Mistakes

Common Mistakes People Make When Training Their Dog

Many people opt to train their dog themselves, pretty much the majority of people I meet. About 99% of them unfortunately run into problems and make training mistakes that can affect training dramatically. Those are:

• Freedom - People give their new dog WAY too much freedom too soon. When you give your dog all this off leash freedom outside without knowing a solid 100% recall, you are setting yourself and your dog up to FAIL. Your dog will learn that running around like a crazed maniac not listening to you is a great thing and will consistently do this. This makes off leash training incredibly harder then starting off on the right paw.
• Expectations - Many people expect their new pup or rescue to know not to go to the bathroom in the house, they should just know. Dogs have absolutely no idea where to go, it doesn't come pre-programmed in their brain, we must show them much like a child when they're potty training you have to highly reinforce and manage them by taking them to the potty every X amount of time.
• Stress - This is probably much too common. People keep putting their dog in stressful situations which in turn puts stress on a dog, what does stress do to a dog? Turns into aggressive behaviour. When your dog is failing in situations with other dogs (getting into little fights, growling, snarling) at anytime, even if it's a little growl, your dog is stressed out and you need to take the dog away from the situation and evaluate WHY he or she is stressed.
• Corrections - I've said this before and will continue to say it. Corrections do not work, we lack the precision and appropriate pressure to apply to make a correction effective. Many people correct to subtle (where the dog felt it, stopped for a moment and went back) this way you're desensitizing your dog to whatever correction and abusing your dog cause you will have to hit, pop, poke, jab your dog more often. Others correct too hard and the dog becomes terrified of you and the surroundings it was corrected in, if this happens you usually get an aggressive dog. It is very hard to implement the proper correction to the proper dog, some dogs cannot take corrections and will physically and mentally shut down from stress.
• Repeating- People repeat a command over and over "sit, sit,sit,sit,sit." If you start on this repetitive path, you are going to be stuck stay "sit" five times before your dog sits. The rule is: when learning a new behaviour such as sit, ask the dog ONCE, if the dog does not comply WAIT 3-5 seconds and ask again.
• Asking too much too soon - Don't expect your dog to be well behaved in a situation where he or she has never encountered before. Example: Bringing your dog to a 1.5 hour walk with friends when your dog can only walk 15 minutes on a loose leash before he starts pulling. What is going to happen here? The dog will end up pulling on the leash after 15 mins and you end up getting frustrated because you're too busy chatting and don't want to train the dog in this new environment. End result = FAILURE and steps back in loose leash walking.
• Follow through - When you ask your dog for a sit and they decide to go down, don't just go "whatever, good enough" make sure you go, "hey, hey, sit" and coax them up into a sit. Always make sure to follow through with the command given because if you allow the dog to decide sit means down, every time you need a sit the dog will down.This applies to all training commands and real life commands.
• Lost opportunities - Don't always make training sessions to show your dog what you like. If you're out on a walk and your dog meets a young child and doesn't jump up, highly reward! This is why I always like to carry some treats on walks and outings -you never know when a GREAT opportunity will strike! If you don't have treats, praise and get excited, maybe play a chase game.

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