Kelpie-i

Would it be on Youtube??

persephone, I don't think we'll ever get these full explanations on any half hour show unfortunately. Kamuzz, it would be the same as training elephants to remain in a holding area/spot. I remember having explained to me how they train the elephants in India for the tourist rides. Initially the elephant's foot is often tied with heavy chain to a tree for a number of months. This chain is then replaced with a lighter one, then followed by a rope. Then the rope is tied only to the elephant's foot but not the tree....by this stage the elephant has been conditioned that trying to move away is fruitless. Finally, a fine piece of string is tied around the elephant's foot only. By this stage full conditioning has taken place and the elephant does not try to move away from the holding area. Amazing isn't it!! Now I know dogs are not elephants, but it's the same learning principle by walking them on a short lead.

I really should be doing some work right now, but couldn't help myself. Good post MarkS. Well said. Dogs show stress signals (to varying degrees) all the time during their day to day activities. When teaching a dog a new complex skill, the dog will most certainly become stressed especially when we move to the next stage of the skill as he/she tries to figure out what it is you want (if shaping). The level of stress will vary from dog to dog, but it still be present. So in essence, we should stop this type of training because it is putting the dog under stress.....? Also, when we look at the dogs on the CM show, not all are showing signs of stress....submission is not stress! Some of the true signs of stress: heavy panting, drooling/frothing, yawning, sniffing, looking away, barking, licking. Some of the signs of submission: licking, ears back, long mouth, low posture, rolling over, urinating. Signs of displacement or distance increasing behaviours: licking, looking away, yawning, sniffing, urinating. Therefore, a dog that yawns or licks isn't necesarily stressed. We need to read the entire cluster of signals to interpret the sentence.

Thanks Erny and yes I totally agree.

Bugger....missed it!

Hi Tess32 I cannot see a problem with it. If the dog has been pulling notoriously for years and the owners have no idea how to deal with it, a compulsive method like this works just fine. It gives the owners the quick-fix that they are after and let's face it......a quick fix is what people want most of the time. They don't want to have to implement methods that take weeks or months to achieve - that is what dog trainers do! They just want the problem gone and with this method, Cesar achieves it. It very quickly unlearns it and re-learns another way. It is much better than continuously yanking on the correction chain IMO. Ultra short lead, quick and swift corrections, back in position, continue walking.....the message gets through no problem. He leads by example and in many cases, the penny seems to drop for some people. Nothing wrong with a head start for some. Haven't you ever taught a dog the beginnings of the drop and then let the owners do it....you empower them! I am yet to meet a dog who either works all day or leads an active lifestyle and has behavioural problems. Yes, I agree with you here Tess32, but then again it's not just Cesar who seems to skip this vital message. None of the other TV trainers ever seem to give it either. I need to reiterate that I am not a fan of ALL of Cesar's methods, but his message is a good one. Dogs need a pack leader, without it we create an imbalance and due to that imbalance, problems are born. If he went around saying that training can take months, even years (which we all know it does).....how many people would become discouraged??? Lots!

:p Inflation's a bugger. Now worth 40c.

It's blatantly obvious that Cesar has both his followers and his enemies. This may be the way you've perceived his message, but the walk is actually used to create the "calm, submissive" state of mind that he talks about and assists the dog in becoming "one with the pack". It's not meant to cure the dog of the problem merely just one tool. If people bothered to walk and exercise their dogs more often, half of the behaviour problems we see these days would not exist. You cannot tell me this isn't so!! Because maybe for him they are!!?? Most problems stem from lack of leadership. Once you've got that sorted, the rest should fall into place. Unless you are working with fear aggression or something more serious, other problems are a walk in the park for most good trainers and behaviourists. No, but in many cases the owners have quite happily relinquished the leadership role to the dog/s, causing a confused, and in turn, problematic dog. Pretty much the same with kids I reckon! Yes it does and this is the part that worries me as we are not "Cesar Milan" with his handling skills. Minus the e-collar, same was said for Victoria Stillwell and any other trainer, on previous threads, who's been brave enough (or fortunate enough) to score their own TV show. There are always the critics. It's human nature to quote others far more wiser, more famous and/or more experienced than us! Such is life! Like him or hate him, his name is out there and most of the world knows of him. As for those who try his methods and end upt getting hurt, then they have ignored the warnings on the show and whatever happens is their fault entirely. I see the same warnings on those reality shows that depict motorcycle stunts and eating worms etc. :p Just my 20c worth.

Yet another Cesar thread I have one of his "Pack leader" Tshirts and I love it. I point it out to my dogs whenever I wear it and they look at me as if to say....."Huh??!!?? Whatever.....where u hiding dat frisbee?" I also have a "Daddy" mug.....Loooove Daddy! As I've mentioned before in previous threads, there are some things I agree with and others I absolutely don't. But I do admire his communication skills with the owners. He is a very charismatic person which is probably why he ended up with his own TV show. Am I a Cesar fan??? You could say...........put it this way, if he came to Australia, I would definitely go along to see him. Let's face it, who wouldn't??

LL, not too sure about KCC herding, but yard trials requires the dog to cast, especially at Open level, but the area is usually flat. When working on the farm, the dog is sent out to gather sheep who are scattered all over the property, flat and/or hilly.

I don't see anything wrong with teaching drive training to most people, infact we teach it to the puppies from a young age, albeit a more watered down version due to baby teeth etc. We teach control over the object which gives the added benefit of teaching a young pup to give the toy up on cue, lessening possessivness. Haven't had a problem with "dominance" or rank yet and we've been doing it for 4 years now. Playing tug, correctly, I feel teaches the dog that the toy is controlled by the human, not the dog. Isn't this similar to what I stated that those dogs which are possessive over toys should be kept away from tug.

Hi Bret I think the first thing you should be teaching your dog is to flank (sides) and work on/off balance. You need to be able to send the dog "back" and "over" effectively before teaching to cast. This will also help you with the cast teaching process. There are many different techniques for teaching the cast but IMO, best to teach it in baby steps, sending the dog back or over from your side and gradually increasing the distance. Some dogs are natural casters, others need to learn the skill. I've only ever taught my dogs to cast on sheep and have never "dry" trained them. The send-away (which is more inclined for Shutzhund work) is different to a herding cast as it utilises different drives and the dogs need to turn into the top of the flock. Teaching dry send-outs will not teach the turn action. Also just because you teach the dog the send-away, doesn't mean she will cast on sheep. Not sure what others have suggested, but I highly recommend teaching the flanks, working on/off balance first with solid stops and create distance if she gets too close. Get these perfected first then go onto the cast.

I have to agree with Arya on this one. Continously "winning" the toy (the human that is) is not a good thing for the dog's love and drive of the game. The dog needs to know it can win the game more often than not in order to keep up enthusiasm. I think the most important thing here is control the game by teaching the dog to "give" the item up on cue. His reward for giving it up is to immediately continue to the game. I find this a better and fairer way of controlling the game. I let my dogs win the game quite often and it always has a boomerang effect.....they keep wanting more. To further control the game, I have taught 2 other commands: 1. "Gentle" which means they cannot tug at full force and must tug gently - great when young kids want to play and also saves my arm if I am getting tired or they are becoming over-stimulated.....they are extremely gentle on this cue. And 2: I also have an "off" swtich which indicates the end of the game, so they must now lgo away and leave me alone, even if they have the toy in their possession. If I can also add, it's not so much the 'dominant' dog you must you must worry about if choosing to play tug, but rather the object possessive dog. Happy tugging!!!

No probs MarkS, you certainly make sense. And I do hope you are not rushing out at the last minute for Christmas shopping......I heard on one of the morning shows this morning that men will be the dominant gender at the stores today as they tend to leave things to the last minute....

Thanks for answering my questions MarkS.......I was beginning to feel left out Here are some of my comments: Could it be that in this situation the timing of the reward was the problem, rather than the general method itself? It seems the instructor may have given this lady incorrect instruction on reward timing and that the dog may have been reinforced for lunging. I totally agree that a well timed correction, in this case, was required but what if the lunging was due to fear aggression and not just a bad habit?? Applying physical corrections to a fear aggressive dog who has not been taught aternative behaviours can have disastrous effects. I do use leash corrections but only if a dog knows 100%what it is supposed to be doing and only if the behaviour is not fear related. Lease corrections or P+ have no place in initial stages of behaviour modification for fear issues IMO. I think in the past, many instructors/training organisations dished out corrections like they were going out of fashion, which is why a lot of problems occurred and the practice became unfavourable. Unfortunately, today we have turned full circle and have gone to the extreme of the other end of the spectrum, posing new problems. Here are the magic words....."current state of the mind". Trainers...please take note!

Hi Mark, welcome to DOL! Your post is very well put and I'm sure you will find many people here who agree with you in may aspects. It's a pity that balanced trainers are pideon-holed as alpha-rollers and with using weopons of mass destruction and nazi torture methods when dog training. This couldn't be further from the truth. As I mentioned in an earlier post, it all boils down to the RSPCA's public perception and how they wish to be seen.....cuddly and fluffy like. So naturally they will delete that which is not conducive to their belief. Your post was a threat to them and perhaps one that they could not fathom due to lack of knowledge. At the end of the day, it is the poor dog that pays the ultimate price for their ignorance. I have one small question for you MarkS, do you believe that the use of food in training is contributing to the higher cases of aggression or is it due to lack of leadership and guidance.?? Your comments in the Adelaide newspaper website seem to indicate that you feel the use of food in training is one of the culprits.....?

Good luck with that Cosmolo, I truly hope it gets the consideration that it will deserve. Whilst I knew that the temp tests currently performed at most major shelters are unsatisfactory, I had no idea they were that bad. I would also like to question the adoptions process and how they decide a dog's suitably to a prospective new owner. I've seen some pretty bad mis-matches in my time!! Perhaps this could be next on the list??

I often watch the US ASPCA show on Foxtel and am interested in their way of temp testing the dogs. Does anyone know if this is similar/different to the way the RSPCA do their temp tests?? The US based ones seem very thorough and tend to work with dogs who have mild problem cases. There was on particular episode where a dog was very possessive towards his food in the bowl and would aggress if anyone came close. Apart from this problem, the dog was great with all other aspects. The staff there put this dog on a rehab regime and fixed the problem and the dog was successfully rehomed to a couple with no kids. I'd be curious to see the criteria for the temp tests by the RSPCA.

And a Merry Christmas to you too Tonymc and to everyone else here on DOL. Whilst I may not visit as often as I'd like, I always enjoy reading the posts and adding a comment here and there. Erny, you've just scared the kiddies again.................

Are you kidding Rom, they don't have enough resources to be able to do such a thing. Here in Melbourne, they are currently way under-staffed as far as inspectors are concerned yet are "admin heavy" so that they can run their advertisments, organise their open days and publish their newsletters. No time to look into the real cruelty cases..... A night out with a sweaty, ageing and drunk Santa!!

People are people and will do "people" things, like stretch the truth so that they can satisfy some inner need to be seen as doing the 'right' thing. I wish I had a dime for every person I met with a rescue dog who tells either myself or my trainers that their dog was the victim of abuse or neglect. I'd be a very rich person. I often wonder why this occurs! Is it that the dog has truly been abused or is it just a notion that comes with a dog from a pound or rescue organisation. Perhaps the word "rescue" is what triggers these thoughts in some people?? If the dog comes from a "rescue" organisation, then it must have been 'rescued' from something nasty. Others may simply like to be seen as "doing good". I am trying not to generalise here, since not everyone is the same and those dogs who have been truly abused do not lie. I don't think Tonymc meant to 'attack' people, but rather point out what he sees as a predictable pattern behaviour within society.

tsk, tsk Erny, you are NOT allowed to HO HO HO......that's cruel!! Yes of course......I didn't think of the $$ in donations...it all boils down to one thing doesn't it....the public's perception!

Sorry, still can't double quote I was thinking the same thing Erny. Barkbusters methods are most certainly not in line with what a "balanced" trainer might do Let's look at the bigger picture here, not just with dog training but with almost everything in our lives these days: We cannot discipline (by way of smacking) our children anymore as this is seen as abuse We cannot sing Christmas Carols or hang up Christmas decorations as it may offend those non-Christians Santa can no longer "Ho Ho Ho" coz it may scare the children - they must now "Ha Ha Ha" And of course The use of purely positive methods in dog training coz it's more socially acceptable. I think the magic word here is "socially acceptable" methods of training and ones that fit into today's cotton wool society, which is the ONLY reason why the RSPCA has adopted the purely positive approach. It cannot be seen as advocating any form of correctional based methods, after all they are the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals!! Let's face it, the RSPCA, like many of our local councils and other organisations these days, wants to be seen as politically correct - nothing more, nothing less. And for this very sad reason, many dogs are PTS because in many cases, a PP approach does not cut it. Will they admit to that, of course not!

LOL, no sweat Tonymc. It's just one of those statements that really urks me and I always feel I need to say something about it.....perhaps I should just crawl back in to the Kelpie cave and shut up!!

Disclaimer: Firstly, my comment below is made on a curious note only and not to flame what anyone beleives and/or has written on this thread. Secondly, as most of you already know that I consider myself a 'balanced' trainer who uses whatever is needed to obtain the required results. So here is my comment/question..... I hear the above comment made many times by various people. My question is this.....why would we think that a dog is not motivated by food, after all it requires food to survive, right? No eat, no live! I think the statement should be "some dogs are not motivated by food that is not placed in their food bowl". Getting back to the thread subject, the RSPCA has not met my old dog "Blue", probably one of the meanest and nastiest working kelpies to ever set foot on this earth . No amount of withholding food, love, attention or whatever would make that bastard listen.