Blog Archives

Roughhousing with dogs, rules and consequences

How fun it is to roughhouse with a dog! They love it, are always willing and happy to oblige and both human and dog are up for a great time. Although men are generally more inclined to such playful activities,

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Posted in Dog/human relationship, Fun, Psychology, Roughhousing

6 ways to prepare your dog to meet the new baby

Dogs are a wonderful addition to any household and growing up with a dog provides a child with valuable learning experiences about respect and care of another being. Most of all, growing up with a dog can be fun and

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Posted in Dog behavior, Dog training, Educational, Positive Animal Training, Resource

10 effective ways to help our dogs feel safe

Barking, aggression, destruction, separation anxiety, resource guarding, … Many behavior issues that directly affect the dogs welfare can be attributed to stress and fear. These emotions dominate the dog’s life experience and are often responsible for the human/dog relationship breakdown.

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Posted in Dog behavior, Dog training, Educational, Positive Animal Training, Resource, science

Punishment affects both the dog and the owner

Reward based training methods are slowly gaining in popularity among dog professionals including: trainers, veterinarians and behaviorists. But popular beliefs about the value of punishing for so-called ‘bad’ behaviors still run strong. In a society where we justify scolding, handing

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Posted in Dog behavior, Dog training, Educational, Positive Animal Training, Resource, science

To use or not to use high value treats…

Most owners and trainers frequently rely on high value treats when working with their dog. We may use them to get better focus during dog classes, more motivation when working outdoors and they generally help us work through the more

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Posted in Dog training, Educational, Fun, Misc, News, Positive Animal Training

The joy of shaping

There are few things more exciting for a trainer than working with a dog on shaping a new behavior through clicker training. From teaching the dog to lie down on his bed, to retrieving objects, or flipping a light switch

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Posted in Dog behavior, Dog training, Educational, Fun, News, Positive Animal Training, Resource, science

Smart breeding – increasing the dog’s chances to a good life

Behavior issues are the primary reason why owners give up their pets. We’re all talking about the latest behavior modification technique, and often blame poor handling or inexperience, but at the core of many behavior problems lies a basic genetic

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Posted in Dog behavior, Dog training, Educational, science

Spatial navigation – how dogs find their way

  Vanessa Woods and Brian Hare surprised me the other day with the drawing they had published in their book ‘The Genius of Dogs’, about one of the experiments I had worked on with the Geneva University in Switzerland (fig.1). I wanted to write about those experiments for

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Posted in Dog behavior, Dog training, Educational, News, Resource, science

Human and Dog – a Bond of True Love

All over the world, extraordinary stories of dogs are reported in the news. In Scotland, an Akita jumped into freezing water to save his owner from drowning, in Australia, a dog laid next to his owner, trapped under his vehicle,

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Posted in Dog behavior, Educational, Positive Animal Training
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