Looking After Pets

When it comes to dog training there are a few fundamentals you should follow. By remembering these principles and being patient with you dog you should be able to se results with your dog in no time.

1. A positive approach

Positive reinforcement is probably the best method you can implement as it keeps your dog or puppy upbeat about training and your praise and encouragement will make him strive to succeed in order to please you. Dogs are fairly simple in this respect. What they want most is your praise and acceptance and this is your best tool in training him. Another popular training method that works well is positive encouragement through the giving of treats. However this can get expensive and bad for your dogs health if you do it too much so only give treats when they are truly deserved.

2. Dogs understand tone

Remember that your dog can’t really understand your words but can easily understand your tone. Use a slightly higher and friendlier tone for commands such as ‘heel’, ‘come’ and ‘fetch’ where as for commands such as ‘sit’, ‘stop’ and other disciplining commands you should use a lower more authoritative tone.

3. Establish your alpha status

Even though your dog might be your best friend it’s important that you don’t treat him as an equal. Dogs don’t want to be treated as equals nor should they be. Dogs are a pack animal that need a hierarchy and if you let your dog take control in your relationship look out because he will start to walk all over you and become a real handful. In order to be the boss don’t give in to your dogs every wish. Be a fair but tough leader. Never feed your dog from the dinner table and feed him after you have finished eating. While walking your dog don’t let him pull on the lead and make sure you are strong yet fair with your discipline.

4. Put yourself in his paws

He doesn’t speak your language and although he tries he can’t always understand what you want him to do. He desperately wants to please you but sometimes just doesn’t know what he needs to do to do so. Give your dog time to understand you and don’t get upset with him as he will pick up on your body language and tone and get upset himself.

5. Keep training sessions short

Its important to keep training sessions short and fun. Following a successful session heap praise on your dog and play one of his favourite games with him. This will make him associate training with play time and he will put a little bit extra into trying to understand and please you.

Keep these principles in mind and hopefully your dog will be a well mannered and well behaved pooch in no time.  

If you need more dog obedience advice to make your dog behave better including advice on how to stop a dog from barking check out this great website full of free dog training tips and advice. 

Free dog training tips and advice.

No matter how adorable that puppy is, we all hate to clean up dog poop. If you have a six-week-old puppy in the house, you’ve got a creature who has no idea about picking a place to “go.” Regardless, dogs really want to be house trained, too, because they don’t like to have their waste in their living space. Here are three ways to use clicker training to make the house training process smoother and easier.

First, take your puppy to his potty place immediately after waking and after meals. These are the times when the puppy is most likely to have to go. Stay with your puppy and reward him when he goes where you want him to. If you’re using clicker training, click when he squats and reward when he’s done.

If he’s not ready to go just yet, give him some more time. But always watch for signs — walking in circles, a certain kind of sniffing around — that it’s time. You’ll know the warning signs as you get to know your dog’s personality. And then always click when he does a behavior you want him to repeat and use a reward of a happy voice and perhaps a treat.

Next, designate a place for the dog to urinate and defecate. If your dog will use the back yard, you might want to teach it to use one confined area. You’ll want to pick up the waste often, because they don’t like to walk through their waste, but it’s one way to narrow the area that needs to be cleaned.

For indoor puppy training, tape an oven liner or pet training pad to an easily cleaned section of floor. As the puppy gets older, he is better able to control his bladder and bowel. Then you can move the potty place outside. You can stop clicking when your dog has mastered a behavior and go back to the training when it’s time for your dog to learn something new.

Finally, don’t punish the dog for getting it wrong. Just help them get it right. Once upon a time, dog owners were advised to “train” their dogs by rubbing their noses in their own excrement. This is cruel and pointless. By the time he is finished with his bowel movement, he has no clue why you’re doing this to him.

If you just help them get it right, they will succeed much sooner. Dogs are creatures of habit, and if you can get them to succeed — and reward their success — they’ll be more than happy to get it right in the future. With clicker training, the dog understands exactly what he’s being rewarded for, so there’s less guesswork for him to do it again.

Dogs want to have a designated area for their waste away from their living area, an instinctive desire they share with wolves in the wild. They are really on your side in this effort. The dog also wants to please you. You can use clicker training to help make your dog a welcome companion around your house.

Click here for more information about clicker training.