Weasels

Is it even legal to sell unvaccinated pups? Not much chance of a long happy life for a pup with parvo Edit - from the Australian Veterinary Association re. parvo:

Here's a nice article and video about the science behind "reinforcing fear" - TLDR: don't worry about it. Feel free to quietly comfort a fearful dog :) http://fearfuldogs.com/myth-of-reinforcing-fear/

It does sound like it - my brain started to go to mush after 45-minute uni lectures too! Possibly never They're 'only human' after all :D Sounds like you are doing great tho and compare how well you are doing now to when you started and remember you will just keep improving with all the work you are doing - and he isn't even an adult yet! Edit - Weez started to come good around 2 years old, all the work I put into him seems totally worthwhile now I can trust him off-lead around most things and can recall him/do heelwork in front of sheep which I couldn't even 6 months ago :) I felt many times we were getting nowhere too!

Honey, they start dog training businesses and advertise they're qualified to deal with aggression and dominance. http://www.youtube.com/user/DogWhispererKev?feature=watch

Advice? Find another puppy school. Dogs have personalities, just like people. Some don't like large crowds, even if they play nicely with one or two dogs doesn't mean they want to jump into the melee of an overexcited free-for-all! He sounds like a lovely puppy with a very attentive owner so please don't overturn the great life he has on the advice of one misguided person

And not just a concern from a dog interaction point of view, but with disease transmission as well

Ahhh different reaction then. A fearful reaction moving away from the object is not for correction :p I was thinking you meant he was actively reacting towards something ie wanting to chase it Cool - I appreciate your detailed explanation still tho :) This is why one of the best things I've done since I got dogs was to research dog body language, makes working with them so much easier -- Sorry to OT a bit there Nachi, I hope everything goes well with your new boy :)

I don't take it personally - I think we have different training goals! I don't want Weez to understand that reacting is wrong, I want him to think bikes are awesome and nothing to be afraid of and not worth reacting to. Once we started working on the CC and could ride a bike straight past him it became even more clear that he was fearful of them because he would flinch and try to hide behind my legs when the bike went past. So with regards to reliability - take away the fear, take away the reaction I'm open-minded about corrections when my dogs are working in a drive situation (herding), but I won't use them on my boy when he's acting out of fear. The turning him towards me was a part of the process when he would hesitate after he saw a bike but was still conflicted between barking at it and playing LAT with me. It was management to prevent him practicing the behaviour but also out of consideration for the people he was barking at because it curbed the behaviour the most effectively. I didn't reward the forced turn, I used it to get more distance to then play LAT :) And choosing wasn't part of our plan - I didn't want him to practice the reacting any more than he already had.

Oh, cool ok that could work :) I found it difficult because the things Weez was reacting to were both common and appeared very quickly (bikes/scooters/skateboards) so I didn't always have time to grab treats and find somewhere to add appropriate distance. I found working on the CC first decreased his threshold distance within a few sessions, enough so that we could play LAT much more effectively in 'the real world'. There are a lot of variables in reactivity though so everyone's best strategy will be different :)

Oh please don't remove the dogs because of alpha concepts If they are providing comfort for you they are doing their doggy job! The idea that a dog sleeping on your bed = dominance doesn't even make sense with the internal logic of common dominance theory. Even if we do accept that dogs = wolves (which I don't), wolves don't have beds! How would desert or plains wolves establish dominance when their sleeping areas are always flat? It makes no sense. Train the dog you have in front of you, all the dominance theory in the world won't train a dog :) As RubyBlue said earlier , he may well be just trying to get a reaction from her. My boy is more playful than my girl and is constantly trying things to get her to notice him, including pawing her in the face, barking in her face, rolling over onto his back, and putting a paw over her back (unsuccesful 95% of the time, but cute to watch :laugh:). She can handle it, but if he's being extra obnoxious I just call him away and send him to his mat or do some other distracting trick. If I was really worried about my girl I would make sure they were separated when I couldn't observe.

Whilst I love LAT, it might be a bit much to coordinate for a new dog and owner? Understanding threshold distance, being able to read the dog's body language before it reacts etc. - plus having to be clicker-savvy and have the timing required With Weez I used a bunch of counter-conditioning first ("omg bike! have a butt-load of food! Aw it's gone, party's over") and then I only moved onto LAT once his reactivity had reduced enough that he started to think of bikes as a training opportunity rather than just time to go crazy. This approach has worked great for us - I have video somewhere of us playing LAT while 3 kids on bikes went right past him, 2 in front of him on the road and one RIGHT behind him on the footpath, with one of the kids yelling at the same time. He didn't even flinch! :) I find my front-attach harness works well when Weez is just on the verge of reacting - if he is on a collar or a sporn harness he can just lean into them (with his front paws in the air if he gets riled up), but with the harness it is much easier to do an about-turn and get him focussed back on me. I agree if the dog is really over-threshold the equipment becomes pretty useless regardless - but if my dog is lunging I'd rather have the pressure distributed across his chest than concentrated on his neck.

I see an adult one at the local park sometimes - she's perfect patting height! :D Lovely girl though, an absolute sook :p

I thought AB was a 'universal acceptor', so they should be able to receive from anyone with RH- blood (?)

:laugh: love the pics RS :D Sometimes when I'm walking with Chess I'll stop and watch her roll in grass clippings because the amount of sheer joy she gets from it is contagious! Makes me smile :) Sorry I didn't chat much this morning - the kelpies do not understand the concept of staying in one place very well -- Whitka that is awesome, yay water! :p

Here's an interesting article on humping (via Zayda-Asher!) - Why Dogs Hump I'm a fan of training a substitute behaviour for something like that - everytime the dog humps, I would interrupt, give another cue (like sit), then heavily reinforce the sitting instead :)

Great work Superminty & Cash!!

Awesome :) See ya then!

Bummer CC Hopefully next time! :) RS - I'll be there, I invited another friend and my OH too but they were noncommital :p If it's as nice as today we'll be set!

Right now, I don't like to have more dogs than I have hands. This may change in the future though :D

:rofl:

It's an agricultural show which travels Aus, so sheep, cattle, dogs, cats, woodchopping, produce etc. plus lots of festival rides and junk food for the kiddies

Aww hello Mr Foal!! There are demos on the Tuesday and Thursday but I'm only doing the Tues I am tempted to go on group 5 day as well just for a stickybeak tho :D

thanks Ness :p The authorities are going to stop taking our calls soon with all this reporting Yay! :) There's a carpark at the corner of Governor & Rockingham Beach Rd, it's the beach just off there :)

I got my tickets for the Royal in the mail today, for herding demo-ing I just hope I can fix Weez's darting in problem, it would break my heart to hear "Mummy, why did that nasty black dog pounce on the poor ducks"

Hopefully we're talking about the one where the carpark is off the roundabout - that one rocks! Yes, just down from the horse beach. Perhaps we should start calling it the "DOL beach" :D