The personal goals I have for my dogs and myself are very simple. They are for them to have the skills and confidence they need to successfully share my home with the minimum amount of human injected control or management.
So, I haven’t ever and do not now, spend hours and hours on orchestrated training sessions. What I have always done is share lots of time interacting with my dogs around the home. This allows for the constant reinforcement of much wanted and appropriate behaviors. It also allows me to manage and prevent the behaviors that are not conducive to our goals while we build better alternatives skills. I consider myself a very lazy trainer!
As a result of this I share my life with two wonderful pet dogs. I have dogs that I can leave unattended and they are happy and healthy. I have dogs that are empowered to come and go as they please, taking into consideration I want, no, need, them to be safe and secure. Because of a long and valuable reinforcement history I have pet dogs that wait at doors, are polite around food, sit if requested to do so when it is needed, have fabulous “leave it” and emergency “wait” cues and come back at full pace if asked.
Today I read a blog titled Puppies or Puppets written by a colleague Lottie Bennett and it again reminded me of the importance of not only managing and training your dog’s well but also allowing them to be dogs and to be empowered to make their own decisions under the safety of secure empowering training protocols.
What do you think, share your comments below
Niki Tudge