversary edition! Have a question for an instructor? Leave it here! Next Episode: To be released 12/07/2018, we'll be talking to Chrissi Schranz about finding time to train.
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Summary: Shade has been training and competing in dog sports since she was a kid. She has successfully competed in Schutzhund, AKC obedience and French Ring and her focus is really on clear communication with your dog. She also recently launched a blog on her website, which all of you should check out at www.shadesdogtraining.com. Next Episode: To be released 10/05/2018, an interview with Stacy Barnett to take a deeper dive into scentwork than we have previously here on the podcast, talking about everything from start line routines to scent cones and converging odor. TRANSCRIPTION: Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports Podcast brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high-quality instruction for competitive dog sports using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today we have Shade Whitesel back on the podcast to talk about concepts of competition. For those of you who haven’t heard the previous episodes with Shade, Shade has been training and competing in dog sports since she was a kid. She has successfully competed in Schutzhund, AKC obedience and French Ring, and her focus is really on clear communication with your dog. She also recently launched a blog on her website, which all of you should check out at www.shadesdogtraining.net. Welcome back to the podcast, Shade! Shade Whitesel: Thank you Melissa. Thanks for having me on again. Melissa Breau: Of course! To start us out, do you want to just remind listeners a little bit about who you are and share a little about the dogs you share your life with … including of course that newest addition? Shade Whitesel: Well, we’ve got six dogs right now. We’ve got three old ones — 10 and a half, 11 and a half, and 12 — so it’s going to be a hard couple of years, but they’re all doing really well. And we have two we call the twins, which is Bailey and Ones, who are almost 6. And the new arrival is a 4-month-old German Shepherd puppy. All of them are German Shepherds, with the exception of one of our old ones, who is a German Shepherd/Australian Shepherd mix. So yeah, we’ve got a full house here, including two kitties, so a lot of individuals in our small house. Melissa Breau: So let’s start with the puppy. It’s Talic, right? Am I pronouncing it right? Shade Whitesell: Yeah, you’re pronouncing it great. Melissa Breau: All right. So I’m pretty sure it’s puppy season, because it feels like everybody has puppies right now. I talked to Sarah Stremming and Leslie about Watson, and I talked to Hannah recently about Figment, and I’ve asked everybody a different version of this question, but … with a new puppy in the house, what have you been focusing on? Shade Whitesel: Well, I haven’t listened to what they said, so I’m interested in what they said. But I’m really about building his reinforcements, like, how I’m going to reinforce him, which means training his toy skills, how to use “chase” and “strike” as reinforcement, will you eat food here, will you eat food there, and then also, as far as skill-wise, how to move his body. Onesie’s got some challenges in his body as far as doing Schutzhund, and Schutzhund is physically challenging on the dogs, so I’m wanting Talic to understand how to move his body in different directions, how to be two on, two off, hind feet. I just want him to be really aware and really flexible and really supple, so I’ve been concentrating a lot on shaping skills like that. And he still does not know how to sit, and that’s not a bad thing. He knows a lot of other words that mean reinforcement, but it’s mainly about building the joy in what I can give him, because that’s what I’m going to be using to teach all the behaviors, like sit, and if I don’t have the reinforcement, then I can’t get the sit. Melissa Breau: We see that pop up on the Facebook page every so often, where people are like, “I have a puppy and I just realized that he’s however many month’s old and he doesn’t actually have that many things on verbal.” It’s like, they’ll come, they’ll happen, as long as you’ve got the other pieces. With new puppies, one of the places people tend to struggle is looking at those long-term goals — like you mentioned Schutzhund — that they have for that dog, and figuring out what to teach more immediately or in the short term. Can you talk a little bit about what your longer-term goals are with Talic and how you’re starting to prepare him for that? Shade Whitesel: Short term is basically the reinforcement, and how to move his body, and long term would be Schutzhund and AKC. I really want him to be OK around other dogs, working in close quarters with other dogs. I taught a seminar this weekend, a camp seminar with Amy Cook and Sarah Stremming, and it was really busy. We had lots of dogs around, and I was really impressed with how Talic handled himself in that environment. He was able to demo a couple of times, he was able to eat, he was able to demo his light toy skills. That’s so important to me because that’s going to fit into his long term, which is do the stuff around other dogs and be comfortable about it. So longer term, the competition goals. No one ever talks about it as much, but short term and long term is life skills. My dogs are in the house, and my short-term goal is getting along with everybody in the house, including that cats. That’s my long-term goal as well — to get along with everybody for all your life. Dogs mature and they’re at different stages, so sometimes that can be challenging when you’ve got a lot of dogs, and when you’ve got highly motivated dogs too. Melissa Breau: This session obviously you’ve got your “Crucial Concepts of Competition” class back on the schedule, which feels a little timely! What “crucial concepts” does it address, and how do those skills eventually help prepare us and obviously our dogs for competition? Shade Whitesel: First of all, I think I might enter Talic in the class, which means I’ll run a Gold spot showing what I’m working on with him and he’ll work through the class skills. I find a lot of people gain perspective seeing the trainers work the dog, so it’s good being a student. When I critique my own videos, when I realize how much more work we have to do, I have more empathy, so that’s a good thing. The class itself is about different ways of getting behavior. Do you want to lure that do you want to shape it, I just go through the ways in which to get it, making sure people are knowledgeable about when do you add the cue, how do you name a lured behavior, how do you name a shaped behavior. Not so much what’s the best way; I don’t really want to compare the ways. I just want to say, “Here’s how you do this, here’s how you do this.” We go through offered behaviors, we go through getting plain behavior loops, clean movement cycles, how do you decide whether your learner is in the frame of mind to work, things like that. I love giving the class because I feel that it covers a lot of different stuff, and so people can get an overall of what they’re going to use to get behaviors. Melissa Breau: I mentioned in the intro that one of the things you focus on is really clear communication when training, which I know obviously all of those bits and pieces fall into that. What are a few of the ways that we can, for lack of a better word, muddy things up when we’re trying to train a new behavior? Shade Whitesel: The first and foremost thing is people’s mechanics aren’t clean. It’s basically click, pause, then treat. That way the dog starts understanding to listen, and not to watch your hands and not to watch where the treats are. I see training get really muddy when there’s not clear cues for what the dog is supposed to do. There’s a lot of training sports that we do want the dog to watch us, like in heeling they need to be on one side of our body, so obviously they need to watch the left side of our body. But we really want the dog also to be listening to what you’re saying as you’re teaching them. In a lot of our sports, body language is not allowed, and we want to be clear in those mechanics. Also know what you’re teaching. Have a clear idea of the steps to get there, and what exactly you want to teach and what you’re going to reinforce. So I really like people to know what they’re teaching and what they’re going for. Melissa Breau: What are some of those common signs that our dogs give us that maybe we’re not being clear? Shade Whitesel: My puppy walked away from me today in his little training session, and we want to stop before they do that. Walking away — that’s not so good. I should have noticed before. But basically look-aways, not re-orienting toward you right away, sniffing, leaving, vocalization, things like that are a good sign that your training is going in a way that you don’t want it to. If you’re using toy skills, dogs that are taking a little longer to come back to you, or a little longer to give up the ball or the toy. You know things are going wrong, or you know your learner is having a hard time with stuff, when they stop re-orientating to you for the next rep, if that’s what you want. If you have a training loop where the dog is doing something, getting reinforcement, and then re-orientating to you in that behavior, then that re-orientating to you — I call that a reset — when that starts to deteriorate, that’s when you know your training session is getting a little harder for your learner. If you’re doing something shaping and the dog is re-orientating to the mat when you’re teaching a “Go to the mat,” if they start arcing on the way to the mat or something, that would be another sign that the training is not going well. And dogs will do that before they leave, before they sniff, so those are the things you want to start noticing and adjust your training session for. Melissa Breau: A lot of times we miss those early signals where things are taking a little bit longer, and it’s good to know that that’s where we want to start to listen. Shade Whitesel: Yeah, and more and more I know that I, as a trainer, I start noticing it faster. It’s a look away, it’s a slow into heel that we need to notice, because those things come before the dog is like, “I don’t know what heel means.” So we need to notice those little things, if that’s how we’re training. If your dog normally looks away in heel, then that wouldn’t be something that would give you information, but if normally they’re heeling along really well and then heel up against a baby gate and the dog looks away, that’s a real good sign that that’s hard. Melissa Breau: And it makes sense to go back and bring it down, and obviously that’s one of those places where video becomes super valuable, because even if you don’t see it in the moment, when you look back at that video, sometimes it’s a lot more obvious. Shade Whitesel: Video is great because you don’t always know. Or if I videoed my session before I’m sure the puppy did some stuff, before he went, “You know, that’s too hard,” if I videoed, I might be a little bit more knowledgeable about that, and in fact I will video our next session for that information. Melissa Breau: Often, if communication is less than clear, it leads to mistakes or misunderstandings about the behavior that we’re trying to teach. I know you have a specific protocol that you share for dealing with mistakes that happen during training. Can you talk us through that? Shade Whitesel: Just having taught this camp seminar with Amy Cook and Sarah Stremming, we had a Q&A session at the end of it, and we talked about mistakes both days. I want to thank … I didn’t know the woman who said this, but a shout out to her because it’s a really good way to put it: I want people to think of mistakes as information for the handler — not for the dog, for the handler — that whatever we’re trying to teach, it’s not getting through. So first of all, just knowing that, knowing that mistakes are information that we’re not communicating what we thought we did, because the learner, the dog, they always think they’re right. They’re doing what we’re teaching them, so mistakes are not really that much mistakes. They’re information that “I need to get a little better about something in that training session,” and we don’t always know at the time. As far as specific protocols, I have some stuff where it’s like, OK, the dog makes one mistake, reset the circumstances that made that mistake, and then, if they make two mistakes in a row, always, always go back, make it super easy, make sure they get reinforced afterwards. Another thing I might do, if I’m working on positions or something, I might feed the dog in position and then do a reset cookie. So basically the dog’s getting two treats: they’re getting one in position and then a reset cookie. If they get the position wrong, then I might not feed them in position, but I would still get that reset treat out there, so if they understand what to do instead, the next time they’ll do it. So they know they missed their opportunity for a cookie there. Everything I’m talking about, like the resetting or missing out on a cookie, that really depends a lot on the history of your learner and how old your learner is in the work. You don’t want to reset a puppy. I might treat one of these mistakes — I have a 6-year-old dog — a little differently than I will treat Talic’s mistakes, both of them being my own fault as their teacher, but one has six years of learning history, whereas the little puppy just has a couple months of learning history, so treating those differently might be a possibility. The big thing, too, is they made a mistake — they already made a mistake. There’s nothing you can do. Don’t worry about it. Give them another behavior they can do. I find everyone’s so worried about the mistakes, and more and more I think we should go … we should note it in our minds: They came off 30 degrees off position in heel position. Let’s not do that again. Let’s figure out and let’s give them a behavior that they can do that I can pay them for, get them reinforced as quickly as possible, and then move on and try to evaluate why they didn’t come in correctly to heel position. Those are just some things I’m thinking about off the top of my head about what we call mistakes but really should be information for us. Melissa Breau: If that kind of stuff happens regularly, obviously it can lead to frustration on the dog’s part. Let’s say someone is seeing definite signs of frustration in their training — barking or leaving or any of those obvious flags. How can they begin to figure out what’s going on and make a plan to fix it? Shade Whitesel: Well, video is your friend, and we’re all kind of talking about the same thing: frustration, mistakes, training being muddy, not having clear resets, behavior from the dog — it’s all kind of the same thing. Frustration — I think we label frustration when the dog is barking or pushy at us, whereas it’s probably the same reason as the dog that sniffs and leaves. Both of it is that they’re semi-confused over what we want, or we’re not communicating correctly. What I always look at is I look at my resets. Does my dog re-orientate to me as fast as they can? If that gets slow, then I always look. If my dog’s barking, that’s definitely I’m going to make sure my rate of reinforcement is up, make sure I’m communicating, make sure I’m breaking it down as tiny steps as possible. Working on my German Shepherds, they love to bark, and I’m very, very careful about drilling very hard behaviors. Frustration-wise, a lot of Shepherds will bark when you ask them to back up or ask them to do a left finish, and I’m very, very careful about training those in a calm way so that I don’t get any extra whines, things like that, and making sure that I don’t ask for ten of them, so that my dog isn’t frustrated, like, “I just did that.” Whereas a lot of times where the dog is moving forward, that’s not as frustrating for them. So look at your training, make sure everything’s clear so your dog isn’t frustrated, but also look at what you’re asking them to do. If they’re trying to inhibit themselves and do a lot of start-stops, that can be really frustrating for dogs that like to move and go forward, so that’s an extra thing to think about. The other thing about frustration is did your dog expect reinforcement, and have you made this association of your dog wanting reinforcement and now all of a sudden you’re not giving them reinforcement, so they get frustrated at you. So it’s about associations. I see a lot of times — and myself included, because I’m far from a perfect trainer — we may stay too long at one step in eventually what’s going to be a behavior chain, and when we try to move beyond that step of training, the dog is like, “But wait a minute. You paid me twenty times, and now this twenty-first time, why aren’t you paying me?” So we have to make sure that we up the criteria as fast as our learner is able to, so we don’t create that frustration of being at one step and then the dog thinking that that’s the end product. I usually describe it, if we’re teaching “Go to the mat,” because that’s a really easy way to describe it. Let’s say it’s five steps to go to the mat, and if we click at Step 2 three times and then we expect Step 3, maybe our specific learner thought, I only moved two steps to this mat. Have you clicked that three times so that’s all I do. And then they don’t understand when two steps doesn’t get a click. I always describe it that way because that seems to make sense to people, where we’re thinking we’re waiting for the next step, where the learner is like, “Wait a minute. You just taught me take two steps.” That’s often a thing that we can figure out in video when we watch them and think about in our training sessions. So lots of stuff to think about, and there’s no recipe for this, which makes it a little hard sometimes. Melissa Breau: Another endorsement for the value of video for sure. Shade Whitesel: Totally. It’s made me a better trainer. Melissa Breau: Looking at the syllabus for “Crucial Concepts,” it lists a lot of, obviously, a lot of concepts. Do you have specific skills — I know you mentioned mat work a couple of times — that students will work through to apply those concepts, or are they picking their own behaviors to work on? How does that work? Shade Whitesel: I do show behaviors that I want them to do, and they can pick their own, if they know those. For instance, one of the behaviors we show is “Go to a mat.” That’s real simple for the shaping part of it. You can choose to shape something else, but I’d rather people take non-trial behaviors so they aren’t so worried about stuff. I don’t want them to try to lure a perfect sit because they’re worried about having that perfect sit for heeling, things like that. I just want nonsense behaviors for them to practice these concepts on, so I really want people to do it on tricks. So I have suggested behaviors, but they can also, with instructor approval, pick their own. Melissa Breau: Fair enough. Fair enough. Share Whitesel: Yeah. Melissa Breau: I think, for a lot of folks, they’ll look at a class like this and they aren’t sure how to tell if it’s a good fit for them and their dog. Can you talk a little bit about who the class is for? Is it for beginners? Folks with young dogs? Experienced competitors? Where’s the focus? Shade Whitesel: All the things. All the people. I don’t think people realize that it’s not for beginners. It’s a great class for beginners because I start really basic and then I work up, but it’s also … I can guarantee you there’s stuff in there that you don’t know, even if you’ve been training dogs a lot. We’re always learning, and as instructors, we’re always learning, and I want this class to show you the basic stuff of how to learn, how to shape, and how to get offered behaviors, but I also talk about how to get clean loops in your training. By far, I see people not doing what we consider the foundation behaviors, the foundation mechanics, and it really, really helps to go back and work on that, and it’s going to really help your training. I’ve had a couple people say, after they took the class, that they got so much out of it; that they thought it was an elementary class, but they got a lot out of it that they didn’t realize. So I think a lot of people should take that. It’s going to be really helpful. Melissa Breau: You’ve also got your retrieve class on the schedule this term. Can you share a little about that class too, just what approach you use and who should consider that class? Shade Whitesel: I shape the retrieve, specifically shape the hold. And to clarify, this class, the retrieve is on retrieving a dumbbell, or mainly an obedience retrieve, where you’re going to send the dog out for a dumbbell and they’re either going to come to heel if they’re hunting, or I think FCI they come to heel position, they don’t do front, or we’ll teach the basic AKC or CKC dumbbell retrieve where the dog comes to front. So to clarify, we’re using … this is a formal, so the dog goes out, gets a dumbbell, and comes back. I’m not playing with the dumbbell, I’m not getting the dumbbell to be very exciting. I’m using what the dog is already is reinforced by, which is normally toy stuff to shape the hold and the dumbbell, so basically they’re retrieving the dumbbell for their toy. It’s preferable and ideal if people already have the toy class in their libraries, if they already have some toy skills, because I really, really like to use the toy marker cue of switch, which is switching grip to grip, so like toy to toy, but it’s not necessary for them to do the class. We can do a lot of the stuff with food, or if they already have some toy skills but they don’t have switch, I’ve got a couple of clients or student who have used just the basic toy skills they already had. So ideally I’d love for people to have the relevant toy skill of switch to shape the hold, but it’s not totally necessary. I’ll work with you, especially at the Gold spot, if you just have food. But really we’re shaping it. We, in the past, have given this class back-to-back, because I think it takes six weeks to get a really good hold on the object that you’re going to have to get, and then the next six weeks to get a really nice retrieve. So I’ve given the class in back-to-back terms. I’m not going to this time. I’m probably going to start teaching this class twice a year, and so ideally be realistic and realize you’re not going to usually be able to teach a retrieve in six short weeks. That’s really a three-month project. Melissa Breau: You mean people can’t get their final formal retrieve ready to walk into an obedience ring in six weeks? No way! Shade Whitesel: It’s like heeling. It takes a little longer. Melissa Breau: That’s so funny. Shade Whitesel: But I’m going to give it more often. People can work on it, and then work on it again in a couple of months. So they should get a good hold out of a hold in front or a hold in heel for this. And I do think this class might be good for people who need to work on dogs that chew in a hold. This might be a good class for that. Melissa Breau: To help problem-solve that a little bit. Shade Whitesel: Yeah. Melissa Breau: I will say, while I have absolutely shaped a “Bring the object to me,” I have no hold on my retrieve, so it’s interesting. Maybe that’s a class I should look at. Shade Whitesel: It is the most boring part because often we can convince a dog to go get something for us. It’s the sitting in front, holding it calmly, that’s so weird for the dogs. I mean, boy, who dreams up that, you know? The dogs are like, “Why would I sit here in perfect front and hold this calmly? I want to chew it, I want to fling it at you,” all the things that they want to do. I enjoy it, but it’s a behavior that probably doesn’t make sense to dogs, which makes it hard for us. Melissa Breau: Right. So I’ve got one last question here. My last question is the one that I’ve taken to asking everyone when they come on: What’s a lesson that you’ve learned or been reminded of recently when it comes to dog training? Shade Whitesel: You know what? Listen to your dog. I think I said that before, too, but just over and over, listen to your learner, listen to what they’re saying. My little puppy, a couple of days ago I’m trying to teach him a chin rest, and I stick my hand … and he would do one perfect chin rest and then he’d leave. He’s a leaver, and I haven’t had a leaver in a while. Normally I have dogs that bark at me. He’d do this perfect chin rest, and I’d give him his little marker cue and give him his little treat, and then he’d be like, “Nope, not doing it again.” And it’s like, why not? Because he was doing it perfectly. Well, obviously I’m not reinforcing it enough. So I switched to, like, five treats in a row, and he was like, “Oh, OK. I’ll do more than one.” I think it’s easy for us, not that I did, but I think it’s easy for us to go, “Well, he knows how to do it, because he just did it, and he’s choosing not to.” And he was. He was like, “You’re not paying me enough for that hard behavior.” I don’t tend to think of a chin rest as a hard behavior, because my other dogs are like, “Sure, we’ll chin rest all day.” But for him, as a young, active puppy, it’s a really hard, expensive behavior, and he was telling me that. Once I started paying it with more food, he was happy to do it again and again, and he’s got a beautiful chin rest now. And now it’s an easier behavior for him, and I don’t have to pay him five treats at once. But over and over in my training sessions, listen to what your dog’s telling you. Listen to what your learner’s telling you. Is your rate of reinforcement up there? Do they like it? I love that way of training, just listening to what they’re saying and their opinion about it. I just think that’s cool. Melissa Breau: That’s so interesting, because it’s something that I was talking to Hannah about. She was on last week and we chatted quite a bit about this idea that dogs really are each unique, and they really do have different things that are hard for them than other dogs, and it’s important to recognize that. Some things are going to be an expensive behavior and some things are going to be a cheap behavior, they’re not going to be the same as the dog you trained before this one. So yes, it’s really interesting. Shade Whitesel: Yeah, and in a way, of course, because I don’t like the same things that my brother and sister like. We all have different interests. So of course dogs, even if they’re related to each other, even if they’re same breed, they’re going to have different likes. I do automatically think of that, but I need to be reminded by my listener, or by my learner, that “This behavior, even though your other dogs know it really well and it was easy, this behavior is hard for me.” So yeah, they’re all individuals, and that’s what makes them pretty darn fascinating. Melissa Breau: Yeah, yeah. Thank you so much Shade. I really appreciate you coming back on the podcast. Shade Whitesel: Thanks for having me. It’s good to talk about this stuff. I enjoy it. Melissa Breau: And thanks to our listeners for tuning in. we’ll be back next week with Stacy Barnett to take a deeper dive into scent work than we previously have here on the podcast, talking about everything from start line routines to scent cones and converging odor. Don’t miss it! It if you haven’t already, subscribe to our podcast in iTunes or the podcast app of your choice to have our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available. CREDITS: Today’s show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called “Buddy.” Audio editing provided by Chris Lang. Thanks again for tuning in -- and happy training!
Summary: Dr. Jennifer Summerfield is a veterinarian and Certified Professional Dog Trainer (CPDT-KA), with a focus on treating behavior problems including aggression to humans or other animals, separation anxiety, and compulsive behavior disorders. She also teaches group classes and private lessons in basic obedience for pet dogs, and coaches students getting started in dog sports such as agility and competitive obedience. Jennifer is proud to be a member of the American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior (AVSAB) and the Association of Professional Dog Trainers (APDT). She is a passionate advocate for positive, science-based methods of training and behavior modification, and loves helping pet owners learn to communicate more clearly with their dogs. Links mentioned: Behavior Medication: First-line Therapy or Last Resort? Dr. Jen's Blog Dog Talk with Dr. Jen (Podcast) Train your dog now! by Dr. Jennifer Summerfield (book) Next Episode: To be released 8/10/2018, featuring Nancy Tucker, talking about how to stop your dog from going crazy at the door. TRANSCRIPTION: Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports Podcast brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high-quality instruction for competitive dog sports using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today we’ll be talking to Dr. Jennifer Summerfield. Dr. Jen is a veterinarian and Certified Professional Dog Trainer (CPDT-KA), with a focus on treating behavior problems including aggression to humans or other animals, separation anxiety, and compulsive behavior disorders. She also teaches group classes and private lessons in basic obedience for pet dogs, and coaches students getting started in dog sports such as agility and competitive obedience. Jennifer is proud to be a member of the American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior (AVSAB) and the Association of Professional Dog Trainers (APDT). She is a passionate advocate for positive, science-based methods of training and behavior modification, and loves helping pet owners learn to communicate more clearly with their dogs. Hi Jen, welcome to the podcast! Jennifer Summerfield: Hey Melissa. I am excited to be here. Melissa Breau: To start us out, can you share a little bit about your own dogs, who they are, and anything you’re working on with them? Jennifer Summerfield: Definitely. I have three dogs at the moment. They are all Shelties. The oldest one is Remy. He just turned 10 years old this year, so double digits now. He’s my old man. We were really excited this past summer because he just finished his PACH, which so far is our highest pinnacle of achievement in agility, and it only took us ten years to get there, so, you know, better late than never! So that’s been really exciting for him. And I finally just got the courage worked up to enter him in AKC Premier in the next trial that we’re entered in, in August. It’s a bit of a new adventure for us because we’ve never tried that before, but I figure what the heck. My middle dog, Gatsby, is 4-and-a-half years old, he’ll be 5 this November, and he is working on his agility titles as well. He currently is in, I want to say, Master Jumpers and Excellent Standard. His agility career has been a little bit slower than Remy’s. He’s had some stress-related weave pole issues that we’re working through, and he also had some really significant dog-reactivity issues when he was younger, so we spent a lot of time when he was about a year and a half to 2 years old or so just working through that to get him to the point where he could even go to agility trials successfully without having a meltdown. So for him, just the fact that he has any titles at all and can occasionally successfully trial is a pretty great accomplishment. But I have him entered in a couple of trials this fall as well, so hopefully we’ll keep building on that. And then my youngest dog, Clint, he is 4 years old now, and his history was a little bit different. He came to me as an adult, almost a year old, because I really wanted a dog to show in conformation. When I got Gatsby as a puppy, he was supposed to be my conformation dog. That’s what we were hoping for, but … I don’t know how much you know about Shelties and conformation, but the height thing is a killer. It looked like he was going to be in size on the charts and everything, and then when he got to be about 6 months old, he was over. So I got Clint a little bit later at a year old from his breeder, and he was already a finished champion at that point, so he knew what to do, which was perfect because I was a total beginner. So I had a really good time showing him for about a year after I got him. We finished his Grand Championship together, so that was really cool. And now we’re branching out and he’s starting to learn some agility and some other things as well. So that’s my guys in a nutshell. Melissa Breau: I’ve got a bit of a chicken-or-egg question for you here. Did dog training come first, or did becoming a vet come first? How did you get into all this stuff? Jennifer Summerfield: Funnily enough, I’ve been interested in dog training and dog behavior from as early as I can remember, even before we had a dog. When I was a kid, I was really crazy about dogs, and I was fascinated by dog training. I had books and books and books, just shelves of books on training dogs, obedience training, and also a bunch of random stuff, like, I had books on Schutzhund training, and books on herding training, and books on service dog training, and just everything I could get my hands on. One of the really formative experiences of my childhood was that my aunt took me to an obedience trial that was at that time … I don’t remember what the name of the kennel club is, but our local kennel club in Charleston — I live in West Virginia — used to have their show at the Civic Center every year, and they would have an obedience trial as part of that. And so my aunt took me one year. I must have been 8 or 9, something like that, and I just remember being absolutely riveted by watching the dogs in the obedience trial, which I guess is maybe a funny thing in retrospect for an 8- or 9-year-old to be riveted by, but I was. I remember watching that and thinking it was absolutely the most amazing thing I had ever seen, and I wanted to do it more than anything, hence all the books and all of that stuff. I wrote to the AKC when I was a kid to ask for a copy of the obedience regulations, because I had read that that was how you could get them. This was back before everything was online, you know, this would have been the early ’90s. So I wrote to the AKC and I remember being super-excited when they sent the manila envelope back that had the obedience regulations in it. I read them and I was just super-fascinated and I knew that was what I wanted to do. We got my first dog when I was about 16, and he was a Sheltie named Duncan, so I did a lot of training with him. We were never very successful in the obedience ring, which was completely my fault, not his. But I’ve just always been really fascinated by the idea of being able to communicate with another species that way, being able to have that kind of relationship with a dog where they understand what you want them to do and there’s all this back and forth communication going on to do these really complicated, fancy things. So when it came time to start thinking about what I actually wanted to do with my life, around junior high school, high school, getting ready to go to college, I always knew that I wanted to do something related to dog training or dog behavior, and I thought about several different ways of going about that. I considered the idea of just being a professional dog trainer straight out, but I was a little bit nervous about that because I wasn’t quite sure if it was easy to make a living doing that, or how one got established, and I was a little bit concerned. It didn’t feel very stable to me, but who knows, but I wanted something that felt like there was more of an established career path for it, I guess. Of course I thought about veterinary medicine, because that’s one of the most obvious things that everybody thinks about when they want to work with animals. And I did actually give some thought in college to going to graduate school and getting a Ph.D., and then possibly becoming an applied animal behaviorist that way, but there were two reasons I opted not to go that route, and one was that I discovered in college that research is really not my thing, and I knew that unfortunately that was going to be a big part of life getting a Ph.D., so that was kind of a strike against it. So what I ultimately decided to do instead was go to veterinary school, and what I liked about that idea was that I felt like I would always have something to fall back on, regardless. I knew that I could do behavior, hopefully relatively easily, I could get into doing that with a veterinary degree, but I could also just be a general practice veterinarian too, if need be, and actually I really like that aspect of my job right now. So that’s how I ended up in vet school, but it really was always kind of a back door way to get into the world of behavior. Melissa Breau: That’s awesome. It’s fantastic that that appealed to you at such a young age. I think that a lot of people who listen to this podcast can probably relate to that. Jennifer Summerfield: I think this was probably the audience that would relate to it. It’s only in retrospect that I realize what a strange little child I probably was. Melissa Breau: Hey, you’re not alone out there. Dr. Jennifer Summerfield: That’s right! Melissa Breau: So how did you become interested in it from such a young age? Were you always a positive trainer? Is that how you started out, or did you cross over at some point? How did that happen? Jennifer Summerfield: I do consider myself to be a crossover trainer, and I think a lot of that has to do with the kind of information that was out there at the time that I first started getting interested in these things and I was first collecting all my books and reading everything. This was the ’90s, for the most part, so positive training I know was starting to become a thing around that time, but it wasn’t, as I recall, super mainstream, at least not where I was, and in the things that I was reading and the classes that I was going to. Most of the books I had, of course, probably like a lot of people at that time, were pretty correction-based, and they talked about how you needed to be in charge, and you needed to make sure that your dog knew who was boss, and that you had to be really careful about using cookies in training because then your dog gets dependent on them, and of course you don’t want your dog to just be working for cookies, you want them to be working for you, and I thought all that made a lot of sense at the time. When I was first working with Duncan, I had this book that was about competitive obedience training, specifically, and I remember working through this book and just working religiously on doing everything it said. I remember teaching him to heel, and the way that the book said that you taught your dog to heel was you put a choke collar on them and you walked around in circles in the yard, and every time they got in front of your leg, you gave a leash correction and you jerked them back and you just did that until they figured it out. That’s how Duncan learned to heel, and obviously if I had it to go back and do it over again, I would do it differently. But he was a good dog, and he learned, and it worked reasonably well. Like I said, we never got to the point of having any great successes in the obedience ring, for probably a lot of other reasons besides that, but that’s kind of how I got started. As I got older and I started reading more things, one thing that I remember that was a big turning point for me was reading Jean Donaldson’s book The Culture Clash. I know that probably a lot of your listeners are familiar with that book, because I know it’s kind of a classic in the world of behavior, but it’s very much about how most of the things our dogs do that bother us are just dog things. They’re just doing things that dogs do, and those things happen to bother us, and that’s reasonable sometimes and we can teach them not to do those things. But that was such a revolutionary thing for me to think, like, You mean it’s not all about that my dog is trying to be in charge and he needs to know that this stuff’s not allowed. She just made so much sense. At that time I had never heard anybody put it that way before, and I want to say that was really the first time that the idea of positive training was presented to me in a way that made a lot of sense. As I got older, of course, and started to learn more about the scientific side of things — you know I’m a huge science nerd, as probably most people are who go to the trouble of getting a veterinary degree — and so as I learned more about the scientific side of things, then I was sold, because obviously the scientific consensus is unanimous that clearly there’s a way to do things that works a lot better than using correction-based techniques, and that there’s lots of really valid scientific reasons to use positive reinforcement training. So I would say by the time I started vet school, I was pretty solidly in that camp. The other thing that probably cemented it for me was seeing the difference in how quickly Duncan learned things, for one thing, once I switched. He learned to heel the old-fashioned way, but he learned to do his dumbbell retrieve with a clicker, and he loved his dumbbell retrieve. He would find his dumbbell, if I forgot to put it away after a training session, he would find it and bring it to me and sit, and he just had an enthusiasm for it that he never, ever had for the things we learned when I was still teaching the old way. And then, when I got my dog Remy, who was the second dog I had, the first dog after Duncan, who by that point I was pretty solidly in the positive reinforcement camp, and he learned to heel with a clicker. Looking at the difference between the two of them, both in terms of how technically good their heeling was, but also just looking at their attitude differences and how much they wanted to do it, I knew, I think, after I had done a little bit of work with Remy and seen that kind of difference, that I would never train another dog with corrections again. Melissa Breau: Sometimes the proof really is in the pudding. Once you’ve seen it, you can’t go back. Jennifer Summerfield: Yeah, and I guess that’s a pretty common experience, I think. I feel like I hear a variation of that from a lot of crossover trainers, that it’s a combination of understanding the science, but also when you see it, you see the difference in your own dog or in a client’s dog and you say, “Why on Earth did I ever used to do it a different way?” Melissa Breau: Absolutely. I’d imagine that being a vet and a dog trainer, you’ve got a lot of knowledge there. How does one body of knowledge inform the other, and how have they both influenced your career? Jennifer Summerfield: I’m really glad, looking back, that I did make the choice to go to vet school, because I think that’s a good skill set to have. Obviously I like being a vet. I am in general practice. Even though I spend a fair amount of my time seeing behavior cases, I do general practice stuff too, which I really enjoy. But that skill set is definitely useful for seeing behavior cases because there are a lot of behavior issues dogs have, and training issues, that have a physical component to them, and it’s very handy to have that knowledge base to fall back on, so that if somebody comes in and they say, “My dog’s having house training issues all of a sudden again, and he’s always been house trained, but now I don’t know what’s going on,” to be able to say, “Well, you know, your dog might have a urinary tract infection,” or “Your dog might have Cushing’s disease,” or “Your dog might have diabetes.” These are things that sometimes people think they have a training problem or behavior problem when actually they have a medical problem. So it’s definitely useful to have that knowledge base to be able to say, “Well, actually, maybe we should look at this.” Both being a veterinarian and being a dog trainer are fields that I think people feel like they have to do with dogs, or they have to do with animals, I guess, more broadly, being a veterinarian. And that’s true, but what sometimes I think people don’t realize, if you’re not in one of these two professions, is how much they have to do with people, because all of the animals come with a person, and it would be rare, being either a dog trainer or a veterinarian, that you’re dealing much directly with the animal. Your job in both of those fields is to coach the owner on what they need to be doing and figuring out what works for them, and engaging in some problem-solving with them and figuring out what they’re able to do with their lifestyle, whether it’s training their dog not to jump on people or whether it’s managing a chronic disease like diabetes. So I think that in a lot of ways that skill set, the people skills part of things, is something that has gotten to be strengthened and developed by doing both of those things. So I think all in all it worked out for the best. Melissa Breau: The last guest we had on — you’ll be right after Sue — the last guest we had before that was Deb Jones, and we were talking all about that piece of it, just the idea that if you’re a dog trainer, you’re training people, you’re not training dogs. It’s such a big difference. Jennifer Summerfield: Yeah. We do Career Day periodically for a lot of the elementary schools, but also junior highs and high schools in the area, because everybody wants a veterinarian to come for Career Day. And it’s amazing, of course, the common thing that you hear from people sometimes is, “Oh, I want to go into veterinary medicine because I really like animals but I don’t like people.” I say, “Well, then, I don’t know if this is the career for you, because it’s very, very, very, very people-centric. It’s all about people, so you really need to like dealing with people and enjoy that aspect of it too.” Melissa Breau: To shift gears a little bit, I know you’ve got a webinar coming up for FDSA on behavior medications, so I wanted to talk a little bit about that stuff too. At what point should someone start thinking about meds versus training for a behavior problem? Jennifer Summerfield: What I always harp on about this, and I actually have a blog post that I wrote a while back on this topic specifically, is that I really wish we could get more into the habit of thinking about behavior medication as a first-line treatment option for behavior issues. I see so many cases where I think people want to save that as a last resort, like, “Well, we’re going to try everything else first,” and “We’ve been working on this for a year and a half, and nothing’s helped, and maybe it’s time to consider meds.” I totally get where they’re coming from with that. I know that there are a lot of reasons people are nervous about medication. But it makes me sad in a lot of ways because I see so many dogs that I think, My goodness, their quality of life could be so much improved with medication, or The training plan that they’re working on could go so much smoother, and be so much less stressful for both the owner and the dog, if they were willing to consider medication earlier in the process. So for me, when I see behavior cases, certainly not every single one do we go straight to medication, but I would say that, gosh, probably a good 70 or 80 percent of them we talk about medication on that first visit, because usually if there are things that are legitimate behavior issues rather than training problems — which I can touch on here in a second, too, if you want — but if it’s a behavior issue that is enough of a problem that the owner is willing to schedule an appointment for it and pay for the consultation and sit down with me for three hours and talk about it, chances are that it’s something that could benefit from medication of some kind. I see so many dogs that do better on meds, and there’s very few downsides to them, so in general not anything to be scared of, and not anything that you have to feel like you have to avoid until nothing else has helped. I think of it more as it’s just like if your dog had an infection. You wouldn’t say, “Well, I really want to try everything we can possibly do until we put him on antibiotics.” Or if he had diabetes, “I really don’t want to use insulin. I just really, really don’t want to use it.” I think we just think of behavior medication differently, which is too bad in a lot of ways, and I would love to see the mainstream thinking about behavior medication move more towards the same way that we use medication for anything else. Melissa Breau: You said you could touch on the behavior stuff in a second. I’d love to have you elaborate. What did you mean? Jennifer Summerfield: As far as determining whether you have a behavior problem versus a training problem, which I do think can be a little bit of a muddy line sometimes for owners, the way that I usually try to break that down for people is that if you have a training problem, this is usually your dog is normal. Your dog is doing normal dog things that happen to be annoying to you or to other people, which is fine. And that’s legitimate, that’s still definitely something that we want to address, so I’m not saying that as like, “See, this isn’t a problem.” It’s totally a problem if your dog is flattening old ladies when it tries to say hi, or something like that. That’s a problem, but it’s a training problem. If your dog is friendly but otherwise normal, it’s not something that we would treat with medication, because this is just something that we need to teach your dog a different behavior to do in that situation. Whereas things that we think of more as behavior issues are things that have some kind of emotional component to them, so things that have an anxiety component, that’s probably the most common. The vast majority of behavior issues that we see do have an underlying anxiety component. But it’s that, or it’s a compulsive behavior issue, or it’s something that’s not normal, a genuinely abnormal behavior that the dog is doing. That’s when at that point that we think they’re more of a candidate for medication. Melissa Breau: That makes sense. It’s kind of, “Is this a normal behavior or is this …” Jennifer Summerfield: Exactly, exactly. I can’t remember who it was, but I know one year I was at a conference and I was listening to a talk on behavior medication, and I remember the way that the speaker put it, which I really liked, was one of the ways they look at whether it’s a true behavior problem that needs medication or not is, Is it something that’s bothering the dog, or is it just bothering you? Which was a great way to word it. Melissa Breau: Yeah, I like that. I’d love to include a link to the blog post that you mentioned that you wrote a while ago in the show notes. Would you be willing to shoot me over a link to that when you get a chance after we’re done? Dr. Jennifer Summerfield: Absolutely, yeah, I could definitely shoot that over to you. Melissa Breau: Awesome. To get back to the behavior meds thing, what are some signs that medications might really have a positive influence on a behavioral problem? Is there something about a problem that you go, “Oh, that, definitely. We can work on that with medication”? Jennifer Summerfield: Yeah, I would say a little bit of what we touched on a minute ago, in that anything that we think has a significant anxiety component to it, which is a lot of things. That encompasses things like separation anxiety, or thunderstorm phobia, or dogs that are generally anxious and constantly on edge and have trouble settling. Anytime we get the sense that, “Hey, this dog seems to be abnormally fearful or worried about things that are pretty normal in life that a ‘normal’ dog shouldn’t be fearful or worried about,” then that’s a pretty good indicator that medication would probably be helpful. The other big thing that makes me think, We should consider meds here is if the people have already been doing some work as far as training or behavior modification that’s appropriate, something that’s like, “OK, that sounds like a pretty good plan,” and they’re just having a really hard time making any headway, that, to me, is a strong indication that we could probably help that process along quite a bit with medication. The problem with a lot of dogs, especially if we’re working on something like, say, leash reactivity, for example, where we know how important it is from a behavior mod standpoint, how important it is to keep the dog below threshold while we’re working with it, for some dogs that are just so sensitive, that’s incredibly difficult because it doesn’t take anything at all to send them over threshold, and it can be really hard to find that little window of opportunity to even start working on training in a way that’s going to be successful. So in a dog like that, for example, medication can be really helpful to just bring things down enough that the dog is able to think, that you’re able to get that little toehold of space where the dog is able to see the trigger and not react so that you actually have some room to do your training. Melissa Breau: If somebody is considering this, they’re looking at medication or they’re thinking it might be good for their dog, what are some resources that they can use, or that they can turn to, to learn more about some of the options out there and the meds, or even just behavior modification training specifically? Jennifer Summerfield: That is such a great question. I think in terms of learning about behavior modification in general, there is some great stuff out there. There are tons of obviously really knowledgeable people in the field who have blogs and podcasts that are easy that anybody can access for free. You can find some great webinars through, of course, FDSA, but also through organizations like the Pet Professional Guild or the Association of Professional Dog Trainers or the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants. There are online courses you can do. I really think that for a lot of dog owners, they might even consider, if they’re into this kind of thing, attending a conference like ClickerExpo or the APDT National Conference, or something like that, if it’s nearby. I find that a lot of dog owners sometimes don’t think about that, or don’t realize that they can go to things like that, but anybody’s totally welcome at those conferences. I know the last couple of years when I’ve been at ClickerExpo, certainly the majority of people there, I would say, are professionals in the field of one kind or another, but there’s always a good smattering of people who are just dog owners who want to learn more about this stuff, and I think that’s really cool. So lots of opportunities to learn more about behavior science and behavior modification. On the behavior meds side of things, I actually wracked my brain trying to come up with some good resources that are available for dog owners for that, and there just really are not a lot, which is one of the reasons that I’m excited to do this webinar, because I do think there’s a lack of good information that is easily accessible for people about behavior meds, other than the very basic stuff, like, “Hey, behavior meds are a thing, you might consider it for your dog.” But beyond that, it is difficult to find much information. Melissa Breau: Now, I know you specialize in behavior. If somebody goes to their average veterinarian, is that person going to have enough of an understanding to start that conversation, or should they really be seeking out somebody who specializes? What’s the guideline there? Jennifer Summerfield: The answer is that it really does depend quite a bit on your veterinarian and whether that’s something that they have an interest in or not. That’s true in general of general practitioners about really anything, so I don’t mean that at all to sound like, “Well, if your vet doesn’t know this stuff, they’re lousy.” Believe me, if you are a general practitioner, you cannot know everything about everything. All of us have areas that we know a lot about and then areas that we know very little about. I know anytime somebody comes to my clinic and they have questions about orthopedic issues, or their dog has a broken leg that it needs pinned or something like that, I send that out the door so fast because I know nothing. That’s not my area and I’ll be the first to say so, and there are some general practitioners who are fantastic at it. So behavior, to me, is a lot like that. There are some GP’s who are going to be great at it and really know their stuff and going to be really well-versed in all the medication options, and then there are others that that’s just not an area that they deal with much, they may not know a lot. But one option that is available that I think a lot of pet owners don’t always realize is an option is that if you don’t have a veterinary behaviorist nearby, or a veterinarian who is good with behavior and sees behavior cases, and your vet says, “I’d really like to help you, I just don’t know that much about this stuff,” many veterinary behaviorists will do a remote consultation with your vet, which can be super-helpful. They can’t do it directly with you, and that has to do with the legalities of the Practice Act and things that we legally cannot make recommendations directly for an animal if we haven’t met them in person. But what they can do is they can talk to your veterinarian, and your veterinarian can give them the whole write-up and details of the case, and they can say, “Oh, OK, I understand. Here is what I would consider as far as a behavior modification plan. Here is what I would consider as far as medication for this dog.” And then your vet can take that information, and they’re the ones who are actually in charge of doing the prescribing and overseeing the case directly, but they can keep in contact with the specialist about the case and make changes as needed and all that kind of stuff. I think that is a really underutilized service that sometimes people don’t realize is out there, but it is. So if your vet’s not super-well-versed in this stuff, but they’d like to help you and you’re willing to do something like that, talk to them about it, because they may not realize it’s an option either. But I think that can be a really good happy medium sometimes if you don’t have somebody in your area who you can work with in person. Melissa Breau: I think that’s an awesome thing to have you mention on something like this, because like you said, maybe people don’t know that it’s an option out there. I certainly wouldn’t know. Jennifer Summerfield: Yeah, definitely. I know I am going to talk a little bit about that in the webinar as well, so I’ll have more details on how that can work and on how people can specifically seek that out, if it’s something they’re interested in. Melissa Breau: Obviously, during the webinar, you’re not going to be able to give dog-specific advice. Like you said, you have to see the dog, hands on the animal in order to do that. But I would love to give people just a little more of an idea on what you plan to cover, especially since I know we’re doing two webinars back-to -back in the same evening. Can you talk a little bit about what you want to cover? Jennifer Summerfield: Yes, I’m super-excited, and I guess this is kind of unprecedented for FDSA to do the double-header. Melissa Breau: It’s our very first one. Jennifer Summerfield: It’s going to be great. It’s going to be a behavior pharmacology extravaganza, and I could not be more excited. The first webinar is going to be an introduction, basically, so meant for people who want some basic information about behavior meds. It’s going to talk about things like how do you know if your dog might benefit from medication, because I know that’s probably a question that a lot of people will have who are watching the webinar. I’m assuming a significant portion of people will be watching because they have a specific dog in mind that has some issues. So we’re definitely going to talk about how to decide that for your own dog, is it something that might be helpful. We’re going to go over all the different classes of drugs that we use for behavior cases, because there are actually quite a few different options now. It just to just be Prozac and Clomicalm, but there’s a lot of other options out now, which is really cool. We’re going to talk about what our goals are when we use behavior meds, so how that works with a training plan and what kinds of things to expect that way. We are going to spend some time also talking about natural supplements and calming aids and things that can help either by themselves or as an adjunct to medication. In the second webinar, that one is going to go into more detail as far as things like how do we actually choose for real specific cases what medication to use, because there are a lot of options. So we’re going to go into factors that we look at to help us decide what medication we think is going to be best for this particular dog. We’re going to talk about combinations, because for a lot of cases we do actually use more than one medication together, so we’re going to talk about how that works and how you decide whether you want to go down that road, and if you do, what things can go together, what things can’t. We’re going to have several case studies to go over, and examples to use for discussion, which I’m really excited about, because I think that’s where sometimes you get the most information is seeing how it applies to some actual cases rather than kind of getting everything in the abstract. And we will be talking in that second webinar, because we know that the FDSA audience obviously is a lot of performance dog people, we are going to talk specifically about considerations for performance dogs, so things like how do behavior meds impact learning and memory, are there any ethical questions that we need to consider when we’re thinking about medicating dogs who are actively showing and competing, that kind of stuff. So I think that will be a really interesting discussion too. Melissa Breau: That sounds so interesting. I’m actually really excited to dig into it. Jennifer Summerfield: Me too. I’m so excited! Melissa Breau: In addition to the webinars and your work as a trainer and a vet — you’re a pretty busy lady — you also blog, and you’ve recently started podcasting. I wanted to point listeners to those resources a little bit. Can you share a little bit on what you write about and talk about, maybe some of the recent topics you’ve covered, and where they can find that stuff? Jennifer Summerfield: Sure, definitely. My blog is Dr. Jen’s Dog Blog, so you can search for that and it will come right up. I’ve been doing it since, gosh, I think July of 2016, maybe, so I’ve got quite a few posts on there. I think the most recent one I did was on accidental behavior chains that sometimes we teach without realizing to our dogs, which was interesting. I know some of the posts I have had in the past on that blog that people have found really helpful have been on things like I have a post on behavior euthanasia, which actually a lot of people have written to me about and said was helpful for them. I have a post on fear periods and single event learning, which I think a lot of people have found pretty interesting. And then I have some posts on specific topics like leash reactivity and odor-directed aggression and things like that. So if anybody’s curious about those topics, a lot of times I do try to include case examples when I write about those too. Melissa Breau: Lots of sticky issues. Jennifer Summerfield: I know, I know. They are sticky issues, but actually those are some of my favorite things to write about because I think that sometimes there’s a lack of honest conversation about some of those things, and I think it’s sometimes useful to just say, “Well, here is something I deal with every day in my job, and here’s some thoughts, here’s my perspective on it.” And I know that I do get a lot of e-mails from people about those sticky topics that they found them helpful, which is really nice to hear. The podcast is pretty recent. I just started that here earlier this year and it’s been super-fun so far. I only have a few episodes of it out so far, but of course I’m actively doing that and the blog, so there will be more coming. The most recent one I did was on teaching reliable recalls to your dog. That’s a topic I get a lot of questions about and a topic that we troubleshoot a lot in our Basic Manners classes. And I’ve had some past episodes, I know I did one on car ride anxiety, and then I’ve got some basic topics like puppy socialization and housetraining and that kind of stuff. I guess I should probably mention here I do have a book out as well, if it’s something that people are interested in. The book is called Train Your Dog Now, and it is basically a reference guide, like a handbook to pretty much anything that might come up, behavior- or training-related, with a dog. So it has sections on teaching basic obedience cues and tricks, but it also talks about how to teach your dog to cooperate for grooming and handling — nail trims and teeth brushing and ear cleaning and that kind of stuff — and then there is a whole section on behavior issues. So it does talk about leash reactivity, it does talk about odor-directed aggression, it talks about aggression to visitors, and there is … it’s a brief section, but there is a section in the book also about behavior medication and supplements. So for people that like to have a hard copy of something they can look at in their home, that might be a good option to consider. Melissa Breau: To round things out, since it’s your first time on, there are three questions I try to ask every guest their first time on the podcast, and I’d love to do those. So first off, what’s the dog-related accomplishment that you’re proudest of? Jennifer Summerfield: I would have to say, and there are so many, that’s always a question that’s hard to narrow down, but honestly, if I had to pick one, I would probably say getting my dog Remy’s CD would be my biggest accomplishment. From the time that I went to that obedience trial when I was a kid, and I watched the dogs and I just wanted to do that so bad, and with Duncan we muddled along and we did a little bit, we dabbled very briefly in competitive obedience and it didn’t go super-well, but I learned a lot from that, obviously. And then with Remy I did things a little differently, and it still took us a long time to get his CD finished, but the day that we finished it was just like … I went back to the crate and I cried. It was such a big deal for us. And I know obviously, for a lot of your listeners, they have much, much higher accomplishments in the obedience ring, but for us, that was huge. Sort of the second part of that, I guess, obviously finishing the title itself was such a big thing for me because it was something that we worked so hard on. But one of the things that kind of was the cherry on top about that trial was I remember when we were packing our stuff up and getting ready to go back to the car, there was a woman that came up to me. I didn’t know her, but I guess she had been standing around, watching the obedience ring, and she came up to me afterwards and she congratulated me on finishing my title. I said, “Thanks,’ and she said, “I just wanted to tell you how much fun I had watching you and your dog because he looked so happy,” and that was huge. I probably still feel the greatest about that of everything that we’ve done in our competition career or anywhere. So that was a great feeling. Melissa Breau: That’s amazing, and I just want to encourage everybody who’s listening, hey, listen, people remember when you say that kind of stuff about them and their dog. It’s worth it. Jennifer Summerfield: I don’t remember very much about that lady now except that that was what she told us, but she made my whole year, my whole decade. So thank you, whoever that lady was, if you’re listening. Melissa Breau: And if you see somebody have a really awesome run and you feel something like that, absolutely step up afterwards and let them know how awesome it was. Jennifer Summerfield: For sure. It makes a big difference. Melissa Breau: It’s such an amazing thing to hear. That’s just awesome. Jennifer Summerfield: Thank you. Melissa Breau: So my second question here is, what’s the best piece of training advice you’ve ever heard? Jennifer Summerfield: What I would have to say — and this is not technically dog training advice, I guess I’ll preface it that way, but I think it can apply to dog training, and I think about it in regards to dog training a lot. It’s actually a quote from Maya Angelou. It gets paraphrased a lot, but the actual quote is, she said, “I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better.” That has always struck me as being such a great way to look at life, a lot of things about life in general, but specifically about dog training, because I think for probably a lot of us who are crossover trainers, I think it’s probably a pretty widespread thing to have some degree of regret or guilt, maybe, about how we did things with our first dog, or how we taught some things that we wish if we could go back and do it differently. I love that quote because it’s so true that there’s no reason to feel guilty or to feel ashamed about doing the best that you knew how to do at the time, and that’s all any of us can do. But when new information comes along and you realize that there’s a different way to do things, that you just adjust your behavior and you do it differently. So I’ve always found that really helpful in terms of thinking about myself and my own choices, but I also think it’s so helpful to keep perspective when I’m thinking about clients and the people that I work with in my job as well, because I think it’s so easy for those of us who do this professionally, and we know all the science and we do this day in and day out, it’s so easy to get a client and to feel like, “Oh, can you believe this person’s been using a shock collar on their aggressive dog,” or “This person’s been alpha-rolling their dog,” and these things that are things that obviously are probably not the ideal way to handle whatever behavior issue they’re having. But I think it’s so helpful to remember that people are just doing the best they can. That’s so powerful, that people are just doing the best they can with what they know, and that’s all any of us can do. We all were there at one point, too, and that thinking about it from that perspective, that our job is to say, “Hey, you know, I totally understand where you’re coming from, and I understand why that seems like it makes sense, but let’s look at some other ways to address this that hopefully are going to be a little bit more effective and don’t have some of the side effects that those methods have.” I think about that frequently, both in terms of my own life and also working with clients, just to try and keep that perspective that it’s important to give people the benefit of the doubt that we’re working with, too, and remember that everybody is just doing the best they can with what they know. Melissa Breau: For our last question, who is somebody else in the dog world that you look up to? Jennifer Summerfield: All three of your questions are very hard because there are so many choices. I have two for this one, if that’s OK. For the first one, as far as being a really well-known public figure in our field that I have always looked up to, I would have to say Dr. Sophia Yin for that. For veterinarians especially, she was such a pioneer of changing the way that we deal with dogs in the clinic, and of course she did a lot of behavior stuff besides the low-stress handling as well. But I think she was such a tremendous role model for all veterinarians in the way that she dealt with animals and the way that she dealt with people, and so I look up to her tremendously, and I think she did great things for the field. The other person that I would have to mention, she’s not overly famous, I don’t think, but she is a great clinical applied animal behaviorist that I worked with when I was in veterinary school, and her name is Traci Shreyer. I worked pretty closely with her through the four years that I was there, because she was very involved in the puppy class program at that school, which I worked with quite a bit, and then she was involved in teaching some of our classes, and things on behavior as well, and working with us, the behavior club setups and some things with her, and so I dealt pretty closely with her the whole four years. What I loved about her and really took away from that experience is she was great with dogs and animals in general, she was fabulous, but she was also so, so great with people, with clients, and she was always reminding us … I think, again, for many of us in this field, being empathetic towards the dogs is easy, that’s kind of what drew us in in the first place, but I think it’s so, so important to remember that we have to have empathy for our human learners too, that what we’re asking them to do is hard, and that they deserve just as much consideration and kindness and respect as our dog patients do. She was probably the single best example of that that I have ever seen. She was fantastic, and that is a lesson that I definitely took away from working with her. So I would say she’s the other person that I still really look up to in the field. Melissa Breau: That’s awesome, and that’s such a great compliment to have given somebody you learned from, to say that they are so empathetic and so good with people. Jennifer Summerfield: Yes, it’s a hard skill, such a hard skill, but it’s so important. Melissa Breau: Absolutely. Well, thank you so much for coming on the podcast Jen. Jennifer Summerfield: No problem. I’ve had a great time! Melissa Breau: And thanks to our listeners for tuning in! We’ll be back next week with Nancy Tucker, to talk about getting better door behaviors. Don’t miss it. If you haven’t already, subscribe to our podcast in iTunes or the podcast app of your choice to have our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available. CREDITS: Today’s show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called “Buddy.” Audio editing provided by Chris Lang and transcription written by CLK Transcription Services. Thanks again for tuning in -- and happy training!
Note: We've rearranged episodes a bit here to better coordinate with guest schedules, so the names mentioned as next episodes in our last podcast was incorrect. Instead of Debbie Torraca, this week we have Esther Zimmerman -- we'll be back next week with Debbie Torraca. Summary: Esther Zimmerman is a long-time FDSA student and has been a participant in AKC events for over 40 years. She's been teaching dogs and their people since the early 1980's. Currently, she is the head competition obedience instructor at MasterPeace Dog Training in Franklin, MA, where she teaches multiple classes at all levels, and coaches many private students. Over the years, Esther has evolved her own special blend of the art and science of dog training, acquired through years of experience, extensive reading, and continuing education at conferences and seminars. She is well known for her patience, compassion, honesty, and humor, along with an unfailingly positive attitude toward both dogs and handlers. She feels it's the trainer's job to have the dogs WANT to play the obedience game, not to make them do it, and that there is no reason to use compulsion for the sake of a ribbon. Her many high-scoring students are proof of this, as they earn advanced titles, many with non-traditional obedience breeds. Esther herself competes with Schipperke, and she has finished the only Champion/Utility Dog Excellent in the history of Schipperke, and three additional Champion/Utility dogs. She also put three UDX legs on Presto, a Golden Retriever, who died of cancer at an early age. Links MasterPeace Dog Training in Franklin, MA Next Episode: To be released 3/16/2018, featuring Debbie Torraca to talk about exercises, including exercise for puppies! TRANSCRIPTION: Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports Podcast brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high-quality instruction for competitive dog sports using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today we'll be talking to Esther Zimmerman. Esther is a long-time FDSA student and has been a participant in AKC events for over 40 years. She's been teaching dogs and their people since the early 1980's. Currently, she is the head competition obedience instructor at MasterPeace Dog Training in Franklin, MA, where she teaches multiple classes at all levels, and coaches many private students. Over the years, Esther has evolved her own special blend of the art and science of dog training, acquired through years of experience, extensive reading, and continuing education at conferences and seminars. She is well known for her patience, compassion, honesty, and humor, along with an unfailingly positive attitude toward both dogs and handlers. She feels it's the trainer's job to have the dogs WANT to play the obedience game, not to make them do it, and that there is no reason to use compulsion for the sake of a ribbon. Her many high-scoring students are proof of this, as they earn advanced titles, many with non-traditional obedience breeds. Esther herself competes with Schipperke, and she has finished the only Champion/Utility Dog Excellent in the history of Schipperke, and three additional Champion/Utility dogs. She also put three UDX legs on Presto, a Golden Retriever, who died of cancer at an early age. Hi Esther, welcome to the podcast! Esther Zimmerman: Hi Melissa. I'm really happy to be here. Thanks for asking me to do this. Melissa Breau: I'm excited to chat. To get us started, do you want to briefly just share a little bit about who your dogs are now and what you're working on with them? Esther Zimmerman: I'd love to, but I have to start by talking about Jeeves, my Champion UD Rally X1 NW3 Schipperke, who passed away a few weeks ago at age 14-and-a-half. He was really an amazing ambassador of the breed. He was a perfect gentleman with all people, dogs of all ages and temperaments. He was that priceless known adult dog that we all want our puppies to meet because he's just so good with them. After surviving several serious illnesses as a youngster, he gave me a very profound appreciation of just how much our dogs do for us and with us when playing the games we love. I was grateful every day he was alive and he is really sorely missed. It's very fresh still because it was only a few weeks ago. Melissa Breau: I'm sorry to hear that. Esther Zimmerman: Thank you. Elphaba is my 9-year-old Schipperke. She happens to be Jeeves's niece. She has her CDX, which, when she earned it, included the group out-of-sight stays. Those were a real challenge for her. She doesn't like other dogs looking at her. But we persisted and succeeded. She's almost ready for the utility ring. She's the first and only nosework Elite 2 Schipperke and is a real little hunting machine in that sport. She also has her Fenzi TEAM 1 and TEAM 1 Plus titles. Friday is my 3-year-old Schipperke. His titles at this point are an NW1 and TEAM 1, 1 Plus and 1-H. He just passed his 1-H, which was very exciting. He's teaching me the importance of patience, a trait that I already have an abundance of, but he really requires it in spades. He really does. He can try my patience sometimes, but he keeps me honest as far as that goes. He's got tons of obedience skills under his collar, but there's no way he's ready for AKC competition. I'm hoping maybe by next year. And then I have Taxi, my 17-month-old Golden Retriever. He's had a Gold spot in an Academy class almost every semester since I brought him home as a baby puppy. He's got great potential, like all of our dogs do. I hope that we get to reach the goals I have in mind. He's a typical, happy, fun-loving dog. He's a real joy. And that's the three dogs that I have right now. Melissa Breau: How did you originally get into dog sports? Esther Zimmerman: It's interesting, because back in the beginning I didn't have my own dog. I didn't have my own dog until I was 15, but I've been training dogs since I was 5 years old. I grew up in New York City, and every apartment superintendent had a dog that they were more than willing to let me borrow. I read every dog and dog-training book in the library, much to my mother's dismay, because that's all I read, and with those dogs, I switched what I was doing based on whatever the advice was that the author of that book gave. So I had a real eclectic education as far as training dogs. Not my own dogs, and I did something different all the time. The very first dog show I ever attended was Westminster in 1969. School was closed because we had a snowstorm, but the trains were running. Westminster's on Monday and Tuesday, always has been. So the trains were running and off I went with my tokens, and I went to Westminster. I was in heaven. I had no idea they had 50 percent absenteeism because of the snowstorm, and I thought that the most beautiful dog there was the Basenji. I did not get a Basenji. Melissa Breau: OK. Esther Zimmerman: The very first obedience trial I ever went to was the Bronx County Kennel Club, and there I saw a woman in a wheelchair competing in Open with her Labrador Retriever, which just blew my mind. I couldn't conceive of such a thing, that not only was this dog doing all this amazing stuff, but that his handler was in a wheelchair. She was around for a really, really long time and quite well known on the East Coast and in New England as a competitor. So I got Juno, my first dog, was a German Shepherd. I got him from an ad in the newspaper — the best way to get a dog, right? Melissa Breau: Of course. Esther Zimmerman: She was one of two 10-month-old puppies who were so fearful that they were climbing over each other in their pen, trying to get away from me. So of course I said, “I'll take that one.” That was Juno. I used the same kind of eclectic training with her, doing something different each week based on what book I was reading from the library. It did apparently work, though, because seven years later, after I got married and moved to Massachusetts, I joined the New England Dog Training Club, which is the oldest still-existing dog-training club in the country. That summer we entered our first trial, we earned our first leg, and I got my first high-in-trial on this fearful dog Melissa Breau: Wow. Esther Zimmerman: And that's how somebody gets really hooked on this sport. The first time you go in the ring, you win high-in-trial, you want to do that again. Melissa Breau: Oh yeah. Esther Zimmerman: And coincidentally, my first paying job as a teenager was as kennel help at Captain Haggerty's School For Dogs. He's actually pretty well known. He used to train dogs for movies a lot out in Hollywood. But their training approach was “Break 'em and make 'em.” They would get dogs in there for boarding and training, and they went home trained. They were not happy, but they went home trained. It was absolutely pure compulsion, which as a teenager was really eye-opening and a little bit scary, actually. Melissa Breau: I can imagine. Esther Zimmerman: So that's how I got started in dog sports. Melissa Breau: Wow. You've really been doing it almost your entire life, but in an interesting, different story. Esther Zimmerman: Yes. Yes. Melissa Breau: You mentioned that it's been eclectic, and it's been a little bit here, a little bit there in terms of reading, but what really got you started on your positive training journey? What got you hooked there? Because I certainly know that's where you are now. Esther Zimmerman: I think this is a good time for us to talk about Patty Ruzzo, because she's a big part of that whole journey. In the early 1980s there was a really tight-knit group of us training at Tails-U-Win in Connecticut, and together we had our first exposures to Karen Pryor and Gary Wilkes and John Rogerson and others who totally and completely changed the way we were training and how we even thought about training. We were all attending every seminar we could go to, every clinic we could go to, we were reading dog magazines. I was amassing a huge personal library of dog books. That was all before the Internet, before YouTube, before Facebook. Patty was an interesting person. She was a really quiet force to be reckoned with. She was a great competitor, she had a great rapport with her dogs, anyone who saw her in the ring with her magnificent Terv, Luca, will always remember what that looked like. They had such a presence about them, and it's an image I always aspire to. It's one of those things that if you close your eyes, you can still picture it all these years later. So Patty was my friend, she was my training buddy, she was my coach. We were determined to pursue a force-free, reward-based approach to training. The first thing we eliminated were the leashes and collars. No more leashes, no more collars. We stopped any physical corrections. As our skills and understanding got better, we were able to even avoid applying psychological pressure to the dogs, and that was a big deal. My dog at that time was a Schipperke, Zapper. She was a dog that really pushed us to examine what we had been doing, and to see what we could accomplish with this new — to us — approach. She became my first utility dog. Patty was a really tremendously creative person. She was continually trying and then discarding ideas. It could be dizzying to try and keep up with her, sort of like Denise. Patty passed away twelve years ago. It was a real tragedy for the world of obedience and for me personally. Several of us from that original group have worked to fill the void by becoming instructors and trainers in our own right. We all made that commitment to stay positive, and I think the group of us really has done a good job of that. Melissa Breau: Denise brought up the fact that you knew Patty when she and I were talking about having you on. In case anybody doesn't really know the name, do you mind sharing a just little bit more about the impact she had on the sport in the area, just a little more about her background, or her history, and the role that she played? Esther Zimmerman: She had multiple OTCH dogs, she competed at the games in regionals and did really, really well at those. She had a Sheltie, she had a Border Collie, and then Luca, the incomparable Luca. And then she got a Whippet. It's a dog like that that really tests your mettle and your commitment, and she was totally committed to being positive with this dog. When I tell you that he not able to do a sit-stay of any sort until he was 2-and-a-half, I really mean it, and she just would keep saying, “Don't worry, he'll do it. Don't worry about it, he'll do it,” and that “Don't worry about it” is something that I say all the time to my students. “But my dog's not doing that.” “Don't worry about it. He will. Eventually.” And she was just like that. I'll tell a little anecdote, and this will tell you everything you need to know about Patty and the influence that she had on people. She had two sons. The younger one was about 4 when this happened. They had gone grocery shopping, and they came home and he wanted to help her unload the groceries. So what did he want to carry up the stairs? Take a guess. Melissa Breau: The eggs? Esther Zimmerman: The eggs. The eggs of course. So he goes up the stairs, and of course he trips and falls and drops the eggs. She hollers up the stairs, “Are you OK?” He says, “Yes. Six of the eggs did not break.” So just that switch, six of the eggs broke, six of the eggs did not break — that's how she raised her children to focus on the positive. Melissa Breau: Part of the impressive part is that back then, nobody was doing that. There weren't people achieving those kind of things with positive training, and a lot of people were saying it could not be done. Esther Zimmerman: Right. So the early dogs — it would not be fair to say that she was totally positive with the early dogs. But by the time Luca came along, it was very, very positive, and by the time Flyer, the Whippet, came along, it was totally positive. She didn't get an OTCH on him, things happened, and then she passed away. But there was and she put it out there in the competitive world the way nobody else was at that point in time. Melissa Breau: We've danced around this question a little bit now, but how would you describe your training philosophy now? Esther Zimmerman: That's a good question. My philosophy is fairly simple, actually: Treat the dogs and handlers with kindness and patience. I could probably stop right there, but I won't. But really, kindness and patience. Break things down into manageable pieces for each of them. Use varied approaches to the same exercise because dog training isn't “one size fits all.” The theory, learning theory, applies equally, but not necessarily the specific approach that you use to help them understand. I try to use a lot of humor to diffuse tension in classes, in private lessons. People are a little bit nervous, or a little bit uptight, so I try to make people laugh. If they can laugh, they feel better about themselves, and what just happened isn't nearly as important as they thought it was. I try to be supportive when the dog or person is struggling to learn something. We've all been there, we've all done that, it's not easy. We're trying to teach new mechanical skills to people. They're trying to teach new things to their dogs. That's a hard combination, and I really respect people who make the effort to do that. At the same time I encourage independent thinking and problem-solving for the handler and for the dog. I cannot be there all the time when the handler is working with their dog. No instructor can. Even with the online classes, we can't be there. So if we give the handler the tools to come up with solutions to the problems on their own, now we've really accomplished something. Let them figure out how to solve the problem on their own. That's a big deal to me. I don't want to be spoon-feeding the answer to every little thing that's happened there. So I applaud all their successes, however small. We celebrate everything. My students know that I always advocate for the dog. Whatever the situation is, I'm on the side of the dog, and I urge them to do the same thing when they find themselves in other places, other situations, where perhaps the atmosphere is not quite so positive, or it's stressful for some reason. Advocate for your dog. You're the only one that's looking out for them, and they're counting on us to do that for them. So I really, really urge people to do that. And it's not just about using a clicker and cookies, or any kind of a marker and cookies. It's about having empathy for a creature who is trying to communicate with us while at the same time we are struggling to communicate with them. It's all really very simple, but none of it's very easy. So that's my philosophy. Pretty simple, don't you think? Melissa Breau: Simple but not necessarily easy. Esther Zimmerman: But not easy. But not easy, yeah. Melissa Breau: You mentioned you've been in dog sports in one variety or another for … you said since you were 15, I think. Esther Zimmerman: A long time, a long time. I was 22 years old the first time I set foot in the ring. Melissa Breau: OK. Esther Zimmerman: So now people can do the math so they'll know how old I am. Melissa Breau: As someone who's been in dog sports for that long, what are some of the biggest changes you've seen over the last ten or so years? Esther Zimmerman: Well, for even longer than that, but the sport of AKC obedience has changed dramatically since I started. Classes have been added and deleted, exercises have been added and deleted. The OTCH — the Obedience Trial Championship — was introduced in 1977, and they added the UDX in either 1992 or 1993. I couldn't find the definitive answer for that, and I couldn't remember off the top of my head. The group stays, as of May 1, have been safer in the novice classes and totally eliminated in Open. They've added a new and interesting and challenging exercise to Open. Jump heights have been lowered twice. My little German Shepherd, she jumped 32 inches when we started. Now she would have jumped probably 20 inches. There are tons of exceptions from that, from the … once their jump height now, for the really giant breeds, the heavy-boned breeds, the short-legged breeds, the brachycephalic dogs, they just have to jump three-quarters their height at the shoulder, so that's a big change. Now you've got to remember all of this has been done with the hope of drawing more people into competition. All of it has been done with the accompanying drama, controversy, charges of dumbing-down the sport, nobody's ever happy with whatever the changes are. But we survived all these changes, and as far as what changes do I want to see in the sport, I don't really want to see any more for a little while. I think we need to give things a chance to settle down, I think we need to give people a chance to simmer down, because this was a very controversial thing, getting rid of stays. And then people need time to train the new Open exercise and give that a try. New people coming up will not know that things were different. The command or cue discrimination exercise won't be something that you teach for Open. As opposed to people who are in a little bit of a panic now, if they've got their CDX and they're going on to a UDX, or they've got their UD, they have to go back and teach a new exercise, and not everybody's happy about that. But I think it's all going to shake out in time, as it usually does. People resist change because inertia is really a powerful force, and I think we need to move on. So that's how I see the changes in the sport. I'm very passionate about the sport, or I wouldn't still be doing it, and I try and go with the flow with all these changes that have happened. Melissa Breau: Do you think, or maybe you could talk about, how the addition of other dog sports has changed obedience in particular? I feel like originally it was really conformation and obedience, and now there's nosework and tricks and all sorts of things. Esther Zimmerman: I think that one of the reasons for the decline in obedience entries is the proliferation of alternate sports. When I started, like you said, it was basically confirmation, obedience, tracking, herding, and field. That was pretty much it. Look at what's been added, not only in sports in general, but there are multiple organizations now that offer their own variations on some of these previously existing activities. I'm just going to rattle these off. Besides those we have rally, we have agility with various venues, earthdog, flyball, multiple venues for nosework, lure coursing, barn hunt, dock diving, parkour, freestyle, weight-pulling, Frisbee, carting, sled dog, treibball, tricks, IPO, French ring. That's without even really thinking about it terribly very much I came up with that list. And I'm sure there are ones that I have overlooked. So depending on what part of the country you live in, there are many options to choose from on any weekend. And some of these sports, at the beginner level at least, seem to offer more immediate gratification with a shorter investment of training time than AKC obedience. This can be quite appealing for some competitors. When you get to the upper levels of almost any of these activities, sports, training matters. It really matters. But there's another influence on competition, and I think that's the advent of the private training center. Back in the day, if you wanted to train your dog, you went to a training club. Once you got out of the puppy class you were encouraged to join that club. In order to join that club you had to attend meetings, you had to help out, you set up equipment, you swept the floor, you rolled up mats in the gymnasium, you stewarded the annual trial, and sometimes you became an assistant to a trainer that was already at the club. You became part of something. Now don't get me wrong. Again, training centers like MasterPeace, where I work, offer far more than the clubs ever could. MasterPeace has classes and activities seven days a week, morning, noon, and night. But most of the people come for that class, and turn around and go home, so their exposure to the notion of competition may be more limited than it was when they went to a club. So only AKC clubs can put on an AKC trial. Without the clubs, there are no trials. Several New England clubs no longer exist because of the lack of membership. They had to just fold up and go away. So consider that. Consider … I want people to consider joining their local club. Support them. If you want to be able to compete, there have to be people working to put on the trials. Another thing: I also want to put in a plug for experienced exhibitors to become judges. I don't care what your activity is. I'm an AKC Open provisional judge now. In case anyone has missed the stat, the average age of judges is getting higher and higher. Without new, younger judges in the pipeline, competition will disappear, because sooner or later these judges have to retire. They can't go on forever, and there have to be new people coming up to step up and judge. Competition requires judges. The other thing is that becoming a judge really changes your perspective of your sport. It's so easy to criticize the judge from outside the ring: “He didn't see this,” “He didn't see that, “She missed this,” “She did something wrong.” Yeah, try stepping behind the clipboard and see how hard it really is to keep all the rules and regs in mind, to see everything that's going on, mark it all down. Yeah, it's not that easy, guys. But I encourage everybody to do it, because how else will we go on? The other thing: I can only compete in New England. I go to my national specialty occasionally, not that much anymore, but I have traveled. But in this area there seems to be an improvement in the general competitive environment. Experienced handlers seem to be a little more welcoming of newbies, and more supportive of each other, than maybe five years ago. But those of us in the FDSA world would like to think that training overall is moving in a positive direction. Again, in my area, we have pockets of people devoted to that concept, but we're surrounded by more traditional training. That can feel a bit isolating. But the ripple effect that we talk about is a real thing. We do reach out to support each other, and we have an influence on what other people decide to do when we show how we behave with our dogs when we're in public, when we're at competition. People are watching when you don't think they're watching, and seeing you celebrate with your dog, even if things haven't gone quite well — they don't miss that, and that's an important thing for them to see. So yeah, things have changed a lot. Things have changed a lot. Melissa Breau: Yeah, for sure. Esther Zimmerman: But I'm hopeful for the future, very hopeful for the future. Melissa Breau: You mentioned FDSA in there, and I'm really curious: What led you to the Academy? How did you wind up there? Esther Zimmerman: I first encountered Denise at a seminar, and she's a dynamic presenter. She's got all this energy, talks really fast, is very excited, she's also passionate about what she does, committed to it, and her message just resonated with me in a way that nothing had since Patty. So I started following her blog — there's a lot of information there. Before FDSA, she offered an online course of relationship-building through play through another organization. I thought the idea was intriguing, but was really uncertain of how that could possibly work. So I got a working spot with Elphaba, and as we all know, it works great. It was a fabulous class, and I've been a devotee of the Academy since its inception. So that's how I came to FDSA. Melissa Breau: We talked through and you had a ton of experience before that point, so what is it that keeps you involved in coming back? Esther Zimmerman: This is a really easy one for me. I love dogs. I love dogs, number one. I love training, number two. I personally love how detail-oriented competition obedience is. It's not for everybody, I understand that, but I love that aspect of it. I love every training session, I love every class I teach, I love every lesson that I give, because every single one of them is different. I really love how my classes are a level playing field. Everyone who comes to the sport is a newbie, regardless of their professional and personal fields of expertise. I have doctors, I have veterinarians, I have lawyers, I have chefs, I have people who are really accomplished in their respective fields who are all starting at the same place when they come to dog training. None of that other stuff matters in the least. And I'm dealing with all the different breeds that come to me. That makes me a better instructor and trainer. I think to some degree people like to bring their non-traditional breeds to me since I have Schipperke. I think they think I will have a different sympathy and empathy for the perception of what we can expect from the non-traditional breeds, and to a degree that is correct, because I don't feel, “Oh, it's a terrier, it can't do that.” “It's a sighthound, we can't expect it to be able to do that.” Right? “It's a fill-in-the-blank, and therefore…” Yeah, there are predilections, but we can be successful, if we work at it and if we want it, with most breeds. And with FDSA specifically, I love how we have access to such a wide variety of subjects, world-class instructors from different parts of the world, and we never have to get out of our jammies if we don't want to. Melissa Breau: That makes me think of Sue's competition, her PJ competition, of everybody posting pictures of themselves training in their PJs. Esther Zimmerman: Exactly. And I don't know if you saw it, somebody was talking about FDSA swag that they bought, I think it was a sweatshirt or something, and I said, “How come there are no FDSA pajamas?” Melissa Breau: Yeah, we are looking at that. This is an aside, but I found onesies, pajama onesies, that you can get with your logo on them online somewhere, and I was sharing them with the other instructors, like, “I don't know, I think this should be what we wear to camp.” I think it got vetoed. But I don't know, I still think it's a good idea. Esther Zimmerman: That might be a little small for some of us. Melissa Breau: It's pajamas. Footie pajamas. One-piece footie pajamas. Esther Zimmerman: Hey, why not? You know some people would take you up on that. Melissa Breau: Right. This has been a lot of fun, but since this is your first time here, I want to ask you the three questions that I used to ask on almost every episode, but now that people have been on once or twice, we haven't gone back to them. The first question is simply, What's the dog-related accomplishment that you are proudest of? Esther Zimmerman: I'm not going to limit it to just one. I have a couple of things to say. Melissa Breau: OK. Esther Zimmerman: I'm really proud of the titles that I've earned with my dogs, with the Schipperke. Some of them have been firsts for the breed, which is really a nice thing to be able to say. What I'm most proud of, though, is how much I appreciate the partnership that I develop with my dogs as we go along. I have a bunch of candid photos that people have taken, and almost every one of them shows me looking right into my dog's eyes, and my dog looking right back into my eyes. I cherish those pictures and that feeling that I have. It's so special, and I can conjure that up at a moment's notice. I almost get choked up every time I talk about it, because it's just me and my dog, and everything else just goes away. That is something that I'm proud of, that I have that connection with my dogs. Melissa Breau: That's beautiful. I love that. Esther Zimmerman: Thank you. The second thing is that I love to share in the accomplishments of my students. That brings me so much joy, that they are finding success and happiness in this sport, and I'm just thrilled for all of them, every little thing that they do, and it doesn't always translate to a ribbon. If a person can come out of the ring when they have not qualified, and come to me and say, “Did you see that drop on recall?” or “Did you see how she worked articles?” when maybe that's something they've been struggling with and the dog did it — even if something else went badly, then I've done my job of teaching that person to focus on the positive and not worry about the rest of it, because we can make that better too. Those are the things I'm really proudest. Melissa Breau: I love that. Our second and second-to-last question is, What is the best piece of training advice that you've ever heard? Esther Zimmerman: I've got a couple of things here too. Melissa Breau: OK. Esther Zimmerman: I do like to talk. Melissa Breau: That makes for a good podcast, so we're good! Esther Zimmerman: Patty said, “When in doubt, put a cookie on it.” That's it. That simple statement can address so many issues. When in doubt, put a cookie on it. Sheila Booth said — I don't know if too many people know who she is, but in Schutzhund circles, IPO circles, I think she's a little better known — but Sheila Booth said, “They can do at 4 what they couldn't do before.” So she's saying what they can do at age 4, they couldn't do before then, which again speaks to patience and not showing prematurely. I firmly believe the dogs will tell you when they're ready to show, and don't rush it. There's no rush. Take your time, put in the work, and you'll be way happier. There are Flyers, there are dogs you can take out at 1 or 2 and accomplish great things, but for the most part, not so much. I have a saying that I say to my students, so much that one of them embroidered it on a vest for me. In class it always comes out when someone says, “How come my dog did that?” I always say, “Too far, too fast, too much, too soon.” Don't go too far too fast. Don't do too much too soon. That's how it got embroidered on my vest. That's my biggest piece of training advice to put out there. Don't go too far too fast. Don't do too much too soon. Melissa Breau: I love that. That's awesome. Esther Zimmerman: Thank you. Melissa Breau: It has a certain sing to it. Too far, too fast, too much, too soon. Last question for you: Who is somebody else in the dog world that you look up to? Esther Zimmerman: This is going to sound like a cliché, but I really admire Denise. In addition to being an outstanding dog trainer and instructor, she's a really smart businessperson. She works harder than any five people I know, she's created something unique with FDSA, and surrounds herself with other smart people who help keep it running smoothly and efficiently, specifically you, Melissa, and Teri Martin. Melissa Breau: Yeah, Teri's fantastic. Esther Zimmerman: And then Denise's generosity to the dog training community always impresses me. There's so much free material and information out there, the blog and these podcasts are free, of course, she joins in the conversations on the various Facebook pages and gives training advice there, she does her live Facebook sessions are free. I think the scholarships for free Bronze-level classes and the contests for free Bronze-level classes are amazing at making education available to everybody, even if you have limited means. It's just a wonderful thing to put out there for people. And then of course the inception of TEAM — that was also just brilliant. It's brought high-quality titling opportunities to anyone, anywhere, anytime. It forces people to pay attention to detail. There's a lot of precision required right through from basic foundation skills through the advanced levels. People who do that are pretty well prepared for success in other types of competition. It was a brilliant concept and brilliant in execution. I don't know what Denise has in store for the future, but I know she's been teasing us about something new coming in April, I don't like being teased like that, but I also can't wait to see what it's going to be, because it's going to be great. I know it is. So I have to say it's Denise. Melissa Breau: I will say that she is by far the most productive person I know. She gets more done in a few hours a day than most people do in a week. Esther Zimmerman: I don't know. It boggles my mind. It just boggles my mind. Melissa Breau: You're not the only one. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast, Esther! This has been great. I really appreciate it. This has been fun. Esther Zimmerman: I know it took us a little bit of time to be able to connect. I had a cold. I hope I sound OK, because my voice was shattered last week. It was worth the wait. It was a lot of fun, and I'm very honored that you decided to ask me to do this. Melissa Breau: Well, I'm definitely glad that you could. And thank you to all of our listeners for tuning in! We'll be back next week, this time with Debbie Torraca, to talk about exercise for puppies. If you enjoyed this episode, I hope you guys will consider hopping over to iTunes and leaving us a review. I know I mentioned this in our last couple of episodes, but reviews really help the show! We've gotten a few new ones since I've started including this request, like this one from Schout: “Melissa does a great job interviewing accomplished guests. Filled with useful insights and funny anecdotes.” Thank you Schout, whoever you are! And, while you're there, if you haven't already, I hope you'll subscribe to have our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available. CREDITS: Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called “Buddy.” Audio editing provided by Chris Lang.
SHOW NOTES: Summary: Denise Fenzi is the founder of the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy (FDSA). She has competed in a wide range of dog sports, titling dogs in obedience, tracking, Schutzhund, Mondioring, herding, conformation, and agility. She is best-known for her flashy and precise obedience work, as demonstrated by two AKC OTCH dogs and perfect scores in both Schutzhund and Mondioring sport obedience. Her specialty is in developing motivation, focus, and relationship in competition dogs, and she has consistently demonstrated the ability to train and compete with dogs using motivational methods in sports where compulsion is the norm. Next Episode: To be released 2/16/2018, featuring Julie Flanery, talking about all the things you were never taught in puppy class. TRANSCRIPTION: Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports Podcast brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high-quality instruction for competitive dog sports using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today we'll be talking to Denise Fenzi. At this point, Denise probably needs to introduction, and I want to save every minute of this interview that we can for what we're here to talk about today: the benefits of play. So welcome back to the podcast Denise! Denise Fenzi: Hi Melissa. Thank you for having me. Melissa Breau: I'm excited. This is a good topic. To start us out, do you want to just remind listeners who each of the dogs is that you share your life with right now? Denise Fenzi: I have three dogs. Raika is the oldest. She's 13-and-a-half and doing very well. There's Lyra, and I believe she's about 6 now, and she is also doing well. And there is little Brito, my terrier mix. He's 4 now. Melissa Breau: It seems like it was not long ago that you got him. Denise Fenzi: Yeah. Every time I think about it, I'm kind of amazed at how time goes by. Melissa Breau: As I mentioned in the intro, we're going to talk about play today… and I think a lot of people who sign up for your class on the topic, they're thinking about one thing: its benefits for competition. So do you want to just briefly talk about what those are, and how play fits into the competition picture? Denise Fenzi: Sure. My online play class covers personal play, which is interaction without toys and food, and also covers toy play and play with food. Most people, when they talk about play, personal play, are thinking in terms of what they can do when they go in a competition ring with their dog when they don't have their cookies and toys. That's actually pretty understandable and is actually what caused me to explore the issue in the first place. But the longer I've been playing with it, and teaching the class, and exploring the topic, the more I've realized that the question's a little bit premature. It probably makes more sense to think about play in terms of building the underlying relationship, and less energy should be spent on what you are going to do with that play. The reason it matters is because the play you can use in the ring may have absolutely nothing to do with the play you do at home while you are working to develop your relationship. But you can't jump ahead. You have to go through the process. So it's kind of an issue of goal versus process. I have noticed — I've taught this class many times now, I would say maybe five times — and I have noticed that the students come into the class with a different perspective. The very first time I taught the class it was kind of universal. Every person said the same thing, which is, “But how will I use this in competition?” And honestly, this term, so far not one student has actually said that. So change is taking place. I don't know if it's because the reputation of the class has encouraged that, or if it's our student base has developed and they see things differently. I'm not sure, but it certainly has saved me some time writing to people, “Please let's focus on the process for now. We'll get to that later.” Melissa Breau: What kind of benefits can learning to play with your dog really have on that underlying relationship? Denise Fenzi: The one I usually bring up first is that to play well with a dog without food or toys requires an incredible amount of attention to how the dog is responding to what you are doing, kind of on a second-by-second basis, because if you do something that you think is attractive to your dog and your dog has a different opinion, you have about a half a second to figure that out before your dog avoids you. Now I look at this as all a great big learning opportunity, so it's not a problem that your dog runs off when you do something. You say to yourself, “Well, maybe I shouldn't do that again.” What I find is that the process of teaching play is probably the fastest way for me to teach people how to observe their dog's body language, because everything is so immediate. The handler does something, the dog responds, the handler responds, the dog gives a final response, and if you made good decisions at those two junctures, then you will have a good response or a neutral response, and if you misread the dog's behavior, you will get instant feedback, and I find that's invaluable. Melissa Breau: So how does that compare or maybe mix with play's role as a motivator for training? Denise Fenzi: Well, within training, if I still have my food and my toys, I primarily use it as a way to break up sessions. For example, over the last month I've been recording every single session with Lyra and Brito learning to heel on my right-hand side, which is a new thing for all of us. That means I'm spending longer than I should on each training session. So let's say that an ideal training session with a new skill is a minute, which is probably about right. After I've taken the time to set up the video camera and make it happen, just for purely pragmatic reasons I cannot do that. But what I can do is train for a minute, stop, and play with my dog. It can be as little as five seconds. As a matter of fact, it often … that would be normal. Five seconds, 10 seconds, maybe 15 or 20 seconds — that would be unusual — and then I can ask for another minute or two. Those little mini-breaks relax everyone. They relax me and the dog, and they let go of the stress which is invariably part of learning. So while positive reinforcement training is designed to be fun and to be low stress, that doesn't change the fact that sometimes the dog or the human is not getting it right and that builds up stress. So being able to play in the middle of a session is really a fantastic thing for everyone. If nothing else, it reminds the handler of why they have their dog, and it reminds the dog that “Everything's good, mama still loves me even if I make some mistakes, everything is fine here.” Melissa Breau: I know you touched on this a little bit already, but how does learning to play really help people read their dog and why is that beneficial? Denise Fenzi: I think for anybody involved in dog training, being able to read your dog is 90 percent of the game. It's actually so significant that now when people describe to me what is happening with their dog, I almost refuse to answer if I don't have a video, because I find it so common that I see something different than they see. So when people can see what their dog is doing and accurately interpret it, their training is going to skyrocket. It's hard to underestimate the value of accurately reading your dog's behavior. For example, when dogs walk off in the middle of training to sniff, the vast majority of novice trainers see that as the dog finding something better to do. They found a good smell. It takes a lot of time to learn that most of the time the dog is actually avoiding you, and while that's a little uncomfortable, recognizing it for what it is, it's not a condemnation of you as a person. It simply means that whatever you are doing at that moment at that time is causing distress to your dog. It's nothing more than that. So if I'm in a training session and it seems to be going OK, and my dog starts to scratch or shows some other sign of distress, I don't get upset about it. I just change my ways. That is something that play can give to you — that quick ability to in real time instantly identify how your dog is feeling. And while I specifically called that distress, that's equally true of a happy dog. So what are your dog's happy signals? What do the ears do? What does the mouth do? What do the eyes do? What does the tail do? There's a lot to the picture. And there's just the sheer fun of it, right? So for the handler to look at their dog and recognize their dog really wants to be there, and to feel confident in that assessment, that really does amazing things for your training. Melissa Breau: What about specifically for anxious dogs? Are there benefits to learning to play for those dogs? Denise Fenzi: Personally, I don't go in that direction in my classes. What I tell people is, “My job is going to be to help you become a better play partner to your dog.” That is my emphasis. However, I know that, for example, Amy Cook, who also teaches at the Academy, she uses play as a way of relaxing dogs in stressful situations, and also as a barometer for the dog's suitability for the place where it's at. So being able to play with an anxious dog is actually super-critical to behavior work. The other thing is, in my opinion, when you play with your dog, what you're able to tell them is that everything's OK and that you're on their side. To be able to communicate that is a big deal. If I'm with somebody and I'm feeling a little nervous, they can absolutely hand me something to eat, it will certainly distract me. But if they put their hand on my shoulder and tell me, “You know what? It's OK. It's going to be OK. I'm right here with you,” that's a completely different level of support. And I think being able to play with your dog, especially with an anxious dog, will take you in the right direction. Melissa Breau: What about me as the human or handler? Is play really all about the dog, or are there benefits for me, too? Denise Fenzi: A few years ago I was going to give — not a webinar — a presentation on play to an audience, and I thought it might be a tough sell to that particular audience. So I felt the need to have a little bit of background and backup for my assertion that I think play is important — and I sure hope nobody contacts me and asks me for the information now, because I don't have it anymore — but I found quite a few studies which talked about the effects on both the dog and the handler on mutual interaction. In some cases the interaction was simply looking at each other. In other cases it was playing together, sometimes it was about playing ball or whatever. And there was just a lovely thread of discussions about how the hormones on both sides of the picture here, for both the dog and the human, the happy hormones went up, the sad hormones went down, and the end result is a more content picture. Like I said, I don't have that anymore, but I'm sure if somebody wants to investigate it they can find that information again. Melissa Breau: It would be interesting to look up some of that stuff and be able to point to some of those studies. I know that you also teach engagement, obviously, so do you mind just talking a little bit about how play, or being able to play with your dog, can impact or influence your engagement training? And maybe just start out with a little bit of explanation on what engagement training is, for those who may not know. Denise Fenzi: The word engagement is a little bit complicated, because when we say “to engage another,” we simply mean to mutually interact. When I talk about engagement training, I'm actually talking about a very specific training process which teaches the dog that it's their responsibility to let the handler know, first of all, when they're comfortable, and secondly, that they would like to work. The second part of that involves the dog engaging the handler in play or strong interactive behaviors. So an example of play would be that the dog play-bows at the human and the human responds. An example of just a strong behavior might be that the dog jumps on the person. So there's variations. I teach engagement online, and I find that students who already have developed some repertoire of play with their dog have a much easier time with it because, first of all, it actually occurs to their dog to offer play, because engagement is a shaped process. It crosses the dog's mind that maybe they should ask the owner to play and see what happens next. So that's a huge benefit right there. The handlers who don't have play training or some comfort with play, they struggle. Not only do their dogs not think to offer it, but even if their dog does think to offer it, they don't know what to do next, and so now it sort of stops the process of training engagement and we redirect into the process of training play. And while that's not terrible, I just find that most people came into engagement class to learn engagement, and the ones who came in with play already make a lot more progress on that skill, and the ones who have to stop and redirect simply don't go as far. Now that's no emergency, but for sure having play skills will make your engagement training easier. Melissa Breau: Let's assume that some of the folks listening are convinced… they want to give this a go, they want to focus on trying to play more with their dog. Where should they start? What are some good ways to start play, especially if it hasn't been a big part of life with their dog before now? Denise Fenzi: Well, right off the bat, loud and crazy is probably not the direction you want to go. Generally when people think about play, they think they're going to imitate how dogs play with each other. That's a little unrealistic in terms of a place to start. So unless you're 5 years of age, you are not going to run around the back yard like a crazy person with your dog, and even if you did, your dog would think that was so bizarre and out of character that you would actually be likely to frighten your dog. And then I've noticed that people get a little intense and nervous because that's not the response they were looking for, and that's when they start to sort of, for lack of a better word, assault their dogs. They come up and start — they call it “playfully,” but anyway — they start pinching and pulling and doing weird things, and that drives the dog further into avoidance. So Rule Number One: start low key. I find it so much more effective to start with what we would normally call praise rather than play. Pet your dog, scratch their ears, gently and sweet. Now, from there, can you ratchet that up to look something like what happens when you walk in the front door and your dog is glad to see you? So maybe you went from a gentle massaging-type interaction, let's call that a 1 or 2 out of 10, to something a little more “Oh boy, you're home, Mom, I'm so glad to see you.” Let's say that's in your 3 to 6 range, depending on your dog. Can you start to get that behavior you get at the front door in your play session when you don't have that context? What do you do at the front door? How do you interact with your dog? Do you clap? Do you pet them? Do you talk to them? And what happens, and what does your dog look like at that moment? What kind of an expression does your dog have? All of that should feel fairly natural and seamless to most people. From there we can start ratcheting up, and little taps and running away. That brings me to my second rule of thumb: I generally strongly suggest that people try to figure out on a scale of 1 to 10, what energy level is your dog showing you right now, and can you match that plus or minus 1? So if your dog's being kind of crazy, and you don't really want to hang out at a 10 with a Great Dane, the problem is you can't go to a 1 because you're not going to register and your dog's going to leave you. So can you get to a 9, and then quickly to an 8 and a 7 and a 6 and a 5? From my point of view, it's perfectly legitimate to put a toy in the dog's mouth or use food for redirection, if it's really rambunctious and you need to get your dog to a level that's more sustainable for both of you. But using the matching system, the number system, helps a lot. It helps people match their dog and stay in the game without it getting out of control, feeling free to add food and toys if you need to. This is a little bit new for me. A few years ago I tried to do a lot more without that, and I don't do that as much. And also starting on the low end of the scale and working your way up — that is also something I would say is new to me. Over time I have discovered that works much, much better for all parties. The final thing I would mention is really watch for signs that your dog isn't having a good time, and take your dog seriously. Respect that. So if you can get one great minute, that's fantastic. Just stop. Don't go for 5 or 10. And if your dog says they want a little break, honor that. It's not personal. Your dog didn't take a break because they think you're horrible. Your dog took a break because he needed one and he recognized that he was struggling with his own arousal — too high, too low, whatever. If you pursue, you will drive your dog into avoidance. So I think I would start with that package and see where that gets you. Melissa Breau: Do you mind just talking a little bit more about that toy piece? What made you change your mind, or how can people use that in a way that it doesn't become all about the toy? Denise Fenzi: Well, I think a lot of it was simply safety. Dogs can hurt us with their teeth, whether they mean to or not, and if you give the dog a toy, and they chomp on the toy instead of on your arm, that's obviously a lot more pleasant. There's all sorts of other things that go with that, you know — habits, and teaching your dog that it hurts when you bite, and all kinds of stuff. The problem is, asking a dog not to use their mouth in play is a lot like asking a human child not to use their hands. That is how dogs communicate with each other. It's how they communicate in play. And so if we're going to do that, we're going to have to spend a lot of time teaching them how to do that. So in the same way that if you tried to teach a child to play with their hands behind their back, while doable, if you gave them something to hold in their hands behind their back while they were doing that, they would be much more likely to remember, and it would give them something to do with their hands, to grip a thing. If you give the dog something to hold, and they have those urges to bite down or to grab, they have something in their mouth already. With Lyra, I don't think I tried to play with her without a toy in her mouth until she was probably 2 years old, and what I discovered is after that time we had made enough progress that she didn't need it anymore. And so then, when the toy was out of her mouth, she didn't have that desire to grab me. She knew what to do. And the time when the toy was in her mouth gave both of us time to learn how to play with each other and kept us out of over-arousal situations while we were learning the game. So it solves a lot of problems. Now if the dog says, “It's all about the toy. If the toy's in my mouth, then let's play with it,” that's actually not that much of a problem. What I do is I will pull on the toy, let's say every 10 seconds, just enough to keep the dog holding it. But the rest of the time is spent quick little tap, run away, little play bow, clapping, finding ways that the dog keeps the toy in their mouth but redirects their energy to me. When I say the dog holds a toy, I don't mean you never touch the toy, and I don't mean it's not OK to play with the toy a little. It's a balance issue. So let's say the first day it's 50/50: 50 percent of the time you're playing with the toy and 50 percent of the time you're playing with the dog. The next day could you get that to 48/52? So over time can you get it to the point where it's 10 percent toy, 90 percent dog, and eventually can you get it where you take the toy away from the dog, play with the dog for 10 seconds, and then go get the toy together and go back to your 90 percent playing with the dog, 10 percent toy. That's how I'm approaching it these days. Melissa Breau: That's really interesting to hear how you've evolved that concept a little bit. What about those people who want to do this, they try to play with their dog and … their dog just doesn't seem to be interested. What might be going on there? Is there still hope that they can figure this out, that they can do this? Denise Fenzi: Well, there's definitely hope. I'm actually amazed at how many people who go through the play class make significant progress when they were pretty sure they weren't going to get anywhere. And, in fairness, I have read some introductions where my initial reaction was, “This is going to be really hard.” And most people progress. Now I define progress exactly as that word states. It's progress. I'm not a goal-oriented person, so what I'm looking for is did we move forward? If we moved forward, I'm probably pretty happy, and I find most of my students get there. So is there hope? Absolutely positively. Might it look the way you thought it was going to look? Might it look like your neighbor's dog? Well, maybe, but that's not really the point. It doesn't need to look like your neighbor's dog. It needs to work for you and your dog, and honestly, if that never gets past the point where you are able to scratch your dog's head and thump your dog's side, even though you're in the middle of a training session and you have access to food and toys and your dog knows it, I'm happy, because as soon as I can get the dog off that look of “Don't touch me, I want my food and toys,” I'm going to be happy. That to me is a huge success. So rethink your goals, and make sure that you're really being reasonable, and I think you will progress. Melissa Breau: If people want to see some examples of this stuff, if they're having a little trouble picturing it, because some of this stuff is complex and it's hard to visualize, can you talk about where they might be able to go to find some of those examples, which pieces of this you cover in class? Denise Fenzi: This particular class I believe has over a hundred videos. It's incredibly dense and complex. One of the cool things about the class itself is the active students, the ones that are learning. Every term I learn a new way to play with a dog. Somebody does something I've never seen before and I go, “Oh, I never thought to cover the dog with a towel and snap it off. I never thought to cover myself with a towel and let the dog find me.” So little things like that. It's a constant process of evolution. Deb Jones and I did write a book on the topic of play, so the third book in the Dog Sports Skills series is on the topic of play and has an awful lot of detail. Having said that, I would say that between a class and a book, this is something … I think you make a lot more progress if you watch videos, because it is so second-by-second, so that is one place where I think video would serve you well. I've never actually searched YouTube for videos of playing with a dog, but you know what, if you are not interested in taking classes, that's not your cup of tea, and you don't really want to sit down with a book, the first thing I would probably do is go to YouTube and search “playing with a dog,” and something has got to come up. It has to. In this day and age there's so much out there. That's probably where I would start. The second thing I would do, if I really wanted to go it myself, is just go back through this podcast, because I gave you a lot of places to work from and a lot to start with, and just give it a shot. See what you get. If you end this podcast feeling inspired to try it, then you're halfway there already. Melissa Breau: I was actually going to add to that, if you don't mind, that I think that some of the TEAM videos have some really nice examples of engagement, and some of those samples of engagement have really nice pieces of play in them, if people wanted to see some additional examples. That's just on the TEAM site free. Denise Fenzi: Not only that. I forgot about that. The Fenzi TEAM Players Facebook list is very active, and a couple three weeks ago I did do a flash challenge on the topic of engagement. So many people did put up their examples of working on engagement, and because it was a flash challenge, I respond to those videos, so I would have given my input and my thoughts on that. That would have been playing more specifically focused towards engagement and work, but regardless, you got to see play there, so maybe join that list. Melissa Breau: That list is free, right? Anybody can join that. They're welcome to join. Denise Fenzi: Sure. Melissa Breau: Just a last question here. If somebody does want to take the class, is there a dog that's good for the class, or maybe not a good fit for the class? Is there anything they should think about from that stance? Denise Fenzi: This term I probably have the widest variety of dogs, off the top of my head, that I've ever had. Let me think about it. I have a Great Dane, a Mastiff, then I have some more typical dogs, Sheltie, Corgi, then I have some teeny guys. I've got a Chihuahua, a softer. more fragile dog, I have a small mix, I think she said it was 10 or 11 pounds. I do believe there might be an Aussie in there, a Corgi. I have much greater size discrepancies than I've ever seen before, so I've got the tiniest and the largest, which is fun and interesting. I have non-players. I have dogs that have shown no interest whatsoever in a toy. And actually those dogs, the first week's lectures, the ones that have been released this week, are all about toy play. So we are focused on toy play right now, but I've seen the baselines for all types of play. So right off the bat the toy play's going really, really well, and the owners are excited because they're seeing things they hadn't expected. Next week, around the 9th or so, is when I start releasing the personal play lectures, and having seen the baseline, there's going to be a little of everything. There are going to be dogs that tend toward over-arousal, and there are going to be dogs that think it's all kinds of crazy and don't want to stay in the game at all, maybe showing avoidance, and I think there will be some middle ground as well. My personal preference when I teach a class is an incredible variety of dogs, and when people join the class I really try to encourage them to understand that there are no good dogs or bad dogs, there are just dogs. So it's OK, the responses your dog gives you, they're not right responses or wrong responses. They're just the response that the dog gave you, and we can just keep changing direction. That's no problem. We explore and look for what works for a more serious dog, a more anxious dog, not an aggressive dog but an assertive dog, and try to find a way, find a route, that makes you love your dog a little bit more and makes your dog think you're just a wee bit more interesting than they did yesterday. Which does bring up a point I meant to say and I forgot it. In my experience, when I go back and read my survey results for this class, probably the most common thing that people say to me at the end of class is that they're surprised at how much more their dog watches them in life. Without being trained to do so, the dog simply finds them more worth their while than they did before, and the dog checks in more. So when they go on walks, the dog just checks, “Are you coming? What are you doing?” The dog just seems to recognize that they offer more than Pez-dispenser-style training. They're more than a food dispenser or a toy machine. They are a valuable person who means more than the next person, and if I get that feedback, if I get that result, then I have won, and I feel very good about that. Melissa Breau: That's awesome, and I think that's a great point. There's some really great gems in there for people that want to tease them out. Thank you so much, Denise, for coming back on the podcast. It was great to chat again. Denise Fenzi: It's always great to be here, Melissa. Thank you. Melissa Breau: And thank you to all of our listeners for tuning in! We'll be back next week, this time with Julie Flanery, and we'll be talking about the things no one ever told you in puppy class. That is, we'll be diving into some of my favorite topics — handler mechanics, verbal cues, all those types of things. And guys, this week I have a special request. If you listen to the podcasts, or you listen to other podcasts, I'm sure you've heard other people say this, but reviews in iTunes have a HUGE impact on helping new people find the show and letting iTunes know that our show is actually worth listening to. So if you've enjoyed this or any of the previous ones, I would really appreciate it personally if you could take a minute to just go into iTunes and leave us a review. And if you haven't already, subscribe while you're there, and our next episode will automatically download to your phone as soon as it becomes available. CREDITS: Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called “Buddy.” Audio editing provided by Chris Lang.
SUMMARY: Self-proclaimed taining nerd, Hannah Branigan is back to talk about training those clean, precision behaviors that get obedience competitors everywhere drooling... tuck sits and fold back downs. Hannah has been training dogs and teaching people for more than 10 years. She is a Certified Professional Dog Trainer (CPDT-KA) and a Karen Pryor Academy Certified Training Partner (KPA-CTP). Hannah is the owner of Wonderpups, LLC, and teaches workshops nationwide, as well as conducting behavior consultations, teaching private lessons, and conducting group classes on pet manners, rally, and competition obedience. She has titled her own dogs in conformation, obedience, rally, schutzhund, and agility. Links Wonderpups Training Drinking From the Toilet (podcast) Next Episode: To be released 12/1/2017, featuring Julie Symons. We will be talking about Handler Scent Discrimination and AKC Scentwork. TRANSCRIPTION: Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports Podcast brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high-quality instruction for competitive dog sports using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today we have Hannah Branigan, of Wonderpups Training back on the podcast to talk about creating precise behaviors — things like tuck sits and fold back downs. Welcome back to the podcast, Hannah! Hannah Branigan: Thanks for having me! Melissa Breau: I'm thrilled to be talking about this today. To start us out, can you just remind listeners who you are and share a little bit about the dogs you currently share your life with? Hannah Branigan: Sure. As you said, my name is Hannah Branigan. I married into the name — the last name, not the first name; I was born with that one. My business is Wonderpups Dog Training, and I am very excited/passionate about finding training solutions using positive reinforcement techniques. I can get really nerdy really fast, but I try to kind of tone it down so that it's appropriate for public consumption. I have a podcast as well. I am a dog trainer/podcaster, and my podcast is Drinking From The Toilet. As you can probably guess from the title, it's a little less polished than this one, but it's my own flavor. And my primary sport that I do with my guys is obedience, although I'm a big fan of cross-training, so I tinker in a lot of other sports. We play a lot in agility, Rugby is learning a little fly ball, we've tinkered in freestyle and barn hunt, we've done a little tracking, and some Schutzhund stuff with the big dogs, not with Rugby. And yeah, if there's a sport out there, I'll usually at least dip a toe because I love learning new things, and I love teaching my dogs new behaviors and seeing how everything comes together and how the principles of positive training reinforcement can apply in a wide range of settings. It's real exciting for me and I could easily get too excited, so I'm going to stop right there. I think that's most of it. I do have specifically, I have in my house right now, we are down to five, no, we're down to four. Oh, that's kind of sad. OK, we're down to four, and I have three Belgian Tervuren, and they are Gambit, because everybody needs to know the names, Stormy and Spark, and they are, let's see, 15, 12, and 8, respectively, and then Rugby, who is 3, is a Border Terrier. All of the Tervs are dual-titled in conformation and multiple performance sports, and then Rugby is just starting his career. He will not be titled in conformation due to, well, disqualifying physical characteristic, which he doesn't like to talk about in public. He has just started novice, and he finished his CDSP novice title with two high-end trials and is looking forward to making his AKC novice debut, I don't even know what date we're on, but very soon. In the next month or two, actually, I think. Melissa Breau: That's awesome. I know that for most people, when they start thinking about precision skills, which will be kind of our focus today, they think fronts, finishes, maybe some heeling. But I know it's as possible to get just as geeky about sits and downs. So I think a lot of people teach sit and down early on, then decide maybe it's not as clean or precise as they eventually want it to be, and I wanted to ask you how you handle that. So what do you recommend? Do you just stop paying for what you don't want? Do you create a new cue? How do you decide? Hannah Branigan: Those are all really good questions, so just bear with me, but I get real excited! So obedience has a lot to do with sits and downs. If you think about it, the sit is a critical component of so many of the exercises in obedience. If you think about all the places where a sit comes up, so at every setup, the beginning of every exercise, we set the dog up in heel position in a sit, and then all of the halts, those are sits again, every single front, every single finish. So if you add up all of the sits that happen, like, say, in one utility run, you're into — I did this once, I should have written it down and put it in front of me — but I think we have something like twelve or fourteen fronts and finishes, plus the halts in the heeling pattern, which you're going to have at least one, maybe two halts and heeling, and then maybe seven or eight setups, so you have, like, twenty-something sits. And so having a dog that sits square, sits fluently, sits quickly, and can sit straight, and then we put it into all these situations, you're already ahead of the game. And if you don't have that, then you're already starting from behind. So having a really clean, square tuck sit is an important piece that we want to have. And what I ran into, and what I think a lot of folks run into, is the way we are taught to teach sit, like in that first puppy class when you take before you know that you think you're going to do dog sports, because I think most of us rarely get that first dog with the idea of, like, “I'm going to go get a puppy and go do competitive obedience.” Usually we get a puppy because we want a puppy. At least that was me. And then we go to puppy class, and puppy class goes pretty good, and we go to the next one, and the next one, and then what else could we do? And then we start getting into rally or obedience or whatever. So in most puppy classes, most people are taught to teach a sit by putting a treat in front of the dog's nose and then you lift the treat and push it back over the dog's back, and so as the puppy follows the treat up in the air and back, they sit down on their rump. And it's a quick way to lure and teach a sit, and you can get a sit on cue very effectively like that. But it's a sit where the puppy's rear feet stay in place and the front feet walk back, so that's what we call a rock back sit. It's very much a weight-shifted behavior, because the puppy is looking up and following the treat over his head. A super-fast way to get a sit. And then we'll often teach a down by luring them up into that rock back sit first, and then we pull the treat down between their paws and forward, and they crawl forward into a down. Again, it's a super-fast way to lure a puppy into a sit and a down. It takes very little skill on the part of the trainer, the handler, but it is the exact opposite of the mechanics that we need for competitive sports. So a lot of people find themselves in a situation where they had originally taught their puppies to sit and lie down using this particular movement pattern, and then, when their dog is 3 or 4 or 5, now they suddenly care how the dog sits, and not only is their dog not sitting the way they want them to, but they've actively taught their dog to sit the complete opposite of what they need for participating in the sport. And that's what happened to me, and again, I hit that kind of wall when I first started competing with my older dog. I had no idea that there was a different way to sit, like sitting that butt on the ground. And so that's pretty good, and we had gotten her first title, we had gotten her novice title, and we were competing in open, and I could not figure out for the life of me why on every single retrieve she would hit me in the stomach with a dumbbell and then end up sitting a full arm's length away. Like, how is that even happening? I was just totally, like, mind blown, perplexed, and some random stranger — I don't even know who it was — on the sidelines says, “Well, it's because she's rocking back into the sit. If you taught her to tuck sit, that wouldn't happen.” And I'm like, “What are you even talking about? A sit is a sit.” And now of course it's really obvious, but it was not obvious back then. I don't know what year that was, 2010 or something, and now I recognize what was happening was she would come in with the dumbbell, bam, punch me in the stomach with it because that's kind of her style — she's still like that at 15 — and then, instead of leaving her front feet in place and pulling her pelvis and her rear feet under there, which would leave her close to me, she would leave her rear feet in place and then walk her back feet into that rock back sit, so she would be a full body length away from where she started when she had that dumbbell. Which we were still able to qualify, but it was an expensive deduction that I could have avoided with the correct sit mechanics from the beginning. Melissa Breau: So what do you do in that situation? Hannah Branigan: Well, I can tell you we can still fix it, even in a 5-year-old dog, but it is a lot easier to fix it sooner rather than later. Starting with a 5-month-old dog is a lot easier than having a 5-year reinforcement history of rocking back into the sit. But we can actually still, we can still teach the dog, “No, I need you to actually do this differently. I need you to support your weight on your front legs and bring your hind legs underneath you for this behavior.” It is hard, because it … I think you asked earlier should we put it on a new cue, and that would certainly be ideal, because I do think that a rock back sit and a tuck sit — and the tuck sit is what we're looking for, where the front feet stay still, and a rock back sit is what we don't want for the purposes of halt or a front or finish — they can be easily defined as different behaviors because there are different body movements, there are different muscles involved in moving the dog through space to achieve. Even if it looks like the same end position, they're very different movements that get the dog there. But say you have a dog that's in open, that's in a retrieve. There is no sit cue there. The cue is the context of you're doing it in a retrieve, so it's a part of the cue is that the dog has a dumbbell in her mouth, and part of the cue is you standing there with that formal front posture, and those aren't things we can change. So we do have to recondition that old cue with a new behavior, which is harder than if we were starting from scratch. But we can still do it, which is cool, and that's why I get so excited. Melissa Breau: It often seems like everybody wants to talk sit, but nobody really knows how to get one. Do you want to explain why people go so crazy for a good tuck sit, and then you walked through a little bit of what a tuck sit is, but if there's anything you want to add there for anybody who doesn't know? Hannah Branigan: Because a tuck sit leaves the dog's front legs in place and this is — I'm actually having a little harder time with this than I expected, because normally when I talk about this you can see me and I can wave my hands and have a whiteboard and video, visuals, and stuff — so with a tuck sit the difference is, if you imagine your dog has four legs — or should, most have four legs, dogs have four legs — and to sit they bring their front and hind legs closer together, because the back is parallel to the ground and then we put it on a diagonal. So the dog goes from being rectangular shaped to a triangle shape. Now he can either do that by leaving the front feet in place and bringing the hind feet closer to the front feet to shorten that base, or he can leave the hind feet in place and walk the front feet back. So either the dog will … since we measure where a dog is, so for our purposes, for our sport, because this is fairly arbitrary but it is what it is, in obedience we are measuring the dog's position and space based on where the dog's shoulder is. So when a dog is in heel position, we are measuring that the dogs, our observable criteria, that the dog's shoulder stays next to the human's leg, underneath their shoulder, hip, or heel, depending on how tall your dog is, comparatively, and how tall you are. So if the dog is standing in heel position, then his front feet are in line with your front feet. You only have two feet. With your ankles, with your legs. The dog's front feet are in line with your legs. And if the dog leaves his hind feet in place to sit and walks his front feet back, well, now he's going to be actually out of heel position because his shoulder will move backward in space. If he leaves his front feet in place and tucks — this is where tuck sit comes from — tucks his hind legs up underneath, so he walks his hind feet closer to his front feet, his shoulder stays in one place, stays in a plane, and so he stays in heel position. So for all of our setups in heel position, all of our halts, all of our finishes, we need that tuck sit so that the shoulder stays in place, so that the dog starts and finishes the whole action in heel position. And then front's the same basic idea, that we're measuring front by how close a dog's front feet are to your front feet, your hind feet, your feet, feet, feet. Your human feet. And so once the dog places those front feet there, I need them to stay put and I need him to bring his hind feet up underneath him. And so how well he can manage that action is part of how we're scored on those halts, those finishes, and those fronts. So being able to have that set of actions, move the dog from a standing position to a sitting position, is really pretty important for performance. Melissa Breau: For good scores in performance, at least. Hannah Branigan: Well, for good scores and even to the point of an end cue. Because for any of our fronts, that threshold between points and an end cue is the dog has to stop within arm's length of you, so you have to be able to reach the dog's collar or reach for the dumbbell without moving your feet. And of course if you have a Chihuahua, it's not going to make a big difference because a 9- or 10-inch dog can sit 9 or 10 inches further away and that's not going to make that much difference, but if you have a big, let's say, German Shepherd or other longer dog whose body length exceeds the length of your arm, then your dog could actually conceivably start off standing as close as possible to you for a front and end up sitting in end cue territory if they sit back further than you can reach. So it is important for the scores but may also actually be the difference between a title and no title. Melissa Breau: I think a lot of people, even people who know they want a tuck sit and understand the difference, still really struggle actually to get one from their dog. Hannah Branigan: Totally. Melissa Breau: Why is that so hard? Hannah Branigan: Most of the dogs that I work with, that I have seen — I don't want to claim all dogs in all of the world, but the dogs that I have had the chance to work with either in person or online usually offer … they fall on a spectrum. They'll offer a range of sits. So we'll see a sit that is 100 percent tuck. The front feet plant and stay put, and everything about the dog's weight moves forward into that sit. And we'll see dogs that 100 percent rock back, where it almost seems no matter what the circumstances are, the hind feet stay put and the dog walks back into the sit. And then most dogs are somewhere in the middle. They'll offer some of the time they'll tuck sit, and some of the time they'll rock back, and we'll even see what I consider a hybrid, where they'll almost move on a diagonal, and they'll rock back with one front foot and tuck with one hind foot and so they'll end up a little bit crooked, which also of course affects the straightness of the front or the finish. And so for some dogs that conveniently fall in the middle of the spectrum, it's just a matter of setting up a situation where a tuck sit is a little more likely. Maybe we're luring them into a tuck sit, or even just reinforcing them for the tucks and not reinforcing for the not tucks. And there are dogs that you get it for free. So after the dog where I learned about the difference between rock back sits and tuck sits, my next dog, Gambit, came with a tuck sit. I did nothing. It was lovely. Melissa Breau: Lucky, lucky dog. Hannah Branigan: Right. The universe loves balance, and I'll tell the story about my third dog following that. But Gambit came with a tuck sit, so he came at 9, 10 weeks old. If he sat, nine times out of ten it was a front foot planted tuck sit, so that was pretty easy. I could just selectively reinforce those and then all I really had to worry about was straightness. But then my next dog was the opposite. Again, the universe loves balance. And it was … actually it's kind of funny because it was around the same time I'm really becoming aware of these things, I'm refining my shaping skills so that I have the mental space to pay attention to that kind of detail, and she was the complete opposite. If she sat at all, it was a rock back. It was a real rock back. She'd move one-and-a-half body lengths backwards into that sit, and I was like, “That's OK, because I'm a dog trainer and I can fix everything if I just love it enough.” I'm just kidding. But I felt like for sure this is a solvable problem, and so I was, like, “Well, I'm going to lure her into a tuck sit,” and I would put food on her nose and I would follow the very best, most effective luring motion up and forward, and she would rock back away from the food into a sit. And we would both just look at each other with rumpled brows, like, “Why aren't you doing this right?” “No, why aren't you doing this right? This is how we sit.” And it was actually I started to freak out a little bit. I took her to see a local trainer that was very experienced in obedience, and she basically had me doing what I was already doing and it still didn't work, so I took her to see a seminar with another nationally recognized, very successful obedience trainer and she helped me problem-solve. We tried a couple of other things, and she couldn't get her to lure her into a tuck sit, and we tried a couple of other things, we put her on a platform, and there was no tucks. I may as well have asked her to fly. No matter how good the food, no matter how talented and skilled the luring hand that held the food, we could not get her into a sit. She would sit all the time, but it was just a rock back sit. And so I put it on the shelf for a little while, like, I don't know, seven months, because I couldn't put a cue on this rock back sit because I was going to compete with this dog in obedience. And so I made, like, a really nice mental block for myself. And the piece that I realized was missing, so then I go, one of my primary defensive strategies is research. So if I don't know what to do, or I don't like the answer, I'll go and “Let's just do more research.” We can learn more about it, and that's better than acting and actually making a decision or something. So I go and I start watching a lot of video of dogs sitting, and I watch dogs in person in trials, coming into a front, tucking and sitting, like, what are they doing, what are they doing that my dog is not doing, so that I can break this down into its individual motions. And the first thing that I'm seeing that these dogs do that's different is that the dogs that tuck into a sit are shifting their full body weight onto their front legs before they even bend a single knee. And my dog was doing the exact opposite. Her head was coming up and she was pushing her body backwards, so her whole weight was rocking backwards to get into the sit. And so then, what happens, if your weight's shifting backwards, you're going to tend to move your body backwards. If your weight's shifting forward, you're going to tend to move your body forward. So what I needed to do was get that forward weight shift. So I started experimenting with what are places where I get that kind of weight shift. And I tried a lot of it because luring just wasn't working. So I couldn't get a full sit, but I could put her front paws on a target, or a low platform, or a step, and she would lean forward over that step. So then I had the weight shift and I could reinforce that. And that turned out to be the pivotal behavior to get a tuck sit out of this dog, and then of course because I'm a good scientist and so I have to test it, so then I tested on all my local clients, and then I tested on my online clients, and so dog after dog, this is the piece for all of those dogs that just seem to be incapable of tucking into the sit. Once we get that forward weight shift, not a sit but just a standing forward weight shift where they lean their weight onto their arms — their front legs, our arms; you can tell I do a lot of projection and gesturing when I'm working through these problems, and if you could see me on video now you would see that I am doing all these actions with my own body on my desk and chair, but anyways. So yeah, once we get that forward weight shift, getting the tuck sit becomes really pretty easy. And if we try to somehow skip that, it's really hard to get the tuck sit and everybody gets frustrated. So that was the piece that finally clicked into place. And there's lots of ways to get that weight shift, but the front feet planted, lean your weight forward, and watching her shoulder muscles — at this time she had really no coat; she has a lot more coat now, so it would be harder to see — but I could see her shoulder muscles actually working as she leaned her weight forward onto those front legs. And being able to mark and reinforce that and then work from there into the sit, then from there it was just like rolling a ball down a hill. It was really easy. Melissa Breau: That's awesome. My next question was going to be, can you break it down and explain how you were teaching it, but I think you've got that covered, unless there's anything you want to add. Hannah Branigan: Really, that's the main thing — if you can find a way to tap into that weight shift. Early on, I was using a lot of front foot targeting, which required the dog have a huge reinforcement history for sticking their front feet to a target, because still front feet is part of it. Since then, I've discovered a few shortcuts, like, for example, using a front edge, like a step. I use the front step on my porch, or I have into the training space that I use has three steps into it, so there's just a front edge. It's not a full platform, because I don't care about the side-to-side limitation at this point. I really actually want the dog to feel comfortable leaning, and we tend to feel more comfortable leaning if we have space to spread out, sort of. But, like, a front step, preferably one that the dog has already existing in their environment. A lot of my clients have the sunken living room where it's one step down into their living room space. I don't know if that makes sense. So a lot of folks seem to have that. Or a step on their porch. So your dog's already used to this in their environment and it doesn't take a lot of extra training to teach them to stand on the top of the step and to lean forward. And the visual I have in my mind as I'm shaping towards this is, if you ever tried to lure your dog into your bathtub, or lure a horse into a horse trailer, or lure your dog off of the dock into the lake, it is amazing how long the dog or the horse's neck can stretch forward without a single paw or hoof stepping into the bathtub or onto the trailer. And if you pull them forward over this edge and they are sufficiently motivated to stay on the edge, now with a bathtub or a horse trailer there's a negative reinforcement instantly because they don't want to put their feet in the trailer or in the bathtub, but if we fed them a bunch of times for staying up on that step and then we present a target or whatever a little bit further forward, they're going to be a little bit used to having their feet up on that, so we can use positive reinforcement here. And as they lean forward without stepping down, they lean forward to get the carrot, to get the treat, you'll actually see their front legs take the weight and their back feet start sliding forward up underneath them. And when we start getting that, because they're leaning as far forward as they can without moving their feet in order to not just flip head over heels off of the step, their haunches come up underneath them. There's no weight on them yet, we have to fix that later, but again, it's that first action of moving from the stand, shifting the weight forward, and letting that pelvis come up underneath them. We can capture that, and then it's really easy to shape into a sit from that point. But trying to get a sit from the stand without that weight shift is really, really hard. So we get that first little activation energy, that first step, and then it's all really very easy. Melissa Breau: I wanted to ask a little bit about age. At what age can you really start working on a behavior like that with a puppy? I know I've seen mixed recommendations in the past and was curious to hear your take... Hannah Branigan: I think with puppies there's a happy medium, as with everything. I would definitely put a lot of energy into making sure that that puppy was really confident and able to shift weight forward and back as a balance proprioceptive, that kind of thing, which I think people do. It's becoming more common, more popular as part of our puppy raising, getting them used to different kinds of surfaces, getting them used to using their body in different ways, and just a forward backward weight shift with a standing puppy is it's very low impact, you can do a whole bunch of them in a very short amount of time, keep a really high rate of reinforcement, really keep it really positive, really simple, and easy for the puppy. So I would put a lot of energy into that forward backward weight shift because then, whether you're looking for that tuck sit or whether you're looking for the fold back down, having a puppy who can confidently balance on front or back and control that movement is going to find any of the other actions that we want to teach easier. I don't want to put a whole lot of — and maybe this is a human problem — I don't want to put a whole lot of pressure on myself or on the human side for getting a perfectly square sit, but I want to be setting up situations where I'm encouraging the mechanics that I do want, because it is easier to teach these correct mechanics when you have that brand new, soft, moldable brain and central nervous system to play with than it is with a 4- or 5-year-old dog who's been sitting a certain way for several years and you have that reinforcement history to overcome. So I think following good puppy training procedures of short, fun sessions, you don't have to do … certainly not 10 minutes of sitting, but do three reps here, three reps there in between while you're teaching him to play with you and cultivating your reinforcers. So you're teaching them about their body, you're teaching them how to move their body in space so they can be safe, and they can be confident, and then gradually, and I would start this as soon at as they're ready to start training, so 5-and-a-half weeks, 6 weeks, whenever they're interested enough in our food and in our interaction that we have leverage, and or 8 or 9 weeks when you bring them home, if you don't have access to them that early. But we can start setting those things up in the context of all the other normal puppy stuff that we would do without getting super-rigorous and formal about it. I'm looking at these sorts of behaviors are the function of a well-balanced, physically well-balanced dog, and we can start that very, very early, for sure. Melissa Breau: So, the other precise behavior I want to talk a little bit about is a fold back down. Can you again just talk about what's the big deal there and describe the behavior a little bit? Hannah Branigan: The fold back down is sort of the opposite of the tuck sit. In the fold back down, I want everything about the dog moving backwards. And the two places where this matters is the drop on recall and the down in the part of the signals exercise in utility. With the novice, the only down that we have in the novice is the long down for the stay, and it doesn't really matter how the dog lays down in that context. But by the time you get to open, the drop and recall and signals exercise, both of those are again scored by the dogs … well, they're kind of scored by the opposite, by how not forward the dog comes after you give the down cue. So ideally you want them to drop in place or even kind of push back into the down. So that's the fold back down idea. So again, if we look at the dog as being sort of a rectangle, we want to flatten that rectangle. And I don't know how many Amazon Prime deliveries you get per month, but you may be breaking down some boxes for recycling periodically. If I have the top and bottom punched out and I'm left with hollow rectangle, I can fold it forward or I can fold it back, and with the dog we want them to fold back, so that everything about their body, their weight shift, is pushing backwards, their hind feet stay planted for this transition from stand to down. And the reason that I want that is (1) in signals the judge is looking at the dog, he starts off in standing position, you're going to give a cue from 40 feet away for the dog to lie down, and the judge is looking for the dog to lie down without coming forward. And so if the dog pushes back, folds back into that down, you're good, you're golden, because he's not going to come forward at all. In the drop on recall, we have that plus the dog is moving towards you like a freight train. So we need not only for the dog not to come forward as part of his down, but we need him to put on the brakes. And what's kind of cool, and again I get kind of excited, is that the same muscles that fold the dog back into a down from a stand-up push the dog back into the down are those same muscles that put on the brakes when a dog is moving fast. So the same muscles that stop a dog who's coming down a contact on a dogwalk, those are the same muscles that are pushing against that forward momentum that are pushing him back into a down. So dogs that have really clean, fast, sharp fold back downs are going to drop really cleanly on your cue, and a dog that needs to move his legs forward and out — doesn't need to because he can learn this — but if his habit of moving into a down is to walk his front legs forward, and he's already moving forward, hurtling forward through space, then that momentum plus the mechanics of that down are going to carry him even that much more towards you forward. And that's definitely scorable and again to the point of an end cue, because if he moves more than maybe a body length forward after you've given the cue, then we're potentially end cuing. And that drop on recall is such a common weakness in an open performance, it's something that I've put a lot of attention into because I get a lot of folks that come to seminars and, “You know, we're doing really good in open, but we can't seem to qualify on that drop on recall.” It seems to be one of the first things that breaks under pressure, and when we pull it apart we'll see that certainly imperfect drop mechanics can still qualify, but you really have to have a sharp cue response. And since the cue response tends to degrade a little bit under pressure, we get a little more late and see a little slower responses. It doesn't take a lot to take an adequate down and turn it into an inadequate down in that setting. So we certainly want to do what we can to improve ring stress, we certainly want to improve the stimulus control over the down, but we can buy ourselves a lot of buffer on those very fragile parts of the performance with a down that is a fold back down because, and even if the dog does take a split-second to respond to the cue, at least once he starts responding, he's not going to come forward any more than he already has. So we get a lot more robust performance with a dog that is, and again we get some overlap there because they're both fluent in putting on the brakes, they're fluent in stopping their forward momentum, and they're fluent in pushing their body back into the down. Those things come together and we get those really flashy drop on recalls, which are also way more likely to hold up under pressure than a little less sharp drop on recall. Melissa Breau: When teaching a fold back down, where do people struggle, and I guess if you have any tips for how they can teach the behavior, those would be great too. Hannah Branigan: Again, one of the problems is how we're taught to teach that down. Teaching the dog to lay down in puppy class is counterproductive to our goals. I mean, it's truly like a dead end. So if the dog is taught that he has to sit and then lay down, and that's what a lot of dogs learn because we teach them to down from a sit, we lure them into the sit and then we lure them forward into the down, and then we put that on cue and the behavior becomes sit and then lay down as, like, one big piece. And so if the dog is standing and you say “down,” the dog puts his butt down and then walks his front feet forward to lie down, and again, that's not helpful. We want that push back into the down. So one of the first things is making sure, “Can my dog actually go from a stand into a down without sitting first?” That's the first and most important and critical piece. Most dogs actually can. If you pay attention, they often lay down from a stand all the time, and we can take those moments and we can build on them so that we're teaching a stand from a down because, or sorry, teaching a down from a stand, because a down from a stand is closer to a down from motion than a down from a sit is, in terms of mechanics, in terms of what muscles are being used and how the body is moving them. So teaching it right off the bat from a standing position instead of cuing or luring the sit first is half the battle. After that, I really find that the most effective thing to look at is the hind feet, making sure that the hind feet stay still. I was originally … I think a lot of us were originally taught to watch the front feet, and those are easier to see, especially from a distance, but they are less predictive of the ideal down mechanics than watching the hind feet. If the hind feet stay in place, then the dog's body tends to stay in place. If the front feet, the front feet can stay in place, but the dog can still kind of hunch up into a down, which again tends to turn into a creep forward when we add any source of pressure or stress. So looking for, it's the opposite of the tuck sit, so I'm looking for a backwards weight shift, I'm looking for the rear feet to be planted, instead of a forward weight shift with the front feet planted. And we can do this with a target, we can do this with a platform, there's lots of pieces, but again it's that focus on the rear feet is what I've observed makes the difference between an OK down and those really snappy, sharp, pretty ones that we all want to replicate. Melissa Breau: Just looking again at sits and downs as a group, and just the idea of precision, are there any common misconceptions people have when it comes to teaching these kinds of behaviors, and can you set the record straight? Hannah Branigan: I think really the biggest misconception is either that we can't change it, like, that's just how your dog comes, which is total crap because we don't have to give that away. I'm not going to let you off the hook. We can completely change that. Even if your dog is 5 or 6 years old. We had in the last Devil in the Details class, which is where we work specifically on these behaviors, we had dogs that were, like, 9, 10, and 12 years old, and we were changing mechanics, which was kind of cool. I did not actually expect that. I would have probably not counseled someone with a 12-year-old dog to try and change how their dog lays down. But you know what, they did great, which was really pretty cool. So I think it's that “This is how my dog comes,” He's just not good at,” or using a label or qualifying is a characteristic of the dog when it's just a behavior and we can shape it. All behavior is modifiable, including these. And then the other side of that is, “Well, it's boring.” And of course that's not true at all, because dog training is awesome and it's really exciting, and having clear criteria and a shaping plan — dogs love that. They love clear criteria. So I think there's this idea of, “Well, if my dog doesn't sit square and I try to teach him to sit square, then he'll hate me, he'll hate obedience, everything sucks, the world sucks,” and that's really not true. It's all the same game to the dog. So then it becomes a matter of “How can I set this dog up for success? How can I break down the criteria so that they're reachable by this dog on this day?” “How can I set up a shaping session that takes me from what my dog currently does, the highest probability version of this behavior, to what my goal for that behavior is?” And being really clear about what each of those steps look like. And when we're doing that, if you get as excited about shaping as I do — which most people probably don't and hopefully don't, for the betterment of the world — then we have these little training projects that we can do, and I've not met a single dog that didn't get more motivated with clearer criteria. As long as they're reachable, like having more clear criteria first is where we do get in trouble, especially with things like fronts and finishes is if we're using the word “enough” in our criteria and particularly in our head. Like, if you're working with your dog on fronts, and you're watching your dog come into a front and you're asking yourself, “Is that straight enough to reinforce?” As soon as we're saying “enough,” then yes, we're absolutely creating frustration, because if you are thinking, Is this straight enough? you are too late in clicking, you're too late to reinforce whatever has already happened to impact the outcome. So again, breaking the movements down and having it really, really clear, “What, exactly, what am I reinforcing?” so that you can mark that instant, and when we're that clear, and our timing is that good, there is absolutely nothing to lose in building that precision. We'll only create more motivated, more clear dogs that love training because they know exactly what they're doing, and they feel good about doing it, and they can earn that reinforcement. Melissa Breau: You snuck in a quick mention there of the Devil in the Details class, and I know it's coming up again and somehow we managed not to mention it before then, so I want to talk about that for a second. Can you just tell us a little bit about the class and what it is? Hannah Branigan: The Devil In The Details, I think the title kind of effectively describes it, this is definitely a dog nerd class. It is written for those who enjoy a certain amount of hairsplitting, that love peeling away all the layers and seeing what muscles are moving, and what's the physiology behind this behavior, and how can I manipulate and adapt my training sessions to effectively change the behavior that my dog is doing. It's definitely not for a casual, brand new dog trainer. Most people would be bored by it. The right people are going to get totally pumped because it's really very nerdy. What we really do is we look at these core behaviors, which are certainly critical to obedience but also to a lot of the conditioning and trick behaviors that we want to do involve some of the same mechanics, and so can we look at what's really going on. If we're having a problem with teaching a particular behavior, what is the dog doing that needs to be changed, and what are the muscle movements that we need to activate, how we put together a plan to systematically activate the right series of muscle movements to take the dog from stand into that beautiful tuck sit, to square up any straggly feet or crookedness, and build this kind of awesome sit, down, and stand. So it is six weeks on sit, down, and stand, and you'd think, How can you spend six weeks on that? And I could easily spend twelve because you can just keep going. There's such a rabbit hole there. But if you've had trouble teaching a tuck sit, and you are interested in behavior, and you're kind of a behavior you'd feel like you would maybe qualify as a behavior nerd, then this is a great class for you because we will absolutely get a tuck sit out of your dog. I feel pretty confident in saying that. But we dig pretty deep in terms of mechanics and physiology and criteria and breaking things down to get that, because that's what the dogs need from us. Melissa Breau: And that's offered in December this time, right? Hannah Branigan: Yes, December. It's in our December session. Melissa Breau: Excellent. Well, thank you so much for coming back on the podcast Hannah! Hannah Branigan: Thanks for having me. Melissa Breau: Absolutely. And thanks to our listeners for tuning in. We'll be back next week with Julie Symons. We will be talking about Handler Scent Discrimination and AKC Scentwork. Don't miss it! It if you haven't already, subscribe to our podcast in itunes or the podcast app of your choice to have our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available. CREDITS: Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called “Buddy.” Audio editing provided by Chris Lang.
SUMMARY: Shade Whitesel returns to talk about toys and the process of introducing work to play. For those of you who haven't heard the previous episode with Shade, Shade has been training and competing in dog sports since she was a kid. She has successfully competed in Schutzhund, AKC obedience and French Ring and her focus is really on clear communication with your dog. Links Shadesdogtraining.net Next Episode: To be released 11/10/2017, featuring Patricia McConnell, to talk about what she's learned over her time in dog training. TRANSCRIPTION: Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports Podcast brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high-quality instruction for competitive dog sports using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today we have Shade Whitesel back with us again, this time to talk about toys and the process of introducing work to play. For those of you who haven't heard the previous episode with Shade, Shade has been training and competing in dog sports since she was a kid. She has successfully competed in Schutzhund, AKC obedience and French Ring and her focus is really on clear communication with your dog. She also recently launched a blog on her website, which all of you should check out at www.shadesdogtraining.net. Welcome back, Shade! Shade Whitesell: Thanks for having me. I'm glad to be back. Melissa Breau: I'm glad to have you. So I kind of want to jump straight into things here. So when we talk about play, I think most people think, It's play, and think it should just kind of come naturally to them and to their dog. But all too often that's not the case. So why is it that play can be hard? Shade Whitesel: I think when you're talking about competitive dog sports, we're thinking about play as a reinforcement, and so the dog's idea of what's reinforcing and our idea what we want to teach them might be different. So it's not always easy. And also I think we have in our mind this ideal thing, this ideal of our childhood dog who always brought the ball back, and things like that. My childhood dog didn't. Maybe that's why I teach this, because I had work to do to get her to bring it back. But, so keeping in mind that I'm talking about play with toys, it's basically an interaction between the dog and the handler using toys. It's hard because it involves shaping on the handler's part, where they're working from approximating a little behavior that the dog is giving you to a bigger behavior that you want to eventually use to reward stuff. So it's kind of like even though it's play, we still have to train little parts of it and make it more … train rules in it might be a good way of putting it, where you've got, you know, you can reward with a ball, but you've got to get the ball back. So kind of like those things are all caught up in our word of play, basically. Melissa Breau: So you mentioned in there kind of the bringing the ball back bit, and I think probably one of the most common issues that you hear about when people are talking about play is the dog takes a toy, runs away in the corner, and enjoys it all on their lonesome. What's going on there — and how do you go about teaching the dog that you really can be part of that fun? Shade Whitesel: Well, the dog, when they're going away and they're chewing it, they're really fixated on the object itself, and so they're thinking that the object itself is fun. And what we need to do is we need to teach the dog that they need us for the interaction. So they need us to activate the toy, whether that's taught or whether we're throwing it for them to chase. And that is more fun and we need to create more value for that, rather than the dog taking the toy away and chewing it off in the corner. And one of those things that we need to do is figure out how to play in a way that the dog likes. It really starts there. And once they figure that out, once you figure out how to play in a way the dog likes, they bring the toy back to you automatically. And then value building for having you in there just works. The problems come when we expect the dog to play how we want them to play, like, for instance, how another dog we have played, or, like, what our sport wants our dog to play like, and then it's no longer play and the dog may have other ideas of what they consider play. So it's important to take what the dog offers to you and then reinforce that by giving the dog what they want, which is normally possession of the toy. I find a lot of people just don't want to give the dog the toy because they're so afraid it's going to take it away and chew it up, because that's what they do when they're babies. But in order to get what you want, you kind of have to give the dog what they want, and a lot of times in the beginning of training that's giving them possession, and honoring that, and being OK with that. So later on, and this affects right at the beginning, it is you also need to think about the tugging itself. One of my favorite things is to tell handlers to make it 50-50 when you're tugging with your dog. And that means that 50 percent of the time the dog pulls you around. The other 50 percent you pull the dog around. Most of the issues I see with dogs and handler play is that the handler is pulling the dog around 95 percent or worse, and then the dog doesn't think you're fair. They don't think they can beat you. So then when you finally let them have the toy, they leave. They're kind of saying their opinion of your playing and it's not all that fun for them, so ... And sometimes that's hard to hear, you know. We've got to start with little tiny parts, so … Melissa Breau: It is a little funny in some respects that kind of the dog wants the toy, but the person wants the toy too. Shade Whitesel: Right, and you need to learn, too, the word that occurs to me is cooperate. I'm not sure I mean that. To compete in a way that each creature has fun with it, and compete in a way that the dog thinks they can win, and maybe look at it that way, not that you're just tugging them around because you think that's what they should do. Melissa Breau: So you mentioned kind of the dog has to think it's fun. And we're talking mostly tug and fetch here. So what kinds of cues should people be looking for in their dog's body language to make sure their dog's enjoying the game and actually having fun? Shade Whitesel: Well, they kind of really have to be all in. So I'm not going to really describe what their actual body language looks like, that's probably different with each dog, but one of the things that I don't like to see is a dog that I think is frantic or hectic. And so I want to see a dog that's calmer than frantically tugging backwards. So I think many handlers are conditioned by their sport, or what they've been exposed to, to think that a dog that is frantically tugging backwards, growling and thrashing, is happy, and I'm not sure that that's always the case. It might be frantic and hectic and not so happy. The simple thing to ask the dog is, you know, when you let them have it, do they like it? Do they run laps? Do they come back and play with you, in which case they like that type of play, or do they race away? So that's kind of what you're looking, the actions that they're doing, rather than, like, their actual body language, because I just think that's open to a lot of interpretation based on people seeing other dogs play, things like that. It's really what does the dog do when you give it and how into it are they. So, yeah, that's what I'd be looking at. Melissa Breau: Looking at tug specifically, what are some of the common mistakes maybe that people make -- either in your toys class or in general -- and how would you address them? Shade Whitesel: Well, the biggest thing is we have to remember we're bigger than the dog, and so we kind of overwhelm the dog with the tugging, especially if the dog is young or if it's smaller than us. I mean, you know, really what I see people accidentally doing is they're dragging the dog all around and they're never allowing the dog to drag them around. And the dog has to affect you, they have to feel like they can pull you down and get the toy, or make you move, or make your hands go loose, or something like that. And then the other common thing is people never give the dog the toy, and that's just a big deal, because they're scared that the dog might not bring it back, and so they don't give it to them. It's a teaching thing. It's teaching trust around your hands near toys. Hands near the dog. My dog thinks hands are good. He thinks they're for shoving toys into. And that's what I want dogs to learn, rather than being overwhelmed. So that's kind of why I'm really big on letting the dog have it and then choose to come back. That gives me information on how I'm playing and if the dog likes that. Melissa Breau: With fetch or with ball play, are there common mistakes you see people make? Shade Whitesel: Yeah, they start, like, they get really concerned with the dropping, which, you know, we have to get the dog to drop it, so, but they start commanding it and cuing it and verbally making the dog do it, and using a little bit of coercion to get the dog to come back and drop it. And those, I'd say, what I want my dogs to figure out is that their dropping activates me, so when a dog drops a toy at my feet, that activates me to bring out another ball in sight and throw it. That's what I want them to look at the out as, rather than this thing that has to be commanded. So dogs will tell you a lot about what they think of the game when they're coming back to you. So, like, people get really concerned with dogs circling, with arcing, and all that kind of stuff, and it's good to notice that, but when you're training that, it's OK as the dog works it out that, yes, I can come back and drop it. So that's a little bit of a common mistake. Melissa Breau: Everybody kind of probably has heard the idea that you should start with the fun and then gradually add work in. So can you talk a little about that? How do you decide when and where you add work to the game? Shade Whitesel: Well, I have, like, a rote fetch game that I teach with rules, where the dog has to drop it, the handler has to have a marker word, and eye contact has to be added. And the dog needs to know that it dropped the ball to make the other ball in sight. So it's kind of a two-ball game, but you have to make sure that the dog understands that their dropping produces the other one in sight and that you're not bribing or prompting them with the one in your hand to drop. So once you have that basic thing for the chase game, then I would feel confident adding some behavior skills through either obedience or agility. With tugging, the dog needs to be bringing it right back. But also with tugging, the dog needs to have the self-control of not just jumping all over you. That self-control with the tugging is a big thing, so I want to physically cue the dog to jump on me when it's allowed, and that way when they've got, when they want to come back right away, but they're also looking for that signal that they're allowed to come back and shove it at you, that's kind of they've got some self-control in the game and some thinking in there. It's not just a frantic thing. When I see that, then I say that you can start to add simple behavior skills, and say you've got the rules, and you can start adding behavior skills. And your focus, especially at first, is to add the skills to the game. You don't want to just run an agility sequence and reward the dog with the ball. You want to basically put the behavior skills into the game itself. So it might look like you throw the ball to the dog a couple of times and then you cue a jump. And then you throw the ball for the dog a couple of times, and if you're doing obedience you might cue a sit. And then throw it a couple of times and then a hand touch. So what you're doing is you're adding those behavior skills in gradually, and you're keeping in mind that it's about the play and the reinforcement of the play. And then in fact it's easier for the dog. You can start to make that reinforcement of play thinner and thinner. And then, when you start doing that, so that leads to a whole other thing, basically, where eventually you're going to want to thin the reinforcement schedule so that you can get some stuff done. You don't want to have to, for the rest of the dog's life, have it three ball throws for one sit, you know? But that's what I call a tell, where, assuming you've got all your games really well taught and the dog is bringing back the ball, your dog's tell are what starts to deteriorate when your rate of reinforcement is too low, or the environment is too hard, or the behavior you're teaching is too hard for the dog. And so in a fetch game a lot of times what the dog will do is, let's say you only gave one ball throw for the sit and they thought that was kind of cheap. Then they'll arc on their way coming back to you when previously they would have run straight back to you. Or they'll not drop the ball quickly. They'll chomp it a couple of times. So those are the things that the dog will start deteriorating, the game skills will deteriorate, and that's what I call the dog's tell. So in tugging, the dog might start growling on the tug, or it may jump on you before being cued, or it will re-bite the toy. All those things that you hopefully trained past in your game skills when you were training for reinforcement will then start to resurface when you add things, behavior skills, too quickly. So, like, thinking of behavior skills as work and the game skills as the fun and the play, your game skills will start to deteriorate if your work is too much, in the dog's opinion. And then you want to figure out as the handler what how your dog is telling you that, because they each have different ways they tell you that. Like, a border collie will usually always give you the ball, but they'll usually arc. Arcing is usually what a stereotypical border collie will do. Whereas a German Shepherd will fully come back to you, but he'll stop dropping the ball. So different types of dogs have different tells. Melissa Breau: Gee, I wonder if I've ever seen that behavior before. Maybe a little. Shade Whitesel: Yeah. Anybody who's had a German Shepherd has seen the “Drop? What's that?” Melissa Breau: The chomp, chomp, chomp. Shade Whitesel: Chomp, chomp, exactly. Melissa Breau: I know kind of before we scheduled this to have you come back on, we chatted a little bit about the idea that you've spent a lot of time lately thinking about training loops and kind of how they feed into how a dog feels about a training session…. And I wanted to dive into that a little bit, but before we go too deep, just to make sure everybody kind of knows the terminology, can you explain just a little bit what a training loop is and why it's really important for the dog to feel good about the training session? Shade Whitesel: Well, I'm not sure this technical way of describing it, but for me right now what a loop is, is think about behaviors as a three-part process. You've got first the dog doing behavior, let's say it's sit, and then the second part is he's collecting his reinforcement, let's say a treat, and then that little part between the treat and when you cue sit again is what I'm calling a reset. I'm sure there's another technical name for it. So you've got behavior, collecting reinforcement, and a reset. And what I've really been interested in, so that all that forms a loop, because once a dog resets back to you, you can then, you know, cue another behavior. What I'm really concentrating on nowadays is that little part of the reset, because we train it, you can, you know, start paying attention to the dog noticing you and then cue a reward or something, but that's where it all starts to deteriorate. You've got your big loop. And what you're doing is you're seeing if the dog decides to do the behavior again or connect with you. So things happen right there where they'll start to deteriorate, and what I mean by that is the dog will start sniffing, they'll start glancing at the environment, and all those are little signs that the dog, how the dog is feeling. So with treats, you give the dog a treat and he'll always eat the treat, but they'll sniff around before they look back at you for the next cued behavior. For toys, that's exactly what the whole toy class is about, basically, teaching the dog how to give up the toy. So they won't give up the toy if that little reset isn't trained, or if they think the reinforcement is too thin. So what I've been noticing is that part of a behavior loop deteriorates before everything else. So you'll have a dog that's sitting, but they're glancing away. And so I'm really interested in that, because as positive trainers we really need to notice that, because it's telling us that the dog is not all into the training session, and I want to know that as their teacher right there. So it's just that reset, where the dog shows they're stressed or their conflict, is just something that I've really been noticing lately and trying to train better and also to address when it happens. Melissa Breau: So you talked a little bit there about some of the things that you've been doing. Is there more you want to say about that? I mean, I know you mentioned you get a little ahead of yourself, but is there more you want to say about what you've been playing with or you know, what you've been doing? Shade Whitesel: Well we need to intentionally notice it. I feel like I never noticed it until the last couple years, and so we need to intentionally also train it so train the reset. And how we do that is we, instead of prompting a dog to look at us — we can call it focus, we can call it engagement — but instead of, like, prompting them to look back at us after they've eaten a treat, we can actually wait and have the dog notice us, OK, and then reinforce that. And so that's we're reinforcing the dog's check-in, and the dog understands that it leads to work or another behavior. So being positive trainers, kind of like I said before, we need total buy-in. And if they're looking away, or they're sniffing, or they're not dropping balls, or arcing on the return, we don't have total buy-in. And so it's really, I think it's awesome because we can, like, address that there in the training session instead of waiting for our behaviors to deteriorate. Hopefully that makes sense. It's, like, the action the dog does between eating a treat or chasing the ball and then doing the next behavior starts to show the stress of the training session on the dog before the actual behaviors deteriorate. Melissa Breau: You know, most of the time you don't notice until the behavior starts to change. Shade Whitesel: Totally, totally. We don't notice until the sits get slower, or the dog doesn't sit, or — heaven forbid — we notice when the dog's not taking food. But I want to notice that stuff before, and I want to address it right then. Because my dog, like, say he starts chomping his ball and he doesn't want to give it up. Then that tells me he doesn't trust me to give him enough reinforcement for what behavior he just did. That tells me that it's hard. Like, if I ask for 50 steps of heeling and I throw the ball, and he brings it right back and drops it at my feet, he's telling me that 50 steps of heeling was not hard. If he doesn't drop his ball right away, he's telling me that was hard, and he needs a lot of ball throws, and he doesn't trust me to do that. When you start noticing that — I call it listening to the dog — then it's so helpful, for me anyway, in my training to know that. And then I can, like, cue another chase. I can throw the ball a couple more times. I can tug a little bit before I ask for 50 more steps of heeling. I can go, “Oh, you can do 50 steps of heeling at home, it's not that big a deal. But here out in the field with lots of other dogs around, this is a really hard behavior.” So I just like knowing that kind of stuff, and so I've been really interested in that the last, especially the last six months. Anyway, lots more questions about that kind of stuff as we all train. Melissa Breau: Yeah, no, I think it's really an interesting concept to kind of think of, and I think you hear everybody kind of say, you know, they have that “just one more rep” problem, right, and that seems like such a good way to kind of check in with yourself and check in with your dog before you ever get to the “one more rep” problem. Shade Whitesel: Yes, exactly. And you know, I think, I think as trainers we all notice this and we call it different things, you know, focus, or engagement, or I call it the reset. So I think we're all kind of talking about the same thing, but we all describe it a little differently. And it just, it's neat and fascinating for me because I always want to know my dog's opinion. I want to know, so yeah. Melissa Breau: So for those kind of interested in learning more about this stuff, how much of this do you explore in the advanced toys class, since it's coming up in December? What do you focus on there? Shade Whitesel: So the advanced toy class is, it's Part 1 working on impulse control and making sure everyone, the handler and the dog, has the mechanics down. So we work on presentations, we really work on the different marker words, so “In spite of the tug in front of your face, when I say ‘yes,' you need to take food,” that kind of thing. And then the second part of it is kind of figuring out where your dog's tell is, adding the work to it. Some people can get through that in the regular toy class because I do include it there, but the advanced toy class I usually get a lot of students who really want to concentrate on, like, adding behavior chains and things and figuring out how arousal plays a part, because a toy's arousal is always there. Melissa Breau: Of course, yeah. Shade Whitesel: So and it catches you by surprise sometimes. So yes, we do really work on that reset, basically, and trying to figure out how individual dogs are feeling about their session. Dogs who would do best in class are ones obviously … the prereq is the basic toy class, but they don't have to have all the skills from the basic toy class, but they do have to have the basics of the fetch game and the tug game. But they just need to work on the specifics. So yeah. Melissa Breau: Awesome. Shade Whitesel: Yeah, it's really a fun class. Melissa Breau: Hey, Shade, I think any class with you would be fun. Shade Whitesel: You're too kind! Melissa Breau: Well, thank you so much for coming back on the podcast Shade. It's always a joy to talk to you about this stuff! Shade Whitesel: Good, yeah, I love to, so thanks so much for having me a second time. I feel honored. Melissa Breau: Well, for all of our wonderful listeners, we'll be back next week with Patricia McConnell. Patricia will be on the podcast to talk about what she's learned over her time in dog training. Don't miss it! It if you haven't already, subscribe to our podcast in itunes or the podcast app of your choice to have our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available. CREDITS: Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called “Buddy.” Audio editing provided by Chris Lang.
SHOW NOTES: Summary: Julie Symons has been involved in dog sports for over 20 years. She's competed in flyball, conformation, agility, obedience, herding, tracking and nosework. One of Julie's favorite things is a versatile team! Her first Belgian Tervuren, Rival, was the first of his breed to finish his championship in conformation, obedience, and agility. Julie truly believes that participating in multiple sports is enriching to both person and dog and builds on that mutual partnership and trust. She also blogs at K9 Rivarly.com, for those of you out there like me, who just can't get enough of all this dog stuff. Links mentioned: K9Rivalry.com Next Episode: To be released 4/28/2017, featuring Julie Symons. TRANSCRIPTION: Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau, and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports Podcast, brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high quality instruction for competitive dog sports, using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today we'll be talking to Julie Symons. Julie has been involved in dog sports for over 20 years. She's competed in flyball, conformation, agility, obedience, herding, tracking, and Nose work. One of Julie's favorite things is a versatile team. Her first Belgian Tervuren, Rival, was the first of his breed to finish his championship in conformation, obedience, and agility. Julie truly believes that participating in multiple sports is enriching to both the person and the dog and builds on that mutual partnership and trust. She also blogs at k9rivalry.com, for those of you, out there who, like me, just can't get enough of all this dog stuff. Hey, Julie. Welcome to the podcast. Julie Symons: Hi, Melissa. Thanks for having me. This is going to be a lot of fun. Melissa Breau: Did I totally butcher the Belgian Tervuren there? Julie Symons: Not bad, but I forgot to remind you Rival is a she and not a he. Melissa Breau: Oh, well that makes a difference. Julie Symons: It does. Melissa Breau: So, to start us out, can you tell us a little bit about the dogs you have now? Julie Symons: I have my Belgian Tervuren, Savvy. She's nine years old, so she's my second Terv, and she is, I would not say semi-retirement, but I'm not training her in agility, or showing in agility or obedience anymore. We are focusing on nose work. She has her breed champion, her agility champion. Last year she got her UD and her Nose Work 3, and a couple of years ago she got a Tracking Dog Excellent, and that was really, a really exciting class to title in. It's hard to get into test, and it's challenging to find places to track and train, so she's a Versatility 3 dog, it's a title in AKC, so she's my first Versatility 3 dog, so that's her. My newest dog is a Belgian Malinois, sometimes also hard to pronounce. He is 17 months old, and I love him. I do prefer girl dogs, but I felt that he was a better addition with my current girl, and they do get along great, and he's a very friendly dog, not quite much phases him, so it's been really nice to find that in a Belgian, and it's just fun to train him, and he's different, so every dog I've had is different. He passed his Nose Work ORTs, Order Recognition Test, last fall, and we have his first Nose Work 1 trial next month. He's still a baby dog, you know. I don't like to push them. Nose work is a little different. I know he's ready for that, but I have years for him, really, you know, trialing and anything else, so I'm taking my time with that. Melissa Breau: It's kind of awesome that's he's a Belgian with the ability to kind of hang out. Julie Symons: Yeah. I actually, kind of, joked that he's like a golden in a Malinois suit, and he's gone to a couple of conformation shows, sometimes the only Malinois, and I never even, you know, he just didn't mind people touching him, examining him. I didn't even have to train that. I probably don't even want to admit that, but we'll see. He's a little older now. He might, you know, sometimes they go through different phases, and they go through different periods of time, and we, actually, have a trial next weekend that we're showing in conformation, so I do like to get dogs out early. That's the one thing I do like, conformation is something that you can get them into the ring early, if they're ready, and they can have some really fun time getting lots of steak and liver in the ring, so. Melissa Breau: Hey. Can't beat that. Julie Symons: No. No. Melissa Breau: So, I think, from reading your bio, and stuff, you started out in flyball, right? Julie Symons: Yeah, when I bought my first house, I was an adult, in my 20s, I wanted a dog, so one of the first things I did was I went and got a dog. I went to a shelter and I picked out Dreyfus, really cute dog, kind of a big, you know, 60 pound, 70 pound, you know, Collie mix. We called him the Dick Clark of dogs because he never aged. He lived to 16, almost 16, and except for his physical appearance, you know, he just looked as handsome and young as Dick Clark, I guess. You know, I don't really remember how I got into flyball. I do know that I started out in some local class where you just stood in the room for an hour, and you got one time up, you know, in such ways we don't train anymore. You just don't have your dog, you know, unfocused and sitting there for an hour, you know, while you wait your turn, and I think I started, I got into the Amber mixed breed, it's an American mixed breed organization registry. I don't even think they have it anymore, and I could get like, you know, obedience titles, so I must have been renting, you know, some other training buildings to practice, and there were some people there that were doing flyball, so I must have networked and met them because I once I started going to matches and some UKC trials, and you just started meeting more people, and I got on this flyball team, and it was neat because, you know, I learned how to teach my dog to hit a box and a ball would pop out. He was really good at flyball. He was a big dog, so he was able to jump the little hurdles fast, and he got a run in every heat, at the trials. I remember my team members weren't always happy that he got a run every time, but he was consistent, you know, and you want the time for the flyball, for the speed. I also learned, you know, like doing a Front Cross, you send your dog down one side and you do a Front Cross and you pick your dog up. So, you know, I do look back at that as, you know, I didn't stick with it, I still really like the sport, didn't stay with it, but it was my first time going to, driving a couple of hours to a trial and I remember thinking, well how can a dog stay in the car that long? What if they have to go to the bathroom? It's funny, when you look back and see, we were all newbies, we all started out somewhere, and you know, I remember taking pictures of my dog in the hotel room, like, wow, they can be in the hotel room, with us. So, I did that for about a year, went to about three or four tournaments for flyball. At that same time, I was starting to look for my purebred dogs, and I thought, oh, I like this. There wasn't as many opportunities for mix breeds back then, as it is today. I, actually, was looking at mixed breeds before I got Drac, my Malinois. I was so open to a mixed breed, it didn't really matter because you can do so much with them now, but back then you couldn't, so I definitely wanted a purebred dog. You know, Dreyfus was great, but he really was, you know, not a lot of drive, very distractible. Now I probably have a lot of skills now to deal with that, but you know, he liked to sniff the ground a lot, and he was not the easiest, you know, dog to train, you know, and for being new, you know, it was kind of hard, so I didn't do much with him, past that. So, I started researching, and I was looking for my next dog, and I saw the David Letterman Stupid Pet Tricks on, you know, one night I was watching TV and they had a Belgian Malinois. I really liked that breed, so I was still going to this local obedience class and I mentioned it, to the instructor, and he said, oh, you should really get a Belgian Tervuren instead, so I went to a show, in Syracuse, a conformation show, and I found when the Belgian Tervuren were on, and I loved them. They were so beautiful. I grew up with rust Collies, so they kind of reminded me of that a little bit, so it was so fortunate how I found my next dog. I contacted breeders. They didn't know me from anybody. They had a boy and a girl, and I got the girl, from Missouri, flown to me, sight unseen. Her name was Rival, and she changed my life, and she was just this high drive, just very biteable, bonded to me immediately, and then, I think, I did bring her to that same dog, pet, class trainer, for a little bit, but I didn't stay long because, you know, the methods were much different, and I heard about a local trainer, who had just got her OTCH, on a lab, so I started private lessons with her, and I never, ever, went back to obedience classes, a class environment. Then, so, when I got her, agility was really starting to hit the scene, so I got into an agility class right away. This is when AKC had one class, you would have the standard class, you would run in. We would drive like, you know, four hours, and you would go in the ring for 30 seconds, and you were done, for the day. So that's how I, kind of, went. Then, in obedience, of course, I was continuing with that, and private lessons, and then I added agility. I started, when she was young, I started tracking the pet class that I had gone to was run by some Schutzhund trainers, so I would meet with them, when they would do some tracking, and so I learned a little bit about tracking, but I didn't stay with them long. I would take a lot of breaks on and off from tracking, you know, and of course nose work wasn't around at that point, but that's how I, kind of, just, you know, I got the bug. I got the dog training bug with Dreyfus, got the purebred dog that I had more opportunities, and you know, she just made it so enjoyable and easy for me to pick up new sports, and so that's how I, kind of, you know, you get that first dog, you know… Melissa Breau: You dive in deep, and the world opens up to you. Julie Symons: Yep. Yep. Melissa Breau: So, at what point, I mean, it sounds like you were doing a lot of different things right out of the gate, with Rival. Did you immediately know that versatility was going to be something that was important to you? At what point was that like a conscious thing where that was like something you wanted to focus on? Julie Symons: You know, I do think it was because of her, and just training her in so many sports, her temperament and her drive were superb. She excelled at everything we did, and she was a great teacher. I mean I still consider myself a novice handler, at that time, and I really got addicted. I got addicted to dog training, and I know, any and all of it, so I just, you know, couldn't imagine just doing agility. I just enjoyed the cross training and just teaching such different skills, to my dog. I think I would get bored if I only did one, and I think that my dogs, the dogs I tend to get, to me, you know, I don't want to put human feelings on dogs, but I do think they enjoy the versatility too. I think they like the different skills and the different things they get to do. Melissa Breau: So, in retrospect, what are some of the benefits that you have seen, from competing in multiple sports, with each of your dogs? Julie Symons: Yeah. So, what I just mentioned, I do think there's a cross training aspect to it. I'm not just working on, you know, their muscles for running fast. I'm using their nose, and I'm asking for some precision in other sports, like obedience. It also gives them breaks, you know, instead of working one sport all the time, you know, they take a break from, maybe, some of the more strenuous running and jumping, and then they get to switch to something else. I found that training in the different sports, you just develop and bond and relationship that's different and maybe a little deeper because you have to learn different context of things, you're learning more skills, and it strengthens that relationship that you have, you know, you have this mutual understanding with each other, to go out and do these different sports, and that you have these, you know, cues and things that they understand, and it's just amazing to know that I have…because I train for sports, I don't normally train just to train. I've gotten a little bit more into doing some tricks, I think that's great for dogs, too, so just to think of all the ways I can teach my dog to do different things, and back to, you know, when I had Rival, she really showed me what was possible to do with a dog, and the possible bonds you can have. I just never thought you could do all of this with a dog, and I just think that's what made me like the versatility of it too, it's just a, kind of, challenge to try other sports, you know. So, when nose work came along, I did not need another dog sport, believe me, but her brother had started it, and I saw a video of it, didn't know much about it, and he passed away at a little bit of a young age, so I was, kind of, inspired to say, you know, in his honor I'm going to take this nose work class that I heard about Denise teaching, before Fenzi started, and she was actually in heat, or she was injured, or something, so like the timing was really good, so I used that, my dog is in heat or has a minor injury or it's winter, you know, I think of what else could I do with my dog because I can't do some of the other things, and that's, actually, how I got into nose work. So, you know, it just comes along at the right time, for you, with the dog that you have. Melissa Breau: So, I'd imagine that knowing now, at least, that that's something that's important to you, that you want to do a lot of different things with your dog, when you have a new puppy, which you've been through fairly recently, you might approach, kind of, those early days a little bit differently, do you want to talk a little bit about that? Julie Symons: Yeah. I think it is a little different, knowing what you're going to, you know, train your dog in and compete in, but it's really quite similar because a lot of the same skills that you need across all the sports, like you need your dog to be able to stay, you know, and sit or down, you really do, in every single sport. You need impulse control, you need them to, you know, wait for your cues. They need focus. They need recalls. You know, you just need all of that stuff, so that's what I just start building. I tend to train thoughtful dogs. That's good. I'm thinking like I want more like, almost out of control dogs, but I really don't. I do tend to train, I tend to teach dogs to be very thoughtful, and I do need to balance that with some of that little bit of edge that I do want from them as well. Let's see, what else? But I also, like, approach it by switching on and off. I'm not training every sport all the time, you know, nobody can do that, and even, since training in multiple sports is also a challenge in itself, I also, you know, have a busy day life, day job. I have, you know, a son. I have a husband, so it's hard to fit everything in. So, how I approach it is I just, sometimes, focus on one thing a month, like I need to teach my dog to weave, so just that month, it happened to be summer, I'm going to just, every day, go out there and train my dogs, a couple of times a day, on the weave poles, and I don't really have time for anything else, but that's okay. That's just what I'm doing that month. Then, the next month, I might focus on, I don't know, getting out to new places for obedience, and then the next month I may focus on teeter, you know, get my dog on the teeter and everything, so it just, I don't really have a good, you know, plan around it. I don't write it down, or anything, I just make sure I train my dog on something, most days, and I usually have a focus, so a lot of it depends on what I might be starting to want to compete in first. Melissa Breau: That makes a lot of sense. Julie Symons: Yeah. Yeah. Because you can't, if you try to sit there and say, you'll get overwhelmed. You'll get overwhelmed if you're going to try to say, I want to do all of these six sports, oh my gosh, you know, and you know, I kind of move on. Once Savvy got her MACH 2 to, you now, I didn't need to get a MACH 3 or 4, so I just decided, she could have still kept running, she was seven or eight, or something, but I just had other things to do. I had to go work on her, you know, TDX or her, whatever, nose work, now. I am very goal oriented to the title, so that kind of drives me in the direction that I train. Melissa Breau: Yeah. I feel like that's something that I've definitely struggled with, so it's interesting to hear, kind of, pick one focus. Now, at least, for me, and for my dog, I found that she doesn't always retain the information long term, if we, kind of, leave it alone and come back to it, you know, like months later. Is that something you've had to deal with at all? Julie Symons: Oh, she doesn't. Well, no. Well I do think it depends on what it is, if you hadn't, you know, taught something to kind of fluency, then you're going to lose a little bit, but I also think they remember some of it, at least, so there are some things that I think you do need to, kind of, not drop off, you know, for too long. It depends, you know, it might be stays or recalls, obviously. I do think that, most part, they do remember, so, in that case, if they don't, then, you know, you might have to just decide what's more important that you need, and keep that in because, you know, I could do more than just my weave pole training that month. Obviously, I'm in the catch, and I'll do stays with my dogs. I'll put them in a sit stay, while I'm making something, or you know, sometimes it just takes one minute of training, just one to three minutes of training, a day. Everybody can find that. I started to train a little bit before I went to work. Lately, with Drac, I train when I get home. He is so pumped and into me, that's when I need to train him because he's a young, adolescent boy. He, kind of, like doesn't have a lot of stamina to focus, so I've actually had some really, really wonderful sessions, and it just might be as much as i can train with a handful of food and that's all I do. Now he's 17 months old, and he is like, oh my gosh, I'm like, he is so focused on me, like that didn't happen months ago. So then, because I have that focus and maturity, I'm able to, kind of, progress a little bit further or teach him something new, so it's, kind of, give and take, and you're right, I know some of the stuff I started with him, like backup, I was teaching him backing up, he doesn't know that at all, anymore, so, yeah, that is something that I did lose, but that's not as important to me, to backup, away from me, so I've got to get back to that because I do think it's useful, in some areas, but yeah, I did lose that one on him, by the way. I think what happened was, I was teaching him some other things, like a fold back down, or something else, and he kept backing up, and it wasn't reinforcing it because I was working on something else, so I think that's why I lost it because of the reinforcement, you know, I extinguished it. I extinguished his backing up, accidentally. Melissa Breau: Yeah. Do you have any advice, I guess, for other trainers, who maybe want to intentionally train for multiple sports or approach the idea that if they have a dog, they want to compete in multiple sports, either for getting started or just, kind of, for balancing things? Julie Symons:Yeah. Yes, I do. So, a little bit, what I mentioned earlier, I think if you just don't get overwhelmed and realize that you aren't trialling your new dog, right away. It really is going to be years before you really get them in the ring, and I know, like it's almost like you put a lot of time in those first, you know, two to four years. I didn't bring in my, you know, Rival, who got an Obedience Champion, she didn't enter the obedience ring until she was five. She could have gone in a little earlier, but I wasn't ready, and once I got in and I realized we were ready, but you have time to bring your dog in because once you get them into that ring, at that time, it goes fast after that, so you take that time, you know, I would say two to four years, depending on the sport, and once you get to that point, then it goes really fast. If you start too early, I think you're just setting yourself up to have too many gaps in your training, and then you're going to, probably, struggle, and then it's going to take you longer, so I would, you know, number one, not worry about time. It will come, when ready. Also, a foundation, like I said earlier, just work on the foundation, work on things that you're going to want anyway, you're going to want to save the recalls, the focus, the impulse control, that's going to apply to every sport, and something that's near and dear to Denise's heart, actually, is personal play. I've had to learn that more so in the last nine years because my first dog, Rival, was just naturally into me. I was her world. Honestly, I didn't do anything, to make that happen, and when I got Savvy, and now I have Drac, other things in the world are more interesting, to them, than me, so I have had to think about, wait, I've got to build that personal bond, that personal play, not relying on food so much, or toys, and if you can focus on that, and you can have a dog that's totally into you, that's half the battle, and then the rest is just skill training, it's just skills, and we all know how to trail skills. Seriously, we have all the classes and the tools and the, you know, video examples, and the people's blogs, we all know how to teach skills, some are harder than others, don't get me wrong, but if you have a dog that you have built up this wonderful relationship with, I mean we all have wonderful relationships with our dogs. I'm not even saying that. It's from an interaction, it's a kind of bonded, you know, interaction that you need to build for that personal play around other, you know, interesting things, in the environment. So, I would say, and I had to, really, grow in that area, for me, and I really bring that into my training more where, to me, it's more important that I'm going to interact and play with my dog then teach Drac to backup again. To me I'd rather need him to really want to come to me and to play with me, so that's the things that I would have people to focus on. Melissa Breau: You know, I've seen, I don't remember if you shared a video or if it's on your Fenzi bio, or what, I mean, I've seen some of your competition videos, and I would never guess that personal play is something you've struggled with. I saw you in between exercises, and on one of the videos you got down on the floor, and you were like very happy to be there. It was really nice. I mean it was… Julie Symons: Yeah. I mean I think one of the videos might have been Rival, and I did make a clip, once, for somebody, to show what I did between the rings with Savvy, and she's a very distractible dog. She'll know the things in her environment, which is typical of Belgians, too, they're very aware of people, there are some people they just don't like, and so I've really had to work on that, so thank you, for that compliment. To be honest, that is why Savvy didn't enter the obedience ring for a while. I can't remember how old she was, when she actually went in for her Novice, CD, but she actually went in for her, you know, Novice CD but she got her Utility title at eight, last year, because I got her, when my son was young, he was only two, so I just didn't have the time. I had three dogs, and I had my older dog, Dreyfus. I had, did I have three dogs? Yeah. Savvy. I still had Rival and Dreyfus, when I got Savvy, and I just couldn't do it all. I, actually, realized I cannot do it all right now, and that was okay. That was okay. If I put pressure on myself then it's just going to carry over to my dogs, so I appreciate that compliment. Melissa Breau: So, you got there, and you got there at your own pace, and you got beautiful results. Julie Symons: Yes. Yes. Melissa Breau: So, I know that, in addition to teaching for FDSA, you also teach in person, right? Julie Symons: Yeah. So, actually, back in the late ‘90s, I started teaching agility, when I was doing well with my dog and it was still new, in this area. I found, you know, that I enjoyed that. I enjoyed helping people, and I was in a dog club, so I started teaching through a dog club, and then, eventually, when we bought our current property, the first thing we built, you know, we have seven open acres, and the first thing we did is we built a hundred by hundred, you know, fence, so the property was, the house hadn't even started building, and I had this hundred by hundred, you know, fence. Melissa Breau: Priorities. Julie Symons: Yeah. Priorities because it was a lot of deer, and everything, and when I first started, without the fence, you know, a couple of dogs to take off, and that was really scary, so we got the fence up. So, I started teaching on my own. That was probably back in 2000, in 1999 or the year 2000, and then I had my son in 2004, and I tried to keep up, you know, and I tried to keep teaching, and I was still showing Rival actively, finishing up some of her big titles. I just had to back off a bit, so I stopped teaching and took a break from that, and then when I got Savvy into nose work, and she got her nose work 1 title, I immediately was like, “I'm going to start teaching.” I just wanted to get that first title and then start bringing it to my area because I could tell it was an up and coming sport. You know, everybody just didn't AKC anymore, you know, there's Barn Hunt, there's a lot of other venues of dog sports. It was about the same time that I started teaching at FDSA, and so it's gone very well, locally. People love the in-person classes because they can have them, you know, from me, so they're spoiled a little bit. So, yeah, really, actually this morning I hosted a little match for some students, and myself, trialing next month, so it's a lot of work. I rented a building and we had a gym area and another room to do hides. It keeps me busy. Melissa Breau: So, just for anybody who may happen to be local to you, do you want to share, kind of, what area you're in? Julie Symons: Yeah. I'm south of Rochester, New York. I'm near the thruway, so I'm actually equal distance between Syracuse and Buffalo. I do have some people that, you know, come about an hour away, but most are local. Ironically some of them are just like within five minutes of my neighborhood, so we all live pretty close, and Rochester, New York, we've heard this for years, we have a really, really big, strong dog community, some really talented people, a lot of people invested in training, you know, competitively with our dogs. You know, I have people, in my classes that, you know, I have few pet people that started with me, people who hadn't done much of the competitive sports, so I have a mix, but I do have a lot of people who have some dog training experience, and it was cool that they, these are people who do Schutzhund, you know, obedience, rally, agility, like they're interested in nose work. Their dogs may be getting a little older, they're retiring form a sport, or they're young dogs who are coming up, and it's, really, taught me that it applies, or interests, a wide range of people, you know, it's not just for certain, you know, demographic of dogs and handlers, so and it's growing. I, actually, can barely keep up. I, just recently, made a job change to go to part time. I work at Xerox. I've been there my whole career, out of college, and I just decided that I want more time to myself, as well as for dog training. So, yeah, I'm actually really excited about that. The hours will change in a couple of weeks, so we'll see. I'm not really sure if I'll get more time to myself. I may just get busier, so we'll see, but I did find that that's what I love. That's what I was passionate about. That's where I was creative, and that wasn't the side of my life that I wanted to cut back on, so I just sat back, looked at our situation, and said, “I can do this,” so, yeah. Melissa Breau: Now you, kind of, mentioned AKC in there, and some of the other Nose work programs, but I know there's been a lot of buzz about the fact that AKC has just recently added a scent work program, right? Julie Symons: Yeah, and that timing came quite at a good time, for some of my latest decisions. Yeah. So AKC rolled out a nose work program, they call it scent work, and you know, I think we all expected it to come at some point. I think a lot of people do like to show in AKC. AKC, you know, is a big organization, and probably going to be able to put on more readily available trials for people to enter. I love the other nose work programs. I think they've done a really great job with them, and I will still trial in them, but there's people that are in some isolated areas that are too far for trials, there's a long waitlist, so I think the AKC program, the reason I'm excited about it, is I think it will get more people into the sport because I really have found that nose work just does something to the dogs. It does something to the handlers. It's not just the dogs that love because they get to use their nose, but just the people, to see their dogs be these little detection dogs, and there's something about it. I haven't quite pinpointed it. I think people like tracking, but tracking, sometimes, is hard to find the field, and there's also limited, you know, tracking tests. There's just something about it, and I think it's just people seeing their dogs, instead of us telling our dogs not to sniff and smell things, we're letting them sniff and smell things, and they're doing it with purpose, and they're doing it, you know, it's a job. I think dogs are, kind of, bred to do jobs, and it's a job that comes naturally to them, but there's still practicing and training and skills that you've got to train to actually compete in that sport, so it's just been something that I'm really excited about with the AKC program. Then they added this handler discrimination class, which existed in a UKC program, so I'm not as familiar with that, from a nose work context, but I've done some articles for 20 years, and you know, I never really had a lot of problem with that, but I understand that it is challenging. I think it's just more of a mindset of people realizing our dogs really can pick up the smallest amount of smell, and it's not even a small amount of smell. I mean we're putting our strong odor on it, compared to anything else, in the environment, so there's a discrimination that they're making between our smell and the steward's, you know, smell, from touching the articles, and in this new AKC program, you actually have your glove, or your sock, that you, you know, scent, and then they're going to have another person's scented, you know, item in one of the other boxes to start, so it's going to be discrimination, and you know, it's just like with anything, you train your dog, what was reinforced, what is the value, so I teach my scent is to be reinforced, there's a value to that, and to me discrimination is less of an issue than somebody going, oh, I like the steward's hand smell better. It's just more that they're stressed, or they just pick up any article, so I think that the discrimination part, to me, you know, is very trainable, and it's easy to teach a dog, just like with nose work, we teach our dog these odors, you know, Birch, Anise, Clove, these are odors that we've taught you that are reinforced. Any other novel owner, whether it's a piece of bread or some meat or a toy, or even animal droppings, you know, they may find that self-reinforcing, but if they have the drive for the odors that we have reinforced, then they will seek those out over everything, so. So, yeah, it is pretty exciting, with the AKC program. Melissa Breau: My understanding is that you're going to be a judge, right? Julie Symons: Yeah. I did apply, to be a judge, and I was approved. They still have to rollout… Melissa Breau: Congrats. Julie Symons: Yeah. Thanks. I've never entered that arena, of judging, so they still have to rollout like some online training and a test to take, so we're waiting for that to come out, and it's exciting because somebody, locally, is taking nose work classes with me. She said, oh, we're thinking of getting this added to our national breed, coming up, and she said, I know somebody who's a judge, so it will be very nice that I could, you know, maybe for some of the local breed shows, you know, I'll be available to help with that, to get it started. Melissa Breau: Right. Right. Now I want to change gears a little bit because I know you also do the obedience games class, at FDSA, even though it's not in the schedule, until October, I wanted to make sure we had a chance to talk a little bit about some of the obedience stuff you teach too, so do you want to just tell us a little bit about the concept for the class and kind of what you cover? Julie Symons: Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for bringing that up. It's been a very fun class topic for me. It's called obedience games, and we added a starter version, which I just ended last term because I found that my first version got advanced pretty quickly, so I thought, wow, I can really even break this down more, and that was a real hit. It, kind of, you know, took a life of its own, and it was just real exciting. It's about, you know, being informal but still being clear to your dog. It's about adding more movement and less, you know, static, stationary behaviors, and less fiddling with, you know, precision and the front, so we're not even doing fronts, so I'm like, we're not doing fronts in this class. Every time your dog comes here, you're going to pass a treat between your legs, and then that just builds this like, you know, center of position, and your dog is going to continue with speed, and they're just going to know, you know, to like go through you, you know. We're not going to worry about errors. I really emphasize that because we all, you know, we all get a little frustrated or disappointed, and I'm really, really impressed, early on, there are no errors, we're just training, we're learning, we're finding out what gaps we have. We're getting information from our dogs. There's no reason to be, you know, upset, or bothered and we don't want our dogs to ever, you know, we don't want them to have stress, in this game, and I think that I'm seeing some people give me comments that they're seeing some people who took my very first obedience game class, last fall, they said, wow, I very rarely still use the games, it's really helped my dog in the ring. I think it's more that it's helped the human, you know, it's helping humans to, kind of, maybe loosen up a little bit. One of the things that I really was, you know, enforcing was, you know, these daily games that if you just work, just a few minutes, like I said earlier, a few minutes a day, with your dog, there's just something about that because I can go days and days without training my dog, I just get busy, you know, but instead, if I just find one little, kind of, action packed, high reinforcing game, to play with my dog, which with a purpose for obedience skills, for example, it just pays off with even your recalls. It pays off with your dog, you know, your personal bond, and I try to do some personal toy and play before every session. I encourage that for the students to do. Then, because we're all so busy, I'm busy, you know, you can find a couple of minutes every day, and it really will add up and you will find your dog actually learned skills, and they want to work with you more because they look forward to that time of the day, you know, that you train with them. Another thing is, you know, these scores will come eventually. When I entered, you know, my OTCH dog in her first trial, you know, we did get good scores, but they weren't going to be scores that got me placed to get the OTCH points, but I was just in the novice class. I didn't need those points yet, so I wanted her to go in there and know her job and be happy. I just, kind of, worked at those point deductions that I got, I just worked to clean them up, over time. I just said, oh, that's where our gap is. I'm going to clean it up, and I'm going to lose less points, in that exercise, and that's how I got to the higher scores, but not until I was, you know, further along, in my obedience competition trial because you've got to get that experience, and I just think I was trying to bring that thought process to the games classes. Melissa Breau: Yeah. I mean, I think that even the mindset, right, from competition to thinking about it all as a game, for the person, is such a difference, and it just brings a more relaxed structure and more fun. Julie Symons: Yeah. Yeah. It has. I have been pleasantly surprised with how well it's been received, and I might even have to come up with like a middle level now. We'll see how I can plan that. And what I love about it, too, is it complements all the great skills classes that we have, at the Academy, so people can be working on their retrieves, and you know, whatever, you know, all these other little skilled areas, you know, separately but at the same time, but separate from the quick little three minute games sessions because I'm doing that with Drac. Believe me, I'm working on, you know, his retrieve and his hold, and things like that. I'm working those heavy-duty skill things off on the side as well, so. Melissa Breau: So, to kind of round things out, I want to ask you the three questions that we've asked everybody so far, who's come on the show. Julie Symons: Okay. Melissa Breau: So, first, what's the dog related accomplishment that you are proudest of? Julie Symons: Okay. It has to be just, you know, Rival, my first Terv, she became the first champion OTCH MACH Terv, and just getting that OTCH, actually, in itself, was just a thrill because I just went from the Novice A classes to OTCH, and I learned so much, from her. I, also, had my son, he was a couple of years at that time, and I just needed a couple of more points, and I was going in the ring, and we weren't doing well. I was no longer training in the open class because my dog was now older, she was ten, or nine, or ten, and there was a lot of jumping. I couldn't even train. I didn't have time to train a lot, and I didn't have time to maintain that, so one of my friends, and trainers, said, “You really need to enter the open class.” On a whim, I entered the one day that had spots left, in open, and we went in the ring, and I said, oh, I'm never going to finish my OTCH. I'm never going to finish my OTCH in an open class because all of the points are in utility and you know the scores, people get such great, you know, scores, you know, and it's so hard to get the points in open, if you look at the point schedule. We went in the ring, and that's the one that I show a lot, it's in my obedience games intro, and we went into the ring, and I love to watch it. I watch it, if I'm down, or something, because just I went in there and I think that's a lot, what I process my obedience games class with because I went in the ring not expecting much, and my dog was getting older, I knew she was going to be retired soon, and I have a son. I just can't keep up with everything. I just thought, someday I'm not going to be able to go in the ring with this dog, and so I'm going to go in there and we got like a 199, you know, first place, we got her OTCH from that run. Melissa Breau: That's awesome. Julie Symons: Yeah. Then, you know, to be a first in something is so hard, in a breed like the Belgian Tervuren. Now the MACH was a relatively newer title, so some fabulous dogs, before, obviously didn't have that chance, but yeah, I am, we are the first Belgian Tervuren champion OTCH MACH, so that was very, yeah, special to me. Melissa Breau: That's awesome. Julie Symons: To be honest, that dog was so deserving of that, so. Melissa Breau: Yeah. She really sounds like something special. Julie Symons: Yes. Melissa Breau: So, the second question, I like to ask everybody, and I think this is, honestly, my favorite question of the whole podcast, is what is the best piece of training advice that you have ever heard? Julie Symons: Yeah. I was looking forward to this one. I thought a lot about it, and you know, we all get such great training advice, but there's two that really stuck out to me, and they've been pretty recent ones. I absolutely love Amy Cook's, in one of her classes, but she also said it at camp last year, that, “Every time you train your dog, you're teaching them how to feel,” and that just, you know, goes back to some of my outlook on training, also, is just like that's why I don't want to, if I stress them out, that's how they're going to feel about training, so it's just such a powerful but simple statement that she made, and I really embrace that, and share that as often as I can with my students. Melissa Breau: That's great. Julie Symons: I have a second one too. Can I have two? Melissa Breau: Absolutely. Julie Symons: Okay. Another one that I really liked was one from Bob Bailey. It was, you know, he's big on clicker training, shaping, and he said something that, also, really resonated with me, with, “You better made a decision because the next one is right around the corner.” So, if you think about when you're training a dog, and you're like, oh, was that the right criteria. Was it right enough? You know, your next decision is right up on you. You have to make a decision, and it might not be the best decision, and it might not even be the right decision. You probably made a wrong decision, but you have to make a decision on whether you're going to click something or reinforce something because the next decision is right around the corner, and it's okay, you look at all of us trainers, our timing is off. We accidently click something that we weren't supposed to. Look how resilient our dogs are. They recover. You know, they're fine. So, I just really like that because I think some people, we freeze up, we freeze up in the training, when we don't know what to do. That's okay. Do something because you're going to have to make another decision, like, another second later, so I really pulled that off of a DVD that I was listening to, and I never wrote it down, exactly what he said, but I just remember that concept. So those are my two. Melissa Breau: That's awesome. So, for our last one, who is somebody else, in the dog world, that you look up to? Julie Symons: So, this is, of course, the hardest question, I think, everybody has had, and I thought about it also, so this is obviously tough because I've learned so much from people, local and afar, because I work in so many different sport areas, you know, it just multiplies how many people I've worked with. I think I'm going to say that I do look up to anyone that thinks out of the box and is willing to try something different. I just think that, sometimes, we all get, kind of, stuck in an area, in a way that we do things, and I think somebody who is willing to, you know, just, kind of, maybe work outside their comfort level or just try something new, I just really respect that because you're not going to grow if don't do that. You're not going to change something, and of course, my learning has exponentially grown, being a part of FDSA. I think the whole base of the FDSA instructors are amazing, so I do look up to the Academy and the instructors that we offer such a diversity of people and topics. It's not just performance now, it's from, you know, your mind to cooperative care to competition. There is one name I will mention, if I have to mention one name, if I have time, is I will never forget one person that I worked with, with Rival, my very first high drive performance dog, her name was Patty Hatfield. She's from Florida, and she had a wonderful Malinois named Lily, who was on the US agility world team, back in the ‘90s, and she would come to our area frequently for agility seminars, and she helped me, so much, with how I interacted with my dog. I am a pretty high drive person, myself, high energy, actually, high energy, and so with my dog, so she taught me how to, you know, adjust my energy levels, when she needed to be calmer. She also does just love her dog. She had a great bond with her dog, Lily. She just loved her. She would talk about, you know, when she went home, from a seminar, I know I'm going to do all the wrong things, and I'm going to go hug my dog and just get all crazy when I see her, but you're not supposed to do that because back in that day, you were supposed to ignore your dog, when you got home. You were supposed to not let them run up the stairs, ahead of you. You're not supposed to let your dogs on the furniture, or you're supposed to eat before they ate, all these little, you know, control things that were told to you, and I always remember, because I, kind of, did that stuff too, but I thought, “I'm not going to tell anybody,” but I let my dog up, on my bed, and let my dog run up the stairs, but I always thought I was doing something wrong because that was what you were told back then. I just remember her just saying, “I don't care what I'm doing, or if I'm doing the wrong thing. I love my dog, and I just got to be excited when I see her, when I come home,” so I always, kind of, still just think of those interactions that I had with her, with the advice she gave me. She had a Malinois, and again, I just love the Belgian breeds, and I could relate to that as well, so. Melissa Breau: Thanks, so much, for coming on the podcast, Julie, and thanks, to our listeners, for tuning in. We'll be back in two weeks with Amy Cook, to talk about using play to help dogs cope with fear and reactivity. If you haven't already, subscribe to our podcast in iTunes or the podcast app, of your choice, to have our next episode automatically download to your phone as soon as it becomes available. CREDITS: Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called “Buddy.” Audio editing provided by Chris Lang and transcription written by CLK Transcription Services. Thanks again for tuning in -- and happy training!
SHOW NOTES: Summary: Shade Whitesel has been training and competing in dog sports since she was a kid. Always interested in how dogs learned, she has successfully competed in Schutzhund, AKC obedience and French Ring. What started out as an experiment, competing at the national level in IPO without the use of an e collar, has now turned into a firm commitment to positive training and the desire to teach other trainers and dogs how to be successful in bitesports with as little punishment as possible. Her focus as a trainer is on clear communication with your dog -- as we discuss in the podcast, she believes this relieves frustration and improves the overall quality of the dog's work. Next Episode: To be released 2/17/2017, featuring Loretta Mueller. TRANSCRIPTION: Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports podcast brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high quality instruction for competitive dog sports using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today we'll be talking to Shade Whitesel. Shade has been training and competing in dog sports since she was a kid. Always interested in how dogs learned, she has successfully competed in Schutzhund, AKC obedience and French Ring. What started out as an experiment, competing at the national level in IPO without the use of an e collar, has now turned into a firm commitment to positive training and the desire to teach other trainers and dogs how to be successful in bitesports with as little punishment as possible. Hi, Shade. Welcome to the podcast. Shade Whitesel: Hi, Melissa. Melissa Breau: So, to start out can you tell me a little bit about the dogs you have now and what you're working on with them? Shade Whitesel: Sure. My youngest dog is Ones who is 4 years old and he just recently earned his Schutzhund 2 in December. I'm looking forward to getting his Schutzhund 3 this spring and then going on to compete nationally with him if it looks like we're a good enough team. Briefly, Schutzhund is kind of like a triathlon for dogs, based on police work. It requires tracking, where they have to follow a person's track and indicate articles that the person's dropped, and then an obedience portion, and then a protection portion. So, Ones attained pretty good scores in his one and his two, and I'm excited about his future career. I tend to do AKC later in the dog's career, since it's easier on their bodies than bitesports. I also have Baileys, Ones's sister, who was returned to me a year ago and we've start setting the foundation for AKC obedience, and she's coming along. She's been teaching me a lot about working an older dog with established habits before I got them. So, kind of what to do with that and how to retrain. And Reiki my old guy, he's both Ones's and Bailey's dad, he's 10 years old and I had really hoped to get him in the AKC utility ring. He's got his CDX, but he's getting older there so we'll see. And he has numerous IPO 3's. We competed nationally for four years, that kind of thing, and he did really well. So, that's my current dogs. Melissa Breau: Awesome. And they're all German Shepherds, right? Shade Whitesel: They are. I have only German Shepherds right now and I'll add a couple of more breeds eventually, but right now because of Schutzhund, I need to do the bite work and so I've chosen the German Shepherd as my breed for that. Melissa Breau: How did you get into competitive dog sports and training? Shade Whitesel: Well, I always wanted a dog when I was a kid and I finally got a mixed breed dog. And at that time, your training classes were kind of like AKC obedience and she did really well in her training class, but I couldn't compete with her because she was a mixed breed. So, I always wanted to kind of compete and then when I got my first purebred dog I got interested in Schutzhund because it's a breed test for the Shepherds. And I started really getting into it and getting titles on the dogs. So, that kind of morphed into people asking me to give training lessons to them and once I put a Schutzhund 1 on a dog then I figured that I could at least start training other people. So, that's kind of when it morphed into becoming a professional dog trainer. Melissa Breau: I've heard you talk before a little bit about your positive training journey and kind of what got you started. But can you kind of share it for the audience? Shade Whitesel: Yeah. In bite work sports and in Schutzhund training you're normally dealing with pretty strong dogs physically and mentally, that really like to bite. So, they have lots of reinforcement history for biting, whether that is the ball or the tug, or the bad guy. And there's a culture correction in this sport when it comes to getting control. Because these dogs are really strong willed and eventually you have to get obedience around that high value reinforcer, there's a lot of correction involved. When I first started doing Schutzhund I definitely was no different than anyone else. I used a lot of correction with my dogs, but I really started breaking down the behaviors much more than anyone I knew at the time. Teaching them at lower arousal, breaking it down in much tinier steps... and then I realized that I could use the helper as a reward. So, for instance, “Hey, dog heel two steps and then I'll send you to the helper for a bite,” and then I really started questioning all the correction, because that worked so well. And so, I kind of started out as a trainer using a lot of correction and then figuring out, and gradually getting more positive as I went till what I am right now. Melissa Breau: And I've seen some of your videos. I mean, you really truly manage to get that same precision and that beauty in the performance that I think most people are looking for. And I know from talking to you, you really do, do it completely positive so it's really impressive. Shade Whitesel: I think there's this thing that sometimes...I remember in Schutzhund even when I used correction we always said we use the ball for reward, but we can't get as precise behaviors when you do that and that was the argument against using a lot of motivation. And I always was like, “Well, I want both. I want the motivation, I want the strongness and then I want the preciseness.” So, even when I was figuring out how to do it without correction I was like, “I don't want to sacrifice anything. I still want really high quality behaviors,” and since Reiki took me to Nationals, now I'm not satisfied with anything other than as good as I can get. So, yeah, it's been a journey. That's a cliché thing, but it's definitely been a journey to figure out how to do that. Melissa: So, how would you describe your training philosophy now? Shade Whitesel: Right now, I feel like I haven't said no to any of my dogs for like four years. No. Seriously, I'm really currently most interested in what the dog is feeling about our training session and what their emotional state is. That's been my task. Ones has been definitely my teacher in that way, because I really need to know what his emotional state is in bite work. They'll tell you way before the behavior skills breakdown. Either lost focus, stressing, whatever that looks like. So, that's currently what I'm really into, trying to figure out how the dog feels and what that tells me of my training plan. And that kind of segues into creating the toy play as a reinforcement. So many of us use toys with our dogs because we realize how joyful they can get with that and how excited. But we could get much more efficient training done if we created more of a significant reinforcement if we had some rules in there like bring the toy back. When they all of a sudden don't drop the toy they're not being belligerent, they're pretty much telling us our rate of reinforcement wasn't up as much as it should be in the training plan. Also, when we use toys to teach stuff it gives us ways to work through high arousal situations, like, we're going to encounter in agility or bite work, or anything else a dog wants. I mean really a high arousal situation for my dogs is going from the car to the beach. That's a situation where they have to be on leash and it is none too fun if I can't get them to walk calmly from point A to point B. So, the toy play reinforcement gives us ways to work through that. I'd say that Ones is my most positively trained dog to date, since he's my youngest and I bred him so I've known him since minute one. I feel like sometimes I've gotten so positive in my teaching that most cases where we use negative punishment I look at that and I'm like, “We could teach that without even that.” So, I feel like I've swung really far in a very positive way in my training, which is good. Melissa Breau: And just in case anybody's not familiar with the four quadrants. Negative punish is the removal of something the dog doesn't like, right? Shade Whitesel: Exactly. And we as positive trainers tend to use that when we don't know what else to do or when we're having a dog that's doing behaviors we don't like. That's accepted for us to go there and it can be good. There's still some fallout sometimes, but it can be a polishing technique. Melissa Breau: So, I was super lucky. I got to shadow you at FDSA Training Camp last year. I have to say I definitely learned a ton following you around for a couple of days. Shade Whitesel: And I appreciated your technical skills, because I don't have any. Melissa Breau: Well, it was a pleasure to get to follow you around. I feel like I learned so, so much. And some of my favorites were just listening to you talk about play and how you structure some of that. And just some of the takeaways that I got at camp definitely I brought them home and worked with my own dog differently, and it really has had an impact. Shade Whitesel: Well, good. Yeah. Melissa Breau: So, it included everything from play to location specific markers... kind of, you ran the gambit, I think, at camp last year and it seems like, or at least seems to me, that there's a theme that kind of runs through all of your FDSA classes and all of the talks that I've heard you give — this idea of communicating as clearly as possible with your dogs. So, do you mind just sharing a little bit why you feel that's so critical? Shade Whitesel: No matter how you train, communicating as clearly as possible is so important, because 99.9 percent of our problems are due to the unclarity of our teaching. And all of our problems with dogs — I mean it's really our problem it's not theirs — go away when you look at the clarity, or more accurately the ‘not clarity' of your teaching. When your communication is clear arousal levels go down, frustration from your learner dog goes down, and you get more confident and fluent behaviors from them. And this holds true over trialing, over living with them, over everything, just to be as clear as possible and predictable, that goes into predictability too. So, no matter what method you do that is just so important I think — obviously, since I talk about it. Melissa Breau: So, I think one really good example of that is the work you've done with location specific markers. Do you mind just briefly kind of explaining what that means and kind of how you use them? Shade Whitesel: You know, markers are such a good thing and people are exploring them, and figuring out that it's really nice to bridge what behavior your dogs doing to get their reward. Tell the dog where to collect their reinforcement, like, technically I want a different marker that means collect it from my hands, whether that's food or a toy and I want a different marker that means collect it away from there, whether it's go pick-up the toy on the ground or whether I'm going to throw the toy, and again it's just that clarity. And I notice with my own dogs if I had a different marker word for, “Strike the tug out of my hand,” versus, “I'm going to throw it,” the dog stopped mugging me, they stopped looking for where the toy was all the time when I was asking for behaviors. Because they knew that I would tell them exactly how to get their reinforcement. And again, it just goes back to the clarity. So, location specific markers is just the dog knows exactly where to go and they don't have to be checking where the toy is or the food — is the food in your pocket? Is it over there in the dish? Because you're going to tell them so they can put 100 percent of their attention to figuring out what behavior you want them to do, because they can trust that you're going to tell them where the reinforcement is. Melissa Breau: I think a lot of trainers tend to rely really heavily on one or two training methods. So, somebody may lean really heavily on shaping, while somebody else tends to mostly lure behaviors or throw a ball, or whatever. I know that in the current session at FDSA, which will be current when this goes live, you're going to be teaching a class to help handlers better use all of their tools. Do you mind just talking a little bit about what that class is, and what it's about? Shade Whitesel: Yeah. I think the more we know and feel comfortable about all the positive ways we can train our dogs the more effective we're going to be as a teacher. And then, if we know how to lure and we know how to shape, and we know how to capture, we can then be more informed about what technique that we want to use to teach a certain behavior. I think we all could use a little more knowledge on how to get behaviors on cue. How to name it, how to get it on stimulus control, whether that behavior is lured or shaped and the one constant that I know I always struggle with is timing. Click, pause, treat. And I see many students coming through the academy, who are great at one technique, but they're kind of unsure of the other techniques and I'd like to help out with that. I'd like to teach that and help people figure out what effective technique they want to use to teach their dog a behavior. Melissa Breau: Now, does the class have specific behaviors that you try and work on through the course of the class? Are the students going to pick their own behavior and use different techniques to accomplish it? Kind of how do you structure it? Shade Whitesel: I'll give a couple of examples of what they can do. They can use behaviors their dog already knows or they can pick new ones. But it's really more about we can, for instance, ‘go to a bed' behavior, we can lure that, we can shape that, we can capture that so it's not so much about having behaviors already for your dog, but about explaining the different ways of getting there. It's good if your dog has some behaviors already on cue; so they can be experienced dogs, where the handler just wants to learn more about it, or it can be a dog that's brand new to stuff. Melissa Breau: So, when you're working with your own dogs how do you decide which technique to use? I assume you're probably better with all of them than say me. Shade Whitesel: Well, it's a steep learning curve for everything. Melissa Breau: But how do you decide whether you want to lure something or shape something, or capture something? Like, how do you pick which method to use when you're teaching something? Shade Whitesel: Well, I have to say when I first started training I was a big lurer and I came late to shaping. I really had no idea and my evolution in my last, I don't know, six, seven years has been really getting better at shaping. I'd be the first to say I'm not the greatest at it, but I'm getting better. So, for my own dogs shaping and capturing shaped behaviors, like, the dog offering a completed shaped behavior that's my preferred technique at this point. If I can communicate to the dog effectively through shaping and then they can choose the behavior, I'll always teach that way first. I think it creates stronger and then more confident and faster behaviors out of the dog. But I can't always figure out how to communicate via shaping. And so, if I can't figure that out I'll lure the behavior. I have no issue luring, but I'll then always put it on what I call capturing. And so, even if it's a lured behavior, I'll eventually want to have the dog offer it and then it becomes a strong shaped behavior, so to speak. Melissa Breau: So, to round things out. I have three more short questions that I've asked everyone so far at the tail end of the interview. So, first what's the dog-related accomplishment that you are proudest of? Shade Whitesel: That's such a hard one because every single dog I have had there are accomplishments that I'm really proud of with the individual dog. So, I don't think of it so much as what I've done, but more of what me and dog have done. [I Recently competed with Ones]. Schutzhund is tracking, obedience and protection and you get 100 in each. And he got 99 out of 100 in the tracking phase, he got 95 out of 100 in obedience and he got 96 out of 100 in protection. And that's a pretty good score for a young dog, because in the one and the two in Schutzhund we're kind of just seeing what does he know, how is my training going and you kind of get your three. And then, if you want to compete, you compete nationally and that's where you start to get your good scores. So, I'm excited for what the future holds for us. Melissa Breau: So, what is the best piece of training advice that you have ever heard? Shade Whitesel: It sounds cliché, but listen to the dog. I'm so into listening to what the dog says at this point. It holds me accountable in my training, it holds me accountable in their reinforcement and I feel like many people say, “Listen to the dog,” but I think we could be doing a lot more of it. Melissa Breau: And the last one. So, who is someone else in the dog world that you look up too? Shade Whitesel: That's always such a hard question as well. I've been training dogs for 20 years and there's too many to name. I've learned so many things from each and every trainer, and person that I've encountered and trained with. So, I've just learned from so many people and I look up to each and every one of them. Melissa Breau: All right. Well, thanks Shade so much for joining me. Shade Whitesel: Yeah. Thanks so much. Melissa Breau: And for those listening, thank you for tuning in. As a heads-up to those of you who aren't currently part of the FDSA community, registration is currently open when this airs for February classes, including Shade's Crucial Concepts for Competition Class, the one we talked about during the podcast. And in two weeks we'll be back with Loretta Mueller to talk about why one size does not fit all when it comes to dog training. If you haven't already, subscribe now on iTunes or the podcast app of your choice to have our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available. CREDITS: Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called “Buddy.” Audio editing provided by Chris Lang and transcription written by CLK Transcription Services. Thanks again for tuning in -- and happy training!
SHOW NOTES: Summary: Competitive sports dog trainer and founder of FDSA Denise Fenzi talks about how she got into dog sports, her journey from traditional training to her current all positive approach, and more. Links mentioned: Fenzi TEAM Training Site FREE Beyond the Backyard Instructors Guide Denise's other books via her website Next Episode: To be released 1/6/2017, featuring Sarah Stremming TRANSCRIPTION: Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau, and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports podcast, brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high-quality instruction for competitive dog sports using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today we'll be talking to FDSA founder Denise Fenzi. Denise has competed in a wide range of dog sports, titling dogs in obedience, tracking, Schutzhund, Mondioring, herding, conformation, and agility. She is best-known for her flashy and precise obedience work, as demonstrated by two AKC OTCH dogs and perfect scores in both Schutzhund and Mondioring sport obedience. Her specialty is in developing motivation, focus, and relationship in competition dogs, and she has consistently demonstrated the ability to train and compete with dogs using motivational methods in sports where compulsion is the norm. Hi Denise, can you tell us a bit about the dogs you have known and what you're working on with them? Denise Fenzi: Hi Melissa, how are you? Melissa: Good. Denise: Good. I'm excited to do this. Yeah, I'll tell you. Let's see, I have three dogs here now. I have Raika, she's my oldest dog, she's 12½ and she is retired and mostly spends her days hanging out with me and going for long walks. That's what she wants to do now. My two younger dogs are Lyra, she's also a Belgian Tervuren, and Brito, who's a little mixed-breed, and I primarily train them to learn new things. So I do a lot of play skills with them, I do a lot of obedience with them. I just use them as, I want to say sample dogs, that's not quite the word I want. But I like to experiment with them and try out new things. And right now I'm sort of in a coaching phase of my life more than a competitive phase of my life, so I'm not actually sure if or when I'll compete. I have done some of the TEAM obedience levels with both of them, and I think they both have a TEAM Two title, [but] I'd have to look. And at some point if I get inspiration I'm going to keep going. So those are my dogs. Melissa: So I know it wasn't on the list of questions I sent over, but do you want to briefly just tell us a little bit more about TEAM? Denise: Oh, TEAM is Training Excellence Assessment Modules, and it's the new obedience program that we started for people who want to compete via video and with more emphasis on quality of training and less about the competitive environment. So anybody who wants can look it up at fenziteamtitles.com. It's, in my opinion, an extremely well-designed program and worth taking a look at. Denise: Yeah, my parents showed dogs, and I'm 48, so I was sort of born into it. They actually competed with Lhasa Apsos in obedience, which is _____ (3.23). I know my parents got a CDX on a Lhasa Apso; it took 23 shows. I think their final show was a 171 1/2, but they did it. So I give them credit for that. It was kind of an ugly way of getting titles back then, it was uglier to watch, but they did it. Melissa: So is that what originally got you into dog sports? Denise: Yes, I guess I inherited it. When I was about 10 I raised a couple of guide dog puppies, and my parents said that if I did that then I could have a dog of my own. So my first dogs were Shelties, because they had to be small dogs. And I just sort of went from there. Melissa: What got you started with positive training? Denise Fenzi: Well, I had been competing in AKC obedience for a long time, and then I decided to try IPO. And when I went over and watched the IPO training at that time, which would have been, I don't know, 20 years ago now I guess I started, I was kind of appalled actually, because they were using so much compulsion and such poor training that my reaction was to go the opposite way. And so I felt obligated to use as little as little as possible and to be successful. But I still absolutely would have called myself a balanced trainer, and I absolutely used compulsion with that dog. He did end up a Schutzhund III. But I did my best to minimize it. And then as time went on I found that I became a better trainer, and I wouldn't say I was trying not to use compulsion so much as just becoming a better trainer and needing less and less. Also, I had some good dogs, that really helps, that were cooperative. And I continued to use compulsion with my student dogs well after I stopped myself. And actually I was thinking about that recently, looking back, why was that? I think I was using it to compensate for my lack of ability to communicate with the humans who owned the dogs how to be better trainers, so it was a bit of an out for me. It's much easier to say, “Correct your dog when the dog sniffs,” than to take the time to try to figure out why the dog is sniffing and then adjust your training, i.e. my training, to get the handler to do it correctly. And so I did use compulsion there, and I can actually look back and see why I did that and also really how under the particular circumstances how unfair it was, because both of those corrections almost certainly were the result of the dog showing displacement behaviors. And then I taught seminars as I traveled; because those weren't my personal students I didn't feel as vested in the same way in the entire process. And so it was pretty obvious when I would walk in that the problems were handler-generated, and so I never got around to correcting the dogs, I was pretty busy correcting the handlers. And after a year of that, seminar after seminar realizing I was never correcting the dogs at all, that I never even got around to the dogs, then it started to be a philosophical thing. And that's when I started looking at it and saying, there's something wrong with holding the dog responsible when in every single case I can look at the situation and see how the handler caused it, and that's when I switched. And that was sort of interesting. Because in terms of solving problems, if you come in with a philosophical point of view and you don't decide that you have the option of reverting to compulsion if you get stuck, I can tell you your ability to problem solve will skyrocket, because it's not sitting there any more as an option. And you get a lot more clever, and you learn to think much more broadly. So it's actually a very good thing for me in my training. Melissa: It always seems easier to train the dog than to train the people. Sometimes the people are definitely the hardest part. Denise: That's true. Melissa: So you kind of mentioned your training philosophy now. Do you want to just describe that a little more for us and tell us kind of how you approach training now? Denise: Well, I think most of us continue to evolve over time, and there's no question that I continue to evolve. Right now I really am looking at dogs a little bit differently. For me it's less than what can the dog do for me to humor me, so I like to do dog sports. So rather than thinking, how can I get the dog to do this for me, I'm more in a place of, how can I get to a point where I can enjoy my time with this dog? And instead of thinking, how can [I set up the] environment so that time spent with me is the best part of their day I'm thinking more, how can I become important to this dog so they want to do things with me? And at first it may sound the same, getting the dog on my team as opposed to me joining their team, but if you think about it you start to realize it's not the same. So I'm perfectly happy to spend time with my young terrier who loves to hunt lizards, and I will sit with him in his little lizard territory telling him, “Did you see that one? Did you look over there?” It's a lot of fun, it really is. It sounds odd, but it's a lot of fun. And I think when I do that with him, I think it creates a really nice place for both of us that makes me appreciate him for who he really is. And then I think he's more willing to play my games. And so it's very much a relationship-based way of thinking about dog training, and sometimes this is hard for people to understand. But I really believe that if your dog genuinely likes you because you are interested in them and because you make their life more interesting, I think that skyrockets what the dog is capable of doing for you. So it's not because the rest of your life is miserable that you want to spend time with me. My dogs have great lives, they have a lot of freedom. I think it's because we just like doing stuff together and it's really fun. So if you can get that relationship down, like I tell people, if you can get your dog to play with you, just run and play and be silly, your dog will start to look at you more, which is really interesting. It's not a trained response at all, it's because we look at others that we enjoy. And that's true with people too. So for example with my older son, he's 16 now, and so he's getting into that, well, independent's not the word I want, but perfectly happy to lock himself in his room sort of phase. And recently he sent me by message text a game, and it's pool, billiards. And he had done a turn, and then says, “Next.” And so when I opened it up it showed me his turn, and then I had a chance to play back. So then I played, and then I sent it back to him. And so we do this, and it's not because I have some great interest in playing pool via text with my son. But what means a lot to me is that he wants me to do that with him. It's something we can do together. So while it would not be my first choice, you bet I respond when he sends me those. And then what I find is, it changes how he interacts with me in general. So that when I need things from him, I think because we have that baseline relationship that we're trying to maintain even as he gets older, I think it allows us to have a better relationship in general, not just about what I want or what he wants. And so I think that dogs are very similar, that if you can find a way to just simply be generically important to them, and accepting, and forgiving, and have a little give and take… You don't always have to get your way. What a concept. It's okay. Your dog does not go through life trying to manipulate you. And I think really internalizing that would sum up where I am right now in terms of how I see training. Melissa: So I know that you kind of touched on this a little bit there with your son, but we've talked before about just the impacts that your training beliefs have had on your other relationships. Do you want to talk a little more about that? I know you've said it's influenced almost all of your relationships, including with your parents and things like that. Denise: It's been probably the most significant thing that's happened in my entire life. When I changed how I trained dogs, you have to be pretty obtuse not to recognize that we all learn the same way. And if you're a positive trainer with dogs and you really emphasize catching what they do right and ignoring what they do wrong, I mean, you really have to choose not to think about it, to realize that exactly the same thing is true with people. So for example both of my kids have very good manners, and I know how that came about in part. One thing is, I'm simply a respectful person and I encourage that. But I remember our first outings to restaurants when they were smaller, and if they would order for themselves, and they would say please and show nice manners, the second that person would walk away from the table I would say to my husband who'd be there, “I am so proud that we have kids who are so respectful and have such good manners. It makes me happy to go places with them.” And you could almost see the difference the next time that opportunity came up again, you could almost see them go just a little bit further with their good manners. And it's not something I comment on any more, because they're older, they're 12 and 16, but they do it by habit. And I know that some part of their brain is always aware of it. So I've never said to them “Say please, say thank you,” I don't tell them what to do, but when it happened I really worked to catch those moments and acknowledge them. And I think dog training is a lot easier than child training, that's just my perspective. But I try to work with that, and I try not to think in terms of getting my kids to go to school and do well because I've restricted the rest of their lives, and I try to think in terms of balance and cooperation. Of course with people you can talk things out more. But at the end of the day if you're having any kind of conflict with another person, whether it's a family member or some random person you see on the street, the question I ask myself now is, do I want to feel better or do I want to change behavior? So if I want to feel better I may well behave badly, I may yell. I do yell, by the way. I do yell at my children, I do yell at my dogs. I know some people say, “That's amazing you do, you're not supposed to do that.” Well that's great, I'm glad you're all there. I'm not, so I will yell, “Get off the couch,” or whatever. I'm not really training, I'm expressing my upsetness. So that's, do I want to feel better? Yes, I'm going to yell. Or somebody irritates me on the street because their dog runs up to mine and is off-leash, and so maybe I'm having a particularly bad day, and I might respond inappropriately. But then the second question is, do I want to change behavior? And I think recognizing that those are different things is really important because never, ever, ever am I yelling if I want to change behavior, and never am I talking to somebody like they're dumb, or ignorant, or anything, because it's all perspective, because they just have a different perspective. So maybe they don't understand that their off-leash dog running up to my old dog is a problem. And the reason it's a problem is, my dog is old and she doesn't like other dogs jumping on her. And I've had much better luck saying, “I know your dog is friendly, but my dog is very old and she has a lot of arthritis. And when your dog comes up like that it really scares her, and it hurts her.” And when I say that, without fail they apologize and they put their dogs on a leash. And I smile, I'm not angry. I might be inside, but I don't show it. The next time I see them we continue with a pleasant set of interactions. And that kind of thinking, do I want to feel better or do I want to change behavior, has been really quite impactful, whether in my family or with people. We often talk about with our dogs, sometimes dog trainers are a lot nicer to their dogs than people. I find that very incongruent, and I don't like to live my life that way. I like my life to make sense. And I think we need to be very aware of not only how we treat our pets but show that same courtesy to each other, and I find that from there I am a happier person. Because when you are kind with people instead of getting your emotions from stewing in your, "oh my God, I can't believe how stupid that person is," that I understand that we take pleasure in those periods of time when we feel superior to other people, because I guess that's where that comes from, I understand that. But it is a short-lived and negative form of emotion, and in the long run it leaves you feeling worse about the world. Whereas when you take the time to think about things from somebody else's point of view, I find that that leads to an understanding, and honestly that makes my life a lot better. It makes me a more pleasant and happy person, so that has a lot of value. Melissa: That kind of transitions us really nicely into my next question, which was going to be, what led you to start FDSA, the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy? And I want to say kind of before you respond to that, that I think that that's part of the reason that there's been such a fantastic community kind of that's grown up around the school, is just because you have that belief and it spreads through the other teachers and the students. It's really created a really welcoming community for dog sports competitors. Now that I've gotten a little ahead of myself, so what did lead you to start the school? Denise: It was a numbers thing. If I spend a half-hour with one person I can work with one person for half an hour. Online, if I can do it well, then I can spend a half-hour with a much greater number of people. And we each have our own drivers in life, and one of my big drivers is, I want to see change in the dog sports community, and that's very important to me. So to be able to affect a large number of people as opposed to a small number of people was very appealing to me. The school in many ways has just sort of exceeded any expectations I could have possibly had, in many ways. But probably one of the most valuable is, I did not recognize what would happen in terms of the culture, not just with each other. There's a second culture that people wouldn't really know about, and that's the one among the instructors. The way they interact with each other, the way they talk on the mailing list, the support they offer is extraordinary. And I see the same thing with the students, the way they interact. And there really is a sense that your accomplishments mean a lot to you, and everybody else is willing to honor that. So if you figured out how to teach your dog to lay down and it's the first time you ever did that, I find that people are just as excited about that for you as another person who went to a dog show and got maybe a high in trial. Because we're each at a different place in what we value. And I think people have really internalized that, and it is extraordinary. I get a fair number of e-mails from people saying thank you for something or the other, maybe with their dog. But the ones I value the most are the ones where people say, “Over time I started to recognize that the same things we do with our dogs work with each other, and I have become kinder to myself, kinder to people around me, and you know, generally I'm just a much happier person.” That's enormous. And starting an online dog training school I really never saw that one coming. I didn't realize how that could work out like that, and it's been really amazing for me. Melissa: Yeah, I mean, the community's probably one of the few places online where even controversial topics are handled very politely. And people honor each other's opinions and honor each other's thoughts, and they don't break down into insults and arguments, at least not that I've seen yet. Denise: No, it's amazing. I mean, it's not that it's perfect. We have a few thousand members, so you're always going to have differences. But I find that people have become quite good at saying, “This has been my experience, and this is my feelings,” as opposed to, “You're dumb and stupid for thinking that.” And I know that people don't mean to come across that way, but sometimes the online communities, all of them, people simply write and don't think too carefully about how what they just said might be interpreted by another person. And within the alumni group or within the Academy group I find an awareness of considering how you phrase things. And anyway the reality is, if you want to change behavior it's the same thing I said earlier. It may make you feel better to say, “You're dumb to think that way,” but you won't change behavior. If you say, “This has been my experience,” now you might actually change behavior, but you have to give up being self-righteous, and that's not always what people have in mind. Melissa: So I know that we wanted to talk about some of the other stuff you've been working on too. FDSA isn't the only thing you've created in the last few years. So you have another new book coming out. I don't know if you want to take a minute and tell us about some of the books that you already have out and then the new book, or if you just want to talk about the new book. I'll leave that up to you. Denise: Oh, so many. I didn't even know I was such a writer until I started writing, and now I can't stop writing. I've written seven, I'm actually looking at them. Four of them I wrote with Deb Jones, that's the Dog Sports Skills Series. Those are all generic to all dog sports but provide a really nice foundation for dog training. I wrote a book called Beyond the Back Yard, which was targeted at the pet market to help them understand how to get from the point of cookie in the hand in the kitchen and hoping for the best to actually getting some very cooperative real-world obedience. That book has done very well, and a lot of people are using it to teach their classes, which makes me very happy. It does have a free instructor's guide to go with it. And then I wrote Blogger Dog, Brito!, which is about Brito. It's, well, I'm going to say a true story, but keep in mind the dog wrote it, so take that with a grain of salt. And it's designed for about a fourth grade audience to read to themself. And if a person reads it they will learn quite a bit about dog behavior without learning that they learned about dog behavior, which was really what I had in mind. And then my newest book is Train the Dog in Front of You. I would call that my personal pet book, and what I mean is, it is how I feel about training and dogs. I feel that every dog is very unique, and I tried hard to find dimensions that people could work with to say, is your dog more secure, more cautious, more handler-focused, more environmental, and then offered suggestions for how to work with a dog based on those qualities. Actually I'm running a class online right now on that topic. And as you might expect there are many, many nontraditional breeds in that class, and I actually find it extremely interesting to watch different dogs behave in different ways under different circumstances. So you can see some of the dogs do a lot with their eyes. They stare when they go to a park. And other dogs' noses never come off the ground when they go to a park. And other dogs air sniff the whole time they're at the park. And other dogs just jump on their owners. And all of these things are really quite relevant to how you train your dog. So if you understand that your dog's dominant sense is going to be sniffing you might be better off training in a shopping center, whereas another dog that has a lot of pressure issues with people in buildings would be much better off in a big open park than in a shopping center. So thinking that way is very interesting to me. And I hope a lot of dog sports people pick this book up, because I think it has a lot to offer. Melissa: I mean, having had a chance to read an advance copy of the book I think it's a fantastic guide, even just as a thought exercise to think through kind of where your dog falls on some of those different meters, and what they are closer to than other things, and what traits are more true for your personal dog than others. Just to kind of give people a little more sense of what's inside the book, do you mind talking about any one of your dogs that you want, just kind of where they fall on some of those spectrums? Denise: In the first chapter I actually did go through the dogs. Well, Brito is, he's the little terrier dog of mine, he's about 10 pounds. He's a small dog. But he's very terrier, he's classic terrier. He's not handler-focused. So if I take him somewhere his nose goes down, he doesn't do a lot of looking with his eyes, he uses his nose. He does very little air sniffing, it's to the ground. Vegetative surfaces, he will not look back at me, it doesn't cross his mind for 15, 20 minutes. He is not what we'd call naturally handler-focused when he's in a new environment. But there's a piece that goes with that. He's also a very confident and social dog, so he likes people, he's confident with people. He's a little careful with dogs. They're big and that makes him nervous. He's also got a little bit of that terrier behavior, so he can get kind of puffed-up. And if he sees aggression around him he'll go there fast, so I keep an eye on that. And in some ways a dog like that is the polar opposite of Raika, my oldest dog who's here. Raika's always liked to be with me, she just does, it doesn't matter where I go. And actually I had to go to some trouble to teach her to look around, which is something I talk about in the book. Why would I do that? Why would I teach her to stop staring at me? It was a very good decision. And she does get nervous about people and dogs, whereas Brito, it just wouldn't happen to him. And knowing these things about them does make a difference, because Raika, I just take her to a park, I can take her anywhere and work with her, and that's easy and makes sense. But it also means that she needs different sorts of preparations for trial than he does. So if I really want to work him around distractions I would be inclined to go to a shopping center, because then I don't have to deal with grass. But at the same time if I want to compete with him outdoors, knowing who he is allows me to pick a middle environment, maybe not grass but maybe not cement, that allow us to go in that direction. So let's say a parking area, which is cement, near a vegetated area like with a forest or field, so that gives us some in-between. That kind of helps me think that way. I don't sit down and actually consciously go through it any more, it's just something that sort of happens in my head. And in the book I talk about case studies, more so in the online class. I put up case studies of specific dogs that I've worked with. But after a while you start to see packages, you just start to notice that dogs that tend to be a little more insecure are a little more likely to look to their owners. You start looking for stuff like that, and it helps you make a plan about which direction to try with the dog. And it also helps you recognize when you've made a bad decision so that you can back up, turn around, and try something else. Melissa: So to kind of bring things to a little bit of a close I have three last questions, kind of quicker questions. So the first one is, what's the dog-related accomplishment that you're proudest of? Denise: My second OTCH dog had a fairly complete meltdown about a third of the way into her OTCH, and I could not resolve that. I didn't know what to do, so I retired her for about a year-and-a-half. And while she was retired I finished an OTCH on a different dog. So she must have been, I don't know, I want to say eight, maybe nine years old. And I just kept thinking about what I now knew, because I had learned a lot, we're always learning, and I decided to try again. And I thought that we had lots of time to actually pursue the OTCH, because it does take a bit of time, and it helps to have a young and very fit dog. And I just felt that her jumping days were going to be wrapping up soon, and so I decided to go back into competition with a different goal. I simply wanted to see if I could stay connected with her and keep the stress out of the picture just for one exercise, and just for two exercises. Could I do this? And I went in with such a different mindset. It was really no longer about finishing the title, I was no longer frustrated, and she finished her OTCH in two months. So just my changing my way of thinking, and it was really amazing. I will tell you that when you hit about 90 points it gets a little hard to say, “Oh gee, I'm just doing this for fun,” but I managed to keep myself under control with it. I'm very proud of that, because it was hard, and I think hard things are always a bigger accomplishment. Melissa: And what's the best piece of training advice that you've ever heard? Denise: It's just behavior. So there's an expression, it's just behavior. When something is happening in front of you it doesn't mean deep and horrible things, it doesn't mean your dog hates you, it doesn't mean you're never going to be successful, it doesn't mean much of anything. It just means it's behavior. The dog just showed you something, and it has roots from where? Maybe an emotion. But it's not more than that. And that is why most of us when we're training our own dogs, everything is so big and magnified. So your dog goes around the broad jump and, "oh my God." "It's oh my God, what am I going to do? It's over." And we obsess and we stress, and we train and we train on the poor thing and the poor dog, and it's very hard to walk away. Whereas an outsider looks at it and says, “I have no idea what you're getting so worked up about. Your dog went around the jump. It's not a big deal, it's not the end of the world, and it doesn't mean it's going to keep happening.” And I think that expression, it's just behavior, really helps us remember that it's not worth quite that much energy. It just happened, it's okay. Move on, train. Melissa: That in some ways seems to sum up your philosophy almost as well as some of your other answers. Denise: That's true. Melissa: So for our last question, who is somebody else in the dog world that you look up to? Denise: There are actually a lot of trainers out there that I really respect. I've often said I don't think I'm a great dog trainer. I think I'm a pretty good dog trainer. I think what I do well is not dig a grave. I mean, if I see I'm starting a hole I back out of it. Whereas there are a lot of other trainers out there who I think are much better than I am at not starting the hole in the first place. So I can't go with just skills, because there's lots of people who are more skilled. So I think I'm going to say Suzanne Clothier, and the reason is, I have a lot of respect for her ability to look at the situation, the dog, the person, the whole picture, and stand back, and get an overview on what's happening, and then communicate that in a way that people can understand. So I really respect that. And she's been around for a long time, much longer than I would say it's been popular to be a force-free trainer. And she's been at it for really some time, and I appreciate that, and I appreciate her honesty and her ability to communicate what I think sometimes people need to hear that might not be very comfortable without getting stuck in how we're supposed to do things. So I think that's my answer. Melissa: All right. Well, thank you so much, Denise. It's been awesome to chat, it's been a lot of fun. Denise: Thank you. I am excited to see who comes after me. Melissa: Well, let me get to that. So for all of our brand-new listeners, since this is our first official podcast, thank you for tuning in, and we'll be back in two weeks. We'll be back with Sarah Stremming. She's the founder of Cognitive Canine, and we'll be talking about over-arousal in sports dogs. If you haven't already, subscribe now on iTunes or the podcast app of your choice, and you'll have our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available. In the meantime, happy training. CREDITS: Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called “Buddy.” Audio editing provided by Chris Lang and transcription written by CLK Transcription Services. Thanks again for tuning in -- and happy training!
Author Alex Kava on Silent Creed; Kathy Jo Magan explains German ring sport, schutzhund; Diane Lovejoy. Cat Lady Chic
Johnny Manziel has his last game in front of a Texas AM crowd and breaks the record for the longest raspberry. News News News: Texas AM Says Goodbye to Johnny Manziel, San Diego Chargers Fan Throws Football Illegally, Chicago Blackhawks Apologize for Fan Misconduct. Sketches: Verifiable True Facts: College Basketball Edition, Big Tobacco's Sam Throat Talks Sports. Weird Sports: Bikejoring, Schutzhund. Make sure to subscribe on iTunes to the Sports Sports Sports Podcast and if you like the show, please rate and review!
In this episode (34:08) Schutzhund trainers are experts in teaching dogs to tug, and special guest Michael Ellis is an expert among experts. We discuss drive and motivation along with several common problems with tug training. This is part 1; part 2 is available here. Mentioned Michael Ellis on Facebook Michael’s Training School Loups duClick here to read the full article →
In this episode (21:10) Training Tip: Walk the course from your dog’s point of view. Agility Topic: What can we learn from trainers in other dog sports? We discuss the influence that Obedience, Schutzhund, and Clicker Training has had on our training. Mentioned Kim Donnell and Waggin’ Tails Dog Training Watch Sarah walk the course. DogwoodClick here to read the full article →
www.DogCastRadio.comSue London, the Canadian Dog Whisperer, had major health problems that nearly resulted in her death, but the love of her Shih Tzu Rocky pulled her through, and now she wants to offer that healing to others. Schutzhund is a fascinating and demanding dog sport which host Julie was lucky enough to participate in - how did she enjoy getting up close and personal with a German Shepherd? In the DogCast Radio News hear about the growing problem of dog obesity - and is there a connection to the increasing variety of dog food on offer? Plus did you know next month is National Dog Adoption Month? All this and more!
www.DogCastRadio.comSue London, the Canadian Dog Whisperer, had major health problems that nearly resulted in her death, but the love of her Shih Tzu Rocky pulled her through, and now she wants to offer that healing to others. Schutzhund is a fascinating and demanding dog sport which host Julie was lucky enough to participate in - how did she enjoy getting up close and personal with a German Shepherd? In the DogCast Radio News hear about the growing problem of dog obesity - and is there a connection to the increasing variety of dog food on offer? Plus did you know next month is National Dog Adoption Month? All this and more!
One of the exercises in the sport of Schutzhund involves being able to send your dog to search 6 blinds on the field. The helper or decoy is always in the 6th blind. By the time the dog reaches Sch2 and Sch3, it knows exactly where the decoy is when it enters the field. Every dog wants to go directly to the 6th blind and the blind search is an exercise in control of the dog. In this short video, Michael Ellis will talk about how he trains the blind search in Schutzhund. I have used video of Tom Brollini from Alaska and his dog, Tygar, doing the blind search in the 2002 National Sch USA competition as an example in this streaming video.
One of the exercises in the sport of Schutzhund involves being able to send your dog to search 6 blinds on the field. The helper or decoy is always in the 6th blind. By the time the dog reaches Sch2 and Sch3, it knows exactly where the decoy is when it enters the field. Every dog wants to go directly to the 6th blind and the blind search is an exercise in control of the dog. In this short video, Michael Ellis will talk about how he trains the blind search in Schutzhund. I have used video of Tom Brollini from Alaska and his dog, Tygar, doing the blind search in the 2002 National Sch USA competition as an example in this streaming video.
Ed Frawley 05:36 no
Ed Frawley 05:36 no
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Ed Frawley 12:12 no
In this video we will watch the first training session to convert a nice Schutzhund 3 female Dutch Shepherd to a body bite suit. Schutzhund dogs are trained to only bite the arm � in a competition is a Schutzhund dog bites the legs they fail bite work. So these dogs are strongly programmed to only bite arms sleeves. It is not a problem to get a Schutzhund dog to bite the arm on a body bite suit jacket � to get them to bite into the legs requires special training. This starts with introducing the dog to the biting surface of a leg sleeve and then when that's OK � teaching the dog to bite one leg sleeve then two leg sleeves. In this video we will only show the work to get the dog to the step where its biting one leg sleeve Next weeks video will take us into biting two leg sleeves.
In this video we will watch the first training session to convert a nice Schutzhund 3 female Dutch Shepherd to a body bite suit. Schutzhund dogs are trained to only bite the arm � in a competition is a Schutzhund dog bites the legs they fail bite work. So these dogs are strongly programmed to only bite arms sleeves. It is not a problem to get a Schutzhund dog to bite the arm on a body bite suit jacket � to get them to bite into the legs requires special training. This starts with introducing the dog to the biting surface of a leg sleeve and then when that's OK � teaching the dog to bite one leg sleeve then two leg sleeves. In this video we will only show the work to get the dog to the step where its biting one leg sleeve Next weeks video will take us into biting two leg sleeves.
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