A night time walk in a blizzard

When I left work today I lamented having to walk Dahlia out in the weather we're having. This afternoon it was windy, about 40mph, blowing the recently fallen snow everywhere. My coworker said "She won't want to be out in this anyway."

I walked outside with Dahlia tonight to discover it was quite the blizzard. Near white-out conditions, snowing heavily, blowing still at around 30-40mph. Lovely. Just lovely. Dahlia ran out into it like this was the BEST STUFF EVAR OMG. I was hoping for a quick pee walk and I got a dog who looked up at me with this look of "wow mom how did you bring this awesome white stuff down!!"

So off we go, Dahlia with a spring in her step, me trudging after her, hoping she'll pee quickly.

She doesn't.

And then as we're coming back around the corner, out of the whiteness and darkness, comes a guy running with two dogs off leash. I can't really tell who it is. But he leashes up the dogs and moves out into the road with them. And as he comes closer I realize it's the guy with the Rottie from down the road and he's walking our neighbor's pit bull puppy. The dogs all know each other so he lets them back off and they come back over to Dahlia.

And play time ensues.

They run around and sniff and dance (and she finally pees!). And then we go see Callahan, a wonderful yellow lab who is sadly rarely walked and usually just tied to the back porch. He's a nice dog despite all of that. Bentley and Bailey are already up with Callahan when Dahlia and I head over. She freezes and I know her next move will be to fly to them. So I call to her and tell her "slow" and she walks slowly with me up to them, each time she forget herself and starts to rush forward I tell her to slow down and she does so. Finally we reach them and the four of them run around (Callahan as best he can being tied to the porch while the others are free) Bentley (the Rottie) takes to humping Callahan, but his owner manages to stop it and Callahan calls him off. Dahlia, of course, plays her proper roll of "police dog" and when Bentley starts to hump, she barks to get his attention and distract him and then herds him away from Callahan. She really is brilliant with that. The people at the dog park love how she sort of seems to defend the dogs who are dealing with a somewhat ruder, more aggressive dog. Luckily Bentley has never tried to hump her or he might get a quick flash of the teeth. Girl knows how to handle herself and does it quite gracefully.

When we decide play time is done, I call Dahlia off and she's awesome as always, following me, though she does start to veer off to chase Bailey and Bentley who are running off in the other direction. I call her back and she's excited and it's play time!! So I toss my glove, which she promptly kills like the predator she is. And then I tell her to bring it inside to Daddy and she does. She brings it right into the house and drops the soaking wet, covered in snow, glove right on top of his dissertation papers.

I love my dog!

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Dahlia shares her opinion of Cesar Millan!

Wordless Wednesday

Night time walk

We bounded out of the apartment tonight. Me with happiness over going for a walk with my dog; Dahlia with a big grin at the sight and smell of more snow. We rushed down the steps as we often do. You see, walks are fun. Dahlia gets to race through the snow, stopping to sniff when she wants to and then rushing to catch up to me or racing ahead to find the next bit of interesting snow to stick her snout in.

And me? I get to laugh with pure joy at watching her. She makes me happy. Walks with her make me happy.

When we got down off the porch I saw my next door neighbor coming up the sidewalk with her German Shepherd. "Stop," I said to Dahlia. She froze in place. Even her big doggy grin froze in place. I came up next to her and asked her to wait. We waited.

My next door neighbor has her dog on a choke chain or a prong collar. I can't recall which, but it ultimately doesn't matter. They serve the same purpose. He stepped slightly away from her and toward us. She jerked him with the leash. Not instantly. But a few seconds after he moved.

He whined.

She jerked him again and turned to walk in the opposite direction, again jerking him when he didn't follow her.

Dahlia and I stood frozen to the spot for a moment and watched them walk off. Each time he moved away from her, she jerked him with it. And he whined. We could hear his whine from several houses down.

Finally, when they were far enough away, I released Dahlia. She immediately headed in the direction he had gone.

I didn't want to go in that direction. I called to her. "Dahlia, wrong way!"

She turned on a dime and rushed back to me and then past me, sticking her face into the snow as she went.

And then we started the race down the path. Dahlia pausing to sniff, me calling excitedly to her and watching her race with joy to me.

The grin had returned.

As had mine.

Walks are a joyous time for Dahlia and I. We race along snow covered sidewalks. We trudge through snow-choked fields 2 or more feet deep. I let her off leash in the park to play the "wait/come" game and to play fetch with a snow-covered tennis ball. We jump and play. We meet other dogs and she plays.

I walk along with a smile on my face that matches Dahlia's. Walks are her time, but they're also for me. It's my time to watch my dog be a dog, my time to watch her enjoy herself.

My neighbor's dog doesn't have that joy. He moves with much anxiety, his back legs bunched up awkwardly as he moves down the sidewalk. My neighbor once told me that she's working "very hard" on his training. She walks with a scowl on her face and is continually fighting her dog. It's a war of wills. She's been told she has to be alpha. She believes it. And so it's a constant fight between her and her dog. She MUST win, you see. Or else he will control all.

I believe Dahlia and I are companions, that I take care of her, that we are partners in our joyous walks together. Training is fun. It should be fun. When it becomes not fun it's over.

We returned to the apartment the same way we left it, with smiles on our faces. Dahlia raced up the porch and into the house. I followed slightly behind, shutting the doors and turning off the lights.

My neighbor is still out with her dog, still struggling with him somewhere on her walk. It's not his. Never his.

Dahlia and I are happy and content inside after our lovely, companionable walk.

I like it that way.

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

How could they?

This coming weekend I'm going to be doing a transport for three Aussie puppies. Two are only 8 weeks old, the 3rd is all of 7 weeks old. Three tiny little puppies.

1. Puppy one cannot hear.
2. Puppy two cannot hear and is visually impaired.
3. Puppy three cannot hear and is visually impaired.

They all deserve a chance at life. In fact, the first two were going to be taken to the vets to be killed by their breeder because they were, essentially, defective. Why were they defective? Why did one litter have two dogs with hearing and vision problems?

Because of the breeder. The merle coloring, that lovely flecked coat so many people admire in Aussies (and Border collies and some other breeds of dog) comes with a gene for deafness and blindness. When two merle dogs are bred together, some 25% of the puppies are born with these defects. It comes with a variety of names, from Double Merle to Lethal White (many of these dogs are put down before they ever have a chance to live) to much more technical terms.

Any way you look at it, it's caused by bad breeding. No good breeder would breed two merles together. But people looking to make a quick buck will do so and not feel any sadness over culling the innocent deaf and/or blind pups they brought into the world.

Two of the puppies on the transport were part of a litter that was being taken to an open air market to sell to whomever wandered by (good breeder? I don't think so). The deaf and blind ones were going to be taken to the vet to be put down. Luckily someone else got to them first and they're going to be coming to rescue. The pups were only 5 weeks old when this stellar example of dog breeding was going to sell them.

It's just so disheartening to think people continue to breed in such a way. To date, I've transported five deaf dogs. These will be numbers 6, 7, and 8.

Some resources, for anyone who finds themselves with a dog they didn't know was deaf or is considering adopting a deaf dog.

http://www.deafdogs.com

http://www.lethalwhites.com

This is pup #3 for the transport this coming weekend. Cute, isn't she?

Old Dogs

Last night we were out on our walk and Dahlia was sniffing around when I noticed, back toward a house, a dog tied out (to the tree). I told David to watch out as the dog started to come toward us. It moved slowly though and seemed interested in Dahlia. The strange thing? Dahlia didn't rush the dog. Usually when she sees a dog she gets so excited she has to run right over to it, sometimes a bit faster than she should. Sometimes she does a sort of border collie crouch and freezes and then rushes the dog (I'm trying to work on that one!).

But this time she went up slowly and the dogs touched noses and met very nicely. The dog was very calm and didn't rudely sniff Dahlia or anything. He just wanted to come say hi.

I noticed as he came into the light that the poor thing was missing patches of hair all over his body and some hair looked like it was growing back in. He looked like he might have mange or something along that line.

The owner then pulled in (her friends had let the dog out and were keeping an eye on him from inside the house -- I could see them in the window) and came over to talk to us. It turned out that the dog was named Zeke. He was a Newfie/Shepherd mix and he was 17 years old! She said he didn't have mange or anything like that, "he was just old." She had had him since she was in high school and just adored the dog.

And the really amazing thing? He still wanted to play. And Dahlia wanted to play too! She started play bowing in front of him and gently coming up to him with her play/growl face on. She would sort of dance around out of his range and then come up to him slowly and jump back. He even play bowed a couple times and ambled around her. It was like two dogs playing in slow motion and it was really awesome to watch.

At one point, Dahlia play bowed and jumped back out of his range. He came over to her and simply reached out a paw toward her. It was so incredibly sweet. I wish I had a photo of that moment. It's an image that will stay with me forever.

Be careful of who you go to training for

Many people nowadays are out there looking for a trainer to help them with their dog. Either they have a "problem dog" (resourcing guarding, varying degrees of aggression, or something more mild like house training issues or jumping up on company and generally being unruly) or they adopted or bought a dog they want to learn how to train.

There are many trainers out there and sometimes the search can be quite daunting. Who do you trust? Who is going to give you a way to work with your dog that gels with what you want? And even more importantly, who is going to give you methods that work and that are humane and that help to build a bond with your dog?

Because this can be so overwhelming, many folks find someone who has advertised in their area and because their website "looks good" they jump at the opportunity to work with that person. But people must look closer. People must question these trainers before they even meet with them. Do not ever simply attend training with the first person you find online. Do some research, check out many people and training facilities, and find the one that is the most successful and most positive-based you can find.

Things to beware of:

1. Websites that do not give any real information on how they train dogs. Many of these sites show a "before" and "after" video and claim that the proof is in the video, but they do not show how they got from point A to point B (and if, indeed, they were the ones who even got the dog from one point to the next). I find, if you delve further into things by writing to the person, you find their methods are often aversive.

2.  Any site that says they always use a certain training collar. This includes choke chains, prong collars, and shock collars. All are aversive techniques that cause pain.  Studies have recently shown that using aggressive training techniques results in more aggression. You cannot treat aggression with aggression and end up with a solid, balanced, happy dog. And for dogs who have more milder problems, who you're trying to teach sit, stay, and come, these collars can create more problems, especially if you have a soft dog who shuts down at the first sign of pain.

3.  Any site that makes use of an aversive tool without ever using any positive methods first.  Take Fred Hassen and his "Sit Means Sit" site. He promotes and solely uses shock collars in training dogs, even on small puppies.  There are no alternatives, there is no "this is a last resort" message.  This is the very first thing trainers in the "Sit Means Sit" franchise go to.  A trainer that promotes shock collars without even considering other, more humane methods, shows a complete lack of understanding of psychology, canine behavior, and (in my personal opinion) a lack of humane treatment of animals. Is this really the kind of place you want to take your dog?

4. If you are comfortable using an aversive method, be wary of how that method is being used.  While I am not a supporter of shock collar usage to train a dog, there is a right way and a wrong way to use this tool.  Putting one on an untrained dog and shocking it until it somehow manages to offer the behavior you want is not the correct way to use a punishment-based tool, yet this is how the "Sit Means Sit" franchise uses it.  Others use this same method with choke chains and prong collars.
Always do your research. I cannot emphasize this enough. You find a website. All looks good. But then you spend a little time finding reviews from people who have experienced that person's training or seen that person's demo and you find out that all is not as it seems.

Take Sit Means Sit again. A little searching on some dog forums found a rather lengthy description from a dog trainer who attended one of his demos.  Unfortunately the original has been removed, but the description consisted of Hassen putting dogs (and even a wolf hybrid) up on a high table and parading them back and forth across it shocking them until they urinated and defecated out of fear.  No matter how many positive reviews are out there for his franchise, something like that would make me leery enough to avoid the place.  A place where something like this might happen, or did happen, is not a place I would trust with my dog.



Let's examine another trainer, Kevin Salem (sometimes written as Kawain, Salim, or any combination thereof) of "Real Life Dog Training." His website (www.dogsecrets.com) touts his great abilities (he's the dog "prodigy," one step up from Cesar Millan of "dog whisperer" fame) and a book (that is still yet to be published) as the be-all end-all of dog training.  At first glance, the website seems good, if a bit on the egotistical side.  But a closer look shows multiple pages disparaging anyone who uses positive training methods such as clicker training or rewarding with "cookies."  Salem uses a method he calls "diverse training," which sounds like a good idea (diversity is always an excellent thing, isn't it?), but the site gives you little information on what is diverse about is (the site is, after all, called "dog secrets").   Instead he offers up some videos of himself "training" dogs.  The videos feature Salem with the untrained dog who he is dragging around by its collar, often quite roughly.  Then, quite suddenly, the scene changes and it's Salem walking the now well-behaved dog.  What you don't see is what worries me: How did the dog get from point A to point B?  He doesn't want to reveal his "secrets" of course, so it's up to you to take your dog to him to find out just what those secrets are.

Unfortunately, to the laymen, these dogs in the "after" portion of the video look calm and well-behaved but a close look at their body language shows otherwise (just as they do in the "after" videos of Hassen and on Cesar Millan's TV show). A fearful dog is not a trained dog. Like Fred of Sit Means Sit, he also touts quick results for owners who have little time to train their dog.. Here's a hint: doing anything correctly takes time; you cannot teach your child to read in an hour and neither can you train your dog in such a short period of time.


So now you've looked at his site.  You think that things look pretty good.  Diversity is a plus.  The dogs look trained.  He has great "customer testimonials."  This is the point at which you need to take any website with a grain of salt.  No trainer is going to put negative reviews on their site.  No trainer is going to say anything less than positive about him/herself.  So you need to look further.

For that, I turn to looking for reviews of a particular trainer.  A quick google search turned up reviews in various places.  Yelp.com lists 9 reviews of "Real Life Dog Training."  Of them, 6 are positive.  So just by going by sheer number, that sounds not so bad.  But it's the content of the bad reviews that might make one leery.


Review #1 of "Real Life Dog Training"

Review #2 of "Real Life Dog Training"

Along with not training their dogs, these people say he's returned them filthy, aggressive, and even injured.  One person mentions a review that has since been removed because both she and this other person have been threatened with lawsuits for stating their experiences.

A continued google search brings up a couple news articles:

Illegal Dog Training Kennel Has Moved  This would be the explanation for all the personal and business name changes.

Amazingly Training Boarding and Training Academy.  Yes, that's right.  Another name for the same business.  If a business consistently changes its name to avoid bad reviews, there's probably something wrong with it.

This gives you the full picture.  You get the websites, the positive reviews, and the negative reviews.  It's up to each individual to weigh the pros and cons and decide if Sit Means Sit or Real Life Dog Training are places they want to take their dog.

I would also add that this person has found this post and has been harassing me for well over a year in order to get it removed.  He's taken to writing fake reports about the dog training business I do not have, paid money to dig me up on the internet, and written nasty misogynstic messages to me since September 2009.  I have given anyone who reads this the opportunity to see the good reviews and the bad.  They're out there for anyone to find.  Would you really want to board your dog with someone who harasses others for reviews they didn't even write?  Please note that none of the reviews above are mine.  I simply looked up his name and found them all.  A google search brought me there.  If they were untrue, do you think he would be so desperate to get this post removed?  Think about it.

After checking out Sit Means Sit and DogSecrets.com, reading their claims about themselves and their customer testimonials, after seeing reviews both positive and negative, I can honestly say the cons far outweigh the pros with both of these places.  I would not be taking my dog there.

Again, I reiterate. When looking for a dog trainer, do your research.

1. Look for reviews of that particular trainer or training facility.

2. Talk to the trainers and find out their philosophy about dog training and how they go about training. Also find out about their experiences with dogs similar to yours. Many trainers deal with basic obedience issues (sit, stay, come), unruly behavior (jumping on guests, puppy mouthing, house training issues), and some mild aggression (resource guarding), but those who have dealt with true aggression are few and far between. If your dog is truly aggressive (human, child, or dog aggressive), you will want to first see a vet to rule out medical issues and then, if there are no medical problems, find a good behaviorist who knows what to do to rehabilitate an aggressive dog.

3. Talk to people who have gone to this person for training. A good trainer will often find ways to connect you with people who are willing to tell you about their experiences. You can also often find people on your local Craigslist or other sites devoted to dogs and dog training who will share an honest opinion of the trainer.

4. Ask the trainer if you can come observe their class or a training session. Any good trainer will be happy for you to come and watch a class (sans dog) to see if they are someone you want to work with. If a trainer refuses, I would personally worry about why. I have once in my life gone against this and ended up paying for a class I walked out of due to their cruel training methods.

5. And mostly, trust your gut. If something feels off, it probably is. If you feel uncomfortable, then they are not the right trainer or training facility for you. Remember, this is your dog and you are the one who has vowed to protect him and keep him safe. Be careful!

Good luck in your search for a good solid dog trainer. There are some fantastic ones out there.

A good place to start might be the International Positive Dog Training Association, which provides lists of positive dog trainers in many areas.

5/14/19: Edited to add
I see today that because of the latest fiasco with Kevin Salem either losing or killing someone's dog, that hits on my post have gone up something like 5200%. Welcome all!

I should have done this a long time ago, but I want to share a couple more posts I made that reference his and his reaction to this post. After I made this, Kevin Salem spent some 3 years sending me harassing e-mails. He threatened me with lawyers and fake court documents, even going so far as to harass my husband through Facebook and trying to get my home address and phone number from the domain that hosts this blog (lucky for me, they sent ME that information and I was allowed to ignore it).

These posts reference the harassment I experienced at his hands:

On harassment, misogyny, and what is slander, really?

A post I didn't want to make 

I'm happy to discuss any of this with anyone! I have never met this man face-to-face, but the online harassment went on for far too long and he took things too far. I only wish that more people would stay far away from him and his "training school."