What Causes 75% of ALL Dog Behavior Problems?

By Aidan Bindoff

When asked what is the biggest cause of dog behavior problems, most people would guess at lack of training, a ‘dominance’ problem, or inadequate socialisation. Some might even try to blame the dog’s genetics or temperament. Whilst any of these might cause dog behavior problems, a great many dog behavior problems are caused in whole or in part by this one thing – not enough Exercise!

So what are your dog’s exercise requirements?

That depends on age, breed and individual. Puppies shouldn’t be exercised for more than 20 minutes at a time, but they can be exercised gently quite frequently. Most puppies like to play, which tires them out with or without your help. Be careful not to over-walk puppies, their bones need to mature before they can be walked for long periods. Speak to your vet, but 20 minutes of walking at a time is about right.

Different breeds have different exercise requirements. Working and herding breeds typically have very high exercise requirements. Take the German Shepherd as an example, German Shepherd Dogs are descended from herding dogs who were required to form a “living fence” for their master’s flock. This was a 24 hour a day job, which included protection from predators and thieves at night.

Some breeds, whilst they may appear to have high exercise requirements, may not. A Greyhound actually has a fairly low exercise requirement, although they do love to exercise intensely for short bursts.

Other breeds were used in hunting. Breeds such as Beagles and Retrievers would work very hard, but not every day. They tend to be fairly flexible with exercise, so long as they are kept in shape and given regular outlets for their energies.

Individuals within any breed will have greater or lesser requirements for exercise than others of that breed. Sometimes the differences can be fairly extreme, although I have never known a Border Collie that didn’t require a lot of exercise! Well, until they got old at least. Older dogs generally require much less exercise.

Nearly every adult dog requires at least 30 minutes walking each day. If you cannot physically provide this for your dog then alternative means for exercise should be arranged. Playing fetch, frisbee or swimming are excellent alternatives. Some dog clubs provide agility classes, which are a great way to train and to exercise your dog – regardless of breed or age.

Some individual dogs have a very high exercise requirement. Typically, trainers or obedience clubs will be presented with a dog who escapes the yard, barks all day, digs in the garden, pulls on the leash, jumps all over people or doesn’t come when called. Usually in some sort of combination!

These dogs almost certainly require more exercise than they are getting.

In addition to exercise, training is essential. What’s more, 5 minutes training is worth about 15 minutes exercise. “Brain work” will tire a dog out fairly quickly. Combine training with exercise and you have a winning combination. Sports such as Agility, Tracking, Schutzhund or Flyball are all excellent outlets for your dog’s boundless energy.

Can you over-exercise a dog? Yes. You can exercise a dog to exhaustion. If you are extremely fit, or your dog is extremely unfit, you can cause injuries, heat-stress and even cause internal organ damage by over-working your dog. If your dog is unfit, consult with your vet before starting a new exercise program with your dog. Start off gently and increase the amount of exercise each week, give your dog time to adjust. In hot weather, scale back and provide plenty of water and rest opportunities.

Please also be aware of any physical limitations your dog may have. Diseases such as Hip Dysplaysia can be hard to detect in the early stages. Some dogs are remarkably adept at hiding injuries if they think the fun will stop. If you suspect your dog has an injury, please end all exercise and immediately seek veterinary help. Early treatment can save weeks of needless pain and hundreds of dollars of vet care.

Aidan Bindoff is Editor of http://www.PositivePetzine.com, your helpful online resource for positive dog training and behavior information.

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What Causes 75% of ALL Dog Behavior Problems? is a post from: Training Dogs Blog

Does Your Dog Bark at the Door?

By Aidan Bindoff

Does your dog bark when you have a knock at the door? Follow this simple plan to end excessive barking at the door.

Many dogs will bark when they hear a knock at the door. This is probably to announce the arrival of a new person to their territory. They learn pretty quickly that a knock on the door is quickly followed by a visitor.

But what if a knock at the door was only occasionally followed by a visitor?

Some dog owners have quick success at reducing barking by simply knocking on the door repeatedly throughout the day. With no visitor appearing at the door, the knock sound soon stops being associated with the visitor. At first, the barking will probably get worse. After a few repetitions, it should start to reduce. Don’t lose heart if it doesn’t appear to work for a little while.

When your dog gets really good at not barking when he hears a knock on the door, invite someone around to help out. Just have them knock on the door every minute and not come in unless your dog hasn’t barked. Do this for about 5 or 6 repetitions, no need to overdo it.

You can speed things up by rewarding your dog for being quiet when he hears a knock at the door. A further refinement is to make the knock a cue to lay down on a mat, or to sit quietly by the front door. This is a very polite greeting indeed!

If you have a doorbell, the same procedure applies. If your doorbell has different ring tones, try to set it to use only one ring tone.

This is certainly not the only approach to ending barking at the door, but for the majority of dogs it is the easiest and most effective approach. Try it and see!

Aidan Bindoff is Editor of http://www.PositivePetzine.com, a free resource for people training their own dog. Each edition is packed with helpful tips for training your dog using the latest pet-friendly methods that work fast and don’t require a degree in animal behavior to use. PLUS, check out the huge archive of useful articles on just about every dog training topic you can think of!

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Does Your Dog Bark at the Door? is a post from: Training Dogs Blog

TV Dog Trainers Exposed!

By Aidan Bindoff

Who could fail to be impressed by the extraordinary results of TV celebrity dog trainers? In minutes they can turn anxious, aggressive, “dominant” mutts into angelic pooches who never set a paw wrong… or can they?

The wonderful thing about television is it’s value as an entertainment medium. TV producers (with some very limited exceptions) are not there to disseminate important information, they are there to sell advertising time or subscriptions. And nothing sells like a story of transformation that inspires hope, particularly if that story is about a beloved pet. It’s something any pet-lover can relate to. Particularly if you are like the majority of pet owners and struggle with training, obedience and doggy manners.

As a dog trainer I am often amazed at the remarkable success stories I see on TV programs about dog training. In minutes, these gifted individuals can turn a problem dog (or dog owner) around. Sure, I’ve had a few remarkable success stories myself, but I know they are the exception, not the rule. Big changes to serious problems tend to take more time than TV producers allow for.

The truth is that TV producers will only show the best stories, and even then they won’t show you the whole story. What gets left on the cutting room floor? Why do we rarely see follow-up? I know a local TV dog trainer has a string of unsuccessful cases that appeared to be successful on television. Those certainly haven’t been followed up and aired!

I also know that it’s easy to impress a client by asking their dog to do something very specific in a situation which sets that dog up for success. With a little knowledge and experience I don’t tend to make the same mistakes my clients will make, yet even my own dogs are far from perfect. The real world sets us up to make a few mistakes along the way. A 5 minute slot on a highly edited TV program is about as far removed from the real world as possible.

So what can we believe about TV celebrity dog trainers? Everything – with a grain of salt. Watching your favourite dog trainer on television may entertain you, but it’s value as an education medium is somewhat limited. Sure, remarkable success stories are possible. Experienced and knowledgeable trainers will get faster results than the general public. But the laws of learning do not change, and it pays to read, discuss and practise them. Getting your information from a multitude of sources would be a wise investment, as would seeking help from a competent ‘real live’ dog trainer if you have a dog behavior problem you need to solve.

Aidan Bindoff is Editor of http://www.PositivePetzine.com, a free resource for people training their own dog. Each edition is packed with helpful tips for training your dog using the latest pet-friendly methods that work fast and don’t require a degree in animal behavior to use.

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But can I leave well enough alone? Not when I found a guest article by one of my favorite dog writers… and I like his point that the biggest problem with this habit is how disgusting we human find it.

Yuck! My Dog Eats His Own Poo!

By Aidan Bindoff

Coprophagia – that’s what vets and animal behaviorists call it when dogs eat their own faeces. To us, it’s possibly the most disgusting thing a dog can do. Is Coprophagia harmful? What can we do to stop it? Will it make our dogs sick? Does it mean that something is missing from their diet?

Unfortunately we don’t really know what causes Coprophagia. There could be many reasons. Some dog owners report that their dog is more likely to eat their own stool after a change in diet – usually to a processed food with preservatives. Owners of dogs who eat their own stool can find that dietary changes may end the habit, particularly changes to a higher quality or more biologically appropriate diet.

Some dog owners have found that Coprophagia stops if they add Pineapple to their dog’s diet. It is not known whether the enzymes in the Pineapple address a dietary imbalance or whether it just doesn’t make poo taste very good to a dog!

Coprophagia has been linked to stress and also to boredom. Regular physical and mental activity may decrease Coprophagia by either reducing stress of relieving boredom.

Picking up dog poo regularly will decrease Coprophagia by prevention. If the dog’s living environment is particularly untidy then that may encourage bad habits.

Coprophagia is generally not harmful unless disease, bacteria or worms have colonised the stool and multiplied prior to ingestion. Dog poo does contain toxins which may become harmful in large repeated doses. There is a greater risk when dogs eat the stool of other dogs, and this should be managed carefully.

The biggest problem with Coprophagia is that humans find it disgusting, particularly the smell of doggy breath after ingesting faeces.

If your dog has a bad Coprophagia habit, please seek veterinary advice to ensure that your dog’s health, diet and lifestyle are in order.

For more information, join the Yahoo Dog Housebreaking group.

Aidan Bindoff is Editor of http://www.PositivePetzine.com, your helpful online resource for positive dog training and behavior information.

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Yuck! My Dog Eats His Own Poo! is a post from: Training Dogs Blog

Most of us would agree that we are frightened of a snarling guard dog, but those with a true fear of dogs are terrified of even a small fluffy pup. Even the sound of a bark can cause anxiety and distress.

As with most fears and phobias, fear of dogs usually starts in childhood. It may stem from being bitten by a dog, or even just being knocked down by an exuberant puppy. Sometimes a child will become frightened of dogs if they see their parent is anxious or worried around dogs – they may think if their parent is concerned, there is a real reason to be afraid.

There seems to be no rhyme or reason as to why a child becomes afraid of dogs. One child may still love dogs after being bitten, yet another may become very fearful if a little dog jumps on them.

If a child is afraid of dogs, it can cause difficulties in their day to day lives. Dogs are everywhere and it won’t be possible to avoid them forever. It’s worth working with your child to overcome their fear.

A commonly recommended method of getting over any phobia is with a slow, gradual and highly controlled exposure to what the person is fearful of. Some children are just too frightened to be within sight of a dog. In this case, you can start with watching a television show or movie that shows friendly happy dogs. The old Lassie movies would be ideal for this.

When your child is happy and relaxed while watching a dog movie, the next step is to show them some baby puppies that are under 6 weeks of age. At this age, the pups aren’t jumpy or yappy, so shouldn’t cause any anxiety. Your child may then be willing to touch or hold a pup, but be sure to do this away from the mom, as she may be protective of her babies.

If all is going smoothly,  take your child to where they can see real dogs, butat this stage be sure  the dogs don’t have access to them. They can then get used to seeing dogs running and jumping, and can hear their noise without having to actually be too close to them. A great venue for this sort of exposure is a dog obedience competition. The dogs are all well trained and under control, so you’re not likely to have a dog rush at you.

The final step is to have your child interact with a quiet adult dog. Choose a calm breed such as a whippet or a cocker spaniel, and allow your child to stroke the dog when they feel ready to do so.

One warning – don’t be tempted to rush through any of these steps, or be in a hurry to solve this problem. If you do go too fast, and your child becomes fearful, you can set your progress back significantly.

Although the fear of dogs can be  frustrating and may be persistent, in most cases you can overcome it with a slow and careful exposure to dogs.

If Your Child Is Afraid of Dogs is a post from: Training Dogs Blog

Dog Training With Distractions – Proofing for the Real World With Positive Reinforcement

By Aidan Bindoff

Dog training is easy when you discover the secrets of dog training professionals explained in this brief article. Once you leave your house, all your training will appear to go down the drain. How do you overcome these distractions? Find out right now!

What is reinforcement? Reinforcement is what happens when a behaviour is maintained or increased. Dog training is essentially a progression of reinforcements. Food, toys, play, attention and ‘life rewards’ such as being let inside or taken for a walk are all potential reinforcers.

Without reinforcement, behavior will never be maintained or increased. This is fine if you want a behavior to disappear – simply stop reinforcing it. But if you want a particular behavior, you need to reinforce it.

Most dog trainers these days use food as a reinforcer. It is by no means the only reinforcer, but food is convenient and, let’s face it, all dogs need to eat!

So we start off training with food in a quiet, distraction-free area inside the house. We put any other pets out of the room. We turn off the TV. We wait until the kids are in bed. Then we shut the door and train. There are numerous books and articles explaining how to do this, so I won’t re-hash the basics.

The problems begin when we get out of that distraction-free environment and into the real world. Here there are other dogs, birds, squirrels, cats, new smells, sights, sounds, people, cars, bikes, postmen – it’s all out there! Our training usually starts falling apart once we leave the house.

But it doesn’t need to.

The big secret to dog training is to always set the dog up for success. If the dog fails, we can’t reinforce. If we can’t reinforce, behavior can not be maintained or increased. If behavior hasn’t been maintained or increased, training has failed.

So we need to set the dog up to succeed. Going too far, too fast will only lead to failure. Allowing too many distractions or too big a distraction too soon is setting our dog up to fail. Without success, we’ve got nothing to reinforce.

The best way to set our dogs up for success is to control the environment as best we possibly can until they are well and truly proofed and ready for the big wide world.

Let’s say we normally train in our kitchen with the door shut. Here’s a list of things we can do to set up some low-level distractions:

1. place a tennis ball in the middle of the floor

2. turn the radio on softly, then turn it up gradually throughout our training session

3. have a friend come into the room with us

4. put a piece of stale dog food on the floor

5. wave our arms around

6. turn the taps on halfway through an exercise

7. whistle a tune

8. roll a tennis ball slowly in front of our dog

9. turn away from our dog

… or any combination of the above.

Remember, the secret is to always set our dogs up for success, so that we may reinforce (maintain or increase) their good behavior.

If any of the distractions on that list are too much, then our dog fails. Just because I wrote it on my list of low-level distractions doesn’t mean that your individual dog won’t find any one of those things too distracting.

Be creative. Think of new things to add to the list. When your dog can cope with them all, start making up combinations. Invite two or more friends around to help. Have them toss a ball back and forth while you practise stays or recalls. Have one of them whistle a tune while the other waves her arms around. The sky is the limit so long as we always set our dogs up for success.

When we have trained with distractions inside the house, we’re ready to find a quiet spot outside. No other dogs around, no kids playing, no cars screaming past, and hopefully no cats or squirrels. We train the behavior, then start adding the distractions from our list, always setting our dog up to succeed.

That is all there is to it – manufacture some controlled distractions, build them up, and always make them just easy enough that our dog continually succeeds so that we can reinforce the behavior.

Aidan Bindoff is Editor of http://www.PositivePetzine.com, your helpful online resource for positive dog training and behavior information.

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Dog Training With Distractions – Proofing for the Real World With Positive Reinforcement is a post from: Training Dogs Blog

Lola was in her crate, with its usual pad in it, and many of her usual toys as well. The crate just fit in the back of the motorhome, in the area where a table would usually be. She wasn’t happy generally, though she did throw up only once, that first morning. LarryDog wore a travel harness which was tied securely to some metalwork, and he was close to Kelly but not so close that Larry could have bumped into Kelly in case of hitting the brakes fast.

The cats, each in a crate, were in the back seat of our car. I was up front, along with a friend who helped with the driving. He had been warned that our part-Siamese cat, Moonlight, had yowled plenty when we brought him down from Colorado. Misty, our Mexican cat, had made one trip of several hours with us.

It was a five-day trip. We knew that the dogs wouldn’t like being separated from me, so we stopped within a couple of hours of setting out, as much for the dogs to see me as anything else. They greeted me with a lot of emotion that time, but both soon caught on to the routines. We took them out and walked them a couple of times or more during each day’s drive, as well as longer walks before and after the journeying.

As for the cats, both of them did complain quite a bit, but really that bothered me less than the long hours when they both seemed, well, CATatonic. I had some Rescue Remedy with me but it was an old bottle and the top of the cap broke off the first night.

That night was in a Mexican motel. It isn’t always easy to find places to stay with pets in Mexico, but this worked out fine. Someone I had been emailing with happened to own a motel halfway from the Lake Chapala area to the Texas border, and so we routed ourselves that way and stayed at his place. There were a few loose dogs living there, and LarryDog can be a bit dog-aggressive, but there were no problems. In fact, Larry was well behaved the whole trip.

We had brought our dogs’ usual beds, and settled them in the room with us. We turned the cats loose in the bathroom, and that became the routine. One night we tried letting the cats have the run of the room but they both spent the night under the king-sized bed and were not that easy to get in the morning! So I spent part of each evening on bathroom floors, having love-times with the kitties.

The second day found us crossing the border into the US in the early evening, at Eagle Pass, Texas. We had to take our animals out of the vehicles. Kelly took the dogs on leash, one at a time, to crates supplied by the border officials, some distance away from the RV. One of my favorite visual memories of the trip occurred as we pulled the car into place for examination. I looked straight ahead and there was LarryDog, alone in jail, standing and gently wagging his tail! I followed his gaze and saw where Lola was in another crate. Kelly was beside her, chatting with some people who were admiring her. LarryDog seemed to enjoy the whole border process. It would have been less boring than most of his day, I guess.

Meanwhile, we were told to take the cats out of the car and to put their crates on a table next to it. Both cats looked pretty dazed.

“Is Doc still here?” one of the officials asked another one. My heart sank.

Our dogs had had their requisite rabies shots more than 30 days before, and we had papers to prove it. We also had veterinary certificates attesting to their good health, which are not legally required but can smooth the way. (No papers were asked for.) No papers or shots were required for cats, but we knew that any cat that appeared ill could be refused admission to the US pending a veterinary exam.

Luckily, “Doc” was still around and turned out to be just another one of the border officials. He glanced at the cats and asked me how they got along with the Rottweiler. I told him that the smaller one liked to settle down in the middle of Lola’s bed with a “make my day” look, and that Lola would whine but yield! He wished me a good evening, the car was all checked, and we were done.

By now it was dark and we were in a strange town, in need of a place to stay with the pets. We found a la Quinta Inn, and much to our delight the other two nights we easily found national chains that were pet-friendly (Motel 6 and Travelodge). None of the desk clerks even asked how many pets, or what kinds, we had.

The next three days were much the same. When we arrived at our new house in Colorado, I think the animals all thought it was just another motel, but after a few days they got the idea. We are all settling in nicely now.

Long Road Trip from Mexico with our Dogs and Cats is a post from: Training Dogs Blog

This approach makes it an environmentally friendly choice, safe for use around us humans and our pets. It works on carpets as well as on other surfaces, and has been in use at vet clinics, pet hospitals, and carpet cleaning companies for over 15 years.

I’ve been hearing raves about this stuff for a long time. Since I blog about housetraining a lot, today I thought I’d mention a way to deal with the mistakes. The image or the link go to the one quart size but you can get more if you will need it!

Anti Icky Poo Odor Remover (1) Quart with Sprayer

Anti Icky Poo is a post from: Training Dogs Blog

The Most Important Exercise for Multiple Dog or Puppy Owners

By Aidan Bindoff

If you have more than one dog or puppy living under your roof, then this is one of the most important and useful exercises you can teach. Without this exercise (or something very similar), one of your dogs will probably learn to bully the other dogs out of the way for attention or food. This exercise lays the foundation for happy, well-mannered multiple dog homes.

What we’re going to do is teach each of our dogs to stay on a Mat while we pay attention to, groom or feed one of our other dogs. The mat gives our dogs a clear place to go to and a boundary to stay within. If we have multiple dogs we can send each dog to their own individual mats. This removes any confusion about what our dogs are to do, and removes the need to place our dogs in position. If you have several dogs, it could be quite time consuming to place a number of dogs.

To start with, teach each dog individually to “Go to Mat”. A “Mat” is either a dog bed you can easily move around, or something as simple as a towel on the floor. We’ll just call it a “mat” from now on.

It’s always easiest to teach a new behavior in the lowest distraction environment you can find. For most people, this means finding a boring room such as the bathroom, and locking your other dogs out while you work with one dog at a time.

Have a bowl or bag of small, tasty treats, your mat, a clicker, and a dog who hasn’t eaten a meal yet today. If you don’t own a clicker, you can substitute with verbal praise, but make it short, sweet and consistent; e.g “good!” or “Yes!”

Full instructions for training “Go to Mat” can be found here.

Train each of your dogs, one at a time, to Level 3 with a full 1 minute stay according to the instructions given. Practise it in different rooms of the house, and maybe even out in your yard.

Aidan Bindoff is Editor of http://www.PositivePetzine.com, a free resource for people training their own dog. Each edition is packed with helpful tips for training your dog using the latest pet-friendly methods that work fast and don’t require a degree in animal behavior to use.

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Have More than One Dog? Go to Mat is a post from: Training Dogs Blog

Ouch! My Puppy Dog is Biting My Hands and Clothes
By Aidan Bindoff

This article explains in plain English the fastest way to stop your puppy dog biting at your clothing, hands or other body parts. If you have “tried everything” or simply have no idea what to do, the answers are all here and made easy. Methods are humane and pet-friendly, utilizing positive reinforcement and ‘time-outs’ instead of spanking or scolding.

All puppies will bite and chew your body parts or clothing. It is just what puppies do. Their sharp, needle-like teeth can cause quite a lot of pain, and clothing can easily be damaged. It makes sense that we want to teach puppy that this is unacceptable as quickly as possible. What’s more, if puppies are allowed to continue this behavior, by the time they are adolescents or adults they could cause some serious damage!

That’s not to say that having a puppy’s mouth on you is necessarily a ‘bad’ thing. Puppies need to learn what we call ‘bite inhibition’, which is a soft, inhibited bite. Why? All dogs will bite under certain circumstances, particularly if taken by surprise. The dog that learns bite inhibition can bite without causing any real damage.

First, some theory. Don’t worry, it’s not long and boring!

If you have read my earlier article “Secrets of Dog Training Professionals – Operant Conditioning” then you will be familiar with the term ‘Negative Punishment’. Sounds awful, doesn’t it? But don’t worry, Negative Punishment simply means that behavior is decreased because we took something away as a consequence of that behavior.

A ‘time out’ is a Negative Punisher when the target behavior is decreased. Time outs are one of the most humane and pet-friendly punishments we can use, when used with thought and care.

Puppies bite at our hands and clothing because that is the way that puppies like to play. It is fun, and they enjoy our attention. They particularly like it if we try to fight them off of us. Have you ever seen two or more puppies playing? They like to fight each other with their mouths and paws.

Normally, other puppies teach our puppy not to bite too hard by squealing in pain. When we take our puppy from the litter, these other puppies aren’t around to teach proper bite inhibition any more. Some people advise trying to emulate a ‘puppy squeal’ to discourage biting too hard.

I don’t know why, but people just don’t seem to be very convincing with their squeals, so I don’t recommend it as a training technique. What’s more, some puppies seem to enjoy it when their human squeals and will get more excited, resulting in more biting. This is obviously not what we want puppy to do! If you can squeal and your puppy immediately stops biting, then this is an acceptable technique. Monitor the behavior long-term, though, to make sure biting too hard is decreasing.

A different, yet highly effective aproach is to say ‘ouch’ in a neutral tone of voice (not loud, not high-pitched and not angry) then walk out of the room, shutting the door behind you for 30 seconds. This marks the exact behavior you are trying to punish, then gives a time-out as a consequence.

It may take puppy a little while to figure out the link between his biting and the time-out, but the marker will make it clearer. It is important to say ‘ouch’ in a neutral tone of voice, and say it exactly at the moment that puppy bites too hard.

Notice that I said “exactly at the moment that puppy bites too hard“? We don’t want to discourage young puppies from biting altogether, this would be bite prohibition. We want to teach puppies to inhibit their bite.

Time-outs should not be excessive. A long time-out can be stressful and lead to other unwanted behaviors. 30 seconds is more than enough and seems to be quite effective. Don’t look back at puppy or try to push puppy away when you say ‘ouch’. Simply get up and leave, closing the door behind you.

If you have family or friends in the room then it might be easier to lead puppy out of the room and shut him out for his time-out. However, this doesn’t seem to be as effective to me.

Remember, it is only punishment if the behavior decreases. Continuing with a punishment which is unclear or ineffective is a waste of time and borders on abuse (although, it would be hard to do damage with a 30 second time-out). Consider your timing, consistency and whether or not there is anyone else in puppy’s life who is not following through with this protocol consistently. It is important that you explain the rules to anyone who plays with puppy.

If all else fails, seek professional advice. Most vet clinics are now offering puppy kinder classes using humane and pet-friendly techniques.

Aidan Bindoff is Editor of http://www.positivepetzine.com your helpful on-line resource for free positive dog training advice that works fast and that anyone can apply today!

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Another Way to Handle Puppy Biting is a post from: Training Dogs Blog