No, I don't think that's the right book for your puppy

At the library, I have an awkward problem sometimes. A person who's gotten a puppy or a new-to-them dog comes in looking for dog training books. Oh good, right? My favorite topic! (well, one of)

Not so good: the only dog trainer they've ever heard of is Cesar Millan.

I've given my opinions on Mr. Millan's methods before. And yes, I have read his show, and have read a bunch of his books. If I'm going to be opinionated about something, I prefer not to be factually inaccurate. And his methods, in practice, do not mesh well with mine.

Book Review: The Possibility Dogs, by Susannah Charlson

I read Scent of the Missing by Susannah Charlson more than two years ago, but it is the book that brought home for me what Search and Rescue really meant.

When I heard The Possibility Dogs was coming out, I didn't even need to know what it was about. I knew I would read it, and fully expected to enjoy it. I was correct on both counts.

The lead in is about a former fire fighter and his service dog, Haska. This encounter was also Charleson's introduction to the world of psychiatric service dogs, and perhaps service dogs to people with "invisible" disabilities.

Etsy Esoteria

Like many people (you know who you are), I dearly love Etsy. Not that I ever purchase very much on Etsy, mind you, nor will I probably ever sell anything there. I just like browsing, getting ideas, seeing what exists in the world.

Of course, my frequent topic of browsing is "dogs", or "dog training", or "Doberman". It seems no matter how specific you get, somebody has something. It's pretty neat.

So, some things I've found. Elka kept me company on the couch while browsing occurred.

Camp NaNoWriMo June 2012: Going Rogue

So, a few times now, I've mentioned writing a dog training eBook (which I'll probably release as a hard copy print on demand book as well, because once you're already on Amazon, why not?). As such a thing has not yet materialized, you might have guessed that I've only been making gestures at it. It's the truth; sorry. (Actually, checking back, it was only February that I first mentioned it. Of this year. Whew.)

But, that's changing! See, It's CampNaNoWriMo time again, and the space science fiction novel that I started hasn't exactly...hatched. So, I'm going rogue. I haven't failed many NaNo's, or cheated, or gone rogue, but after November '10, where I spent two weeks hammering at a novel that wasn't ready yet, and switched in the middle to a delightful novel that all but wrote itself, but then ran out of time....yeah. One week is enough to know it's time to switch. Now.

So, tentatively titled "A Dog's Guide to Owner Training" on my Camp NaNoWriMo profile (I'm GingerGunlock, if there are any fellow Wrimos here), I'm only at 2191 words, but I did that yesterday. Evening. So I'm confident that I can have a cogent body of work done by the 31. That's the great thing about Camp NaNoWriMo...you get an extra day!

Reward and Punishment

Rewards and punishments get discussed an awful lot in the dog world.

If you want to be more precise, though, you need to go the behavioral route, and talk about reinforcement. In dog training books, and on sites, you may or may not have seen the little grid with "positive reinforcement", "negative reinforcement", "positive punishment", and "negative punishment" in it.

Now in this case, positive and negative may not mean what you think they mean. Nor does punishment.

Book Review: Teaching the Dog to Think, by Kimberley Davis

I learned about the book Teaching the Dog to Think, by Kimberly Davis, from a post at Chronicles of a Puppy Walker. It was many things that I'm interested in: a book about dog training, a book about "thinking dog" training, and free. For the Kindle, anyway. Not that I have a Kindle, but they have an application for every platform. So, I went to Amazon, downloaded the app, downloaded the book, and blitzed right through it.

Davis starts out the book with her first night going to agility class with her rough collie, Willow. Willow is a young, exuberant dog, and he frequently has problems with being nutso and pulling on the leash, so he wears both a flat buckle collar and also a choke chain.

Blog the Change, April 15, 2012

Well, I daresay my Blog the Change platform is the same as it was back in January.  Train your dog! Your life, and hers, will be better.

I don't know a lot of dog owners, at least not to talk to at length. I try to "spread the gospel" anyway, as it were. One library patron got a puppy a few months back, and lately has come in describing how the puppy is chewing everything up. Oh, we've dealt with that, haven't we? I recommended feeding her only out of Kongs, which would contain her regular meals but mixed with a bit of yogurt and freezing, to use up that mental energy. Apparently the puppy does well in other realms, with sitting nicely for her meals, and retrieving. 

One of my friends, when visiting somebody else, taught the dog in that household "touch". Another friend's dog knows "roll over", which Elka does not, by the by. Any time Elka is on her back, it is on her own terms, and it's typically on a couch and on an object of her vigorous affection.

"Touch" and "roll over" might seem like silly tricks. "Touch", however, can lead to other things, like closing doors or cabinets, or send aways in agility and other dog sports."Roll over" might be pure fun, but you all know that I think trick training is valuable in and of itself. When you do trick training, you're still spending time with your dog and bonding, and working together. When Elka and I trick train, it's also typically when I bust the clicker out, and she's overjoyed to see that happens. The clicker means treats, and Elka loves treats. She also kind of likes getting something right, which is nice. 

Elka's "drop it" is still quite nice. She had a piece of candy in her mouth that somebody had let fall on the floor, unnoticed (a Sour Patch Kid). My fiance said "drop it", and she did immediately. I'm so very proud of that in her.

Dogs that you spend time with aren't bored. Dogs that you train don't tend to get cast aside and end up in shelters. Rescue, maybe, because sometimes home situations occur that are unavoidable. I think it was in Playtraining Your Dog that Patricia Gail Burnham said something about how people will sell their conformation champions, but asking somebody to sell their titled Utility Dog? No way, José. Granted, there's also a degree of training that goes into conformation dogs, and I don't know that owners give them up that easily either, but every owner is different, and competitors may be in it for different things, to be sure.

Title Talk

I've been thinking about title lately.

Ebook titles, not Titles to go after (or before!) Elka's name. I've got a few in mind I figured I'd run by you, my lovely readers. Tell me what you think about any one of these, and feel free to suggest ones I haven't listed! I do have a hard time coming up with titles.

Books on the brain

So, I've been thinking for a little while about maybe doing a little ebook.

Dog training, for Dobermans, that kind of thing. What do you guys think? It could be as simple as putting my Command Clinics together; even though there are only 7 (according to my tags. I don't think I missed any?), they're kind of "things your dog should know, plus some fun stuff". Of course I'd need a zippier title than that!

There are a lot of dog training ebooks on Amazon.com, and I'm sure some of them are better than others. That's definitely one reason I've been thinking of this. If they can do it, I can too, right? Plus, there's always a deficit of Doberman information.

Thoughts? Comments? Suggestions? Requests? Lay it on me! Tell your friends. I'd really love to hear them!

Take Responsibility

Dogs, like kids, don't know what you don't teach them.

Imagine this: You're in a public place (say, a library) and there's a kid running around, climbing on things, and yelling or screaming. The caretake is either not in sight, or following the child around at a much slower pace, occasionally saying things like "Billy, no, come here, you can't do that here, Billy, come on. You're in so much trouble, mister, we're going to have a talk."

Now imagine a dog doing it.